The Sundering

With the Shadow’s fall, a black veil crossed the sun and all the lands of Aryth went dark. The darkness brought with it earthquakes, floods, and rains of fire. Foul demons trapped by the veil ravaged the lands. Forests burned, mountains were shattered, and waters boiled away. Fey civilization was destroyed by a maelstrom of divine chaos. Cities were razed and their inhabitants burned to ash. Those that survived were hunted by foul creatures or starved to death in the endless winter that followed. The remaining fey prayed to the silent gods, begging for salvation. Their supplications were not heard and they fell into despair.

In time, the black Shadow slowly recoiled from the sky, its dark tendrils retreating to the frozen north where its shattered form would lie dormant, slumber, and in time regain its power. As the sky cleared, the sun once again warmed the land, and the animals and plants of Aryth began to grow and thrive once more. The elder fey adapted to their new world, becoming the ancestors of the dwarves and elves, halflings and gnomes, and other fey races of Eredane. But the Sundering had left more than just physical scars. The soul of Aryth itself had been shattered.

The Veil

As the people of Eredane struggled to recover from the darkness of the Sundering, they looked to their gods and found only silence. Those benevolent beings, the ancient powers that had given birth to the elthedar and guided them through the millennia, were gone. Those who were foremost among them and whose loss was most keenly felt were the lords of light, but even the darker gods who claimed Izrador as kin and the lesser deities and demigods who were their offspring failed to answer their supplicants’ prayers.

The Abandoned, as the followers of these gods came to be known, now believe that Izrador tricked his punishers and jailers. He was meant to be thrown down to the mortal realm, they say, banished from the higher planes. There he was meant to learn to suffer as only a mortal can suffer, and subsequently to be destroyed by a great host of the servants and angels of the lords of light. But something went wrong. Izrador, they believe, twisted the magic with which the gods meant to imprison him, corrupting it with a tendril of his own being. He is, after all, corruption and evil incarnate. In so doing, he ensured that his banishment to the world of Aryth spelled the doom of the precious mortals that his fellow gods watched over. The suffering that was meant for Izrador became the suffering of the people of Aryth, and the walls that were meant to keep Izrador forever locked away from the other planes became the same walls by which the other gods were kept out. That barrier, which is known only as the Veil, prevents Izrador from returning to the heavens to spread his corruption, but also prevents the Silent Ones from answering their followers’ prayers or aiding them against the dark god.

The Sundering had other, far-reaching effects on all of the creatures of Aryth, even those who claimed no connection with the gods. The Fell and the Lost are one manifestation of this cataclysm: without a final resting place the spirits of the dead remained on Aryth. Some were bound to their bodies, rising as hideous parodies of their former selves, tainted by madness and hungering for the flesh of the living. Others left their bodies and roamed the world, unseen but not unfelt, bodiless spirits that might assist or destroy the living depending on their whim.

The impenetrable Veil between the mortal and celestial realms affected other creatures besides the once-living. All travelers from other planes, demons and angels alike, were now trapped on Aryth. Countless such beings were trapped in the mortal realm when it was severed from the outer planes, including creatures of the fey, elemental, and outsider types. Some were simply here when the Sundering happened, having been called by magic or sent by their gods. Others were banished with Izrador, his willing minions in his war against the gods and therefore forced to share in his punishment. And finally, many of these unfortunate beings were pulled from beside their gods when Izrador’s banishment went awry, pulled down to Aryth by the Sundering and bound there by the Veil.

Regardless of the means by which they came here, all of these creatures became known as the Trapped, and joined the Eternal and the Lost as the spirits of MIDNIGHT.