Ragin
ENDE
world

Characters

The people of Myrvand whose lives are caught up in its songs, from the Hearthkin of the Greenfold to the elders of Eilvaran and the deep-delvers of the Blackspine.

When the Crown of Ash arrives with survey stakes and census books, five Hearthkin of the Greenfold stand at the start of a story none of them chose. A convener who refuses to become a ruler, her impatient former student, a healer who bars no door, a village speaker who loves her home above all, and a courier who knows every hidden ford.

Their story is told across the songs of No Throne in the Valley.

Beyond the valley, others are drawn into the same gathering storm: the quarrelling voices of the Council of Nine Groves in the forests of Eilvaran, and the Stonebound of the Blackspine, where a sealed shaft has been opened and the bells have begun to ring on their own.

Characters

18
Mara BrambleheartA trusted convener of the Quiet Paths who leads by persuasion and an open hand, and fears the day her chair becomes a throne.
Corren AshfootFounder of the Briar Knives, a grieving resistance captain whose warnings came true and whose anger now threatens to command others.
Elsi HoneyhandA Greenfold healer and keeper of the Honey House rule, who treats soldier, rebel and refugee alike and refuses to let grief choose who is saved.
Nella UnderboughThe aging speaker of Willowmere, the one village that did not burn, whose care for her people hides a question the whole valley must answer.
Toman ReedwhistleA courier, pathfinder and saboteur who once broke his father's bridge to save the valley, and who measures resistance by who it lets survive.
Perrin RainlistenerA weather-reader and storykeeper of the Greenfold who listens to the rain for signs of the old powers, and fears the day people start obeying what he hears.
Red FenA loud, stubborn old farmer of the Brindle country who begged the valley to hold the old bridge, then helped turn the Crown's map east into west.
Aelwen ThornsongA Grovewarden of Eilvaran building a coalition against the Crown, knowing that every alliance she makes brings the war a little closer to the trees she defends.
Caerith Ash-BowThe militant commander of the Ash-Bow Host, raised among elders whose memories burned with Veyrwood, who wants every invasion of Eilvaran to cost more than it could ever win.
Lethariel of Nine WintersAn ancient Eilvaren memory keeper who remembers the coming of the Aethyr, and who guards unedited history because she knows exactly what her own is missing.
Miraleth RootspeakerAn Eilvaren diplomat and healer who binds peoples together through mutual obligation and opens the groves to refugees, and is hated for it by isolationists and militants alike.
Sylvaren the Pale LeafThe isolationist elder of the Still Bough, who wants Eilvaran sealed against the world and believes the forest can only be preserved if its people are willing to abandon even their allies.
Brogar DeepdelverA Stonebound mine master who goes where the maps stop, and who broke an ancient seal beneath the Blackspine without knowing what he might be waking.
Dorrik IronmemoryThe High Archivist of the Stonebound, who reads testimony from stone itself and keeps records no ruler would ever choose to have written.
Hesta ThunderforgeA one-armed Stonebound master smith and devotee of Thor whose refusal to forge weapons without limits has become a legend her own allies find ever harder to live with.
Keld MarrbreakerThe most notorious of the Stonebound Vein Lords, an ore and arms magnate who sells to every side and rarely bothers to lie about it.
Orun BellstoneA Stonebound Deep Listener who warned against opening the Warm Shaft and now hears a heartbeat beneath the mountains that nobody wants to act on.
Yrsa FlintvoiceA Stonebound diplomat and contract judge who is binding the peoples together against the Crown with agreements that are meant to expire.