Nighthawk

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Pellem Vero - “To Hide theTruth”

Small but densely populated, history of war in which their side has always won and been in the right (but has actually been framing every war story in their favor, since the other people aren’t alive to say any different). Their current King is two-faced in the lamest of terms: he is fair-seeming and offered a peace treaty with a neighboring kingdom (Kingdom B) through a promise of marrying his daughter to their son, when in reality he’s been plotting against their kingdom from before he even has a daughter. All citizens in the kingdom have been trained from childhood for generations to be soldiers, and to thrive on very little sustenance. In the current day, the King has engineered a famine years prior that makes the kingdom seem a lot more vulnerable than it really is.

Prendre L’air - “To Take a Breath of Fresh Air”

Large and well-fortified by the landscape, and powerful in magic, but very peaceful. They do not have a military and their King expects the best of others, generally assuming that those who interact with them are friendly, especially Kingdom A whose King has been on friendly terms with him for a long long while. They do not expect any kind of hostility and could be easily defeated in battle simply due to being unprepared for a surprise death battle.

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The History of Pellem Vero

Pellem Vero is one of the oldest kingdoms to be born from the Bazuar Empire’s collapse, and it has a long history of war that easily proves how it was able to survive for so long.


The People

The common people of Pellem Vero are raised from early childhood to become soldiers in their adulthood. They are trained to survive in bitter conditions with little sustenance and no comforts. They are trained to handle any weapon with ease, to navigate foreign territory unseen, to battle to the death without hesitation or, in better terms, empathy. This tradition has been in place for so long that no record even exists of other systems within Pellem Vero. The people don’t question their traditions and they don’t question their King- doing so instantly pins you as a traitor.


The Royal Customs

Heirs to the throne are not decided through bloodlines like many kingdoms, but rather through a duel to the death between the ruling monarch and any common person of Pellem Vero. If no one proposes a duel against the ruling monarch, then the title of Heir moves to either the eldest child of said ruling monarch or, if they have no children, an apprentice of the monarch’s choosing. The duels have been few and far between and are treated as sacred rituals when they do arise.


The Wars

Pellem Vero has a long history of war, given how old and military-centered the kingdom is. Every one of those wars was started by Pellem Vero and won by Pellem Vero, and after every one of those wars, the King who led them to victory would twist the truth so that anyone who asked would believe Pellem Vero was the victim. That Pellem Vero was provoked. The soldiers showed no mercy and left no witnesses, and without survivors to tell the other side of the story, Pellem Vero saw no consequences. No records exist within the palace of wars past, not even maps of kingdoms past- all burned to ashes to protect the kingdom from the weight of its crimes.


The Royal Family

The house of Callaghan came into power when a palace knight challenged the King to a duel and won. The kingdom was recovering from a recent war in which they had claimed victory but lost a great many soldiers, and both the new King and his son after him avoided starting any new wars during their individual reigns. The current King, King Jannon, became Heir apparent after the first born son of the King suddenly passed due to unknown causes. When his father eventually died as well, Jannon rose to the throne and quickly chose a bride whom he gave the name Brita. The two ruled in relative peace for many years, eventually giving birth to a daughter who was then promised to the Prince of Prendre L’air in order to secure an alliance between kingdoms. Queen Brita passed suddenly when the Princess was still young and though the kingdom wept, life went on. Now the time has come for the Princess to be wed, and the kingdom rejoices.


The Plot

Even before Jannon became King, he hungered for the glory of war, of defeat and the adrenaline of battle. He poisoned his brother in order to gain the throne and as soon as he held power, he began to plan for wars to come. Pellem Vero’s nearest neighbor, Prendre L’air, became the obvious target of these plans due to their lack of military and apparent naivety. Jannon cultivated a distant friendship with the King of Prendre L’air and the kinship between the Queens of each kingdom strengthened that friendship. When children were both to both Queens, a son and a daughter, Jannon offered his daughter’s hand in exchange for an alliance between kingdoms.

From the very beginning, Deryn was nothing more than a pawn in King Jannon’s game. Being a girl and unable to take the throne per Pellem Vero’s tradition, she was a disappointment in the King’s eyes, only useful as a martyr when the time should finally come for the war to begin.

King Jannon was not a faithful or respectful man- he often ordered female palace servants to sleep with him. One such servant became pregnant within the same cycle as the Queen. She was terrified the King would kill her or her child, and she hid her pregnancy until the last moment, dying in childbirth. The King named the child Callum and had him raised alongside his daughter, already beginning to sort how a son would factor into his plans.

Callum was raised as a personal knight to protect the Princess, who was in turn raised to be as alluring to the people as possible. The people had to love her, adore her, or the King’s plan would be all for nothing. For his plan was thus: marry Deryn to the kingdom of Prendre L’air, only for her to be killed, and her murder pinned on the very man she was set to marry. Such an act of hate would spur the people of Pellem Vero into action, and glorious war would begin.

Of course, someone had to orchestrate her death- and who better than King Jannon’s own son, groomed from birth to follow every order without question, same as the common people?

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General Story/Plot

- Knight is born of the King and a concubine who dies in childbirth. He is raised by the King to be a pawn of sorts, unerringly loyal to all the King’s orders and skilled as a Knight. He is made to be the Princess’ personal bodyguard, both as a method of keeping an eye on her pretty much every second of every day, and as a way to make sure he’s at the front of every interaction she has with her future husband.
- Princess is born to the King and Queen- a pure heir, unlike her brother who she doesn’t actually know is her blood brother. She does see him as a brother figure though, since he was raised alongside her, if not in the same way, and the Queen would dote on them both pretty equally. She was very close to the Queen, and was very upset when she died. She doesn’t disapprove of the arranged marriage because she understands it was made to ensure the kingdom would have an ally should it ever need aid, and she also really likes the Prince’s library which her own kingdom doesn’t have, so that’s a plus.
- Prince is born a pure heir to Kingdom B and is raised with his kingdom’s peaceful values, becoming fast friends with the Princess and Knight who often visit him in an effort for him and the Princess to get to know each other so it isn’t as weird when they do marry later.
- The Queens of both kingdoms are good friends and often visit each other, usually with their children in tow, and the three children become fast friends as well. The three go on to become incredibly close as years pass, joking about the future marriage and what they want to do when they’re married, not quite understanding what marriage is beyond living in the same castle and having to hang out all the time, which they already do anyways, so how can it possibly be a bad thing?
- Then the Queen of Kingdom A passes away when the kids are around preteen/teen age, and the kids stop visiting Kingdom B. Several years pass, in which the King orders the Knight to remain more distant from the Princess, as the plot against Kingdom B includes the Knight murdering the Princess and blaming it on the Prince. The King is convinced he won’t be able to follow orders if he gets to attached to her (which is correct).
- The Knight knows the King is his father. With the Queen who raised him (his surrogate mother) and the Princess (his surrogate sister/best friend) now taken away from him, all he has is the King and the King’s orders, and he’s desperate for the King’s affection and approval, which is the only reason he follows the man’s plot so dutifully.
- A couple years after the Queen passes (poisoned by the King because she started to suspect his plan and was very against it), the kingdom suffers from a famine (engineered by the King to make his kingdom seem vulnerable, even though the people are trained to survive on very little as part of being raised from birth as soldiers) and the King sends off his daughter to make good on that arranged marriage with Kingdom B’s Prince.
- So the Princess and Knight return to Kingdom B and reunite with the Prince, except the Knight is still distant and different and while the wed-to-be hit it off like no time at all has passed, the Knight struggles to get in on the conversation.
- The Princess is annoyed with the Knight being distant from her and suspects her father has something to do with it, so she makes up a story about wanting some kind of rare prize that requires a quest to retrieve. She insists the Prince finds it for her as a wedding present, and insists the Knight go with him as protection, since the Prince doesn’t have a bodyguard on account of their kingdom being so peaceful and crime-free. The Prince is fully aware of her plot and appreciates it, and takes his time during their travels to worm his way back into the Knight’s heart, which works.
- They retrieve the rare prize and return to Kingdom B, and now it seems like all three kids are back to being friends, except now the Knight is conflicted between whether to spill the beans on the King’s murder plot or to stay loyal to the King like he’s been trained to. The Knight eventually breaks down and reveals everything- cue the betrayal and anger from the Princess and probably the Prince too, much like that scene from Avatar.
- And this is where I’m not sure where to go next.