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Kallyr Starbrow and the Dragonrise

Posted on January 31, 2024

It may come to some surprise, but Kallyr Starbrow likely had no idea that her intervention at the New Lunar Temple ceremony would result in the Dragonrise.

Let’s start with what was going on at the Lunar ceremony and what Kallyr did. So the big ceremony was intended to place the Red Goddess in the sky above Sartar. Each the celebrants represented part of the celestial realm and were linked to that entity – a variation of “As Above, So Below” (see Mythology Book).

The first part of the ceremony was to create the connections, then the Red Goddess’s representative (Enerian Scarlet) was to go through the phases of the moon and ultimately fix the Moon in the Sky above Dragon Pass in its Full Moon Phase. While they did this, all the participants would be on the Hero Plane, completely lost in prayer and concentration; able only to perceive the Otherworld.

Kallyr and her companions found a way into the ritual – they took the role of Orlanth’s Ring and snuck in through the “Storm Gate”. Their goal was to disrupt the ritual; perhaps they had an idea that by reaching the head of the Star Dragon, they’d awaken it in the ritual. I do not think she had any idea that would awaken an 8-km long True Dragon in the mundane world.

So Orlanth’s Ring made its way through the ceremony, killing some of the participants. As this happened, stars in the heavens flared. Nobody present could move out of their dance to try to stop “Orlanth’s Ring” lest the entire ritual fail. When they reached the place where the head of the Star Dragon should be, they called upon Orlanth, figuring that they could awaken the Sky Dragon on the dance floor and get away. Kallyr and her companions flew up in the air.

And then the Dragon awoke. And instead of something confined to the dance floor, something huge awoke. It not only ended the ritual, but it destroyed the temple and killed thousands of people.

I personally think she was terrified by what she had done. Probably made even worse by Orlaront saying he expected that might happen but didn’t tell her.

Others were looking at allying with the dragons. Orlaront of course, but so was the FHQ. And also out in Prax so is Argrath. The FHQ might have been aware of the Brown Dragon and was trying to talk to it, but had no idea Kallyr was going to physically show up on the dance floor and try to awaken the Star Dragon in the ceremony. And so on. Tatius no doubt was awakening all the magical and spiritual energy in the area to power his ritual. A perfect storm.

Afterwards Kallyr was Prince of the Ruins. I am sure the destruction she unleashed was a big part of why she spent most of her short reign trying to perform a giant Lightbringers’s ceremony (which was to some level modeled on the big Lunar celestial ceremony) to fix things and put the genie back in the bottle.

Dragonrise star maps by Eric Vanel from the Guide to Glorantha, page 735

Orlaront in all this is an understated figure. Orlaront was born to the Jerending Clan of the Sambari Tribe in 1582, cursed and left-handed. He was protected by strange guardian spirits. Orlaront learned to speak with the dragonewts and other draconic entities. He participated in the Dragonrise in 1625, and was afterwards exiled to Prax by Kallyr Starbrow and became a companion of Argrath Whitebull. He taught Argrath how to speak with dragons.

He was brought into Kallyr’s gang of heroquesters (which also included Minaryth the Purple) to communicate with the Star Dragon. I personally think Orlaront had a pretty good idea that this would awaken something big, and he might be the only one who was not shocked by what happened. I also think Orlaront didn’t let his companions on.

He’s a dangerous Merlin figure – he knows a lot more than he tells.

Orlanth has a some deep draconic ties that are unknown even to his mundane cultists. The Dragonslayer is the Dragon.

Jeff Richard

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1582 ST, Brown Dragon, Dragonrise 1625 ST, Enerian Scarlet, Eric Vanel (artist), Feathered Horse Queen, FHQ, Jerending (clan), Kallyr, Orlanth ’s Ring, Orlaront Dragonfriend, Sambarri (Sartar tribe), Stella Draconis, Stormgate

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