BASTON ARE STILICHO

Baston Stilicho was born the son of Thitas Amer Stilicho who was cavalry commander in Tier's army before Kael sacked the city. His father died in the siege and Baston found himself aboard a ship to the island of Shinar, the largest of the Storm Isles. There the Tieran exiles formed New Tier north of the city of Shinarendretta. Stilicho was taken care of by Pikus, an uncle who was captain of a small mercenary troop.

When Stilicho was twenty, Pikus sailed with him back to the mainland. In Camaan Pikus found work assisting the kingdom of Cairn with roadside patrols and aiding in dispatching a growing population of dagashi spawn in the eastern Ambros mountains. Baston Stilicho was given command of a small squad of mounted mercenaries by his uncle. Learning from his uncle, as well as from the horselords of Cairn, experts at riding horseback, Stilicho became skillful at mounted warfare. As their bounties and patrols brought them more and more wealth, the size of Pikus' small band continually expanded.

Soon the small army was being called upon by the Queen of Cairn herself to aid in campaigns of her own against rebel outlaw detachments, rogue barons, and border conflicts with the peoples of Ur-Khar to the east. In all of this Stilicho did his best to follow all of his uncle's commands. The two's relationship began to sour when the conflict between the Queen of Cairn and the Merchant Kings of Cassad escalated to all out war. Stilicho felt the Queen was using Pikus' men as expendable soldiers. Attrocities were being committed by Pikus' men upon the civilians of the towns of Ur-Khar, and all of this with Pikus' consent.

Following the sacking of the township of Kar-Kar, Stilicho confronted his uncle over the pointless bloodshed as the town burned around them, and the two came to blows. Stilicho inflicted a deadly wound upon his uncle and Pikus died at Stilicho's feet. Immediatly afterwards, Stilicho took those men who would follow him back to Camaan, and refused to aid the Queen with her war, instead opting to patrol the road south of Cairn while the Queen's armies were embattled in the east.

Pikus had aquired vast amounts of wealth. Wealth Stilicho put to use outfitting his men with armour and weaponry. Stilicho dealt in the horse trade, and made money providing for the Cairnians equestrian needs. Stilicho renamed his mercenary army the Falcon Army and built a large fort in central Camaan he named Falcon's Nest.

Stilicho had lived the life of a soldier's son before the fall of Tier, and he remembered the drills his father had implemented in Tier's cavalry. These he used in the training of his men. Life inside the fort was militaristic. With the wealth left to him from his uncle, Stilicho was able to pay his men a monthly wage, and bonuses when funds were made available through their mercenary work. By the time he was 28 his Falcon Army had become a force to reckon with on the Camaan plains.

At this time an old family friend travelled to find Stilicho from New Tier. The man's name was Gock and he was a physician in the former Tieran army. He informed Stilicho of a growing movement in New Tier's council, headed by prince Tornoah and other nobles from the old kingdom, to return to reclaim their old homeland in Albiane. Gock was impressed with the boy's accomplishments, though saddened at the fate of Pikus.

A young man by the name of Sould travelled with Gock. He was the bastard son of the baron Rotiart, a aged baron who was on his deathbed in New Tier. Sould had trained with a cloister of monks in Shinarendretta, becoming a master with a bowstaff and spear. He was enamoured with his peer's success, and while visiting, got caught up in the defense of local villages from a marauding band of mercenaries come over from Ur-Khar, some of these soldiers being former members of Pikus' army. Through the small adventure Stilicho and Sould became good friends. After a month, Gock returned to Shinar, leaving Sould behind with Stilicho.

Stilicho set out to prepare the way for the return of the exiles, and built a series of small forts all the way to the western coast. These he outfitted with small troops who kept watch over the surrounding countryside. Signal fires were used to communicate between forts. Stilicho began to gather intelligence reports from Tier and Kaelian movements and sent them via Sould and Gock back to the Tieran nobles in New Tier. Rotiart was instrumental in getting the plans to the nobles. Word was sent back by the nobles, asking Stilicho if Falcon's Nest could be used as a launching board for the invasion of Albiane to retake Tier.

During the small war that followed, the Falcon Army was instrumental in taking the North Pass out of Albiane into Camaan, and following the siege of Tier Stilicho's army chased the fleeing Kaelians back to the former southern border of Tier. For weeks Stilicho's men guarded the entrance into Tieran lands while the main army reinforced Tier and recovered from the bloody battle.

Kael had been doing its best to squash the threat of the mother matron's spawn in the Dragon Mountains far to the east, exhausting Kael's resources and leaving them vulnerable. Because of this, they were unnable to successfully mount a counter-attack to push back the Tierans, who were now in Tier to stay.

Stilicho remained in Tier for many years. Being the son of a noble he was given a seat on one of the two arms of the the Tieran Council, the body that now governed Tier and its surrounding lands. Tornoah was little more than a figurehead, an impotent reminder of the weak kings of the past.

Stilicho became mired in Tieran politics. Using his wealth he was able to secure the office of city judge for a nobleman's son named Hythloth, who he hoped would give him a rubber stamp on questionable trade deals he was involved in with Cairn, Cassad, and Kael. Trade deals that many of the Tieran nobles wanted stopped. After repeated warnings by the nobles, Hythloth arrested Stilicho for his dealings, and that night Sould and captains in the Falcon Army sprung him from prison. In the fight that ensued Hythloth was killed and Stilicho fled Tier with his men.

Hythloth's emergency replacement, the orphan Anavrin, a hero in the battle to reclaim Tier, banished Stilicho from Tier and placed a bounty on his head. Anavrin's position was renamed to the All-Father. Constables and a group of thirteen judges were placed under his command, armed soldiers answerable only to him, to keep peace in the streets of Tier.

Stilicho and Sould, later joined by Gock, stayed in Camaan from that time forward, returning to the old mercenary lifestyle. Stilicho's wealth was secured through his trade dealings in horses, salt, and iron ingots. Falcon's Nest was becoming more like a small city than a fort.

Stilicho would later be called upon when the warlord Salla invades with a large army from the west. Following that he would undertake an adventure to the old continent of Tara where he and Sould would finally be killed by the dark lord Devaron. Notable figures were present with him during this final adventure, and he and Anavrin were able to let past bygones be bygones.

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