Codex

Two Brothers

Ruin · part of Argysis

A distinctive pair of peaks north of Erebinthias, visible for miles along the approaches to Argysis.

Type
Ruin
Within
Argysis
Peoples
Shyka

A distinctive pair of peaks north of Erebinthias, visible for miles along the approaches to Argysis. The Two Brothers mark the traditional boundary between Hephake and Argysis, or what was Argysis before the dragon came. The survivors of the Dragon Betrayal crossed here on their way east, and the peaks have carried the memory of that crossing ever since.

The folk story attached to them is older in its bones than the dwarves who now tell it. It says the peaks were one mountain, split in two by a duel between two brothers, princes who turned on each other until the loser fell into the chasm between them. The peaks were named long before the fall, but the duel as it is told today is the betrayal wearing a dwarven face. The two brothers who turned on each other were Rothogomos and Tepheranos, and over two centuries the refugees who fled across these exact peaks recast the dragons as princes of their own blood. The story is true in shape and wrong in cast. What it remembers correctly is that a kingdom died because two brothers could not share a hoard.

The Two Brothers are a pilgrimage site now for those mourning Argysis. Dwarves climb to the col between the peaks to leave offerings and pray for their cousins' liberation. Rothogomos knows of the tradition and finds it amusing; he sends agents to watch the pilgrims and make sure none of them pray with their hands.

The Codex of Alaria