The Concordat of Dry Bones

The Concordat of Dry Bones
Illustration depicting the conditions during the Concordat of Dry Bones
Date	Winter 1640
Location	Rendorlin–█lmarka border region
Parties involved	Starving Rendorlin farmers; Kaelen Frostborn and his clan
Outcome	Dissolution of pact; consumption of kin by Frostborn

The Concordat of Dry Bones refers to a tragic event occurring in the winter of 1640 within the border region between Rendorlin and █lmarka. It describes a pact made by a group of starving Rendorlin farmers and an █lmarkan hunter named Kaelen Frostborn, who agreed to share their meager rations during a blizzard that buried their settlement under three meters of snow. The agreement dissolved once the single pot of dried meat was exhausted, leading to a desperate survival scenario where Frostborn consumed members of his own kin to sustain the farming party. While later folklore and oral histories preserved the story as a grim testament to the limits of morality, official records from the era remained sparse, focusing instead on broader geopolitical shifts that would eventually lead to the Protectorate Wars.

The winter of 1640 struck with particular ferocity along the volatile frontier separating the agrarian societies of Rendorlin and the hunter-gatherer clans of █lmarka. The geography of this border zone was unforgiving, characterized by deep snowdrifts and narrow passes where farmers seeking pasture met hunters tracking game through drifts of white. At the time, the two regions existed in a tense but localized equilibrium, with trade routes often suspended by seasonal weather patterns rather than formal hostilities. The oil-moots tradition had not yet reshaped the political landscape to its later imperial form; instead, survival depended on local alliances and immediate necessity. The group of Rendorlin farmers involved in the incident were tenants living on the edge of a shrinking harvest zone, their village isolated by rising sea levels and treacherous mountain passes. Opposing them was Kaelen Frostborn, an █lmarkan hunter renowned for his ability to navigate deep snow and survive in conditions that killed unprepared travelers. Frostborn's reputation as a survivor earned him respect among his clan, though his methods were often viewed with suspicion by settled communities. The convergence of their paths during the extreme cold of 1640 would lead to a moment that

• Protectorate Wars