A closed order of fire kineticists, founded in the late 6th Era and continuously active since the fall of the Human Empire. Their stated duty is to bring peace, justice, and security to the worlds their light shines on. Their working method is to find what threatens those worlds and end it.
"We are zealots. We do not pretend otherwise. The work cannot be done by anyone unwilling to go past where reasonable people stop."
The Keepers number in the low hundreds. Every full member of the order is a kineticist who wields fire to some degree. Most operate alone or in pairs across the fifteen worlds. Coordinated action involving more than three Sons is rare and requires the Father's signed warrant.
The order considers itself zealous and says so plainly. They do not justify themselves to outsiders. When asked why they took an action, they will state what they did and what it accomplished. They will not argue that it was right.
Most Sons are recruited from Spacers. The order will accept Grounders and Skylords whose affinity for fire is strong enough to survive the trial of flame. They do not accept Void Walkers; the Void interferes with the bond.
The order's seat is Vor'athal, a 6th Era space station whose construction predates the Empire's fall by roughly forty years. The technology used to build it is not understood by anyone now living. The station has not been moved from its current orbit in any record the order keeps.
Thirteen velathi are mounted in Vor'athal's lower ring. A velath is an eternal engine of the Empire's make; it runs indefinitely so long as it holds a sehar: a small dense sphere of contained energy roughly the size of a clenched fist. Three of the thirteen velathi are presently powered. The remaining ten sit dark and have for centuries.
The order has tried to fabricate a sehar. They have tried to recover one of the missing ten. They have tried to learn how the velathi function and how the sehari are made. None of this work has produced a usable result. The three running velathi generate sufficient power for current operations with margin to spare. What the station was built to do at full power is not known.
Full station details, layout, sehar progression, stores, and life aboard ↗
A Keeper who completes the bonding rite is called a Son. The rite ties a Son to a chosen partner, the One Love, and the two thereafter share a single pool of vitality. Damage taken by either is counted against the combined total. When the pool is reduced to zero, both die in the same instant. The bond is permanent and cannot be undone by any method the order is willing to attempt.
The One Love resides on Vor'athal and does not leave it. The Vigil keeps the bond-records, which show in real time when each Son's pool takes a wound, when it stabilizes, and when it goes empty. This is how the order tracks whether each Son still lives, and where in broad terms the Sons are taking damage at any given moment.
If a Son is judged to have betrayed the order, the One Love is killed where they stand. The Son dies in the same instant, wherever he is in the system. The judgment is rendered by a Hand of the Father. There is no appeal and no second hearing.
Starblades are a finite resource. The order does not know how many were forged or where, only that no new ones have been made in living memory and that each known blade is accounted for in the Reclamation's ledger. A blade carried by a Son who dies in territory the order can reach is recovered with the body. A blade carried by a Son who dies in territory the order cannot reach is added to the lost rolls.
The Reclamation works the lost rolls continuously. When a blade surfaces in an estate that has forgotten what it inherited, in a private collection, in the hands of a fence, or in the armory of a planetary government, the standard procedure is to offer trade. The order will pay in coin, in materials, in service, in the lives of debtors held on Vor'athal. They will pay generously and they will negotiate at length.
When trade fails, the Reclamation takes the blade by force and accepts whatever the taking costs. They have done this on every world where space travel exists, and on three of the five worlds where it does not.
Ranks are listed below from bottom to top. Promotion is by judgment of a Hand of the Father, except for promotion to Hand and to Father, which require a sitting of the full Hand-council.
An untested recruit. Brought to Vor'athal on the recommendation of a Son or a Hunt scout. Held until the trial of flame confirms or denies kinetic affinity with fire. Aspirants who fail the trial are returned home with a stipend and forbidden to speak of Vor'athal's interior.
A confirmed fire kineticist in the order's first stage of training. Embers learn the doctrine, the martial forms, the inventory of known seeds of darkness, and the order's history. Most spend ten years in this rank. They do not leave Vor'athal except under supervision.
A senior trainee attached to a Son. Squires accompany their Son into the field, learn the work directly, and serve as the order's only path to becoming a Son themselves: when a Son falls, his Squire is offered the next available starblade and the bonding rite. Squires bear no blade and hold no One Love.
Bonded, blade-bearing, deployed. The operational rank of the order. A Son's One Love resides on Vor'athal and the bond is permanent. Sons take their own counsel in the field within the limits set by their Hand. Most Sons never meet most other Sons.
A Son trusted to lead other Sons in coordinated operations. Lances exist because the order will sometimes choose to act in concert; they are few because the order rarely chooses this. A Lance commands for the duration of an operation and then returns to the rank of Son.
A division head. There are five Hands at any time, one per division. Hands hold judicial authority within their division and render the betrayal verdict on Sons under their command. They sit on the Hand-council, which selects the Father from among themselves on the Father's death.
The order's singular head. Always a former Hand. Holds the position until death. Sets doctrine, signs the warrants of operations involving more than three Sons, and is the only voice the order recognizes when speaking to a planetary government. The current Father has held the position for fifty-one years.
The order is split into five divisions, each commanded by a Hand of the Father. A Son is assigned to one division upon bonding and rarely transfers.
Identifies seeds of darkness across the fifteen worlds and dispatches Sons to destroy them. Maintains the inventory of known seeds, the watch lists, and the standing kill warrants. The largest division by headcount. Primary hull: Edrin's Hand.
Locates lost starblades, negotiates their return, and takes them by force when negotiation fails. Keeps the blade ledger and the lost rolls. Has standing arrangements with several fences and at least one ducal house on Solveth that the order will not name publicly. Primary hull: Iskar Vahn.
Manages Vor'athal itself. Keeps the bond-records, oversees the One Loves' quarters and provisioning, and carries out the betrayal protocol when a Hand returns the verdict. The Vigil does not deploy.
Maintains the three running velathi, Vor'athal's life support, and the systems whose function the order does understand. The Wardens are the order's only technical specialists. They have not been able to repair anything 6th Era in the time the order has kept records.
Handles outside contact. Receives petitioners on Vor'athal's outer ring, negotiates trade with planetary governments, and conducts the rare political work the order chooses to undertake. The smallest division. Travels aboard Tovell's Word when off-station.
Four hulls move the order between worlds. Each is named for a Son whose end defined what the ship is now used for.
The only ship the order shows when it has been invited to a planetary government. Tovell was a Hand of the Father whose given word ended the war over the seed of Cathol; the flagship carries his name and the order's blade-ledger.
| Length | 142 m |
| Size | Large |
| Ship Level | 11 |
| Crew | 14–20 (min 6, max 20), Sons, Squires, Open Hand staff |
| Drive | Twin arcane sails, escort-rated |
| Cargo | Blade-ledger vault, court chambers, 60 t hold |
| Bond-Relay | High-bandwidth; carries the Father when he travels |
| Commander | Hand of the Open Hand, Velith Mar |
| Combat Statistics | |
| HP | 298 (CT 59) |
| AC | 24 |
| Evasion DC | 24 |
| Fortitude | +22 |
| Speed | 8 hex/round |
| Shields | SP 160 (regen 8/rd), distributed across 4 quadrants |
| Hardness | None |
| Agility | Average (turn 2) |
| Armor | Mk 5 (+5 AC, −1 Reflex) |
| Computer | Mk 5 Mononode (+5 item bonus, 1 node) |
A lean, long-legged hull built to sit on a single trade lane for months. Named for the Son who first died alone on a Reclamation route, bond intact to the last, blade recovered the following season.
| Length | 58 m |
| Size | Medium |
| Ship Level | 9 |
| Crew | 6–8 (min 1, max 6), Sons and Squires |
| Drive | Single arcane sail, aux alchemical burn-rig |
| Cargo | 18 t hold, six-month rations, two debtor cells |
| Bond-Relay | Mid-bandwidth; pings Vor'athal at watch-change |
| Commander | Lance Karro Vesh |
| Combat Statistics | |
| HP | 163 (CT 32) |
| AC | 24 |
| Evasion DC | 24 |
| Fortitude | +18 |
| Speed | 10 hex/round |
| Shields | SP 80 (regen 2/rd), distributed across 4 quadrants |
| Hardness | None |
| Agility | Average (turn 2) |
| Armor | Mk 5 (+5 AC, −1 Reflex) |
| Computer | Mk 5 Mononode (+5 item bonus, 1 node) |
The fleet's fastest hull. Edrin was a Squire who carried a verbal warning across two worlds without rest, arrived dead in the courier saddle, and got there in time. The ship does what he did.
| Length | 34 m |
| Size | Small |
| Ship Level | 7 |
| Crew | 4–5 (min 1, max 6), Sons and Squire |
| Drive | Twin oversize arcane sails, overclock power core |
| Cargo | 4 t courier hold |
| Bond-Relay | Low-bandwidth, high-frequency pings |
| Commander | Lance Avi Karenn |
| Combat Statistics | |
| HP | 86 (CT 17) |
| AC | 22 |
| Evasion DC | 22 |
| Fortitude | +14 |
| Speed | 10 hex/round |
| Shields | SP 30 (regen 1/rd), distributed across 4 quadrants |
| Hardness | None |
| Agility | Good (turn 1) |
| Armor | Mk 3 (+3 AC) |
| Computer | Mk 3 Mononode (+3 item bonus, 1 node) |
A fortress that moves. Marren was the Hand who held the line at the fall of a world the order will no longer name; the carrier is the hull built to do that work afterward. Marrenfell sails only with the Father's signed warrant.
| Length | 198 m |
| Size | Huge |
| Ship Level | 13 |
| Crew | 42–50+ (min 20, max 100), Sons, Squires, Warden detachment |
| Drive | Quad arcane-sail core array, reinforced hull |
| Cargo | Spare reactor stock, surplus armory, hydroponic tier, 240 t hold |
| Bond-Relay | High-bandwidth, hardened relay spire |
| Commander | Lance Hadric Vorn |
| Combat Statistics | |
| HP | 478 (CT 95) |
| AC | 26 |
| Evasion DC | 26 |
| Fortitude | +26 |
| Speed | 6 hex/round |
| Shields | SP 280 (regen 16/rd), distributed across 4 quadrants |
| Hardness | 5 (Huge, damage ≤ 5 is ignored) |
| Agility | Average (turn 2) |
| Armor | Mk 7 (+7 AC, −1 Reflex) |
| Computer | Mk 7 Mononode (+7 item bonus, 1 node) |
The order's stated duty is to bring peace, justice, and security to the worlds their light shines on. By doctrine they avoid politics. In practice they enter politics when they have decided a matter requires it, and once committed they do not withdraw until the matter has resolved on their terms. The order is aware that the exception undercuts the rule and has not seen fit to revise either.
Sons do not hold property off Vor'athal. Sons do not father children; the bond's nature makes it functionally impossible. Sons do not contract any loyalty the order has not approved. A Son's word, given in the field, binds the order; this is part of why operations are conducted alone. A Lance may countermand a Son in coordinated work. A Hand may countermand a Lance. The Father may countermand a Hand. Nothing countermands the Father.