It was in the year 343 PBI (Post-Barushkan Invasion), nearly 600 hundred years ago, that Trevasil Monde became one of the first permanent settlers in what is now the Port of Kestra.  Legend has it that Trevasil had been a monk at the Vacchón Monastery long before he became an entrepreneur at the Port.  According to the monastery records, there was in fact a monk by the same name that proved to be quite brilliant with numbers and rose quickly in rank due to his superior intellect.  He was only twenty-one when he was granted the position of Chamberlain Viceroy which is essentially to say he was to govern the monastery treasury.  Being such an ambitious individual, the position suited him perfectly.  He had a stunning aptitude for creating new ways to increase the monastery’s coffers, with the assistance of his monastery brothers, without diverting their attentions from their ultimate calling.  The monastery flourished during the time that Trevasil was, in essence, in charge.

Vacchón, being situated between the two ridges of the mountain pass, was quite often called the Armpit of Frozen Hell.  Due to its location, it was also notorious for its extended Wintervales.   In Trevasil’s twenty-fourth year he took ill because of an unexpected snowstorm toward the end of a particularly harsh Wintervale.  His illness caused him to be bedbound for several months while waiting for his body to recover. 

Luckily for the monastery by the time he took ill the brothers were well acquainted with the daily operations that kept the monastery profitable.  Thus upon his recovery it was determined by Trevasil’s superiors that in order for him to remain in good health, he needed to relocate to a more temperate climate.  The following Springtide, Trevasil reluctantly began his journey to the southern part of the kingdom.

He traveled south from the Crystal Cliffs through the Mountain Ridge down into the lush valley of the mountain basin.  At that time, the area was not so vastly populated but the rainy season at the foot of the mountains was still a bit too damp for his now delicate health.  He sought refuge from a sudden thunderstorm in one of the farming villages along the lake at the base of the mountains.  While there he overheard several of the men discussing a small fishing village further west.  It was situated at the mouth of the only known route leading from the sea up the river to the rest of the kingdom.  Trevasil grew up on the lake but had never seen the river or the sea and this caught his attention.  He was so intrigued that, once the storm passed, he traveled to the small village of Kestra.  It was so close to the water’s edge that it seemed to have just popped up out of the sea.  He was suddenly attracted by the vast potential the place had along with the capital gain he could achieve as it grew.

With the funds his superiors had provided, as compensation for his years of service to the monastery, Trevasil was able to acquire a modest business office close to the port’s entrance.  From there, he tracked the daily operations that were conducted on the docks, as well as in town, and thus began an empire that still exists in Kestra to this day.

With a keen sense of business and an eye on the future potential of the budding fishing village he managed to establish himself as the port’s central contact.  Nothing happened in Kestra that he was not privy to nor that he did not profit from. He became a very prosperous man creating enterprise after enterprise for which he always turned a substantial gain.  He dealt fairly in his business practices which garnered him the respect of the merchants with whom he traded.  He expanded his wealth by stretching the borders of the little fishing village to encompass the foothills of the Mountain Ridge thereby ensuring the trade routes to the mountain folk.  He then added to it the surrounding lands on either side of the Trevas River thus also securing his ability to control the shipping business from the coast to the southern inlands and on up to the lake.

As with any population expansion, there were disagreements.  Because Lord Trevasil was so well-respected, the port residents and businessmen would come to him for assistance to settle their conflicts with little to no opposition from the parties involved, whether it was neighbor boundary disputes, theft accusations, marital issues, or other such circumstances.

It was during this time of growth that Cameron Marshall visited Lord Trevasil offering a pledge of loyalty to the Lord to act, in the best interest of the Lord and the province, as the local magistrate to settle these common disputes that unnecessarily consumed Trevasil’s time. In this fashion, the laws would be upheld and order could be maintained allowing the Lord to spend his time conducting business transactions that would lead to continued improvement for Kestrian lives and lands.

Lord Trevasil accepted this offer with great delight as he envisioned his time better utilized if he did not have to listen to every grievance, gripe, concern, and allegation. He gladly appointed Cameron Marshall as the local court official wherein if one had an issue that required mediation that individual would bring the plea to the ‘Marshall’.  It was the Marshall’s responsibility to enforce the Lord’s laws, set forth judgments or sentences and then carry them out.  On occasion the accusations were so severe that it became necessary for the punishments to be swift and savage consequently creating a negative reputation that caused the Marshalls to later be labeled as “Blood Dragons”.  While the evidence did not always support a Marshall’s decisions, they were nonetheless final and the persons involved were without recourse.  No one but the Lord had power or authority to override a decision made by the Marshall.

On the day Cameron was officially appointed, as a symbol of this pact, Lord Trevasil offered him a priceless gift– a beautifully crafted dagger suitable and fitting for such an esteemed position.  The hilt was a foreign metal, black and smooth, one unknown to the people of Kestra, masterfully wrought with a dragon, wings furled forward forming an unusually long hilt.  The neck of which was designed to fit within the palm of the wielder’s hand comfortably with the dragon’s head wrought to rest against the hand as if on guard.  Its two fire rock stone eyes keeping constant vigil over the bearer.  The blade itself was shaped in a long slender “S” mimicking the same fluid motion of the dragon’s tail.  The blade’s extraordinary artistry etched upon it further impressed that image to all who saw it.  The grand design was not intended for functionality but merely as a physical representation of the Lord’s trust in his Marshall.  It was immediately adopted as the Marshall House crest and the symbol of the Marshall’s position in society as well as his duty to the Lord and later, as the Kestrian kingdom grew, the King.

From that day forward the Marshall house chose one member from each generation to serve as the “King’s Marshall.”  The dagger was passed from one generation to the next on the day of appointment, each Marshall accepting his or her position when he or she accepted the dagger from the King.  The appointments were not always a choice but more a lack of choice since some generations only had one or two children.  During the years of the plague, the decision was simply whoever survived.  Sadly, this did not always produce a wise, just or intelligent Marshall.  Kaylan’s father, Marshall Bruhndahl, was one of the wisest, most just Marshalls the kingdom had seen in over a hundred years.

The lords and kings of the past had also, for a time, abused the position of the Marshall using them to carry out their wishes regardless of justice.  Over the years, if a selfish or brutal king had a weaker Marshall, the injustices became numerous and the death toll was high.  It was these atrocities that caused the unfavorable reputation and the Marshall became a dreaded vision, a waking nightmare.  It was no longer a position of justice but one of vile corruption, hatred, and distaste.  The people of Kestra could no longer trust the Marshall to fight for truth.  Fear, dread, death – that is what it meant when the Marshall was in town.  After that, the significance of the dagger was no longer the trust between King and Marshall but rather instead the bondage of Executioner to Master.  The dagger had always been used as part of the ceremony when the next Marshall was chosen, but during the time of the Black Lords and Kings, the dagger was used to impart the death blow to the king’s victims. The sheer beauty of the dragon dagger and what it represented was lost beneath layers of innocent blood.   

One particular Marshall – Haedis, by name – was not very competent and had the misfortune of a gambling problem.  The problem wasn’t that he liked to gamble; the problem was that he wasn’t very good at it. Now it just so happened that he was in the mountain regions tracking a wanted “criminal” to whom the king had taken a particular dislike.  Haedis entered into a high stakes game of Crodus.  He had been doing fairly well for a little while and decided to bet everything he had, including the dragon dagger, on a final hand.  He lost.  While Haedis managed to get his horse and money back within a few days, the dagger had unfortunately disappeared.  This was the ill-fated event that branded him with the name ‘Marshall Haedis, the Disgraced’. 

Few records of this incident were known to exist in Kestra as it was such a dishonor to the Marshall House.  Marshall Adrelle, the first of only two female Marshalls, supposedly destroyed all records that discredited the Marshall House.  She was not a strong Marshall and became obsessed with removing all accounts that brought disgrace to the Marshall name.  It was unfortunate for her that destroying written records did not destroy the memories of those who witnessed the ‘objectionable’ incidents.  Just as unfortunate, no one knows exactly what happened to the undesirable chronicles or if there was still any written record of the events in existence.

While the Marshalls that followed the period of the Black Lords and Kings were stronger in their resolve to enact justice rather than act on bias, the one thing the Kestrian people were not able to forget was the violent and bloody reputation created by the Marshalls during that time.  Following that dark period it was often necessary for a Marshall to carry out drastic sentences that reaffirmed the hateful reputation.  It is this very reason that warranted the absolute courtesies afforded to the Marshalls.  It is also this same reason that has caused the Marshall station to become such a lonely solitary position.

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