Though some of his thanes objected, the great love and respect the ailing King Ethered had won over his many years ruling Raemerrund carried the day. And so his eldest son, scholarly, introspective, and decidedly unmartial, would assume the Elkhorn Crown, despite possessing neither the prowess nor the intent to slay the linnorms that gave those rough lands their name. Jarguut was clever and sensible, said the old king, and he would lead Raemerrund with wisdom. But fifteen years later, the evil crone Baba Yaga, marching down from the windswept glaciers of the north with her monstrous army, met a kingdom ruled by a Linnorm King who had never earned that title-a king now known as Jarguut the Weak, Jarguut the Unready, and Jarguut the Last.
-From The Conquering Cold: A Brief History of the Winter War
While on the road to Waldsby and carrying on quite a conversation with Nadya, Zaaz solidifies her memories of her mother's (and relative's) teachings of the lands to the north and eventually relays the compiled information to the party:
Nearly 1,400 years ago, the Witch Queen Baba Yaga and an allied army of trolls, frost giants, winter wolves, and icy fey minions swept down from the Crown of the World to crash upon the easternmost Lands of the Linnorm Kings like an apocalyptic avalanche, slaying their formidable Ulfen defenders by the thousands. The first hammer's blow of the Winter War landed on the Linnorm Kingdom of Raemerrund. Under the leadership of studious King Jarguut- a Linnorm King who inherited his crown without performing the legendary quest that title traditionally demands, Raemerrund collapsed like fractured ice in a mere 6 days. The squabbling thanes of the Djurstor Confederacy to Raemerrund's south managed to resist the onslaught for 17 more days, but they too fell to the otherworldly witch's irresistible army. In under a month, Baba Yaga conquered two independent kingdoms that had stood for centuries and remade them into the nation of Irrisen, a land swathed forever in bitter, supernatural winter.
But Baba Yaga soon lost interest in her newfound realm. She left Golarion, handing power to her eldest daughter, Jadwiga, who proved herself every bit as capable and cruel as her mother, and established the nation of Irrisen as it's known today. Queen Jadwiga divided her nascent kingdom into four provinces-Bleakmarch, Hoarwood, Thronehold, and Wintercrux-and directed the construction of new cities to serve as provincial capitals, built by the conquered and enslaved Ulfen inhabitants. The new queen awarded her most trusted daughters authority over these lands, granting them the title of duchess. She awarded a fifth province to the capricious and cruel fey who had aided her mother in conquest, granting them the land north of the Frozen Road-now called Feyfrost-and allowing these unpredictable allies to do whatever they wished. A sixth province, the Verge, was later carved out of Wintercrux to guard the border with the Lands of the Linnorm Kings.
The many pastoral Ulfen villages that dotted the countryside before the Winter War died cruel deaths from isolation and neglect over time as Irrisen's endless winter limited travel, eliminated game, and prevented all agriculture. With few exceptions, only towns along the nation's rivers or the shores of Glacier Lake managed to survive in this stark new environment. They rely on fishing and shipments of imported grain and other staples that make the journey along the frigid waterways and snowy land routes from surrounding nations where the seasons still dance through their eternal cycle.
During the century following the Winter War, Queen Jadwiga's armies, led by her male progeny, made many attempts to expand the new kingdom's borders, but the Linnorm Kings and Mammoth Lords on Irrisen's borders kept vigilant watch over their belligerent neighbor and resisted further invasion. Many blamed Queen Jadwiga's failure to continue the conquest of northern Avistan for causing Baba Yaga to return to Golarion 100 years later. Baba Yaga removed Queen Jadwiga and the first generation of her children from Golarion, and crowned the deposed queen's sister Morgannan as Irrisen's new queen. Those descendants of Queen Jadwiga who had held positions of prestige and authority were pushed aside by the offspring of the new queen. Jadwiga's descendants, who resented this affront but were unable to oppose it, assumed lesser roles in the hierarchy, venting their anger upon the enslaved Ulfen folk who made up Irrisen's peasant population and scheming with and against one another for privileges, luxuries, and revenge. This ritual has been repeated every hundred years, with Baba Yaga returning to replace one daughter with another, and taking the deposed queen and the queen's children with her when she leaves Golarion. Elvanna is Irrisen's current queen, and her own centenary creeps closer with every passing day.
Baba Yaga's descendants are known today as Jadwiga, taking their name from Irrisen's first queen, though many outsiders incorrectly translate the term as "children of the witch-mother." By all appearances human, the Jadwiga are a vain, arrogant, and cruel people, proud of their bloodline and the authority and privilege it brings. The many petty rivalries and bloody feuds between Jadwiga clans are all that enables the oppressed lower orders to survive in Irrisen.
Although there are rare exceptions to the rule, female Jadwiga winter witches run the nation's government. These Jadwiga make up the ranks of the White Witches, who are much feared both within Irrisen's borders and without. Male Jadwiga command Irrisen's military. Ultimately, though, all answer to the reigning queen, whose ruthless vindictiveness is legendary. Most are careful not to earn the ire of their ruler and her most influential progeny.
Sitting at the summit of lrrisen's rather severe hierarchy are the offspring of the reigning queen. Holding positions of power and prestige in the government and military, they are haughty and disdainful of all lower classes. Below this elite are the descendants of lrrisen's previous queens. These Jadwiga make up the broad upper and middle classes of lrrisen, and they are a varied lot. Though most are proud and vindictive, they give reluctant public respect to the Jadwiga Elvanna, lest they anger an aristocrat of real authority and venom. They vent much of their bile upon the unfortunates at the bottom of the hierarchy.
Monsters such as ice trolls, ogres, snow goblins, winter wolves, frost giants, and cold fey come next in the pecking order. Allies of the Jadwiga, these creatures live either in the major cities of Irrisen or in scattered tribes across the snowy wilderness.
Merchants, visiting scholars, and other foreigners make up the next rung of the social hierarchy. These folk tread very lightly in Irrisen if they are wise, and are rarely seen outside the nation's major cities. Their presence in Irrisen is tolerated for the most part as essential for the nation's economic health, but this does not mean that individuals can't run afoul of their betters. The potential rewards for trade with Irrisen are immense since the land depends so heavily on imported foodstuffs, lumber, and other goods whose production is taken for granted by nations that experience four seasons. But the dangers in this strange place are legion, and there are countless tales of those who came to the Land of Eternal Winter thinking to make their fortunes and found their dooms instead. Still, those who master the contradictory art of being at once bold and cautious can reap enormous wealth.
Descendants of the Ulfen survivors of the Winter War lie at the bottom of lrrisen's brutal hierarchy, though their resemblance to the Ulfen people of the Lands of the Linnorm Kings has been utterly erased. Their culture is now an inward and frightened one, filled with primitive superstitions and odd customs. This peasant class makes up the bulk of Irrisen's population, scraping out a meager existence in towns and villages along Glacier Lake and Irrisen's rivers. Most Jadwiga consider these settlements insufferably backward and dull, and a posting to one is seen as exile or worse-few Jadwiga live in such places willingly.
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Queen Elvanna
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Random facts known about the region... either acquired through conversation with the locals, remembered from books during your schooling, or pulled from your childhood memories as fragments from stories told to you by your elders.
• After 1,400 years of winter, nearly all growing things in Irrisen are long dead or locked in eternal hibernation. The great birches, elms, and oaks of the forests are bare of leaves, and only tall evergreens such as firs, pines, and spruces provide a green break to the endless blues and whites of ice and snow. The coniferous winteryew tree, believed to have been brought to Golarion from some far-off world by Baba Yaga, is absolutely essential to the survival of many species of Irrisen. Winteryews' cones produce edible seeds year-round, and their bark, which grows back even in Irrisen's frigid temperatures when stripped from the trunk, provides nutrition for other animals, including humans. Were it not for the winteryew, known colloquially as the "witch-tree," no wildlife could survive in this wintry land.
• Vault of Silver and Ice: This valuable mine briefly served as a major source of wealth for Irrisen, until the deadly plague known as chillbane fever issued from its depths. The vault has been sealed ever since, haunted by ghosts and some say demons as well.
• Hoarwood Forest: Once part of the Djurstor Confederacy and home to a thriving forest culture, the Hoarwood Forest changed dramatically with the coming of Baba Yaga and the cruelty of Irrisen's eternal winter. With the cycle of seasons broken, every deciduous tree in the forest either perished or went dormant, leaving only evergreens. Within a generation, the spread of Baba Yaga's winteryew trees provided enough of a foundation for some of the wildlife to rebound, but the forest was never the same again. Since the reign of Queen Jadwiga, logging in the forest is strictly regulated, and woodcutters or lumberjacks must be licensed in the city of Hoarwood before they can cut even a single branch or face a death sentence if caught. Beyond these few woodspeople, the wild reaches of the forest are home to asocial fur trappers and multiple tribes of boreal ogres, snow goblins, and taiga giants, who are often too busy fighting one another to make trouble for the small settlements sheltering under the forest's eaves. Many stories of wandering, restless spirits are told across the province-tales of ghostly parties of mounted huntsmen, lone weeping women, and incorporeal wolves hungry for the flesh of the living. Traveling in the Hoarwood off one of the established trails is an endeavor that should not be undertaken lightly.
• Hoarwood: The city of Hoarwood is unique in all of Golarion- an entire settlement housing nearly 9,000 souls, carved from a gigantic oak in the middle of the eponymous forest. The tree, believed to have been planted by Gozreh himself at the dawn of time, was sacred to the druids of Irrisen's conquered native Ulfen population. Rivers of blood from the leaders of their brief uprising were used to kill the once-mighty tree. The tree is 500 feet in diameter at its base, and towers thousands of feet in the air. Not all of the city is built within the tree-a large portion nestles among the tree's sprawling roots, and is home to a majority of Hoarwood's peasants. Most of the city's Jadwiga inhabitants, however, reside above the rest of the city along a broad avenue carved into the great trunk in a counterclockwise corkscrew. This concourse rises hundreds of feet into the air where the first massive branches emerge from the tree's trunk, winding past hundreds of rooms, balconies, patios, and overhangs painted in vibrant colors and decorated with the delicate gingerbread woodwork so common in Whitethrone. It took hundreds of carpenters, artisans, and woodworkers conscripted from every corner of Irrisen more than 4 years to complete the monumental task, a masterpiece of design that continues to inspire wonder. Though it is said that Duchess Anelisha herself has a map of the city in its entirety, many believe that no one knows every twist and tunnel within the immense interior, riddled as it is with hidden passageways and secret chimneys. The city proper stops at the tree's first branches; its upper reaches are reserved for the duchess's Arboreal Palace. The palace is connected by a complex system of elevators operated by ice trolls and frost giants.
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| Hoarwood, city built from a giant oak tree. |
• Whitethrone: More than just the provincial capital of Thronehold, Whitethrone is the capital of all Irrisen. Baba Yaga established the city as her capital on the ruins of the Raemerrund capital of Elkswoad, literally paving the new city's roads with the skulls of slain Ulfen warriors. Whitethrone sits on the frigid northern shore of Glacier Lake. Its most distinguishing characteristic is the diversity of its populace: Jadwiga, Ulfen, dwarves, fey, gnomes, ice trolls, snow goblins, and winter wolves all live in relatively stable coexistence inside the city. Of course, the majority of the dwarven, gnome, and Ulfen residents are slaves-save for visiting merchants, diplomats, and adventurers, most of whom confine themselves to the Merchants' Quarter that girds Whitethrone's Market Square.
Queen Elvanna rules all of Irrisen from the Royal Palace, a magnificent structure of ice sitting atop an enormous ice pillar that rises 200 feet from the surface of Glacier Lake. The palace towers10 stories high, with at least as many dungeon levels in the ice pillar on which it sits. The queen's many offspring, the Jadwiga Elvanna, scurry through the labyrinthine hallways and chambers of the palace, carrying out their business of running the wintry nation and seeing to it that their mother's wishes are carried out.
• The Cold Sisters
Of all the bureaucrats and government officials who run Irrisen, perhaps none are as feared as the Cold Sisters, an order of winter witches based in Whitethrone and charged with rooting out insurrection and enforcing Irrisen's strict laws throughout the land. The Cold Sisters tour the provinces, seeking evidence of malfeasance or double-dealing among peasants, foreign merchants, and even the Jadwiga. The Cold Sisters find and punish those who would cheat Whitethrone of its due, and are harsh, cruel, and relentless. A fugitive from their justice has little choice but to flee the country, for they will never give up the hunt as long as their quarry remains within the borders of Irrisen. The Cold Sisters are also feared for their savage and inventive tortures. Indeed, it is not uncommon for prisoners to commit suicide rather than surrender themselves to the mercy of the Cold Sisters.
Cold Sisters wear hooded robes of unsullied white, their faces obscured by a misty frost that dances about their heads.They address one another as "adored sister," regardless of rank, and assume names only when charged with a very specific task or when temporarily replacing a government official recently removed from her post.
Holidays in Irrisen
The people of Irrisen celebrate a few holidays unknown elsewhere on Golarion.
Pjallarane Day (1 Abadius): Like so many things in Irrisen, the celebration of the NewYear has its roots in rather dark soil. The holiday extends back a thousand years to the day Queen Pjallarane and her children resisted leaving Golarion with Baba Yaga. The day long rebellion ended with the first-generation Jadwiga Pjallarane crucified along the banks of Glacier Lake from Baldachin
to Ytterjorna, covered in tar, and set aflame as a rather dramatic warning to others who would resist Baba Yaga. The festival is celebrated with a feast and rituals echoing that day, such as burning effigies made of tar and straw.
Feast of Szurpada (26 Rova): This "celebration of plenty," as Queen Urvalane dubbed it, serves to supplant and mock the traditional harvest festivals once observed by the Ulfen people of Irrisen, and always includes one dish served cold and raw. For an Irriseni peasant, that dish is likely the only one. For Jadwiga, however, this feast is an opportunity for obscene displays of wealth and unrestrained gluttony.
Festival of the Witch (30 Lamashan): This festival celebrates witchcraft and the central role it plays in daily Irriseni culture. Pranks ranging from harmless to unforgivably cruel are played on the uninitiated. The holiday's climax involves the burning of a prisoner who has impersonated a witch, rather than the usual punishment of the loss of a hand or an eye.
Baptism of Ice (24-30 Neth): Children born the preceding year are paraded down city streets or through town squares attired in their finest clothing during this week-long fertility festival. The culmination involves the sacrifice of a peasant child by exposure to the cold. For most towns this ritual is merely symbolic, but in Whitethrone and Irrisen's provincial capitals,this barbaric custom is all too real.
