The Maelstrom Fellowship

 Friends, acquaintances, scholars of the Twelve Houses of Arithma, mark what I say for every brother and sister in the whole of the realm, in hopes that future generations, if there be any left, may know the immense gravity of our situation.  The world is breaking apart, the elements are disintegrating, great storms of abrasion are upon us.  All the lands beyond the mountains have been reduced to rubble, not by an act of war, or by industrial pursuits of the vainglorious entrepreneurs of Xixox, but by the omnipotent forces that bond the world; those same forces that put oxygen into our atmosphere, blood into our bodies, and machinery into our minds.   To give animation to these inorganic forces may seem nefarious to the more practical Houses, but I ask them: have they any better explanation for what is happening?  For years we have faced the inevitable; that some force out there, imperceptible to us even with our finest scientific instruments, has been driving us all into oblivion.  As I speak, the painted deserts of Pentas are being sucked of all their sands, the waterfalls of Dodecas are drying out in whirlpools of coriosis, the megaplex of chimneys in Monos are being chopped up like cinder blocks.  Our world is being swallowed up by an unstoppable leech, more dangerous than any other in our long history of battling the cosmoconscious.  Some have even reported sightings of apparitions, mythological beasts, shape-shifting jinns, and other ominous creatures of the trans-cerebral creatium, infiltrating our microverse without so much as an invitation from our highest gurus. 

You've all been summoned to appoint a delegate from each House to find the source of this catastrophe.  We aren't sure where it's coming from, so the whole planet will have to be searched, especially in places where the storms have already struck.  The only lead we can give you is that our gravitometer has detected a steady increase in g-waves throughout the period, indicating that our world may be entering a turbulent region of space.  Yet that doesn't explain all the paranormal metamorphoses that have taken place where the storms have sprung.  Men have grown wings; women have given birth to ghastly bhutas; caterpillas have evolved into dragons in the blink of an eye; pit-holes the size of Abaddon have appeared in the Octonian ice caps.  In Heptas, that supreme kingdom of the skies, the Highguard priests have reported disturbing vibrations in the Etheric dimension during their meditation vespers.  We advise you to stay clear of these dangerous places, though unfortunately they may be the only ones that hold the answers you seek.  We can't guarantee any chance of success, only that the delegates you choose must have superior instincts, as they'll be sifting through a world of chaos.  But it's also imperative that they be in the top of their class, and that they strongly resemble the archetypes of their respective Houses.  Our instincts tell us that a group of great minds, consisting of a balanced range of opinions that draw from the wisdom of each House, may be the key to solving this greatest of mysteries. 

It is with great honor that I summon here today the twelve delegates of the Maelstrom Fellowship.  There once was a time when all the Houses ruled the world together, united in legislation, commerce, and diplomacy.  Like the bird that seeks comfort from the wrath of winter by soaring south in the summer months, separated from the home it once knew and the birds it once shared with, today we return from our nomadic schisms to the source of our inheritance: these holy mountains of Aeria.  Once, when the land was unsettled and humans had no business being here, these very same mountains provided the genesis of our evolution.  They nursed us from the harsh wilderness of Decas, where animals twice our size hunted us with every beat of their scavenging hearts.  O holy mountains, allow us to express our gratitude for the shelter you provided us, your cradles of growth, your towers of wisdom.  Let us remember who we are; humble servants of the land you built, lost children at rest in the arms of your valleys.  Let the power of unity enamor us with the heavens you so highly reach for, as all things under the grace of God strive for His kingdom, but none create the universal sensation of ascension the way you have.  Let the tall glassy cliffs echo these words of reconciliation; that gathered around us here today, refugees that have come from distances as far as tens of thousands of miles, after many centuries of migration, have returned here, in our most dire hour, to unite with the people they were once torn away from; to salvage a glimmer of hope in finding a cure for the terrible storms that ravage our world.