Rangers
Rangers are perhaps the closest thing Dust Flag has to a standing army - individuals drawn deliberately from all tribes of the confederation, tasked with patrolling the length and breadth of the western expanse in search of threat and opportunity.
Mounted upon reptilian hadrassa steeds, and bearing handcrafted flashlock weapons, these rugged warrior-scouts ride out for months at a time, far from the well travelled routes of their tribekin, developing more in common with their fellow ranger than with those they leave behind at 'home.'
And this is, perhaps, for the best - an organisation such as theirs cannot be partial to one tribe above another when they are tasked with the mutual defence of all. When one joins their ranks, they swear a solemn oath of dedication and sacrifice, both to their ranger kin and Dust Flag as a whole. Nominally this places their allegiance beyond that of their tribe of origin.
When incursions into Dust Flag lands occur - be they marauding bands of Rust Banner raiders, the dedicated warparties of Thousand Spears riding out to claim territory, or any number of threats in force to the usually peaceable tribes of the west, it is the rangers who will first detect that threat, the rangers who will ride day and night to bring warning to the elders, and the rangers who will harass the incurring foe all the way, slowing and disrupting them with hit and run attacks practised over a lifetime of hunting, manoeuvring, and coming intimately to know their native lands.
Rangers have a reputation for a dry and laconic manner, hardened as they are by rough survival and desolate travel, often spent alone. Even in the small packs they sometimes travel in, one quickly runs out of conversation by the first week. With the mundane cares of tribe life so far removed from their experience, what need have they for chit-chat? One cannot drink small-talk. One cannot find shade under banter.
Image by Ellen
Dust Flag
Mounted upon reptilian hadrassa steeds, and bearing handcrafted flashlock weapons, these rugged warrior-scouts ride out for months at a time, far from the well travelled routes of their tribekin, developing more in common with their fellow ranger than with those they leave behind at 'home.'
And this is, perhaps, for the best - an organisation such as theirs cannot be partial to one tribe above another when they are tasked with the mutual defence of all. When one joins their ranks, they swear a solemn oath of dedication and sacrifice, both to their ranger kin and Dust Flag as a whole. Nominally this places their allegiance beyond that of their tribe of origin.
When incursions into Dust Flag lands occur - be they marauding bands of Rust Banner raiders, the dedicated warparties of Thousand Spears riding out to claim territory, or any number of threats in force to the usually peaceable tribes of the west, it is the rangers who will first detect that threat, the rangers who will ride day and night to bring warning to the elders, and the rangers who will harass the incurring foe all the way, slowing and disrupting them with hit and run attacks practised over a lifetime of hunting, manoeuvring, and coming intimately to know their native lands.
Rangers have a reputation for a dry and laconic manner, hardened as they are by rough survival and desolate travel, often spent alone. Even in the small packs they sometimes travel in, one quickly runs out of conversation by the first week. With the mundane cares of tribe life so far removed from their experience, what need have they for chit-chat? One cannot drink small-talk. One cannot find shade under banter.
Dust Flag
Comments
Post a Comment