Moraath

''...we grant him the right to speak to us as leader in times of war; certainly it is true that we now find ourselves so engaged. But tonight is a night of the spirits and gods, before whom we are all equal...''

Moraath is the high shaman and spiritual leader of all Hulun. She is the earthly representative of the Goddess Empala and is a senior figure within the tribe, an elder and leader within K'harg's band.

Description
Moraath is plump and cheerful: she has copper skin and almond shaped eyes, and wears her long silver hair in a braid hanging in front of her left shoulder. She dresses in a variety of animal skins and keeps various tokens and charms about her person, including feathers and bones taken from significant sacrifices.

The tribe's spiritual leader and healer, Moraath is an elderly woman who is close friends with tribe elder- and de facto leader- Fanwé. She is a cleric of Empala, the earth-mother, but pays homage to all deities. As well as representing the deities of the plains, she is closely aligned with the spirits, and mentors spirit shaman such as Grimach and Wyk. Moraath leads all major religious rites within K'harg's band. She is also responsile for leading and organising the adepts who deal with such daily tasks as healing the sick, preparing food and caring for the animals. She has a good relationship with K'harg but is suspicious of his children- albeit in a good-natured way- being wary of their desire for war with other tribes.

Moraath is fifty-four yeasrs old.

Early Life
Moraath was born fifty-four years ago to a Hulun mother and father, an adept and warrior respectively. Moraath exhibited uncanny awareness of the spirit world, and was taken in hand by an elderly spirit shaman. During a conflict with the Raven, her band were enslaved and her father murdered. The old shaman took Moraath into the wilderness, where she further developed her capabilities.

At this time the lands south of the village of Rem were nominally Hulun; however, they were overrun by Raven warriors, displacing many Hulun who wandered the territory in small bands, similar to pariahs. Moraath and her mentor helped guide these bands to the comparative safety of Hulun territory.

Rise of G'heeg
In the west of the Hulun territories, a mighty warrior was uniting the bands into a potent force. G'heeg was a cruel and tyrannical ruler, however, and Moraath despaired of the fates of those refugees she was supposed to be leading to safety.

At this time, the young Moraath received a vision: that one day the Hulun could live in peace and comfort, in harmony with their environment and the spirits. She took this as a sign that she devote herself to the goddess Empala. Her mentor, although supportive, believed that he could no longer guide her: he had received his own vision and vanished into the Great Forest.

Moraath reasoned that the safest place for her people was amongst the Beyond-the-River clan. This meant brokering a treaty with K'harg, the defender of the territories around the Three Rivers. K'harg agreed to provide protection for Moraath's refugees, if she would in turn encourage the displaced warriors to join his bands. Moraath consulted her goddess, and received a second vision in which Empala told her that K'harg would one day lead all the Hulun and defend the ancestral lands from the enemy. She agreed to support K'harg's rise to power.

It was at this time that Moraath met Fanwé who, like her, had spent most of her life as an itinerant and was now a rsing political force in the plains. Moraath used her connections with the Beyond-the-River Clan to help Fanwé broker an alliance. Moraath began to help bands defect from G'heeg's banner, guiding the weaker and more helpless to safer territories and encouragin the stronger to join K'harg. At this stage she was accompanied by her small retinue of scouts known as the Pariahs of Empala.

The Battle of Rem
War between K'harg and G'heeg was avoided when the tyrant agreed to face the young pretender in single combat; K'harg one and ultimately united all the Hulun to face down the combined threat of the Empire, Raven and Tolda  armies that had gathered outside Rem. She led the Pariahs of Empala- which included Daromir - against the combined armies, routing the Imperial light infantry and defeating the Tolda scouts.

In the aftermath of the Hulun victory, Moraath was encouraged by Fanwé to join K'harg's band as a permanent advisor, bringing the young Daromir with her.

Broker of Peace
During the years following K'harg's ascension, Moraath helped Fanwé and K'harg consolidate their power over the Hulun, whilst simultaneously brokering peace. Using the model adopted by K'harg at the Three Rivers, the Hulun positioned themselves as protectors of the settled peoples, and as such were given favoured trading rights with Forl, Jedda, Three Rivers and many of the smaller villages.

Moraath developed strong ties with the Threem during her early wanderings, and helped to establish foraging rights in the forest south of the Ur for the Hulun. She was meticulous in ensuring that traditions could be maintained whilst ensuring resources were adequately shared. This also helped her foster stronger ties with the druids- traditional guardians of the culture and ecology of the plains- and she developed a strong friendship with the druid the then young druid Lomnu.

Though popular and much loved, many of the more martial tribes resented the curtailing of raiding against settled peoples, which later led to an explosion of border conflicts with the Tolda and increased raiding against Rem. She also developed a powerful enemy in the High Shaman. A cleric of Raad, he was apopleptic that a follower of Empala- and his junior- should be given so much power. The High Shaman had long ago been an ally of G'heeg and had been increasingly marginalised by K'harg.

Nevertheless, Moraath recalls this period of her life warmly: there were few wars and the Hulun prospered, with her goddess Empala increasing in popularity amongst junior shaman.

Night of Flames
Numerous conspiracies concerning the role of the Beyond-the-River Clan, Fanwé and sorcerers generally led to a great massacre at the six-hundred-and-forty-sixth summer solstice, with many individuals identified as witches regardless of the veracity of such claims. Though the incident could be attributed to a number of factors, it is largely believed to have been orchestrated by the High Shaman in a bid to discredit Fanwé and Moraath by proxy. The elder Holis had a significant role in the vent, too, though his reputation has escaped largely unscathed.

As a result of the massacre, all out war was only narrowly avoided by the cunning maneuvrings of Moraath. Skirmishes, reprisals and bitter blood feuds continued for much of the year, some of which remain unresolved to this day. K'harg and Fanwé were both comprimised however: they were looking for revenge against the High Shaman, not least because it ensured the continued support of the powerful Beyond-the-River Clan.

When the High Shaman was slain in battle (between his band and that of the sorceress Getha) Moraath was appointed his replacement. She was reluctant to accept the role- not because she didn't want it, but because it affirmed many of the murmurings of the conspiracy theorists. Nevertheless, she has assumed the mantle with aplomb and continues to push for a more peaceful way of lie in her role as High Shaman- the first to be a follower of Empala in the entire history of the plains.

Role in the Story so Far
Moraath presided over the Feast of Xa before her role was usurped by K'harg, who used the opportunity to make a grand speech and led a rading party to expel the Raven who had raided their lands. She saddened by what she saw as an act of blasphemy, and also stood up for those not taken to war, encouraging thm to speak. Fanwé comforted her old friend, and she rallied her spirits enough to assist Bundu in organising the guard of the camp. At some point during the night she was visited by the druid Lomnu, and the two left to travel to The Meet, apparently to attend an emergency meeting of the Council of Druids.