| He who loves the world as his body may be entrusted with the empire. |
| — Lao-Tzu, the Tao Te Ching |
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Faction: Pentacle1
Modern understanding: The Rulers of Atlantis - The Oracles
From the Silver Ladder book:
Legends say Atlantis had kings and queens who ruled all the orders, though scholars sometimes postulate that the royal “Blood of the Dragon” were only ceremonial overlords, objects of devotion who left governance to other mages. Monarchy is an unpopular concept in the modern age, so théarchs often avoid discussing it at all.
Of all the orders, the Ladder knows the most about the Blood of the Dragon, but even its knowledge is filled with apocrypha. Many believe the royal line died with Atlantis. Nobles stayed with their sinking towers or met their end by Exarch treachery. Some say the Blood are the Exarchs, that the royal house betrayed humanity, but the order dislikes the implications of this story because it calls Atlantis’ virtues into question. A more positive spin says the Oracles are five siblings of the Blood who have vowed to save the human race.
Discovered by the characters:
Ancient records not only confirm that the "Blood of the Dragon" were the people in charge who ruled the Atlantean civilization, but also that the five people who became the Oracles were indeed among them.
This "monarchy" was apparently not technically a hereditary institution as we know it today, but rather an order or faction which required incredibly strict requirements of a person in order to qualify for membership. These demands were set by the Voice of the Dragon, the law-writers and ancestors of the modern Silver Ladder, who were also the ones who organized the tests and "exams" which any prospective mage had to pass in order to prove they were actually smart, wise, sensible, robust and selfless enough to have authority over others.
The records uncovered thus far indicate that these demands were so harsh, that so much was required in order for someone to be considered fit for leadership, that most people had to be specifically hard-trained since infancy in order to have a chance of measuring up, sacrificing a happy and carefree childhood in the process. This meant that over time certain families saw more and more of its members achieve membership, as they were the bloodlines who developed a tradition for training their offspring for leadership positions. These lineages seem to have been misunderstood by researchers in later times, who formed the erroneous conclusion that power was passed down from father to son like in a royal family, when it had more to do with the child of a "king" being more likely to have been raised in such a way as to fulfill the requirements.
To some extent this would also explain why this Order died out while the others survived, as the mage population was too dispersed across the world without means of communicating, which meant that it wasn't possible to have a majority of the senior Théarchs meet in one place and participate in the formal Concordance-sessions required to appoint a new member of the Blood of the Dragon. Without any way for new mages to join the order it effectively died out when the members who had survived the Fall eventually passed away.
This would for example be why Shemyaza was a member of the Silver Ladder, despite the fact that his mother was a member of the "Royal Family": Membership wasn't automatically inherited, and they had no way to arrange for him to join (assuming he wanted to do so in the first place, of course).
Order tools: Cup, Pentacle, Wand, Blade & Mirror. A different "set" were the weighing-scales, the measuring-rod, and the glass lens (as in telescope, microscope, spectacles, etc).
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To list of organizations
To list of orders
