Between the mountains and the western sea, on Areaer’s southern continent, Galen, lie the Plains of Zharda. Northwards, the uncrossable River of Death separates the Plains from contact with the rest of the continent. East and south the Mountains of the Sun’s Rising curve away the Plains and into the sea, sheltering them. And there, cupped away from the rest of the world, and cut through by a few rivers lie the Plains, protected by the Ellen Zharda, Guardian of the Storms. Sometimes, they are lush and green, and grow rich forests. Other times large portions of them are desert or near-desert, as the climate of the world moves through its own long seasons.

The Plains of Zharda are the only place where humans who are not chosen and selected or blessed by the Guardian, are permitted to live in the domain of that Guardian. Long, long ago an epic battle was fought between the Nightmare – which the people of the Plains call the ‘Old Gods’ – and Zharda, the Sun, and the Storm Chosen – a human chosen by Zharda, and after the battle the human survivors were invited to continue to live in the Plains, under the Guardianship of Zharda. Thus, while ages pass and turn, and even the nations of the elves rise and fall and are lost from the memory even of the elves, the Plains of Zharda and those who live in them remain. Their culture is relatively constant, as it is guided by Zharda and her Storm Chosen back again and again whenever it strays too far – something that may be considered either the price, or the blessing, of the land in which they live. While various clans have their own symbols, as a whole the tribes do not have a single emblem that remains steady across the clans and through the eons, though if they did, such an emblem would feature symbols for the Storms and the Sun.

They are forbidden to build cities or develop technology, instead living as nomadic hunter-gatherers, who know that upon death they will be gathered to the Home-in-the-Sun. As children they have child-names, but when they approach adulthood, each must go out in solitude, to find his Name before Zharda and the Sun, before he can return to his people as an adult. The society is very egalitarian, with everyone holding him or herself as an equal among his peers, before the Gods.

Those who are afraid to delve into themselves and stand naked in their hearts before the Gods sometimes leave their clan and may turn to banditry. For the most part, Zharda does nothing about this if it is only a few, and they prove but a nuisance to a clan. However, if they mass into something that draws her attention, she will choose and bless a Storm Chosen to annihilate them. Likewise, the Clans themselves – especially in times of extreme hardship, such as a severe and long drought – so sometimes have conflicts. Usually, Zharda does nothing about them if they are mild, but if they turn to outright war or otherwise get her attention, she may similarly intervene, usually through the Storm Chosen.

Those who live in the Plains generally consider themselves the chosen beloved of the God of Storms and the Sun. What many of them do not realize, is that the Plains contain a sacred place to the Spirits of the Storms, and while they live there with Zharda’s blessing and under her protection, one of the only people to live under the protection of a Guardian, it is not primarily they whom Zharda guards or who have her attention. Neither does she – or the Sun – care for the worship that they generally give her. She guides their society and culture so stringently not because she desires their respect, or even for them to know of her at all, but because if they are to live in her Plains, they must not become a threat to the Storm Spirits she protects and nurtures, but instead live in harmony with her purpose.

Due to a long-ago event – or several such – in which corrupted dragons put the people of the Plains in peril and threatened Zharda’s Guardianship, the Clans of the Storm and Sun scorn dragons, and require that any of their people who bond to a dragon must leave the Plains, never to return.

The Plains of Zharda, and the people of the Plains, feature in the Dragon-Mage series.