Military & Security of the Eldeen Reaches
FIELD REPORT — Knight Commander Aelys ir'Taranath, Aundairian Royal Eyes, to the Office of the Crown, Zarantyr 997 YK
Commander,
I will be blunt. We do not know what the Wardens are capable of. During the secession, the druidic forces unleashed earthquakes that leveled border fortresses, walls of thorns that swallowed cavalry columns, and — if the accounts can be believed — raised the waters of Lake Galifar to repel our southern forces. The soldiers who were present at the siege cannot explain what happened. The druids who were present will not.
The Arcane Congress has devoted two research teams to analyzing the primal capabilities of the Reaches. After three years of study, they have produced a report that I can summarize in four words: we do not know.
I recommend we proceed with caution.
The Eldeen Reaches have no standing army, no national guard, no officer corps, and no military academy. They are defended by a loose alliance of druid circles, ranger patrols, village militias, and the Towering Wood itself — a combination that sounds absurd on paper and that has successfully repelled the armed forces of two of the Five Nations. The Reaches' military strength does not come from numbers or industrial capacity; it comes from the fact that no one — including the Reachers themselves — knows what happens when the full power of the druid sects is turned toward war.
The Warden Rangers
The Wardens of the Wood are the closest thing the Reaches have to a national defense force and a police service, and they serve as both simultaneously. Bands of Warden rangers patrol the roads between settlements, the edges of the Towering Wood, and the eastern border with Aundair. They respond to threats as they arise — bandits, aberrations, monstrous incursions from the deep Wood, Droaamite raiders crossing the Shadowcrags, and hostile wildlife that has wandered too close to farming communities. They carry news between villages, investigate crimes, mediate disputes, and function as the connective tissue that holds the nation together.
Rangers operate in small groups — typically four to eight members — drawn from a mix of humans, shifters, half-elves, and the occasional orc or half-orc with Gatekeeper ties. Most are trained in both martial and primal disciplines; a typical Warden patrol includes at least one member capable of casting druidic magic and at least one with extensive tracking experience. They carry weapons and armor produced in the eastern farmlands — metal gear of Aundairian quality, forged with primal techniques — though deep Wood patrols increasingly favor bronzewood, darkleaf, and hide armor crafted from the Towering Wood's own materials.
The Wardens also maintain a corps of awakened canines — the Bloodhounds — who work alongside rangers to investigate crimes and track fugitives. And Oalian's Voice, the network of awakened bird scouts and messengers, functions as a combined intelligence network and early warning system, allowing information to move across the Reaches faster than any conventional courier service.
The Warden rangers are effective, they are respected, and they are everywhere. But they are not numerous. The total active ranger force is a fraction of the size of any Five Nations army, and they are spread thin across a territory that includes one of the largest forests on the continent.
"The Aundairians have an army. We have a forest. Let them try to march through it." — attributed to a Warden elder at the Greenheart conclave, 959 YK
The Village Militias
Every village in the eastern Reaches maintains a militia — a force of farmers, woodcutters, herders, and tradespeople who train regularly and can be assembled on short notice. This is not a formality. Most Reachers believe it is only a matter of time before Aundair attempts to reclaim the territory, and the village militia is the first line of defense.
Militia members drill under the direction of their local druid counselor and any Warden rangers stationed in the area. They are equipped with Aundairian-style weapons inherited from before the secession or forged locally — spears, bows, axes, leather armor, and shields. Some communities have access to primal equipment crafted from the Wood's materials. Training emphasizes defense of fixed positions, ambush tactics, and cooperation with druidic forces — the militia holds the line while the druids shape the battlefield.
The militias are not coordinated at a national level. There is no central command, no unified chain of authority, and no mechanism for rapid mobilization across the entire nation. If a major threat materialized on the eastern border, the Wardens would carry word to Greenheart and the villages would respond — but the response would be a patchwork of local forces rallying to a crisis, not a disciplined army executing a battle plan. This worked during the secession because the sects united behind a single cause. Whether it would work again is an open question.
Primal Warfare
The Reaches' true military strength lies not in conventional arms but in the primal power wielded by the druid sects — a power that has never been fully tested and that no nation on Khorvaire fully understands.
During the secession, the druid sects united behind the cause of independence for the only time in living memory. Wardens, Ashbound, Children of Winter, Greensingers, and Gatekeepers fought together alongside the village militias, and the results were devastating. Aundairian border fortresses were leveled by earthquakes. Cavalry columns were swallowed by walls of thorns that erupted from the earth. Brelish forces that had crossed the Silver Lake to occupy Sylbaran, Greenblade, and Erlaskar were driven back — with unconfirmed reports that the waters of Lake Galifar itself rose against them. Treants marched with the Warden forces, and Aundairian soldiers who encountered them assumed they were fighting Oalian itself; in fact, the Great Druid never left the grove. The treant who led those forces — a child of the Eldeen Ada — was enough.
Fey allies answered the call of the Greensingers. Awakened dragonhawks were sent east into Aundairian territory, where they may still serve as a potential fifth column against Aundair's air forces. The deep Wood itself became a weapon — any army that entered the Towering Wood without the Wardens' blessing faced not only the sects but the forest's own hazards: feral gnolls, horrid animals, aberrations, fey, undead, and terrain that shifts with the will of the druids who guard it.
The Five Nations do not know what the Reaches are capable of. The Reachers do not know what they are capable of. The spells and abilities of individual druids provide a foundation, but primal warfare operates at a different scale — war rituals performed by full circles of druids, drawing on the power of manifest zones and the ancient force of the Wood itself. Even the Warden soldiers who participated in the secession battles cannot explain what happened. This uncertainty is the Reaches' most effective deterrent. No general in Fairhaven or Wroat is willing to risk an invasion when the defenders might be able to raise a lake.
The Towering Wood as Fortress
The Towering Wood itself is the Reaches' greatest defensive asset — and its greatest source of internal danger. No conventional army can operate within it. The forest is vast, ancient, and hostile to unauthorized entry. Any force that enters without the cooperation of the druid sects faces fey, fiends, aberrations, plants corrupted by the daelkyr Avassh, undead from the Gloaming, horrid animals whose hides turn blades, feral gnolls, and terrain that does not behave the way terrain is supposed to behave.
The Wardens patrol the buffer zone — a few miles of smaller woodland at the forest's edge where the trees are younger and the dangers are manageable. Beyond that buffer lies the Wood proper, where the capital W earns itself. The sects maintain their own territories within: the Ashbound patrol the northern reaches against fiends crossing the Shadowcrags from the Demon Wastes, the Children of Winter guard the borders of the Gloaming, the Gatekeepers watch the ancient seals that imprison the daelkyr in Khyber, and the Greensingers walk the Twilight Demesne where the fey hold sway. Each sect handles threats within its own domain, and the Wardens serve as the mediating force between them.
The practical consequence for travelers: the Towering Wood is not a place you enter casually. The Wardens will help you navigate the buffer zone. Beyond that, you are on your own unless you have earned the trust of a druid circle or a shifter tribe — and the deep Wood contains things that are dangerous even to the druids who live there.
The Eastern Border
The Aundairian border is the Reaches' primary external security concern. Most Reachers believe Aundair will try to reclaim the territory eventually, and the Wardens have made clear to both Aundair and Breland that they will defend the nation against any military threat — and have no interest in further discussions regarding borders, treaties, or resource rights.
The border follows the Wynarn River and the shores of Lake Galifar, with Warden ranger patrols maintaining a constant watch. Villages along the border drill their militias more frequently than those deeper in the farmlands, and the Wardens maintain their highest concentration of rangers in the eastern settlements. Varna — the largest city, with the strongest ties to Aundair — receives particular attention; the Wardens watch for Aundairian agents and pro-reconquest sympathizers alongside the more conventional threats.
The southern border with Droaam is a secondary concern. Monstrous raids cross the Shadowcrags periodically, and the Ashbound and Warden rangers in the southwestern reaches deal with these incursions as they arise — but the Daughters of Sora Kell's consolidation of power in Droaam has actually reduced the frequency of random raids compared to the pre-Droaam era, when Sora Maenya herself was the Terror of the Towering Woods.
Law and Order
There is no national police force, no centralized court system, and no prison network in the Eldeen Reaches. Justice is handled locally by village councils with the advice of their druid counselors and the enforcement support of Warden rangers. The Galifar Code of Justice provides a general framework that most eastern communities follow out of inherited custom, but interpretation varies sharply depending on the druidic sect a community has aligned with. Justice is swift, personal, and shaped by the community's relationship with the natural world.
Serious crimes — murder, arson, assault, theft — are investigated by Warden rangers, sometimes assisted by Bloodhound awakened canines. Punishment ranges from restitution and community service to exile, depending on the severity of the offense and the traditions of the village. Imprisonment is rare; the Reaches do not maintain jails. A dangerous criminal is more likely to be escorted to the edge of the territory and told not to come back than to be locked in a cell — though communities aligned with the Ashbound or Children of Winter may have harsher ideas about natural justice.
Sentinel Marshals from House Deneith are technically authorized to operate within the Reaches under Treaty law, but in practice most Reacher communities regard outside law enforcement with suspicion, and a Marshal pursuing a fugitive into the Towering Wood will need either Warden cooperation or extraordinary luck.
"We don't have prisons. We have the Wood. If someone is dangerous enough to need locking up, the Wood handles it." — overheard in Delethorn