“Let Them Climb”

House Bocksten has held its ground for generations, stubborn as the stone beneath its feet. Their ancestral seat, Bockfort, stands astride a narrow mountain pass in Eastholde’s eastern reaches, where steep slopes and unforgiving terrain have long made their lands difficult to conquer and harder still to govern. The Bockstens are a hardy folk, raised on hard work, rough weather and the conviction that a thing worth having is worth fighting for.

They are not known for courtly manners or elaborate schemes, and their patience for either is limited. A Bocksten remembers a slight, honours a bargain and seldom abandons a quarrel before it is settled. Their herds graze the high valleys, their quarrymen cut stone from the mountains, and their warriors defend their holdings with the same unyielding determination. Others may call them crude, obstinate or ill-tempered. The Bockstens have never been particularly troubled by what others call them.

The mountain pass has endured sieges, feuds and the passing of Dukes. Through it all, Bockfort has remained theirs. And should the day come when someone attempts to take it, they will find the Bockstens every bit as difficult to move as the mountains they call home.