Douglas Niles: Winterheim

Kerrick smiled thinly and reached out to take her hand. “I think that I don’t want to go. I’ve found a new home,” he said. “I’ve made my life and my destiny here, and here I will remain.”

The Kingdom of Icereach existed for more than five hundred years, a unique arrangement of peaceful coexistence between ogres and men, unlike any other time in the history of Krynn. Winterheim was its capital, but great centers of the kingdom were to be found in Guilderglow and the bustling harbor city of Brackenrock, which came to be known as the “Tarsis of the South.”

The sons and grandsons of Grimwar Bane, proud half-ogres mingling their paternal heritage with the gentle influence of Queen Bruni, ruled Winterheim for many years, a dynasty that prospered through five centuries of freedom and riches. Through the auspices of the traders of Brackenrock, the ogres traded their gold with the empire of Istar and other realms of far-off Ansalon. In return, the Icereach imported foodstuffs and silks, wines and jewels, and magic aplenty, a steady stream of wonders that the frozen southland of Krynn had never before known.

In Brackenrock, it was the half-elf prince, Coraltop Redfist Bayguard Fallabrine, named for his grandfather and his adopted uncle, who established the rule that saw peace and prosperity among the Arktos for long centuries, long after his beloved mother had passed away in the limited time span granted to those of pure human blood. Her memory dwelled in the annals of history forever, and her husband, called Kerrick the Messenger, lived to a ripe old age of nearly six hundred years.

He might have even lived longer if not for the Cataclysm. That devastating event wracked the Icereach as it did so much of Krynn, bringing forth the glaciers that sealed away Winterheim and Brackenrock and all those other places remote in memory. The kingdom of Icereach vanished, and the glaciers and the Icewall were all that could be seen.

Those magical places remain beneath ice and snow, still warmed by Krynn’s internal fires. Perhaps, someday, their brightness will once again emerge to illuminate the world.