Echoes of Pagalan
Step beyond the pages of The Pagalan Chronicles. Here we share insights into the lore of Pagalan, behind-the-scenes glimpses of writing, and reflections on the craft of fantasy and science fiction.
Ancient Maps vs. Morganuke’s Age: How Pagalan Changed Through the Ages
Pagalan three thousand years before Morganuke’s timeline
One of the most fascinating mysteries in The Pagalan Chronicles lies not only in the people and battles, but in the maps themselves. When Morganuke uncovered ancient Patronese knowledge, he discovered that the Pagalan of his time was not the same world his ancestors first set foot upon.
Pagalan during Morganuke’s timeline
The Ancient Maps of Arrival
When the Patronese first arrived on Pagalan, their maps showed a very different landscape. Vast continents stretched unbroken, coastlines ran smoothly across the seas, and enormous polar ice sheets pressed far into the northern and southern lands. Rivers, mountain ranges, and fertile plains sprawled where now only waves roll.
The Patronese recorded this world with precision, mapping stances of territory and detailing cities that have long since sunk into memory. These ancient charts became not just navigational tools, but a testament to what Pagalan once was before calamity reshaped it.
A World Remade by Catastrophe
By the time of Morganuke Beldere, centuries later, those maps no longer matched reality. Large areas of land had disappeared beneath the sea, swallowed by cataclysmic shifts that tore apart whole regions. Islands stood where continents once stretched. Harbours bustled along jagged coastlines that had once been wide, fertile valleys.
The polar ice sheets had shrunk dramatically, retreating into distant extremes. Their loss exposed new passageways and seas, altering climate and trade, while legends whispered that the melting revealed tunnels and hidden ruins buried since the Patronese first arrival.
Why the Differences Matter
The contrast between these maps is more than geography—it is evidence of the Age of Calamity. Somewhere between the Patronese arrival and Morganuke’s time, Pagalan endured upheavals so immense they reshaped the planet itself. These events, linked to ancient wars and the misuse of portal technology, left scars visible not only in terrain but in memory.
For Morganuke and his allies, the discovery of these differences was more than scholarly curiosity. They pointed to lost homelands, hidden ruins beneath the sea, and the possibility that Denesthear itself lay concealed by the shifting world.
The Legacy of the Maps
Studying these ancient and modern charts side by side reveals Pagalan as a living world of change, mystery, and survival. To hold an old Patronese map is to glimpse a forgotten earth. To walk in Morganuke’s time is to live in the aftermath of a world forever altered.
And within those differences lies the key to understanding not only where the Patronese came from—but where Pagalan’s destiny is still heading.
Pagalan in the Time of Morganuke
When we speak of Pagalan’s long and storied past, few names rise with the same mixture of awe, sorrow, and wonder as Morganuke Beldere. His age was not merely a chapter in history, it was a crossroads where myth and destiny walked hand in hand.
A World at War and in Waiting
Pagalan in Morganuke’s day was a realm divided. Across its seas and fractured lands, the great war with the Cordinens raged, fuelled by treachery and the dark hand of Patronese defectors. Cities like Cryantor, Lobos, and Ventor became battlegrounds, while distant islands such as Banton and Cadmun stood as bastions of resistance. Every community, from the fishing villages to the fortified castles—felt the weight of conflict and the uncertainty of survival.
Yet beyond the clash of swords and the thunder of cavalry, there pulsed something older: the whisper of Denesthear. Long thought a legend, this hidden Patronese homeland, veiled beneath the Nebulee seas, was said to hold truths from an age before the great calamities reshaped Pagalan. For most, it was a tale for dreamers. For Morganuke, it became a destiny he could neither refuse nor fully grasp.
The Burden of Bloodlines
Morganuke was no ordinary island farm boy. Though raised among the simple folk of Banton, he carried within him the blood of House Martilismore, one of Denesthear’s ruling lineages. His silver hair and red eyes marked him as Patronese, but it was his visions, his strange connection to the Nebulee, and the emerald sword that confirmed his place in a greater saga.
In these times, lineage could be a curse as much as a gift. Morganuke longed for peace, for the embrace of Melinor and the laughter of friends. Yet the call of his ancestry demanded more: that he journey across hostile lands, seek lost maps and hidden tunnels, and confront the truth of a civilization splintered between High Orders and rebels.
Allies, Tests, and Betrayals
Pagalan in Morganuke’s age was not a place where any one person could survive alone. He travelled with Melinor, Lengrond, Chanterly, and Calarel, each carrying burdens of their own. He fought beside General Yaloop, Commander Craden Brenadere, and Captain Fraytar, men of iron will but conflicting loyalties. And always, he faced mistrust, Epleon councils branding him heretic, Patronese rulers questioning his worth, and enemies eager to exploit his power.
But it was also a time of resilience. Cities rebuilt after devastation. Armies of once-divided nations formed fragile alliances. Families clung to hope even when the future seemed to crumble into mist.
The Legacy of Morganuke’s Time
What, then, was Pagalan in the time of Morganuke? It was a land of thresholds: between old and new, faith and doubt, exile and belonging. It was an age when the fate of the world rested not in armies alone, but in the choices of a young man torn between the quiet life he yearned for and the impossible destiny thrust upon him.
For readers, revisiting Pagalan in these years is to step into a world both perilous and wondrous. A place where ships like the Aurora braved impossible seas, where hidden tunnels led to forgotten knowledge, and where even in the shadow of betrayal, the bonds of love and friendship glimmered like torches against the dark.
Morganuke’s age reminds us that history is never just about battles won or lost—it is about the people who dared to dream of more, even when the cost of that dream was everything.
Pagalan in the Time of Nigel & Samir: The First Patronese Legacy
Three thousand year before Morganuke was found abandoned as a baby on the Island of Banton, Pagalan stood at a different threshold. It was the age of Nigel Telismore and Samir Camberlain, two names etched into the foundations of Patronese history. Their generation did not inherit stability. Instead, they were the architects of survival, forced to navigate a land where every alliance, every choice, could decide the fate of their people.
The First Arrival
The Patronese did not come to Pagalan quietly. They stepped through the torch-ring with ships, technologies, and hopes that glittered as brightly as their silver hair. Yet to the indigenous tribal peoples, they were strangers, red-eyed interlopers carrying a resonance that stirred the stones themselves. From the first moments, there was suspicion, awe, and the constant threat of misunderstanding turning into war.
Nigel and Samir, distant ancestors to Morganuke, emerged as voices in this uncertain dawn. Nigel was cautious, a steady figure who weighed decisions with care, seeking to hold his people together against internal and external pressures. Samir, though younger, carried a sharper fire, his words often urgent, his visions pressing forward, his conviction that survival meant hard choices.
High Order and Low
It was in their time that the first great schism took root: the division of High Order and Low Order. To preserve what they believed was strength, some councillors decreed that bloodlines mattered, that resonance affinity must be guarded. Nigel’s caution lent weight to restraint, yet Samir pushed hardest for restrictions, convinced it was the only way to keep the Patronese strong.
This decree left scars that would never fully heal. The High Order bore the burden of command, while the Low Order carried resentment in silence. Generations later, that divide still lingered like an old wound beneath Tramstell’s shining walls.
Building Tramstell
Despite their divisions, the Patronese built. Tramstell rose from stone and trellisite, a city shaped by both necessity and vision. Its archive halls began as little more than shelters for memory-stones, yet grew into vast chambers where history itself seemed alive. The city’s gates were sealed, partly in fear, partly in hope that one day they might open on safer terms.
Nigel and Samir walked those streets not as distant ancestors but as men of flesh and struggle, bearing the weight of decisions that would echo for centuries. They brokered uneasy truces with the tribes, sent expeditions across the ridges, and carried the voices of their people into council chambers that often rang with discord.
Why Their Age Still Matters
The time of Nigel and Samir is more than a prologue to the ages and generation that followed It is the crucible where the Patronese identity was forged. Every choice they made, to divide Orders, to seal the gates, to build Tramstell as both fortress and sanctuary, shaped the path of those who came after.
For readers of The Pagalan Chronicles Origins, their story is a reminder that history is not distant. The debates they began would still resonate in the ages to follow. Their words, preserved in crystalline archives, still whisper through the corridors where new generations seek answers.
Nigel and Samir did not see themselves as legends. They were Patronese people trying to balance fear, hope, and survival. Yet their legacy endures, not as relics of the past, but as living voices in the stones of Tramstell.