Alter Aeon The Great Library

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Note - as with any topic, researchers should question the reliability
and veracity of these texts.  The library's aim is to preserve
documents, not verify accuracy.

AABN:  79108
Title: a book entitled, 'The History of Pellam, volume 1'

This is a book that has seen better days.  Mold grows on the hard cover,
and much of the beginning of the book has taken water damage, making it
difficult to read.  It is impossible to determine who the author is.

From what you can gather flipping through the first portion of the book, it
is supposed to detail the history of a noble family called House Pellam. 
Its origins are unclear, as you can find both the Rubicon Principality and
the Duchy of Feiran mentioned early in the book, but no concrete evidence
as to which nation House Pellam once belonged.  There are snippets of war
and intrigue, shifting allegiances and barbarian intrusions.  As you glance
over the last event, the barbarian intrusions of House Pellam  lands, the
text becomes less spotty and more legible.

An orcish horde overran the fertile valley where House Pellam ruled. 
Apparently at this point in time, House Pellam owed its allegiance to
Avalon, but the kingdom failed drive the barbarians back and Lord Antioch
Pellam, the family's patriarch, essentially became a landless minor noble.

"Lord Pellam had heard of the exploits on the faraway Westering Islands,
which were in the process of being tamed by hardy colonists and
frontiersmen after the portals linking the islands together had been
reactivated.  He decided to take a chance and seek fortune on the still
largely unexplored island of Sloe.  Taking his family and servants, he made
the long journey to Ralnoth, then across Archais and Kordan, and finally
arrived in Vemarken.

Vemarken was already established as strong presence on the island,
embroiled in local politics and governed by entrepreneurs who enjoyed their
freedom and weren't eager for a family of so-called nobles to settle down
there.  Lord Pellam headed west and encountered the village of Marguera on
the west coast of Sloe.  There he toured the village and found it an
appealing place to put down roots, but the village elders were suspicious
of the lord and his motives and politely asked his family to leave.

When Lord Pellam pondered on what to do next, he brought up something that
the village elders had mentioned in passing during his tour of Marguera to
the village elders, and that was the condition of the primary crop, quinoa.
Apparently the plants were yielding less seeds year after year, but they
had also said that they were unable to expand their fields as it would
leave them to more exposed to bandits and wild animals.  Raiders from the
nearby towns of Barquisimeto and Bandera Azul were already trying  to steal
from their outlying fields.

Lord Pellam had an idea.  He told the Marguerans about an old farming
technique used in his homeland that involved the use of domesticated
ankhegs help fertilize the fields.  Lord Pellam asked that his family be
permitted to stay with the promise to provide and handle a tame ankheg
during the next growing season.  If the village elders liked the results,
then his family would be allowed to stay-otherwise, they would have to
leave Marguera.  The villagers were skeptical but ultimately agreed.

While the rest of the family settled down east of Marguera, Lord Pellam
returned to Ralnoth and hired adventurers to obtain an wild ankheg egg. 
Once he had one, he then recruited an experienced handler of exotic animals
to tame and train the hatchling to accept his commands.  By the time Lord
Pellam had returned to Marguera with his trained ankheg, the new growing
season of quinoa was about to begin.

The ankheg was instructed to construct burrows under the fields, wherein it
stayed most of the time.  It was fed carrion by the villagers, and even
attacked dangerous predators that wandered too close to the village at Lord
Pellam's command.  The quinoa harvest was so bountiful that the village
elders and wise men not only unanimously agreed to let Lord Pellam and his
family stay, they also swore fealty to his house.  The village was renamed
in honor of his family, and the noble family of Pellam had a small castle
constructed east of the village wherein they dwelt thereafter that bore the
former name of the village: Fort Marguera."

Water has damaged the latter part of the book, making it unreadable.