Followers of Zolan

The Followers of Zolan are a mercenary company in the Raphael Efsanesi ("The Legend of Raphael") campaign, one of the four powers of the streets of White City beside the army. They are organised like an army rather than a gang, sell their fighters for pay, and use force to collect debts; man for man they are the strongest of the four. Picolo says they also run the city's arena.¹²³

Founder

Fazon, the company's leader in White City, says that its founder, Zolan the Undying, has not been home since a powerful mage cursed him and misspoke: instead of "may you never die in peace" he said "may you never die at home". Zolan is about a hundred and fifty years old and does not age. He keeps a training camp in the forest, and the company is present in many cities.⁴

Fazon also says that the trial in Zolan's tomb copies the way Zolan himself was once tested by the gods, and that an offering there may be an object, a task or a test. A winged avatar of Zolan rose from the tomb to fight beside the assassin Raphael against an orc ambush.⁵⁶

The arena

The company's base in the city lies beneath what looks from outside like a butcher's shop, a street below a garrison post: a sunken fighting pit fenced with wire, with seats rising around it like an amphitheatre. Fazon, a human, meets visitors in the outer rooms. The fighters in the arena are not the company's own mercenaries but sailors passing through the city, and bets change hands on them.⁷⁸

The war on Kalel

Fazon told Raphael he was sure no agents had got into his ranks, that he did not trust the assassins of Kalel, and that hired soldiers may work for different sides of a war. He agreed to supply three experienced leaders, twenty-five soldiers and mages for Raphael's attack on Kalel, partly on credit and in return for future guard work at Raphael's inn. He would not bring his goliaths on a secret job, fearing a loud open assault would draw the city's defenders.⁹¹⁰¹¹

An officer called Half or Par commanded the soldiers with his brother. After the battle he came to Raphael bloodied, with an enemy mage's head in his hand, to say that the inn was his. Fazon himself went in invisible beside Raphael and was badly wounded fighting Naros.¹²¹³¹⁴

Relations with the authorities

Fazon says the company is on good terms with the local authorities and takes on work when the soldiers are not enough. Yet he refused to attack imperial soldiers on the high road for Raphael: the company fights the Empire only when it has no other choice, and he recalled a siege of three months in the Free Ports that followed the killing of four or five legionaries. In the end his men only smuggled the stolen saddle into the city.¹⁵¹⁶¹⁷

A breach of the rules

Spoiler: A comrade lostRevealSpoils: Raphael Efsanesi #4; Raphael Efsanesi #5 · Say what you have read

Taf, a half-orc of the company, was hired by Raphael as a guard for a job, on condition that his pay go to Fazon if he died. He was killed by the mage Falstad. Killing a comrade on a job is the gravest breach of the company's rules: Fazon touched the thick book of rules and performed a special summoning, the first in his fifteen years as leader, and said Zolan would speak with the dead warrior's soul to learn how he died.¹⁸¹⁹

Fazon gave Raphael one of only three amulets he knew of that could hide him from Zolan's questioning, and told him not to kill Falstad but to report where he was, since judgement belonged to Zolan. When the questioning came, about thirty followers emptied Raphael's inn and drew a protective circle on the floor, and Fazon shielded Raphael with his own body.^20212223

Later

Derek Sunshield, seeking to clean up the city, said he would no longer tolerate the Zolans, who worked for anyone who paid; he also hired Fazon and his men for a month, promising Fazon a family name and lands if he survived.²⁴²⁵

Spoiler: Later eventsRevealSpoils: Raphael Efsanesi #8 · Say what you have read

After the emperor was assassinated, Raphael told Derek that the Zolans were no fools and would not have taken part in such a deed. Under the military rule that followed, some of the company were exiled.²⁶²⁷