The Machaire line has ruled Glathnor since nearly its founding. Long have the Kings and even Queens been of Machaire descent. The first remembered King of that line being Colwyn Machaire who died in battle leaving his son of barely 18 years to rule in his place. Granth was not Glathnor's best King, but as time would show he was not its worst either. In time he came to understand his duties and gave the land four healthy princes to love. The first, Talien they would loose in battle before he saw his 22nd birthday, The second was lost to a fever the same year. The third would be crowned but would die childless in his thirties, at which point Halban was crowned.

        While not the greatest of Kings Halban Machaire was more prepared for his place on the throne than his father had been, and so in many ways made a better King than his sire had been. During his reign he kept peace in the land, and spent gold on making roads better and improving the lot of the peasants in his realm. He gifted the kingdom with five daughters before a son was born, but alas that son would never see the throne. Instead he married his eldest daughter, Michaela, off to a distant cousin who was descended from the royal line and it was her son who would be the next King.

        Over the next several generations the land was a peaceful place. Many kings lived well into their old age and many sons stepped aside for their own sons to take the throne. There were any number of reasons for this, some never wanted to rule, still others thought the land would be better off with a younger king. There were even health considerations in at least one father stepping aside in favor of his son to take the throne. Throughout these years the land prospered, the people flurished, and the happiness seemed the right of all those who lived in Glathnor reguardless of their standing.

        Then it all came tumbling down around them. Many were slaughtered or taken captive as the invaders from the south swept in over now peace-loving Glathnor. The land was conquered and many of the royal family slain. They missed two children, however. Two who had been away from the castle visiting an aunt beyond the city. Two they never learned about until it was too late.

        Colwyn was barely 12 at the time, and young Thali was only a young girl of 9. But they were all that was left of the Machaire royal line. The brother and sister had lost older and younger siblings in the castle that day and clung to each other as children are wont to do. Their aunt had them swiftly spirited out of Glathnor and raised in the court of a distant cousin such that the children would know what it was their lives were meant to be like.

        Colwyn was trained as a knight and eventually married the daughter of a noble house. Thali married one of their guardian's youngest sons and lived well into her old age with many grandchildren. Colwyn's children were all raised up in the court where their father and aunt had grown up in exile, and in turn their children as well. Colwyn's grandson Thales was the first to return to Glathnor and to begin the gathering of support. A younger son he would never have been king while his older brothers lived, but it was for his families rightful place he sought not his own reward.

        Soon he was joined by a younger brother and the pair worked tirelessly their sons taking after them generation after generation. The family line was kept strong, their daughters sent back to be raised up and married into the family, the sons taking distant cousins as wives. When the time came it was a man named Kylan who became King, a strong older man of some forty years who sat upon the Machaire throne once more. Seven strong sons came into Glathnor with him, three died in battle taking back the castle.

        His son Bryod took the throne after Kylan's death and married the daughter of one of a second cousin. The pair brought the laughter of Machaire children to the Throne Hall of Alithir once more. Four tall strong sons and six daughters caused the halls of the old castle to ring with the joy of children whose ancestors had raised the walls from the stones of the cliff over which it looked. Byrod had been the youngest son, the one never meant for the throne, but at his father's deathbed it was he who stood foward when one by one his three older brothers all stepped away from rulership.

        It was Byrod's first son Nilen who married the daughter of one of his grandfather's sister's children. Their only child Colain was married to his cousin Fiona and bore only one son, Aidan. Aidan took the throne only a year ago upon his father's very sudden and unexpected death. Fiona was a relatively young Queen of barely thirty-six years, loved throughout the city and the realm, her husband a few years older and greatly respected.

        She often visited poor villages all around Glathnor bringing presents for children and gathering orphans to bring back to the castle to be raised as ward of the crown. It was on one such trip, accompanied rather unusually by her husband, that an arrow pierced his breast and he fell from his horse to lie in the road. None can ever truely be sure why King Garan was killed, for the peasants rent the killer limb from limb in their hatred and sorrow at the loss of their King. Who would kill any man in front of his very own wife, and a wife so beloved by all the people of the realm.

        News of his death fled back to Alithir like a dark cloud leading a terrible storm and Aidan was shocked. His father dead, and worry for his mother nearly breaking his heart. But Fiona was truely loved by all the peasants and he was sure that his mother would return to the castle safely. He was, however, deeply troubled that upon her return she brought with her the young woman who was to be his wife. A young woman he barely knew at all.

        Of course he knew the Duke of Kentigern and naturally knew that the older man had a daughter, but he could not recall having seen the young woman at court. He could not even say he rightly knew her name until his mother introduced them at the signing of their marriage decree. A week later, barely the second after Aidan's crowning, the two were married. Immediately afterward Aliana was crowned as the Queen and Fiona retired to different quarters leaving those that had belonged to herself in Aliana's possession while her son was moved into the quarters his father once occupied.

        The young couple was given only one night together, one night which they spent talking rather than as was intended. For they knew barely anything of the other despite their attraction, and so it was that their marriage lay between them unconsumated for long weeks as they both learned their duties. But those stolen moments where they were able to share brief words or a bit of laughter made the moment all the sweeter when, finally, their marriage was made whole with a union of their bodies.