The Moonlit Glades is the most prominent ray of light and hope in the bleak landscape of the Shadow Realm. Here the bearfolk dwell and tend their small patch of home against the corruption of Shadow. While the bearfolk are established enough to be considered natives of the Shadow Realm, they remain as vulnerable to the plane’s corruptive influence as any visitor from Midgard. That generations have lived and died within Shadow without falling to its temptation represents a minor miracle.
A proud people, the bearfolk originally hailed from Björnrike the Bear Kingdom in the Northlands of
Midgard. The ruler of Björnrike, Mesikämmen the Bear King, foresaw a terrible doom growing in the Shadow Realm that threatened all his people. He gathered his most trusted warriors and druids and charged them with an impossible task—to enter the Shadow Realm and fight back the corruption at its source. His brave subjects set forth on a forbidden shadow road without hesitation and never looked back.
The Moonswept North
The Moonlit Glades nestle deep in a black pine forest of the Shadow Realm’s far “north,” corresponding closely to the physical location of Björnrike. The moon of Midgard shines its face upon these glades as if blessing the bearfolk in their desperate struggle. Remote even by the ever-shifting standards of the Shadow Realm, the Moonlit Glades border on the tenebrous reflection of the Nieder Straits to the west. Shadow roads offer the only reliable and timely path of entry into the Glades, and the bearfolk have wrested control of these paths from the shadow fey. Stone and silver cairns mark the borders of the Moonlit Glades, and moonlight always bathes these markers. Bearfolk
druids conduct rituals at these stones, renewing the magic that holds Shadow’s touch at bay. Each bearfolk settlement similarly features a standing stone or cairn at its center, creating another layer of protection for its residents.
Given their relative safety from the more powerful denizens of the Shadow Realm, the bearfolk have nurtured their claim of the dark land. The Moonlit Glades serve as home to the most numerous pure resources in the Shadow Realm, and the bearfolk fight furiously to maintain them. Waterways in the Moonlit Glades run clear, glittering like rivers of molten silver beneath the moonlit sky. The spirits
that haunt rivers and streams in the rest of the Shadow Realm grow quiet and peaceful within the bearfolk’s borders, allowing travelers to drink unmolested. The bearfolk tribes maintain a strong druidic tradition, as well as worship of the Green Gods in their masks as Freyr and Freyja. These divine servants spend most of their time tending to the things that grow, producing fruits and
vegetables free of shadow corruption. Even the beasts of the Shadow Realm become more like their material counterparts here, and their meat is wholesome and nourishing. Few things rouse the ire of the bearfolk more quickly or more violently than poachers.
Settlements in the Moonlit Glades are small and dispersed, but each remains in close contact with the others. Runners, hunters, druids, and priests make regular rounds between the villages and the capital settlement of Solvheim, carrying news, requests for aid, and generally reinforcing close ties with the surrounding tribes. Originally the population of the Moonlit Glades was purely bearfolk, but over the years it has grown more diverse. Other races from the Kingdom of the Bear have come to the Shadow Realm, initially to maintain contact between the Shadow colony and their kin on Midgard,
but eventually many integrated into the existing bearfolk communities. Humans are the most prominent of these newcomer races, but a contingent of reaver dwarves who venerate bear totem spirits found their way here and decided to settle. The dwarves represent an invaluable asset to the Moonlit Glades, since they are among the few seafarers willing to sail on the fog-shrouded black waters of the Shadow Realm’s sea. Even these stalwart sailors don’t venture far from land, but their crafts allow the bearfolk and their allies unprecedented swift access to other areas of the Shadow Realm when the shadow roads become too dangerous or don’t lead to the proper destination. The rivers Styx and Lethe are far safer for the moonlit reavers to navigate, though, and they occasionally raid shadow fey villages along the waterways.
Some renegade shadow fey call the Moonlit Glades home, although they go to extraordinary lengths to prove their honorable intentions and win the bearfolk’s trust. Elfmarked also reside here, as well as a fair number of werebears scattered throughout the population. The Moonlit Glades have a calming effect on werebears, and even during the full moon these lycanthropes find their more destructive urges curbed. Some cursed werebears of Midgard long to discover the way to the Glades so they can live out their lives in righteous service with less fear of losing themselves to the curse.