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THE PEOPLE
The Algars, of course, are merely another branch of the numerous
Alorn people and are similar to their northern cousins. They are tall,
fair and generally an open people, honest in their dealings and ' firm
in their friendships and alliances. They dwell for the most part in
large wagons in which they follow the wanderings of their herds.
An Algarian city can rise in the space of an hour - a well-ordered
city of tents and pavilions, neatly laid out on streets, and the whole
surrounded by a wall of poles which are carried under their wagons.
Each of these moveable cities represents an entire Algarian clan
usually numbering up to a thousand armed and mounted men and
their families. The herds of each clan are vast and are owned in
common. As with most Alorns, feuds among them are not
uncommon, but the last clan-war took place at about the end of the third
millennium. Since that time disputes have been settled by ritualized
single combat.
There are two major peculiarities about Algarian society' The first
is the presence in the hill country at the south of the grassland of a
vast stone fortress known simply as 'The Stronghold' which is
garrisoned but not actually occupied. The second is the continuous
mounted patrols maintained around the perimeters of the Vale of
Aldur, a beautiful but uninhabited area in the extreme south of the
kingdom. Both the garrison at the Stronghold and the patrols in the
Vale are comprised of contingents from all of the clans.
THE HISTORY OF THE ALGARS
Once again we see an Alorn people who were separated from their
fellows at the time of the disintegration of the empire of Cherek
Bear-shoulders. The legendary founder of the nation was Algar
Fleet-foot, second son of old King Cherek. Like Drasnia and Riva,
Algaria was populated at the end of the second millennium. There
appear to have been large herds of wild horses and cattle on the
Algarian plains, and the people were soon mounted upon the horses
and their own herds had mingled with the wild cattle, creating a
new breed much sturdier than the somewhat scrubby Alorn cattle
they had brought with them, while not so totally unmanageable as
the wild cattle indigenous to the plains.
There is evidence that a prolonged series of skirmishes with
Angarak raiding parties took place along the eastern escarpment
of Algaria with always the same predictable results. The Angarak
columns were, naturally, on foot and were quite simply cut to pieces
by the mounted Algars. The ability of the Algars to move rapidly
and to call upon other clans for reinforcements as required made the
Angarak penetration suicidal. No hint of motive can be discovered
to explain why the Angaraks continued these hopeless expeditions
for a thousand years.
During the fourth millennium Tolnedran emissaries attempted to
conclude treaties with the Algars as they had with the other
kingdoms of the west, but suffered a full five hundred years of
frustration, since they were unable even to identify the Algarian King
often negotiating for years with a man who turned out to be a mere
clan-chief. When they finally did manage to single out the true king
of the Algars, the venerable Cho-Dom the old, the wily old bandit
came to the negotiation pavilion armed with copies of every treaty