Archsage Yanvalis
The latest in a line of Archsage’s stretching back thousands of years, Yanvalis is the 268th Archsage of the Church. To his followers and admirers, Yanvalis leads the Church with humility, wisdom and a strong but stead hand, with his devotion to the Church and its teaching unwavering and his righteous judgement of the Church’s enemies unfaltering. To his enemies, however, Yanvalis is a ruthless zealot and an aspiring tyrant, a man who has taken advantage of a weakened royal throne to consolidate his own power, rather than to strengthen any position of the Church. And it is true that, even amongst the Church’s more traditionalist and conservative positions, Yanvalis holds extreme views. The Church has always been opposed to the wide spread practice of magic, due to their belief that magic was created by the demons who opposed the Gods in the war of creation (ironic really, considering that, to the trained eye at least, there is virtually no difference between miracles of the Church and common sorcery), and many previous Archsgaes have condemned magic and ordered purges against magic users. But Yanvalis’ purge is unlike any seen in a thousand years, not since The Great Church Imperium of Archsage Naevaris. There are also mutterings that Yanvalis’ ascension may not have been entirely legitimate, rumours of bribery and the suspicious death of his predecessor sway many. Although, one cannot be sure if the death of the previous Archsage was down to foul play due to the Church doctorine on the sanctity of the body, a law forbidding the disturbance of the bodies of deceased Archsages, laid out by Yanvalis’s predecessor after his own murky rise to power. Still, Yanvalis does not heed the hearsay of idle gossips. He has absolute authority within the Church, more than enough support from its members and, most importantly, he has the ear of the Prince, who, what with his father’s terrible sickness, seems poised to take the throne.
