The Younger Prince of Unauwen Conquers Eviellan and Rebels

The younger prince’s conquest of Eviellan transforms a family dispute over succession into a lasting political rupture between Unauwen and Eviellan. As Ristridin recounts to Tiuri, the prince first expands his authority as governor of the south, then defies King Unauwen by claiming Eviellan as his own kingdom. The king refuses to accept either the conquest or the division of his realm; the resulting struggle leaves the two brothers opposed and peace across the region increasingly fragile.

Dynastic rivalry and the southern governorship

King Unauwen had two sons, born on the same day. The elder, only minutes older, was Crown Prince of Unauwen, as custom required, and from the age of eighteen served as the realm’s deputy ruler and governor. The brothers were alike in appearance and intellect, but not in character. The Crown Prince resembled his father in his concern for the realm and its future subjects; the younger son was ambitious for power. Their difference in temperament sharpened the younger prince’s resentment of a succession determined by so small an age difference.

King Unauwen tried repeatedly to reconcile his sons and persuade the younger to accept his position. On one point, however, he would not yield: the realm must remain whole, ruled by the person entitled to succeed him. He eventually appointed the younger son governor of the southern Province of Rivers. The appointment seemed at first to offer a settlement, but the prince began to govern with growing independence, sometimes acting directly against his father’s wishes. The governorship gave the rivalry a territory and an office through which it could become a contest for power.

Conquest and declaration of kingship

The crisis escalated when the younger prince marched south into Eviellan, conquered it, and made it a province of Unauwen. Ristridin dates this conquest to seven years before his account and describes the prince as thereafter ruling Eviellan with a firm hand. The military success did not make the annexation legitimate in his father’s eyes. King Unauwen revoked the decision and ordered his son to withdraw from the conquered land immediately.

The prince answered the order by declaring himself king of Eviellan. He also claimed the title of ruler in his own right, placing himself on equal terms with his father and declaring that he no longer had to obey him. The declaration made the dispute more than a quarrel over a province: it directly challenged the king’s authority and the principle that Unauwen should remain indivisible. King Unauwen was deeply grieved and removed his son from the governorship. The younger prince refused to accept his dismissal, turning defiance into rebellion.

The brothers at war

The younger prince had supporters in the Province of Rivers, and their allegiance enabled him to resist the king’s decision. The Crown Prince came with an army to take over the governorship, and the opposing sides fought. Ristridin’s account makes the family cost plain: brothers fought against one another. The forces representing Unauwen, led by the elder son, prevailed, but victory did not restore the earlier condition of the realm. Ristridin says that peace and friendship had since disappeared from parts of Unauwen.

The younger prince remained the Lord of Eviellan, while the father’s attempt to remove him from office had failed to end the wider conflict. The sequence leaves a sharp contrast between formal victory and durable settlement: the Crown Prince wins the fight over the governorship, but his father’s hope of keeping the realm whole and the family reconciled is not fulfilled. The younger prince’s separate claim to kingship continues to shape relations between the two territories.

Unsettled borders and the account’s wider reach

Although there was no war in name, fighting continued along the border and in the south of Unauwen. The Lord of Eviellan sent bands of warriors into his father’s land to stir unrest. Fighters from both Eviellan and Unauwen also travelled along Dagonaut’s Third Great Road, where they clashed and damaged the surrounding estates, setting villages alight. The dynastic rebellion therefore had consequences beyond the two rival rulers: their unresolved conflict endangered the neighboring realm of Dagonaut as well.

Ristridin connects the political history to the dangers encountered by Dagonaut’s knights. He describes pursuing a band of Eviellan warriors along the Third Great Road and into the Vorgóta Forest, where he lost their trail and eventually met a hostile force. In a related account, he says that King Unauwen sent Edwinem to drive a band out of the forest. These episodes show how the prince’s refusal to submit sustained violence far from the original contest over succession. Told to Tiuri as background to the regional conflict, the rebellion explains why raids and armed encounters persist even without a declared war.