Current Monarch : Lady Kathryn Charles, Regent / The Council of Nine 

Current Voice : Regent Kathryn (Kate) Charles of House Swan

Of all the Ten Realms, Oxford is the most divided; quite literally in recent months. Whilst rulership ostensibly belongs the Regent and the nobles of the Council of Nine (the nine Earls, Countesses and Counts who rule the Nine Counties of Oxford; Ashton, Barton, Elvesham, Fencott, Gosford, Medway, Newbury, Oxenford and Winterbrook), a vast swathe of land under the dominion of a lich under the control of the late Regent, Earl Samantha Hawksmoor, bisects the realm. Those lands still nominally aligned with the Council lie to the east, while the isolated Eorling of Elvesham, openly opposing the former Regent and the Lich Lord, lies to the far west, cut off from the rest of Oxford by the ravaged Blightlands held by the undead.  

Within those lands not withering away from the undead blight, there is yet more division. Many of Oxford are content to ignore the Lich Lord’s depredations, as long as his forces are not turned against their own lands. There are even those who openly endorse Earl Hawksmoor’s heinous alliance with the foul undead, hoping to gain lands as the Lich Lord invades Cornwall to the south and Elmet to the north, and seeking to reclaim past glories. Standing in direct and open opposition to these plans are a scattering of dissenting nobles and exiled Oxfordians, led by the current appointed Regent. It remains to be seen who will prevail, and to which side the various nobles will turn, as war blights the realm.

There has been a history of antagonism between Oxford and its neighbour to the east, Wessex, with the former refusing to open its borders to Wessex troops marching to Cornwall during the war with the First King. While this ill-feeling had died down in the years since, it has flared dramatically with the former Regent’s ill-judged actions over the previous months; Oxfordian and Wessexian forces now build on the border, ready to repel whatever mortal or undead fiend steps foot across in either direction - war seems inevitable. To the north, the already weakened realm of Elmet has lost leagues to the invading undead armies of the Lich Lord, and seeks aid to both defend itself and support the many refugees fleeing the devastation. To the south, the Cornish once again take up arms against an undead threat, holding their own against the invaders with raw courage and deadly skill. Oxford’s list of friends rapidly grows thin.

Internally, many of Oxford continue their lives as they always have. For them, Oxford remains a realm of grasslands and forests, a place of academic achievement, of progressive thinking and learned research. Were it not for the undead plague, Oxford would retain such a reputation in the other Ten Realms, that of a bastion of civilisation and culture, a realm where education and refinement balance well the courtly intrigue, social one-upmanship and intricate political manoeuvrings known, unofficially, as ‘The Dance’, that are ever the hallmark of that land.

As it is, most outsiders view the Oxford of recent times as an out of touch bully, willing to debase itself with foul necromancy and indulge atrocities so long as it allows them to reclaim past glory and save face. Where once the realm was considered honourable enough to maintain strong relationships with the Ælvhen folk of Elvesham, now most of the Ælvhenkin have withdrawn into seclusion within the Eorling, or into the mists of the forest itself, save for those who dwell in the southern forest county of Winterbrook. Where once Oxford University was considered the eminent centre of learning across the known world, it slowly becoming viewed as a place of damnation, of cast off morals and ethical bankruptcy, where the ends justify the means, no matter how foul, and brother attacks brother. Oxford has fallen far, and there is no telling how much more it will lose in this fight for the soul of the realm, nor that Lady Kate and her fledgling 'Council in Exile' can divert its march towards doom.