Introduction
The Feronian League is a confederation of small states and corporate polities that cohabitate around Saffron and Scarlet, the coolest of The Bary's stars.
Sometimes dubbed "The Alizarin Twins," Saffron and Scarlet engage in a very close orbital dance, and there is reason to believe that some early chance encounter disrupted their formation into a single, larger main sequence star in the past. At present, the two stars continue to fall towards each other, shedding gravitational waves. Further orbital decay will eventually result in a contact binary, and perhaps a luminous red nova, frying the immediate vicinity a billion years from now and creating a new, unitary star.
All planets major and minor within the Saffron-Scarlet system orbit in a circumbinary fashion, such that the twin stars are often considered one stellar object, with their proximity only becoming apparent to the naked eye within the stellar system itself. Normally hostile to life, a red dwarf star in a binary configuration offers its biological denizens a reprieve. The gravitational dance of the two stars slows their rotation rate, quieting their solar winds.
The loosely associated political entities of this system are scattered upon the savanna world of Leire and its moon Feronia, on the arid planet Sebek, and orbiting above the fiery binary minor planets of Cinder and Cindra. Various deep space outposts also exist.
As a political entity, the League is little more than a free-trade pact with a policing and defense mechanism bolted on. Mercantile, adept, and pragmatic, but few in number and economically deficient alone, the League’s microstates saw incursions of foreign explorers as a sign they needed to work together in some way, lest they be overrun and conquered. The League was only ten years old when the first international treaties governing commerce and trade were signed.
The League maintains a very well-trained marine corps that is feared by all but the Republic (and then only as a matter of numbers). They are particularly accomplished in breach and boarding procedures. Their “chauffeurs” in the Feronian Guard patrol hyperlane exits and orbital spheres, where they take a watchful and judicature posture. The now common concept of outsourcing orbital interdiction and bounty hunting to privateers came from Feronian corporations seeking logistically simple ways to protect their assets.
Worlds
Leire is a breadbasket with a minimal axial tilt, providing a year-long dry and mild climate ripe for luxury agricultural products. Ambassadors and dignitaries often remark upon its pastoral qualities. The planet is known particularly for its wineries and distilleries. Before the recent advent of FTL travel, fermentation and distillation occurred in transit to other systems, as it took a good few years to make the journey. The pre-hyperlane vintage is highly prized among connoisseurs.
The planet Sebek is in the process of becoming tidally locked, and its long days are punishing while its night side is increasingly frigid. Sebek’s geology is surprisingly differentiated for an arid world, from rolling sand dunes, to rocky canyons that shelter aquifers from torrid heat, to salt pans, ancient riverbeds, and dry, white, red, or indigo mountains. Springs and oases are vital to the people of Sebek, and have been steadily disappearing since first settlement and record two thousand years ago. Consequently, the old nomadic lifestyle through the mid-latitudes has largely vanished and populations have moved poleward. Thorium and uranium deposits are significant on Sebek and coveted by the League’s armed forces.
The accords founding the League were signed on Feronia, Leire’s only moon. Government business is handled remotely, with no centralization to speak of, except for those capitals of the many individual states themselves.
Cinder and Cindra, in spite of being binary, barren lava worlds impossible to live or even exist upon, are rich in resources like aluminum and titanium oxides which can be stripped by mining robots and transported to orbital forges efficiently.
Feronian Aptitudes
Feronian microstates all have their own cultural eccentricities with economic conditions that feedback onto their histories. Some are lands of agrarian and pastoral toil, others are megacorporate combines of fire and steel, and some are subsistence and nomadic societies that have remained relatively unchanged since their landfall. The common thread between these polities is a diligent work ethic among the masses.
Feronian voidfarers are frequently rough and tumble; those who will get into the bowels of a ship to keep her running with nothing but a toothbrush, some canvas, and a few spare bolts. Feronian ingenuity is frequently unmatched. When a ship is in bad shape and damage control is the foremost imperative, a captain will rarely regret having Feronian voidfarers aboard her ship.
As mentioned, the Feronian Guard’s marine corps are fearsome in any voidborne environment. They see themselves as brothers and sisters united in labor and toil, of which combat is just another stripe. Feronian mercenaries and pirates are often retired marines, and these hardened warriors lead productive lives among the stars, sometimes excelling in their endeavors with very little.
