Frostkin, Slaves no longer

Standing head and shoulders over their dwarven kin, and nearly as broad, the Frostkin Dwarves are frightfully imposing to even their far taller Frost Giant forefathers.

Their skin is chalk white to slate gray with only the barest hints of rosy life within. Elaborately braided hair ranges from ash blonde to white and occasionally into shades of blue or black. Their pronounced features are primarily inherited from their Dwarven parentage, with bold noses, and heavy brows above full and thick beards on both men and women. Deep-set eyes of blue, gray or black lend them an overall grim appearance by most accounts. Both men and women of the Frostkin are well-muscled and heavyset as a rule, with the en more likely than not to have thick hair covering much of their body.

Due to the volatility of their mixed bloodlines, occasional Frostkin are born with an appearance hewing closer to one or the other of their ancestors.

The newly born Frostkin societies have learned much from their former masters. Adapting the strengths of giant society and integrating it into their dwarven heritage, they have forged a social hierarchy that embraces both the strength of their warriors and the wisdom of their sages.

Each summer solstice sees the selection (through a series of trials) of a Jarl from the bravest of their young to serve as chief in matters of war and defense. He or she is advised by the Council of Memory, members of which are entrusted with oligarchic governance in all other matters. The council welcomes any and all who pledge to serve it justly, so long as they are able to recite the oral history of their people going back to the first days of enslavement. Word for word.

The Inskaatorak dialect is a harsh, broken, bastard tongue of Dwarven and Giant and their names are likewise a motley combination of the two peppered with sounds often reminiscent of cracking ice and howling wind.

All Frostkin children remain nameless for their first year out of grim tradition. A second name, or assortment of additional names, are granted and adopted throughout adulthood from parents, mentors and their community.

The grand city of Torakanuuc stands as the center of Frostkin society both above and below ground, hewn equally from cold gray stone and glittering blue glacial ice. Though the Frostkin lack technique for the effortless stone artistry of their Dwarven cousins, the city is nevertheless magnificent to look upon. Most notable to the rare visitors to this distant stead are the carefully faceted ice crystals used to spread daylight through buttressed halls, seamless streets and endless tunnels deep in the mountains below.

Though they do not consider themselves within the dominion of any deity, they often pray for guidance from the spirits of the elements and the very animals they hunt for food. Frostkin who journey to visit other Dwarven peoples often return converts to Moradin, but these followers find little welcome upon return to their frigid homes for the god that ignored their centuries of plight.

Magic is nearly unheard of within their young society, and is usually related to the divine interest of one or another god seeking to claim this young people for their own. Equally rare, but far more celebrated, are those born with the gift to tap into the magics of nature. Druids, Shamans, Rangers and their ilk are given a hero’s welcome in any Frostkin city.

The average Frostkin has little patience for dalliance when work is to be done, but with a full belly and a head full of ale their warmer nature shows through clear as glacial ice, with eager smiles and open arms. Those rebellious few who seek out or are exiled to the southern lands can often fall into a wildly hedonistic lifestyle, finding so little of the relentless hardship they thought a bare fact of life in their unrelenting homeland.