History Characters / MageWarsTrilogy

[[center:[-[[Characters/HeraldsOfValdemar Main Character Index]] | [[Characters/DeitiesAndGeneralCharacterTropes Deities and General Character Tropes]] | [[Characters/MageWarsTrilogy Mage Wars Trilogy]] | [[Characters/LastHeraldMageTrilogy Last Herald Mage Trilogy]] | [[Characters/CollegiumChronicles Collegium Chronicles]] | [[Characters/BrightlyBurning Brightly Burning]] | [[Characters/VowsAndHonor Vows and Honor]] | [[Characters/ExileDuology Exile Duology]] | [[Characters/ArrowsTrilogyAndRelatedBooks Arrows Trilogy and Related Books]] | [[Characters/MageWindsAndMageStorms Mage Winds and Mage Storms]] | [[Characters/DariansTale Darian'sTale]]-]]]

This subsection of the Characters/HeraldsOfValdemar CharacterSheet lists characters from the ''Mage Wars'' trilogy.

!Urtho
* AbsentmindedProfessor: In the ''Storms'' books, readers get another glimpse into his Tower. He appears to have been interested in ''everything'', but this also meant he could and would jump between projects on a whim, and in at least one case, forgot he had an entirely new breed of gryphons to watch over. In his defense, there was a war on.
* TheArchmage: Can make permanent Gates, made the gryphons from scratch, and helped with the Tayledras bondbirds and Shin'a'in horses.
* BigGood: Leader of the forces against Ma'ar, and widely beloved by them. Also so good that he says he would help even Ma'ar himself if he could.
* TheChainsOfCommanding: He softly gave his reason for opposing Ma'ar in one single sentence: "if not me, then who?"
* CreatingLifeIsAwesome: Made the gryphons, who universally love him. He thinks of them as his children, and even the few sketchy things - like controlling their fertility and keeping Kechara in private - are EasilyForgiven. Later characters credit the kyree and hertasi to him too, but those were the creations of older mages.
** WordOfGod from the "Under the Vale" chapter in one of the anthologies is that he revised the hertasi to be more intelligent and also made sure they were grateful; that's why they so happily serve people, even many centuries after his death.
* EmperorScientist: Capable of incredible feats of science and magic, and ruler of a large, disparate group of people... but only because they ''asked'' him to because of the war. Otherwise he'd be "ruling" over nothing more than his tower and its experiments.
* EasilyForgiven: There are sketchy aspects to him which Skandranon realizes, like his insistence on controlling the reproduction of the gryphons and keeping Kechara in seclusion, but as soon as Skan hears the slightest justification he forgives his creator completely, as do all the other gryphons.
* FatalFlaw: WideEyedIdealism. He's overly trusting that the people under his command have no ulterior motives, or are as skilled as they claim to be. This bites him repeatedly: firstly, one of his generals has his position because his ''father'' was exceptionally skilled in war and Urtho (erroneously) believes that ''must'' have been passed on to his son ([[spoiler:and said son later turns traitor or could have been one all along]]), and the guards on his Tower wave through anyone they know, which [[spoiler:leads to Urtho's assassination by a mage who turned traitor as well]].
* {{Foil}}: To Ma'ar. Both are PersonOfMassDestruction and leaders of their respective armies and are scientists (Urtho made gryphons, Ma'ar created makaar) and powerful mages. However, Ma'ar seeks power and control while Urtho wants peace and is a ReluctantRuler. Urtho shelters the very people Ma'ar is trying to eradicate.
* GoodCannotComprehendEvil: Averted; Urtho knows what makes Ma'ar tick, and can even think like him to help figure out his overall plans, but he hates doing so thanks to how counter to his own personality it is.
* PersonOfMassDestruction: A combination of a one of his Mage weapons and his own Tower blowing up caused a WorldWreckingWave. If you thought Vanyel was strong... well, the result reshaped a not-inconsiderable portion of the world physically, and disrupted the ''entire'' planet for at ''least'' ten years magically.
* RedBaron: The "Mage of Silence", so called because uniquely, no spell that he casts has any form of identifying "personal flair". On the other hand, this means that since his magic is so incredibly "generic", it's a dead giveaway that Urtho was behind it.
* ReluctantRuler: Ended up as the leader of an army by 1. being one of the most powerful mages alive and 2. being the only guy to take charge after everything fell apart.
* SorcerousOverlord: A generally benevolent one.

!Skandranon Rashkae
* AceCustom: Until the end of ''The Black Gryphon'', his feathers are black, and since he doesn't belong to a specific unit, he doesn't have his primaries dyed in any unit's colors. It's never stated if he's naturally mostly dark-feathered, just that he's got some kind of barring on his wing feathers and uses black dye to make his coloration uniform.
* [[AcePilot Ace Gryphon]]: One of the best fliers among the gryphons. Also, one of the most ''insane'' fliers among the gryphons.
* DeskJockey: In ''The White Gryphon'', he's become one of the leaders of the new settlement, and he's getting fat and out-of-shape because herding cats and leading the settlement have [[RetiredBadass kept him from going out and doing stuff like he used to]].
** HesBack: Signified by dyeing his feathers black when he tries to figure out who's framing Amberdrake for murder.
* DanceBattler: ''Yes''. He studied choreography and incorporated what he learned into his flying stunts. It's what's made him so difficult to kill and unpredictable in the sky.
* DeadpanSnarker: Oh yeah. It's funniest when he's snarking at himself.
* DidntThinkThisThrough: Usually when coming up with {{Indy Ploy}}s
* TheGadfly: He finds perhaps a bit too much enjoyment in teasing his friends and family...
* HeterosexualLifePartners: He and Amberdrake.
* IconicOutfit: Or the Gryphon equivalent, anyway. Unlike the various other gryphons, with their various bird of prey-inspired markings, Skandranon has purely black feathers, making him visually distinct from a distance.
* IndyPloy: Skandranon's strategy seems to be come up with a crazy idea, improvise when everything goes to heck and hope it works out.
* LargeHam: Skandranon revels in being overdramatic and flashy.
* LockedIntoStrangeness: His black feathers are bleached white when he just barely makes it through a portal at the end of ''The Black Gryphon''.
* OverprotectiveDad: In ''The Silver Gryphon''.
* RedBaron: "The Black Gryphon," for obvious reasons.
* SnakeTalk: Skan is noted as being unusually articulate for a gryphon, and normally has perfect diction, but he does slip into hissing when he's very tired or angry.
* TrrrillingRrrs: When tired or angry.
* WellDoneSonGuy: Despite his dramatic self confidence, the approval of his creator Urtho still means something to Skan.
* VitriolicBestBuds: Skandranon is incredibly difficult to be around if he likes you. If he dislikes you, he's insufferable.

!Amberdrake
* DarkAndTroubledPast: He had a rough adolescence, leaving his family to attend a "modern" college of medicine in an unfamiliar city, with well-meaning teachers who didn't understand him and largely hostile classmates. Ma'ar's ascendance to power made things much, much worse.
* TheEmpath
** AMindIsATerribleThingToRead: Not helped by his old teachers not believing in mystical gifts.
* FlorenceNightingaleEffect: A rare male version. Helping Winterhart recover from her trauma brings them closer together.
* HappyEndingMassage: A constant expectation, also sometimes how his massages actually do end.
* HealingHands: Very good with his magic; one character is amazed he can trigger only the sensation of "cold" in a small area whereas the healers she was familiar with would trigger cold, heat, pain, and pressure in a much larger area.
* HeterosexualLifePartners: Everyone knows how much he loves Skan. He's afraid that all Skan feels for him is simple friendship, but EveryoneCanSeeIt, and Zhaneel assures him of that.
* HighClassCallGirl: He is a kestra'chern, a profession that entails being counselor, confessor, emotional support, entertainer, lover, physical therapist, and mediator, anything that can contribute to the emotional, physical, and mental well-being of others. They're rather similar to the Companions on {{Series/Firefly}}, though less religious in nature. Amberdrake does regularly have sex with clients but insists that kestra'chern aren't ''primarily'' bedmates. Rather, his primary duties tend towards talk therapy and massage. The confusion between kestra'chern and [[CampFollower camp prostitutes]] leads to several unfortunate though somewhat funny incidents.
** A young Healer makes the mistake of accosting him in a public mess hall and harming a patient by soliciting sex from him. Amberdrake cuts the Healer completely down in public, without raising his voice at all.
** A very confused, very sexually frustrated Zhaneel, overhearing a satisfied client and misled by some innocent remarks from Skandranon, straddles Amberdrake during her first appointment with him, asking if he was going to... service her (the appointment technically was for a grooming and primping session, after which female gryphons usually go to meet an intended partner). It goes from bawdy comedy to tragedy pretty quickly though, as Amberdrake's refusal kicks up Zhaneel's self-loathing, her belief that she's so misshapen that even a prostitute won't take her money. Thankfully, Amberdrake is able to calm her down and switches to therapist mode.
* MedicateTheMedium: When he was sent away to college in Predain to study "modern medicine", he was in a city that didn't believe in the existence of Mind Gifts, and his well-meaning teachers tried to diagnose and treat him in ways that didn't help.
* MindlinkMates: With Winterhart
* NonActionGuy: His entire purpose in a group is to serve as TheHeart. Only at the end of ''The Silver Gryphon'' does he show any signs of weapons training, having taught himself to throw knives sometime after ''The White Gryphon''.
* StepfordSmiler: Type A. As a Kestra'chern and Healer, he has to maintain an image of calm serenity for his patients and the army as a whole. A visibly unhappy kestra'chern has just heard something bad from a client, after all. But he's introduced having a grief-induced breakdown out of worry for Skan, and going to friends he can unburden himself to.
* OverprotectiveDad: In ''The Silver Gryphon''.
* UnproblematicProstitution: While they're not ''primarily'' bedmates, sex with clients is often part of a kestra'chern's job. The client doesn't get to decide that and is refused as often as not if they come in expecting it. Amberdrake and anyone else who winds up in bed with a client seems pretty happy about it.

!Zhaneel
* AllOfTheOtherReindeer: She was bullied and laughed at for being a runt and being different.
* InterspeciesRomance: Has the wrong idea about Amberdrake's services and thinks she's going to pay him to have sex with her, and consequently takes his refusal hard. After he helps build her confidence up - among other things, saying that they're not physically compatible as he's got thin skin and is a third her size - she returns to gryphons.
* ShrinkingViolet: Due to being bullied as a chick.
* SnakeTalk: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.
* TookALevelInBadass: Starts off viewed as (and viewing herself) as a "misborn" who would never amount to anything and would only be of use in the army as cannon fodder. Ends up being one of, if not ''the'' only gryphon who can keep up with Skandranon, and personally relied upon by Urtho for specific missions only she can carry out.
* TrrrillingRrrs: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy. Sometimes the author forgets to add these and the SnakeTalk in, as when she confesses her woes to Amberdrake.

!Winterhart
* BlueBlood: She was a member of a noble family before Ma'ar's invasion laid waste to the royal court. She hid her identity and changed her name in order to join Urtho's army.
* BrokenBird: As an unidentified, untrained and unshielded Empath, she was especially vulnerable to the fear spell Ma'ar unleashed on the court. Not only did it drive her (and most of the other nobility) to flee in terror, it left her with lasting emotional wounds which she only really begins to recover from once Amberdrake identifies and helps her cope with the pain she's been hiding behind her cold facade.
* CowardlyLion: Loathes herself for being overwhelmed by the fear spell that drove her and the rest of the court to fleeing. She was not aware that this was a magical attack causing psychic wounds and thinks of herself as a coward, and she is terrified of battle. She also believed that Urtho's forces would be overrun and killed within weeks, and yet she took training and joined them, even if not as a fighter.
* DefrostingIceQueen: All the puns intended. She's introduced as a very brusque, unsympathetic woman not well-suited to her job as a caretaker and healer to the gryphons of Urtho's army (including Zhaneel). As Amberdrake works with and gets to know her and she comes to see the gryphons as people, however, she softens quite a bit.
* TheEmpath: Like many healers, she has a strong Empathic Gift.
* MeaningfulRename: Chose the name "Winterhart" deliberately after traumatic events in her past. [[spoiler:Her birth name was Reanna Laury.]] Lampshaded by Amberdrake when he figures it out:
-->"I'd wondered. It wasn't because it was Kaled'a'in at all--it was because a hart is a hunted creature, and because you hoped the cold of winter would close around you and keep you from ever feeling anything again."
* MindlinkMates: With Amberdrake.

!Gesten the ''Hertasi''
* DeadpanSnarker: ''Boy howdy''. When Skandranon comments that he would court a ''makaar'' if it would give him a bath, Gesten who is actually supplying it bats his eyes and claims he had no idea Skan felt that way about him.
** ServileSnarker: He loves Amberdrake as though they were brothers. And like brothers, will take every opportunity to snark at him.
* IntellectualAnimal: A bipedal, humanoid lizard, like all ''hertasi''.

!Kechara
* DisabilitySuperpower: Kechara is perhaps the most powerful telepath we encounter in the Velgarth universe, but it's implied (and outright discussed in The Silver Gryphon) that her power comes at the expense of her developmental disabilites.
* MeaningfulName: Kechara means "beloved". Her name lets Skandranon know that while Urtho kept her in a tower, he still cares for her.
* {{Mutant}}: She's one of the unexpected results of the gryphon breeding program.
* NeverGrewUp: She's chronologically the same age as Skandranon, but physically and mentally stuck in a childish state.
* SnakeTalk: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.
* {{Telepathy}}: An extremely powerful telepath. Urtho has her locked in a tower for her own safety as her powers would make her a target for Ma'ar's forces
* TrrrillingRrrs: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.

!Tamsin
* HealingHands: One of Urtho's best healers.
* MindlinkMates: With Cinnabar

!Cinnabar
* BlueBlood: how she was able to recognize [[spoiler: Winterhart]]
* HealingHands: Much like Tamsin and Amberdrake; however she seems to have more outright power if perhaps a trifle less skill.
* MindlinkMates: With Tamsin
* SilkHidingSteel: Skan suspects she could take down armies with one stern lecture, but never once does she lose her calm, dignified manner. It's part of why Skan and Amberdrake like her so much.
* SpannerInTheWorks: Ma'ar's conquest hit its first real stumbling block because Cinnabar's family allowed her Healing and Empathy to be properly trained, meaning she was shielded from the effects of the fear spell that ravaged the rest of the court. While the rest of the nobles were fleeing or gripped in terror, she was able to call in Urtho, who promptly took charge and rallied a defense against Ma'ar's invasion.
* UptownGirl: With Tamsin. It's noted that despite being MindlinkMates, [[ScrewTheRulesItsTheApocalypse their relationship would have never worked out if not for the fact at a war is going on.]]

!Ma'ar
See the entry on the Characters/MageWindsAndMageStorms page.

!Shalaman
* FailedASpotCheck: When he considers marrying [[spoiler:Winterhart]] and she starts showing reluctance to pursuing the later stages of courtship, it takes him a while to make a link between this and the glaringly obvious fact that [[spoiler:she has a young child fathered by Amberdrake and the child in question has come to the palace with her parents]].

!Silver Veil
* HighClassCallGirl: Technically a kestra'chern, a profession that entails being counselor, confessor, emotional support, entertainer, and mediator, anything that can contribute to the emotional and mental well-being of others. As part of being a provider of comfort and support, kestra'chern can provide sensual and sexual services, most being trained in massage, beauty treatments, and sexual acts. They're rather similar to the Companions on {{Series/Firefly}}. When traveling with her household, including a disguised Amberdrake, she has to use every bit of her training to get through checkpoints when bribery or bluffing doesn't work. Slightly averted because she ends up in southern empire, where kestra'chern are revered and well-respected members of society.
* HookerWithAHeartOfGold: Her services include more than sex work, but they do ''include'' sex. When Amberdrake's former neighbors and friends turned him away a day before Ma'ar's forces arrived, Silver Veil took him in even though he was a stranger, despite the danger of sheltering a Kaled'a'in.
* IWantMyBelovedToBeHappy: Desperately in love with [[spoiler: her primary "client," Shalaman, though they cannot be together because of the strict social hierarchy, and very nearly has a breakdown when Shalaman proposes to Winterhart, though she doesn't hate Winterhart for attracting the attention of her beloved.]]
* LadyOfWar: Beautiful, composed, sword skills and able to lead a group of refugees through a war.
* TheMentor: To Amberdrake.
* SilverVixen: Her kestra'chern name comes from her beautiful long white hair. Silver Veil is probably about age fifty in ''White Gryphon'' and still considered quite beautiful.

!Judeth
* FourStarBadass: A respectably ranked officer in Urtho's army who keeps getting promoted higher and higher - in part from her intelligence, courage, and leadership but also in part because a horrifying war of attrition is eating away at Urtho's army despite his best efforts. By the time ''White Gryphon'' comes around, she then makes quite a respectable shift as a civilian leader too, organizing infrastructure and starting a police force.
* HeroOfAnotherStory: Only the first book of the trilogy features the Mage Wars, and that only a late period, focusing on two noncombatants and two special forces gryphons - Judith and some others indicate something about the breadth of the war.
* IronLady: There is next to nothing thrown at her that can faze or slow her down.

!Aubri
* DeadpanSnarker: Less so than some of the other characters on this page, but he does have his moments with Skandranon.
* HonoraryUncle: To Kechara and the twins. Kechara even calls him "Unca Aubri".
* SnakeTalk: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.
* SnarkToSnarkCombat: When he and Skandranon are together.
* TrrrillingRrrs: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.
* VitriolicBestBuds: He and Skandranon are constantly throwing insults at each other when they are in the same room, yet he's part of the group Skandranon considers to be friends.

!Silverblade
* ActionGirl: Notable in that her parents are both markedly [[NonActionGuy Non-Action People]].
* TheEmpath: She ''hates'' her Gift and the insight it gives her into people and their business. Unlike her kestra'chern father, the last thing she wants to do is get involved.
* MeaningfulRename: Her parents gave her the name "Windsong" when she was born. She chose the name "Silverblade" for herself when she reached maturity--a common practice among the Kaled'a'in--because she wanted to join the Silver Gryphons.
* WellDoneDaughterGirl: A not insignificant part of the plot of ''The Silver Gryphon'' is driven by Silverblade's desire to come out of Amberdrake's shadow and prove herself in her own way rather than following in his footsteps.

!Tadrith
* RedBaron: Became known as "Tadrith Wyrsabane" after the events of ''The Silver Gryphon'', and is still remembered millennia later as more than just "one of Skandranon's children", a ''remarkable'' achievement.
* SnakeTalk: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.
* TrrrillingRrrs: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.

!Keenath
* SnakeTalk: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.
* TrrrillingRrrs: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.

* DarkAndTroubledPast: He had a rough adolescence, leaving his family to attend a "modern" college of medicine in an unfamiliar city, with well-meaning teachers who didn't understand him and largely hostile classmates. Ma'ar's ascendence to power made things much, much worse.

** A very confused, very sexually frustrated Zhaneel, overhearing the above soldier client and misled by some innocent remarks from Skandranon, straddles Amberdrake during her first appointment with him, asking if he was going to... service her (the appointment technically was for a grooming and primping session, after which female gryphons usually go to meet an intended partner). It goes from bawdy comedy to tragedy pretty quickly though, as Amberdrake's refusal kicks up Zhaneel's self-loathing, her belief that she's so misshapen that even a prostitute won't take her money. Thankfully, Amberdrake is able to calm her down and switches to therapist mode.

* HookerWithAHeartOfGold: Her services include more than sex work, but they do ''include'' sex. When Amberdrake's former neighbors and friend turned him away a day before Ma'ar's forces arrived, Silver Veil took him in despite the danger of sheltering a Kaled'a'in.

* BiTheWay: Only shown sleeping with female clients, but he doesn't object to the idea of servicing men.

* BigGood: Leader of the forces against Ma'ar, and widely beloved by them.

!Skandranon
* AceCustom: Has a custom paint job (actually customizing ''himself'' would be weird). His feathers are painted black.

* DeskJockey: In ''The White Gryphon'', he's become one of the leaders of the new settlement, and he's getting fat and out-of-shape because herding cats and leading the settlement have [[RetiredBadass kept him from going out and doing stuff like he used to]]. Signifying this, he doesn't have his feathers painted anymore.
** HesBack: Signified by painting his feathers black again, when he tries to figure out who's framing Amberdrake for murder.

* IconicOutfit: Or the Gryphon equivalent, anyway. Skandranon has his feathers painted black as a sort of AceCustom paint job.

* RedBaron: "The Black Gryphon," so named because of his painted feathers.

* DarkAndTroubledPast: He's had a rough life due to the war.

** AMindIsATerribleThingToRead: Not helped by his old teachers not believing in Mental abilities.

* HighClassCallGirl: Unfortunately mistaken for one, to his frustration. He is a kestra'chern, a profession that entails being counselor, confessor, emotional support, entertainer, and mediator, anything that can contribute to the emotional and mental well-being of others. They're rather similar to the Companions on {{Series/Firefly}}, though less religious in nature. It's implied that he has sex with a client, a young female soldier, after he gives her a rather brutal sports massage to realign her spine after she was thrown from her horse (she didn't want to go to the Healers because she didn't want to waste their resources on fixing her when there were those who were far worse injured). The unfortunate confusion between kestra'chern and camp prostitutes leads to several unfortunate though somewhat funny incidents.
** A young Healer makes the mistake of calling him a prostitute in a public mess hall. Amberdrake cuts the Healer completely down in public, without raising his voice at all.
** A very confused, very sexually frustrated Zhaneel, overhearing the above soldier client and misled by some innocent remarks from Skandranon, tackles Amberdrake during her first appointment with him, asking if he was going to... service her (the appointment technically was for a grooming and primping session, after which female gryphons usually go to meet an intended partner). It goes from bawdy comedy to tragedy pretty quickly though, as Amberdrake yells rather thoughtlessly, "I can't!" meaning the size and species differences but inadvertently triggering an emotional meltdown from Zhaneel, who suffered from suicidal ideation from her crippling self-hatred. Thankfully, Amberdrake is able to calm her down sometime later.

* StepfordSmiler: Type A. As a Kestra'chern and Healer, he has to maintain an image of calm serenity for his patients, but he's introduced having a grief-induced breakdown out of worry for Skan.

* TrrrillingRrrs: Because of the gryphon vocal anatomy.

* DefrostingIceQueen: All the puns intended. She's introduced as a very brusque, unsympathetic woman not well-suited to her job as a caretaker and healer to the gryphons of Urtho's army (including Zhaneel). As Amberdrake works with and gets to know her, however, she softens quite a bit.

* HighClassCallGirl: Technically a kestra'chern, a profession that entails being counselor, confessor, emotional support, entertainer, and mediator, anything that can contribute to the emotional and mental well-being of others. As part of being a provider of comfort and support, kestra'chern can provide sensual and sexual services, most being trained in massage, beauty treatments, and sexual acts. They're rather similar to the Companions on {{Series/Firefly}}. When traveling with her household, including a disguised Amberdrake, she has to use every bit of her training to get through checkpoints when bribery or bluffing doesn't work. Slightly averted because she ends up in southern empire, where kestra'chern are revered and well-respected members of society and not conflated with sex workers.

* NonActionGuy: His entire purpose in a group is to serve as TheHeart. At no point does he show any signs of weapons training.

* BigGood: Leader of the forces against Ma'ar

* TheChainsOfCommanding
* EmperorScientist:

* PersonOfMassDestruction: A combination of a one of his Mage weapons and his own Tower blowing up caused a WorldWreckingWave. If you think Vanyel is strong.....

* HealingHands

* NonActionGuy

* DeadpanSnarker: ''Boy howdy''.
** ServileSnarker
* IntellectualAnimal

* HealingHands

* HealingHands

* IronLady

* DeadpanSnarker

* MeaningfulRename: Chose the name "Silverblade" because she wanted to join the Silver Gryphons.
* WellDoneDaughterGirl

* BrokenBird: As an unidentified, untrained and unshielded Empath, she was especially vulnerable to the fear spell Ma'ar unleashed on the court. Not only did it drive her (and most of the other nobility) to flee in terror, it left her with last emotional wounds which she only really begins to recover from once Amberdrake identifies and helps her cope with the pain she's been hiding behind her cold facade.

* [[spoiler: BlueBlood]]
* BrokenBird: Her backstory
* DefrostingIceQueen: All the puns intended.
* TheEmpath
* MeaningfulRename: Chose the name "Winterhart" deliberately as subtle reference to her backstory.
* MindlinkMates: With Amberdrake

* {{Foil}}: To Ma'ar. Both are PersonOfMassDestruction and leaders of their respective armies and are scientists (Uthro made gryphons, Ma'ar created makaar) and powerful mages. However, Ma'ar seeks power and control while Uthro wants peace and is a ReluctantRuler. Urthro shelters the very people Ma'ar is trying to eradicate.