Wanted to do more but I got everything covered and I reeeaaaly don't want to have to go into Rus vs. Mongol territory. Although then again if I'm willing to do Iberia then Rus shouldn't be so hard (Right?).
Before you people freak, there is evidence that the league could have been established at around 1000 A.D. give or take a decade or two, so it's still relatively new.
(People also keep saying that it happened at an eclipse, but I find it more likely that the "Darkness" described was most likely thick clouds or something).
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Some of the Haudenosaunee had known of the Norse, although contact was very little and most of the Haudenosaunee had lived so far inland that only those close to the Lake had ever made contact with them. The Seneca tribe who guardians of the 'western door' had made nearly all the contacts, many of their chieftains had Iron daggers or other trinkets as a sign of power. In recent years with the rising popularity of Storfoss, more attention has been paid to the land of the Lakes and with the other tribes making contact with the Norse eventually with many travelling men going down the Nawa River and speaking of the huge settlements on it. The Great Council, or Rotinonsionni in the official language of the full council; had decided to make further contact with the pale skinned men. The Seneca were not fond of the decision at all and wanted to keep their monopoly on contact and trade with the Norse, however with the tribes to the east making contact with the various portage villages along the River Nawa it was inevitable.
The Chieftain of Storfoss had greeted the Skraeling 'emissaries' and even had translators who knew the various dialects that the Haudenosaunee used. The Skraelings were then told to venture down the River Nawa until it reached the sea to find the center of the Western Norse world. When the Paramount Chieftain of Leifrvalde Ketil Bjornsson had spoke with the Skraelings they had discussed many things that the Haudenosaunee were interested in, Ketil Bjornsson agreed to trading pacts and wished to travel back to their lands to meet with the Rotinonsionni to get more things agreed on. When he had traveled their lands he brought with him various missionaries who knew of the Skraeling tongue, by the time he went before the Rotinonsionni many of the villages had been visited by Missionaries and converted a significant amount of Skraelings. The Rotinonsionni had asked Ketil Bjornsson many things; how was Iron made? How do you bake bread? How do you get Lime from Limestone? All these things he said he didn't know exactly but would be eager to form trade deals for them.
The Haudenosaunee may have been primitive, but they were not stupid and could easily see the intentions of Ketil Bjornsson and the meeting ended with a few trade deals but nothing significant done. When Ketil had found that many of the Missionaries had been killed by the Skraelings who claimed that many of the things they preached had gone against the words of the "Great Peace Maker", in response Ketil went to Storfoss and with some of the Town Guard along with the warriors escorting him he attacked and burnt down several of the villages thought to have killed the missionaries. He brought back to Storfoss loads of food and even some slaves, he had called to Gifurflud for reinforcements and Skraeling Auxiliaries. The Rotinonsionni had then agreed that the Norse were enemies and that all converts were to renounce their new faith or be killed.
To Ketil Bjornsson this was the perfect casus belli and he had defeated many Haudenosaunee villages, after nearly a century the Norse had learned to fight against the tactics employed by Skraelings, the Crossbow had shredded down many Haudenosaunee fighters with its superior range. The Norse were not the only ones fighting against the Haudenosaunee, the Skraelings to the east had long been enemies of the Haudenosaunee and were taking advantage of the Norse attacks and invaded the Haudenosaunee territory as well. Eventually the Rotinonsionni had surrendered to Ketil Bjornsson's army at the end of a sword and the conditions for peace were: that they would submit to the authority of the Allthing, every prominent member would have to give a hostage from their families, and that they would accept the teachings of Jesus Christ. To further cement the deal (no pun intended,(okay maybe a little)) Ketil had a church built out of stone with mortar and plastered with Lime brought from Storfoss, a Priest would remain with fifteen bodyguards to man the church and spread the gospel into the Skraeling lands.
In Leifrvalde further advancements into shipbuilding took place, multiple masts had been around for a while but now they were being heavily used and with the widespread use of 'heavy' ships which there was no chance of portage because they had been approximately as long as five and a half standard knarrs that were being used in Scandinavia and four times as wide, and they were also much taller with storage and crew quarters under the deck. They were capable of crossing the Atlantic from Vinland to Ireland with no need for stops; However this was still uneconomical and the Heavy ships were designed to travel south along the coast much faster and to be able to successfully make regular trade with the Heitteyjar which has been mostly disconnected with the rest of the world other than Iberia. However the 'heavy' ships came at a price that it would take large efforts to properly dock them where separate docks had to be built to support them.
Along the Nawa River the the first Great Lake however ship technology was taking a different turn. The old longship used in Scandinavia for generations had been ideal in swimming up rivers and portaging, however along the new lands they needed to be able to hold more cargo while still being able to be easily portaged. The result of the need was something people did not expect, given how little sails were used along the lake and along the river the mast had been sacrificed for poles holding up small decks that were able to carry baggage. They also had a strange modification for portages, the hull had two large horizontal grooves along the bottom that were able to accommodate wheels and an axle to pull it across short distances and whatnot.
In Britain, Malcolm the Third had been preparing for a great campaign to take the rest of England. Olaf Haraldsson had been bedridden for years and his son Sigurd had been ruling in his stead and had proven to be a fair ruler and a mighty warrior, seeing an opportunity Malcolm had an assassin poison Sigurd with a non-lethal poison and spread rumors that it was his brothers seeking the crown. With the brothers rising up in rebellion merely to save themselves is when Malcolm begun his great invasion of England, however his acts in poisoning Sigurd had been a poor idea as the brothers rebellions had made the English prepare for conflict and he was not able to use the advantage of surprise as he had wanted to. Malcolm was able to fight and kill two of the brothers that rose in revolt leaving only one who surrendered to Sigurd and joined forces that were able to fight back the Scottish army. In the end the Scottish were able to make small territorial gains but was largely seen as a waste.
Malcolm then had the Idea to ally with Welsh nations, he then supported the nation of Deheubarth and gave them support against Gwynedd. With Crossbows the Welsh of Deheubarth had managed to conquer Gwynedd, Powys, and Morgannwg and was well on the way to unifying Wales. The King, Hywel ap Rhys had already claimed to be the rightful king of all Wales and had proclaimed he and King Malcolm were in the process of "Establishing the Celtic people to the position of the rightful owners of the Island once more." Malcolm had approved of this and used it as a reason for having taken such vast amounts of land from England, although with his Quarter-Norse heritage and his mainly Orkney Norse army many saw this as hypocritical. Hywel eventually was able to take Cornwall and a portion of Mercia. With England in it's current state Wales wasn't at as much a disadvantage anymore with Scotland as an ally and being more or less unified.
In Iberia, many Crown endorsed privateers had raided Arab settlements in North Africa. However some had gone down the Atlantic coast and found an archipelago of islands, they were named the Runnieyjar. The Islands were inhabited by a primitive people similar to Skraelings of Leifrvalde, but little attention was paid to the land and other than some trade for things like Iron and cloth in exchange for loads of fish or other everyday material but in bulk.
The Iberian Emperor, Einar Rollosson was a mere figurehead for his wife Urraca. While Einar led the armies plenty, it was Uracca that handled all political matters, this was an asset because many of the Norse mercenaries in Iberia had been thrilled with a Norseman being Emperor but the Iberian nobility were content with the rule of Urraca. While Einar may look like a brute from this angle, it is no small feat to be able to hold onto the small bit of land in North Africa and to keep the Muslim Hordes away, it was just as important as managing the realm that the straits of Gibraltar stay Christian.
The Crusades had been somewhat successful, the Jordan River valley was more or less under Christian control; However the Saracen strongholds in the mountains west of the Jordan River were still holding and Jerusalem was still under Muslim rule. The Crusaders were desperate after years or fighting to take back the Holy City, however the best strategy to retake the holy land would be a strategy that was used to retake it once before. With using strategies employed by Joshua in the Old Testament, a group of Crusaders originating mostly from France and Italy were able to cut off enough supply routes that the Mountains were easier to take. The City of Jerusalem held strong however despite other towns in the area falling, however the other than Jerusalem the last Saracen Stronghold remained. The Ancient Fortress of Masada was famous for only Thirty or Forty Jews being able to resist the Romans for three years within it's confines before committing suicide, this time it would lay host to a defending army of around two hundred and fifty.
When the Crusaders tried to breach the fort they quickly found the reason why the army of thousands of Romans didn't take it so easily, the Fort of Masada is quite the piece of engineering and with the fact there was little to no wood nearby to build scaling ladders or even just to simply light fires the Crusaders had to do as the Romans once did and wait for the enemies food stores to run out. This was not as easy as it sounds, the mountain which Masada is based on is host to nut and fruit trees as well as being large enough to contain it's own aquifer; while they had sufficient water eventually the food was going to run out and the Nuts and Fruits would only delay the inevitable and after two years the Fortress had fallen to Crusader forces.
With Masada out of the way nearly all Crusader forces were aimed at the siege of Jerusalem which fell after a Year and Three Months. The News of the reclamation of Jerusalem was a welcoming prospect for many men in all of Christendom, as did the notion that most of the Holy Land was under the rule of Christianity; However much reclaimed by the Egyptian army. With this it was clear that the hold on the Holy land was still vulnerable and new key defenses would have to be put in place with the various Italian city states (most notably Venice) being responsible for the defense of Acre and the Northern border, while many of the various small time lords from the Holy Roman Empire were stationed along the Jordan Valley to stop any invasion from the east, the Norse (many were former members of the Varangian Guard),Normans, and even Anglo-Saxon Lords who escaped the fighting in England were put along the border to the south to defend against attacks from Egypt while also being gifted many fine horses to add to their cavalry forces. New Soldiers from Europe would be stationed in Jaffa and Caesaria, and new soldiers came plenty along with many pilgrims to see the holy land.
