You're most likely to raid neighbours.
And who does your clan marry with?
In most cases, neighbours.
Caution is urged.
Violence leads to vengeance.
Vengeance leads to feuds.
No one wins in a feud.
Caution is urged.
Orlanthi law isn't about absolutes or punishment, its about controlling the cycle of violence through compensation and shame and the restoration of honour. (Though Orlanthi being what they are, the system is often pushed to the very brink before someone throws a rug and bashes some heads together to let the wind in.)
Orlanthi culture, being largely cult based, doesn't have a sense of ethics in the same way our civilisation does: that will have to wait until the gods die (in about fifty years, and counting :)). The same god 'allows' widely differing value systems: Orlanth is also Niskis and Finovan, all with widely differing views on marriage and private property.
So I think neighbour raiding is highly ritualised and a bit of a game, with strong, very strong, unspoken prohibitions about doing serious damage. Most neighbour raiding is done by young men seeking to build a name, start a herd, and (in the eyes of everyone else) learn from their mistakes. Bashing open a few heads is the Orlanthi equivalent of a footy game or night on the town, but when things escalate into real violence or damage, those concerned know theyre in one great broopit of trouble - largely from their own clan and elders.
So a good deal of restraint is build into the system.
Bashing a neighbour on the head might be a test of courage, but the *real* testing will start when the raiders get home and have to face the chief, the moot, and especially the women - many of whom will have been born in the very steads that have been raided.
Determined raiding involving open murder and stead-burning does occasionally happen of course - for food, for survival, for vengeance, or because of the occasional onset of collective mania that seems to periodically beset the Orlanthi. But its beyond law. And its one of the greatest nightmares imaginable. Orlanth gave the clans law to prevent the judgement of bronze.
Cheers
John
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