《The Seas of Solace》


 Chapter One

    I grew up on the edge of the Siinlan, right at the bank of the Ashlit Mire; you could see it from the hill that used to be one of my favorite places to play as a child. Justmyfavorite place, mind¡ªmost people avoided that particular spot, especially at night, especially those years right after the attack, after the ashwights.


    I look back now and understand how vague that is, "the attack," there are attacks all the time all over Solace, plenty of them involving ashwights, and there was nothing very special about what our little town had suffered the year after I was born, except perhaps that no one was killed, just some close calls and lots of injuries. Healed up without a single scar, those, praise the physicians. Except in the head, and in the eyes, you could see it there, even if I didn''t understand it at that age, didn''t know how it was connected to their reluctance to look. And I loved to look.


    Because I didn''t remember the attack, and anyway it wasn''t really the Ashlit Mire I was seeing when I looked out from that hill, though it is very pretty in its own sinister sort of way, especially in the dark with the embertrees lit up by slow swirling patterns of silver-green from the ash-sludge below. No, I was seeing farther, even though I couldn''t actually make anything out beyond the morass, or catch a glimpse past the high shimmer of the Siinlan Veil. Farther than the Mire on this side, or the other side, farther than the Gyring Ash flowing in between. Out of the Caustlands we all call home. Into the Abwaild.


    The Abwaild. The other-place, the unknown, hostile to all us Fallen, humans and other people, the beasts, the birds, the trees, all of it, all of us. Most of would rather stay away, but not all. Not ones like me, and there are always ones like me, always have been, that''s part of what it means to be a member of the human race. Or one of its unintentional children, like two of our companions on this venture of ours. I need to see, need to see beyond for real, something truly new, to swallow the unknown. Because I''m thirsty for it. Some of us always will be.


    - Chioma Onyeneme,We''ll Walk Until Our Feet Are Wet,Various Periodicals, 275 SE


    Hafaljaheem, Auraramad, The Caustlands, 275 SE


    Marwan Chadriji was getting pretty tired of the speech by the time it looked like Chioma might finally be about to wrap it up. He supposed it didn''t help that he was anxious to get the actual start of the expedition properly underway, and that they were all sitting on the grass looking up at her like children on a school trip. It hadn''t actually been all that long a speech, or even a bad one, as speeches went; the smattering of journalists from various Caustland State publications certainly seemed rapt enough. But he''d heard the whole thing before in about a hundred variations, they all had.


    Something batted lightly against his right leg, and he glanced down to see a black-furred tail flicking back in the direction of its owner. He leaned over to let her know he was listening, and Sabiqah craned her neck up to whisper, one feline ear flicking in amusement.


    "You''re not very good at concealing boredom, Marwan. It''s a wonder you ever survived in the Army, hard to kiss superior-officer posterior properly if you can''t even convince dull people you find them interesting."


    Marwan stifled a laugh and gave his head the smallest of shakes before whispering back. "She''snot dull, I wouldn''t ever say that, it''s just..."


    "Yeah, I know." Sabiqah stretched her front paws out in front of her and seemed to be within a hair''s breadth of the kind of massive yawn only a cat was truly capable of. But she found her composure, and drew herself up again to whisper up at him. "Trust me, we all do. But she''s wrapping up."


    "Hopefully. And you''re not very good at the whole not-bored act yourself, with that almost-yawn."


    "Didn''t do it, though, so it doesn''t count. Anyway, I can get away with more, body-language wise. Not fair, but there it is. Only one other Caustland Cat with the journalists, and he''s looking at Chioma, not me."


    "Like no human knows what a bored Pircaat looks like. Come on."


    She gave a feline shrug, dipping her head momentarily down below shoulder-level. "Sure, but they''re not attuned to it the same way they are with other humans, they have to be paying attention. It''s not instinctual. You, though, they definitely notice. Bet Chioma''s gonna be annoyed with you."


    There was a hint of mrowling laughter behind that last bit, and he let out a small whispered scoff in response. "She''s too wrapped up in herself and the moment and all the attention to give a shit about a bored expedition member. But yeah, let''s at least give her our full attention for the end here."


    She just nodded, and they both settled back to listen.


    "...to mark the start of a new era for we Fallen here on Solace: for humanity, for the Caustland Races, for everyone who''s ever looked past the boundaries of the safe and familiar world of the Caustlands and wondered. We will be the first of the Fallen to touch the Solacian sea with skin or fur or feather, and we will bring its waters back, not just in bottles but in our words and memories, our shared dreams. Thank you for being here to share them as well. We march! The Siinlan awaits."


    A small moment of silence, and then applause, though somewhat scattered as Chioma''s choice of speechmaking venue didn''t allow for a very large audience¡ªthe journalists, a few city dignitaries, a handful of Auraramad Army officers, and of course the members of the expedition itself. There was Zheng Xiansu, a Caustland Crow from Zhon Han who studied the strange flora in the Abwaild out beyond the Siinlan. Sabiqah Jahangir, with whom he''d been whispering, a Caustland Cat from Nainadion who studied Abwaild fauna and was an accomplished physician as well. Astrud and Shu, the pair of Somonei nuns hired in the hopes that their trained-almost-from-birth combat skills would help keep everyone alive in the dangerous unknown.


    And there was himself, of course. Marwan Chadriji of Auraramad. Grumpy old Army veteran turned academic turned adventurer, apparently. He still couldn''t quite believe he''d agreed to come along on this mad trip, but really there was no way he''d have been able to pass it up. The Praedhc lived out in the Abwaild, and they were his whole field. Sure, he could go on interviewing groups on the edges of the Caustlands, reading old translations, trying to learn new languages so he didn''thaveto rely on old translations¡ªor he could meet people no Fallen had ever even heard of.


    Sabiqah nudged him with her front paw. "Come on, Professor, time to stand up and go. Time for thinking deep thoughts later."


    Marwan started and laughed at himself and saw that Sabiqah was indeed standing up, stretching out her hind legs after sitting on her haunches for so long, and that everyone else seated on the hill was rising as well. He hopped to his feet and turned to pick up his pack. Yep, still heavy as Hell. "Yeah, yeah. Thanks Sabiqah."


    She nodded and stretched. No big pack for her, of course, just a harness with a few pouches for essentials, but then he was fairly tall and stocky for a human male; she weighed maybe a sixth what he did and stood perhaps a quarter his height on all fours. And a Pircaat''s frame wasn''t exactly built for burdens anyway.


    "Hey Marwan! Mind if I hitch a ride?" Ah, and speaking of burden-bearing, there was Zheng Xiansu, looking up at him from the grass, wings spread. Not that he''d bemuchof a burden. Caustland Crows might be a lot bigger than a common crow, bigger than most common ravens in fact, but they were still flying creatures and therefore pretty lightweight. Hitching rides on the shoulders of human friends and colleagues was pretty standard practice.


    Though it''s probably going to be either me or Chioma for him, almost the whole trip. Maybe standing on Sabiqah''s back now and then, when he''s not flying to scout ahead, and we''ll have to be careful about that, too dangerous.There were, of course, two other humans in the expedition party, but the Triune Path religion followed by Somonei like the two nuns had weird theological prejudices about non-humans, something about not being high enough up the reincarnation ladders. Bigoted crowshit, in his opinion. But they were good fighters, maybe the best in the Caustlands by some estimations, and this wasn''t exactly going to be a stroll.


    "Yeah, Xiansu, sure. Hop on," he said, aware that the Cropr had been standing there waiting for an answer a few moments too long. "Sorry, I got a little lost in thought."


    "No problem," Xiansu said, and fluttered up to perch on the leather shoulder strap of Marwan''s pack. "Plenty of thoughts to get lost in right now, for all of us."


    Marwan nodded, and glanced over at Chioma, who was holding court with some of the journalists. He was about to say something when one of the Somonei nuns walked over. Astrud, the shorter albino one. At least that''s what he assumed she was, with her pinkish-blue eyes and white eyebrows. He wasn''t about to bring it up on such short acquaintance.Support the creativity of authors by visiting the original site for this novel and more.


    "Ms. Onyeneme," the Somonei said, "we have to get going if we''re going to keep to schedule." Her voice was calm, as he supposed befitted a nun of such a meditation-focused religion. Though that didn''t quite explain her partner Shu''s constant lean-forward nervous energy. Maybe Somonei training actually had calmed her down and she would have been positively frantic without it, who knew.


    "Thank you, Astrud," Chioma replied. "You''re right, we should be going." She flashed the journalists a brilliant smile and hefted her own pack up from the grassy ground onto her shoulders. "Sorry, that''s all the questions I can answer for now."


    Astrud strode over to where Shu stood looking out over the Ashlit Mire, and tapped her Somonei partner on the shoulder. They shared a look Marwan couldn''t quite read, then looked back toward the Mire together. Marwan moved to join them, with Xiansu still perched on his right shoulder and Sabiqah padding along by his left leg.


    The Mire. He wasn''t surprised that this view had inspired Chioma as a kid, it was damned impressive. You could follow its tangle of embertrees left and right all the way to the horizons, becoming just a grey-green smudge as it moved into the distance. You couldn''t actually see into the Abwaild, though, as the rising silver shimmer of the Siinlan Veil obscured everything past about a dozen embertrees deep into the Mire.


    "One last look," Chioma said from behind him.


    "One last look," Marwan agreed. "I have to admit, I have a hard time taking inspiration from it the way you do. I just see a barrier, you know? An annoying, dangerous obstacle between me and where I need to go. It''s pretty, sure, but so''s a wall of fire."


    "It''ll be behind us soon enough," Chioma said. "Let''s get going. In formation, like we''ve discussed. Might as well start practicing now."


    They all formed up without further comment, and started down the hill toward the town''s back gate, the one facing the Mire. Chioma in the middle as befit the founder (and funder) of the expedition, the two Somonei nuns up front, Marwan taking up the rear with Xiansu bobbing along on his shoulder.


    Sabiqah stayed on his left at a brisk feline trot; he knew she''d had to undergo some pretty serious training for this trip, Fathom-meditations and techniques to bridge the gap between her own natural endurance and that of the humans she''d be travelling with.No Fallen creature has greater distance-endurance than humans,she''d told him.Most of the time that doesn''t matter so much, but on an expedition like this I''m going to basically need magic to keep up.


    Of course they''d probably need just about all the magic they could muster between now and their return to the Caustlands. Every member of the expedition had at least some facility with the Fathom, though with a fairly broad spectrum of focus.


    Chioma was frankly the weakest link in that regard; she''d had some level of training since she was a child, but a lot of it was rich-kid dilettante training in comparison to the rest of the party. She had seemed competent enough with the Akrafena sword on her hip during the handful of training sessions they''d all had together, clearly understood the basics of marshalling the Fathom to empower her strikes and defenses and movements, had built up enough resilience to shrug off at least a handful of moderate would-be injuries before she got into real trouble.


    Sill, compared with the two Somonei she was a scrappy ferret between a pair of battle-hardened wolverines. Of course, that''s why she''d hired them. Marwan could only imagine what it must have cost; the Presilyo charged dearly for the services of its warrior monks and nuns.


    He noticed a slight tremor in his sword hand, and stilled it. God willing, none of them would need any of their fighting skills, just the rest of their wits. God willing, he wouldn''t have to relive even the smallest part of the war, sorry,border skirmish.Only that was crowshit, and he knew it, because he''d privately ceased to believe in any kind of God years ago, because they were going into the Abwaild, because heknew. So he stilled the tremor, and took a deep breath, and walked through the city gates.


    "Good luck!" one of the guards called out.


    "Thank you," Chioma responded. The rest of the party held their peace until they were halfway across the hilly patch of ground between the city and the edge of the Mire. Xiansu stirred on Marwan''s shoulder.


    "Nervous?" he asked in his slightly raspy voice. Marwan felt the brush of feathers along the skin of his neck as the Cropr ruffled his wings.


    "God, yes," Marwan said. "Of course I am."


    Xiansu laughed, a series of softcaw caw caws."Glad to know I''m not the only one. Tell me, Marwan, exactly what went wrong in all our heads that we''re about to be doing this, wading right into the Ashlit Mire on our way across the Siinlan?"


    "Men and all their children, feathered and furred, men and all their children have always been mad," Marwan quoted. "Woman cat and bird and child, seek Elsewhere in its time."


    "Oh Heavens," Xiansu said. "Is that how you''re going to spend the whole expedition? Spouting poetry in response to questions?"


    Marwan laughed, and liked the way it sent a stream of steady-relief to his nervous limbs. "I''m not about to promise I won''t. But seriously, we''re people and people want to see new things, around the corner, across the river, even when the river glows and is made of ash-sludge and has Things lurking under it."


    Sabiqah whacked him on the back of his calf with her tail; apparently she''d been listening. "Don''t talk about those, not just yet. Ashwights are bad enough if we run into any."


    "Mmmm," Marwan said. "Fair enough. Though I''m optimistic about the ashwights, it''s been a while since the guards on the wall have seen them in any serious numbers, and a few I''m sure we can handle."Though it would be ironic if our expedition ended before we even made it all the way out of the Caustlands. No, not ironic. Maybe just terrible and sad. Maybe stop thinking about it.


    "I''m not sure at all," Astrud said from up ahead. "Complacency is a killer, terror is a tomb, confidence is a knife''s edge. You have to find just the right amount of afraid, and that''s hard."


    Shu glanced at her partner and shrugged. "Do what needs doing and let the Divine sort it out. I''m ready."


    "We''re all going to need to be ready," Chioma said. "There''s the edge of the Mire. Draw your weapons. Sabiqah, there''s your boat. Jump in when we get close enough and I''ll tie it to my belt."


    Marwan looked down at the Pircaat and grinned. "You get the Very Important Person treatment, Sabiqah, sitting pretty with your paws clean while the rest of us wade through the muck."


    "Yeah, well, I''m too short for this crowshit," Sabiqah said. "And too heavy to ride on someone''s shoulder."


    Xiansu cawed a laugh, and Marwan tossed his head in the Cropr''s direction. "Speaking of which, mind switching shoulders? Better if you''re not on my sword-arm side for this bit. Watch my flank." He was actually quite happy to have Xiansu there, because as well as being an expert on Abwaild flora the Caustland Crow was quite adept at defensive spells.


    "Sure," Xiansu said, and hopped over.


    They crested the last of the hills before the Mire, and there it was, just a few dozen paces in front of them. Ash-sludge slurried and churned, crusted with a semi-solid layer the color of charcoal that put off soft grey illumination, parting in places for brief flashes of stronger silver-green light. Up from the sludge rose the bent and twisted trunks of reddish embertrees, here and there a tangle of undergrowth between them, making any path through the Mire a mazelike one.


    And there was indeed a boat, a small and simple thing with a thick rope coiled up inside and tied to the bow. Sabiqah waited for the rest of them to stand on the shore before she jumped in and rose up on her hind legs, surveying the sifting patterns of light and dark on the surface of the bog. She unfolded one of her front paws, flexing the resulting six-fingered almost-human hand before using it to point toward an especially turbulent spot. Everyone paid close attention; Sabiqah was the only one of their number who had ever crossed the Siinlan without using the great bridge far to the East.


    "That''s going to be at least two or three of them. Maybe they''ll stay dormant as we pass, maybe they won''t, but I don''t see any other signs of ashwights so we may as well take care of these so we don''t have to worry about them rising up behind us."


    Marwan thumbed the hilt of his old officer''s sword, feeling the corded grip, pulling out familiar memories from the sturdy scimitar.If we''re going to do this, let''s do this.He reached into the Fathom, seeing the tide-and-pull of underlying realities, threading here, tugging there, strands wound into muscle and bone, forming fields around his blade, the readied potential of a spell around his free hand. Ready to scythe and wound and kill, but that was fine, he told himself, these were ashwights, not people. No more killing people. No more hurt.


    The Somonei waded in first, Shu with her big pudao polearm, curved blade flashing as she twisted the haft between her fingers, Astrud with her simple but heavily-imbued machete, though really all the Somonei pair''s equipment carried powerful enchantments. These were serious veterans.Can''t have come cheap,Marwan thought again.


    Chioma followed, sword drawn, pushing Sabiqah ahead of her in the boat for now. Marwan waded in after them. It was unpleasant, the ash-sludge pulling at his trousers, slowly trickling in to fill his boots. Waders would have been nice, but this wasn''t the sort of where they could afford to carry anything beyond the essentials. Had to make room for food.


    Nothing at all to eat out there, not for Fallen like them.


    It happened very fast. Shu jabbed her pudao into the spot Sabiqah had pointed out, and up they came, one two three, misshapen misunderstandings of the human form, all lumpy flesh and disproportioned limbs and strange round eyeless heads, more maw than anything else.


    They screeched, and Marwan felt a hard shiver go up his spine. The first went down burbling as Shu''s pudao came back around to slice its blade clean through the creature''s midsection. The second died a bare second after Sabiqah landed on its chest, clinging with the claws of three feet while using the fourth to rip out its throat. The third lost its head to Astrud''s machete, spurting ichor from a neck stump weirdly devoid of anything like real anatomy.


    A moment''s silence. Breaths of relief.


    "Behind you!" Xiansu yelled into his ear. Marwan spun just in time to see a ragged-claw hand swipe at his ribs as it rose up from the muck, turned barely aside by the Cropr''s hasty deflecting spell. "Khara!" Marwan swore, and brought the center of his scimitar''s curved edge down right on the crown of the creature''s lumpy head. It split with a sickeningshlunkof parting pseudo-flesh, and the thing shuddered, fell back into the sludge that had birthed it.


    Sabiqah had jumped back into her boat, and the party circled round it, facing east, west, north, south, waiting.


    Nothing came. Marwan felt his pulse slowly return to normal. His hand was steady. It had come, it had gone, they had survived. The journey was begun in earnest.


    Plenty more ahead.

 Chapter Two

    The rest of the trip¡ªor rather the rest of the slog¡ªwent without further incident right up until the Gyring Ash came in to view. Of course, "without incident" didn''t actually mean pleasant. Marwan soon became incredibly, maddeningly sick of the feel of ash-sludge slowly seeping into and then squelching back out of his boots. He assumed the other three humans had to feel the same way, but Chioma was busy playing Fearless Leader and therefore wasn''t about to admit to shit, and the Somonei were Somonei; serene stoicism was like half their professional self-image.


    So he settled for a couple grumbled comments to Sabiqah, who teased him gently about them but that was alright. He''d already spent a few minutes teasing her as she washed ashwight-ichor off her claws and the surrounding fur-and-flesh with a small cloth and an expression of supreme disgust. And he did feel for her, using a sword was one thing, using a bit of one''s personal anatomy was another, even if her Fathomclaw techniques effectively gave them something like ten times their natural reach.


    Squelch. Squelch. Squelch. It was dark, not enough that any of them were in any danger of running into one of the embertrees, but still oppressive, utterly sunless even during the late morning, all of Farrod''s light absorbed utterly by the Siinlan Veil overhead. Instead there was just the faint illumination of the ash-sludge, constant only in its slow eye-straining shifts.


    Squelch. Squelch. Squelch. No one was speaking, least of all Marwan, and then the word came from the Somonei up ahead. "There''s the Gyring Ash. It''s...wow. I have to admit, it''s more...more than I expected it to be."Astrud''s voice, sounding calm but still genuinely surprised.


    "Is the boat there?" Chioma demanded. Marwan noted the deep thread of anxiety buried in her voice and didn''t blame her for it.


    "Yeah, it''s there, I can see it up ahead." Astrud said. "Still tied up to an embertree. We''d better hope the deal you struck with the Praedhc holds when we get back, or we''re going to be spending some time making our very own very special raft and hoping it can get us across the Gyring Ash before it''s done a full quarter turn round the Caustlands."


    The small sudden burst of acerbic commentary gave him a moment''s surprise, along with a small warm sense of relief. The Somonei were fully human after all, or at least Astrud was. And of course he''d known that, but hadn''t really felt it up til now.


    It took a few moments, moments without any sound but the arrhythmic chur, chur-chur of the Mire and the sludging sounds of their own forward progress, before Chioma replied. "Yes, we''ll just have to trust that the deal holds. We''re in Praedhc territory until we cross back into the Caustlands. We''re going to be at their mercy in one way or another for essentially the entire trip, but they have no reason to wish us harm, they know what our expedition is for and won''t want to needlessly antagonize Auraramad¡ª or for that matter all the Fallen of the Caustlands, because make no mistake, all eyes are on us with this thing."


    It was a pretty good speech on such short notice, and had the virtue of also being true enough, though there might be a degree of exaggeration especially there at the end. Certainly there would be a measure of outrage throughout the Caustland States if the Praedhc just across the Siinlan screwed the expedition over, but this particular clan normally had very little commerce or even contact with their Fallen neighbors. The town of Hafaljaheem was there to exploit an especially rich field of skysteel, not to serve as a trade outpost, which was just as well because as this expedition showed, there was no easy way into the Abwaild nearby.


    The only reason they were crossing here was that it was reportedly the closest point in the Caustlands to the continent''s shoreline, and that mattered for all kinds of reasons. Only an utter fool of a Fallen would spend a single moment than they had to in the Abwaild. One could argue that only an utter fool of a Fallen would set foot in the Abwaild at all, and many had argued it, including plenty among Marwan''s own friends and relations.


    There it was again, the silence of voices, the soft maddening malpredictable chur, chur-chur of the Mire.


    "They''re Praedhc," Shu said flatly. "We''re Fallen. They''re not likely to put a lot of stock in promises to us." The haft of her pudao bounced up and down on one upraised palm, but stilled when Astrud put a hand on her shoulder.


    "We don''t know what they''ll do, Sister. We have to be prepared either way and hold off on judgement."


    Shu kind of grunted at that, but then she''d reached the boat and her attention was now taken up by removing its strap from around an embertree. And doing so a bit gingerly, Marwan thought, until he got closer himself and saw that it was clearly some exotic material of Deisiindr manufacture, and remembered that these followers of the Triune Path considered the Deisiindr unholy. "That Fathomless tower of iniquity," as he''d heard it put. Anything that came out of it was therefore unclean, which was unfortunate since it was also exactly the kind of thing you''d need to make sure that, say, a strap didn''t rot away and let a needed boat drift off to God knew where.


    Ah well. He''d followed plenty of rules without much sense to them too, in an earlier life. Maybe one day they''d come round to his sort of thinking, maybe not, meanwhile there wasn''t any sense in antagonizing anyone.


    "Let me help you with that," he said, stepping up. "I''ve used this sort of strap before, in my Army days." Which was true enough, but Shu seemed to sense the intention behind the gesture and spared him a tight smile before stepping away.


    Progress already, he thought as he tossed the strap into its box at the back of the boat. Working with Somonei might not end up an utter pain in the ass after all. Then he reminded himself that Shu must be shaved utterly bald beneath the light helmet she wore, like all Somonei, because he had liked that smile, tight or not, and that wasn''t wise, he shouldn''t be watching the graceful way her tall wire-willow body moved, keeping her polearm ready above the muck. Shouldn''t shouldn''t shouldn''t, and he thought of other things.


    Specifically, he thought about the Gyring Ash, which he''d avoided looking at up til now without really realizing it, even thought it was right there through the trees and not many trees now and he could see exactly what Astrud has meant about it being more than she expected.A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.


    It was huge, for one thing, and moving at once faster and slower than he''d expected, which seemed impossible of course but there was such a sense of inevitability to its flow, such unbreakable momentum, that it frankly fucked with any notions he had in his head about speed and the way it should work when it came to a massive river of ash-sludge. And it wasn''t a seeing thing, anyway, it pulled at him, a great thrumming sideways shunt of energy he could feel in every bone and nerve channel from his left to his right.


    "Marwan," Xiansu said, tapping one scaly foot against the bit of shoulder armor he was standing on. "It''s not healthy to spend too long staring at that thing."


    "That thing," Marwan repeated, and wrenched his gaze away, looked at the boat instead, started calculating how he was going to get himself and his pack in without upsetting the balance. That thing. It was way too big and...he didn''t know, significant maybe, to be just a thing. But Xiansu was right, and Marwan gave him what he hoped was a properly apologetic smile as the Caustland Crow hopped off his shoulder onto the boat.


    "Yeah, sorry, kind of lost in my own thoughts here."


    "Understandable," Xiansu said. "Just remember, the Gyring Ash really isn''t. We understand almost nothing about it even after two and a half centuries of study, but we do know it has strange effects on the human mind. It''s no, well, it''s no Black Fence..." he paused and gave his feathers a rapid ruffle, "...but still. We should be careful."


    Marwan nodded. He knew, but Xiansu was still right to remind him, and he also knew he''d been thinking that, that his mind was in a bit of a loop but there were worse things.


    "Go on," Shu said, and he started, staring at her across the boat, there on the other side holding it steady.


    "Right, of course," Marwan said, and gave her a smile he found himself wondering about, what qualities it had. You Goddamn idiot. "Thank you, ah, Sena-Somonei." He knew that was the proper form of address, he''d researched it after finding out Chioma was planning to hire from the Presilyo. Sen-Somonei for the monks, Sena-Somonei for the nuns. It sounded much too formal, though, in such a small group, staring down such a long and uncertain time.


    Shu smiled, less tight this time, more wry, and nodded. "Of course, Raqiib Chadriji." There was no mockery in her tone, throwing his old title right back at him, but maybe something in the eyes?


    He threw it from his head, and hopped up into the boat with what he thought a reasonable measure of grace, considering the way the ash-sludge dragged at his clothing and dripped into the boat. "No, not for a couple decades now. Since I carried military rank, I mean. You can simply call me Marwan."


    "Not Doctor Chadriji, then?" Maybe a hint of teasing, now, as she climbed into the boat herself. But Astrud came up right behind her, and touched her lightly on the arm, and the two of them looked at each other, and he didn''t think he could read that look even if he''d been rude enough to stare. "Okay," Shu said, still holding her partner''s gaze. "Marwan."


    She wasn''t asking him to call her just "Shu" but he knew he could anyway; whatever their other faults, Somonei weren''t really demanding about titles when it came to outsiders, they spent too much of their time embedded with whoever had hired them, like state militaries or mad expeditions out into the Abwaild. Still, though, still.


    The boat was moving now, and he realized he''d been using Shu as a distraction, and maybe she''d been doing the same thing, because it was a profoundly uncomfortable sensation. The vessel was pushed forward by the Fathom-imbued channels on its underside, and that was fine, but that feeling of forward motion paled next to the sheer sideways pull the Gyring Ash was exerting on the boat and its inhabitants and...everything. Everything, the air, the blood in his veins, the breath in his lungs, the utterly overwhelmed web of his thoughts. Right flow right go right.


    Sabiqah came and pressed herself to his side and he clutched at her, feeling her rabid breathing, knowing she could probably feel his. She was warm and alive and familiar-Fallen and he looked to his right in the direction of the flow and saw something roiling under the dark grey crust, creating a pattern of breaking-out greenish light, cracks on the surface, and how far away was it? Was it moving toward them? Because they were moving toward it, and he looked ahead and saw they were nearly at the edge, not the shore, this thing had no shore just more ash-sludge it moved past as though it weren''t there, and he remembered the last time he''d crossed the Gyring Ash, the way the river had flowed across, some over but mostly below, still that tug on the boat, and this, this was worse but...


    They were there, crossing into the Mire on the other side, almost immediately wedged between the twisted trunks of two embertrees, some minor scrapes to the sides of the boat but that was fine, because they''d made it.


    But also something was coming, there under the Gyring Ash, one of the Things that were under it and that no one understood.


    "Jump out!" Marwan yelled, already halfway over the side himself. "We need to carry the boat away!" Some part of his training hooked into his brain and pulled hard, he knew he was terrified but it was calmly dragging him along, horribly familiar but still better than the utterly Other push-pull-drag of the Gyring Ash.


    Sabiqah and Xiansu stayed in the boat but the three other humans heeded him, splashing into the ash-sludge, lifting the vessel with him to navigate it between the trees while something approached, no point looking back at it, just trudge through as fast as possible.


    "Don''t look at it!" he yelled. "No point, we get away or we don''t!"


    It wasn''t alive. He knew that. Not alive the way other things were alive, not even something partway like the Ashwights seemed to be. The Fathom, always at least in the periphery of his awareness, told him nothing, because in the Fathom there was nothing to tell about this Thing. It was driven-animated by whatever something-else kept the Gyring Ash circling circling circling round the Caustlands through the center of the Siinlan with the Ashlit Mire looking on from both sides.


    Embertrees splintered behind him. He moved. There was a noise, then a rush of air, almost like expelled breath, smelling of nothing at all. He moved. Then it was moving away, behind them, now they were beyond its reach or its interest, if it even had anything so understandable as interests at all. He was breathing hard. They hadn''t gone far, it hadn''t been long, it had been forever. He slumped back against the slimy pseudobark of an embertree and breathed, prayed no ashwights would choose this time to make a visit, prayed silent even though he had no reason to believe anyone was listening.


    Old habits old thoughts surfacing when everything has been churned through plowed up shaken hard.


    But fuck it, this was long enough, this was going to have to be enough for now.


    "Okay," he said. "Chioma, I think we should probably get out of the Mire as soon as we can. We''re all going to need some real rest and we won''t get it here."


    Chioma stared at him just a moment with wide eyes, a hint of flush even under the dark brown of her skin. "Yes, you''re right. Come on. Let''s get moving." She reached into the boat and pulled out Sabiqah''s smaller vessel, and the Pircaat hopped in the moment it hit the ash-sludge surface.


    He felt a weight settle onto his left shoulder, heard Xiansu''s voice in his ear. "Good nerves, you, keeping your cool back there. We''re lucky to have you."


    Marwan laughed, enjoying the small relief it brought to those same quite frayed nerves as some of the tension flowed out. "I was terrified, like everyone else. The secret is to do what you have to do anyway."


    "Makes a difference," Xiansu said. "Now on to the Abwaild."


    "Yes," Marwan agreed. "On to the Abwaild."

 Chapter Three

    Marwan had been to the Abwaild only once before. Sort of a shameful thing to admit for an academic studying just about any other subject, that you''d only been to see the actual object of your inquiry in actual context the one time. He''d stayed for six weeks, and it had been expensive, hiring Praedhc Mire-scouts to keep him resupplied with food by ferrying it across the Siinlan. Expensive for his institution, anyway, he wasn''t exactly a wealthy man himself.


    The people he''d been studying had lived in a village a good week''s hike from the river he''d use to cross over, fairly far removed from the Mire. No Praedhc group had, in his opinion, been studied anything like near enough, but those nearest the rivers and their attendant trading posts had gotten by far the most attention over the past two centuries and change, and Marwan wanted to cover entirely new ground to the extent it was possible. Still did, of course, why else was he here?


    That had been more than seven years ago, and while it had prepared him to an extent for the strangeness, finally slogging his way out of the Mire still gave his senses a shock.


    "My God," Chioma said. She stood knee-deep at the Mire''s edge, staring out, right hand resting lightly on the pommel of the Akrafena sword hanging off her left hip, left hand half-raised as if to do...something she''d forgotten. Marwan knew the feeling.


    "Someone''s God, anyway," he muttered. He hadn''t meant to, but he was tired down to his bone-marrow nerves. She turned slightly toward him, but didn''t say anything.


    It was the colors, really, the colors and the smell. You could catch just a whiff of it, here, snaking through the overwhelming char-and-iron scent of the Mire, just enough to tickle the edges of the mind. It wasn''t strong, or unpleasant, the Abwaild was by no means a repulsive place¡ªjust very strange, and not just one strangeness either, a whole m¨¦lange of the lifelong unfamiliar to Fallen senses.


    It was almost enough to distract from the colors, but not quite. First of all, there was the violet; the Abwaild was purple the way the Caustlands were green. Every leaf, practically every growing stalk, the high curling carpets of almost-grass, all some shade or other of vivid lavender. There were purple flowers in the Caustlands, of course, and purple paint, but nothing like this, nothing at all. And the earth, where it was exposed, was not brown or even the near-black of really rich Caustlands loam, but yellow verging-on-gold, sparkling where there was sunlight.


    Of course a lot of it really was gold, scattered dust, small irregular nuggets, larger heavy lumps. You could find the near-useless metal in parts of the Caustlands too, but you had to dig a good ways down to find it. Here, it was all there on the surface. At least in this patch of the Abwaild; in other spots it was platinum, or rainbow-colored bismuth that studded and dusted the soil.


    Xiansu''s small weight shifted on his shoulder, and the slight rasp of the Cropr''s voice sounded low and awed in Marwan''s ear. "Every time, even after a half dozen times, every time it''s a bit of a shock to see the Abwaild for the first time in a while."


    "I don''t doubt you," Marwan said, and made more noise than necessary in trudging through the final few steps from Mire to dry violet-carpeted land, in the hopes that it would stir Chioma from her reverie. It did.


    "My God," she said again, and shook her head, and laughed. "I''ve seen pictures, echoframes even, and they just don''t do it justice." She began trudging forward herself, shaking ash-sludge off her boots as they finally cleared the bog for good.


    "Yeah, it''s very pretty," Astrud said from up ahead, already standing out ahead on solid ground with her sling swaying back and forth, weighed down with a readied bullet while she scanned the hilly horizon.


    "Oh, come on," Shu said, standing a few paces to Astrud''s right with a throwing axe held loose in her left hand. "It''s a lot more than just, ''yeah, pretty.'' More and different I guess, because for me? Too strange at first to be called ''pretty.'' Maybe once I''ve gotten used to it."


    Xiansu laughed in Marwan''s ear, caw caw caw, then flutter-hopped to Chioma''s shoulder when she gestured him over. "You never really get used to it," he said. "Or at least I never did. But you do get over the strangeness enough to appreciate it. Or maybe it was different for me, I''d been studying it so long. It''s true pictures don''t do it justice, but that doesn''t mean they''re worthless. Learned a lot from pictures and echoframes before I actually flew over the Siinlan for the first time."


    "We''re all going to get plenty of time for getting acclimated," Chioma said. She''d pulled a large compass from a pouch on her belt, and was leaning over it along with Xiansu, concentrating. Marwan could feel the gentle tug-and-push in the Fathom as they shooed away the small semi-sentient bits of Fathom-consciousness people sometimes called "Fathom-djinn" or just "spirits." Xiansu was doing most of the work, which was no surprise, but Chioma was putting in a good effort; just as important, she was putting in a fairly competent effort.Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.


    Still, though. Not for the first time, Marwan found himself wishing Chioma had more training, more facility with the Fathom, and also not for the first time he reminded himself that her wealth and connections and, yes, very impressive social skills were what made the expedition possible in the first place. A good bit of unfairness in it, but you didn''t get anywhere without grappling with plenty of that.


    Once the Fathom had been stilled long enough to allow the compass to operate properly, Xiansu stared at it a few moments before nodding his assent, and Chioma snapped the case shut with a flourish, though a very careful one. Almost as though she''d practiced. Almost as though she''d practiced when she could have been...but no, that was uncharitable, Marwan knew he had small useless vanities of his own.


    Sabiqah trotted past him to plop herself on her haunches by Chioma''s left knee. "Got your bearing? Show me."


    Chioma pointed, and Sabiqah sat still, tail waving. Waited. Considered. "Yep," she said at last. "Looks good to me. Let''s head on out, I don''t like lingering on the edge of the Mire like this."


    "Agreed," Chioma said, and the two Somonei converged into the lead with well-trained ease as the other four started walking. Well, other three, with Xiansu still on Chioma''s shoulder.


    The Caustland Crow didn''t get to rest for long, though. Once they''d found a likely-seeming campsite within a clearing on the top of a quartzwood-copse hill, they sent him out scouting. He took off and made a widening spiral round the spot, and they all watched him with watchful apprehension. It was dangerous for a Fallen creature to be as visible as flying would inevitably make them, but a view from the air was also much too valuable to give up, so Xiansu kept low and watchful and they all breathed easier when he came back untouched and, so far as anyone could tell, unseen by anything or anyone that might matter.


    "Seems like a good enough spot," he said, perched now on Marwan''s forearm and held out so as to address the whole party. "No water source, but that would be too much to hope for this close to the Mire, yes? And you''ve all got plenty in your dewskins?"


    They did, although the water that a dewskin condensed slowly into its bladder always tasted rather flat and, worse in certain situations, at least a little bit like whatever smell the air it came from had carried. Which meant a small taste of both Mire and Abwaild right before going to bed, which Marwan really wasn''t looking forward to. They''d brought methods for water purification with them, of course; there might be nothing edible in the Abwaild for the Fallen, but the water wasn''t any worse than the Caustlands, drinkable with a little care. So they wouldn''t be relying on dewskins the whole expedition or, hopefully, even for most of it.


    But tonight they''d all go to bed with strange fragrant tastes at the back of their throats and soaked into their gums and there was just nothing for it, still better by great leaping bounds than trying to sleep thirsty.


    And he''d be too tired to care much, or at least that''s what he told himself as the last few drops of the water he''d brought with him from the beginning soaked into the drier parts of his throat.


    By the time he''d set up his little tent and Sabiqah had crawled in beside him and he started drinking the distilled water, he turned out to be half-right. He grimaced, yawned, offered some to the Pircaat. She took a few gulps, made a face, and then curled up to sleep. He followed suit. It was pretty bad, and would probably taste even worse when he woke after a whole night of marinating in his mouth tissues, but right then sleep mattered most.


    The night passed dark and heavy with only the vaguest suggestions of dreams.


    When he rose for last watch as he''d been assigned, Sabiqah was already sitting in the center of the camp waiting for him.


    "I woke up a bit early, wasn''t worth going back to sleep," she said. Her black fur blended into the night a fair bit, but her green eyes shone strangely bright in the flicker of the hedgeflame torch he carried. Behind her, he could see Chioma and Xiansu retreating to their own tent. The two Somonei slept out in the open, wrapped up in their sleeping-meditations to protect them from the elements and any small creatures that might want to approach or take a bite.


    It looked very peaceful, if a little eerie, the small shimmer it put around them, the expression of mixed serenity and unconscious-trained concentration on their faces. He made sure not to look too long, especially at Shu.


    God damn it, every god damn it, even the Praedhc ones, he hoped this inconvenient little crush passed soon.


    Sabiqah was looking at him, and he wondered what she saw, but talking wasn''t something you did on watch unless it was absolutely necessary, so he held his peace, held it until the sun began to rise over the Western horizon and the others started to stir again.


    So. First day in the Abwaild. First morning. Time to eat breakfast and get moving.


    He surveyed his thoughts and found they formed an endless line, only it wasn''t a line because three or four always wanted his attention at once, so he breathed deep, started sorting them out, discarding the vast majority that just weren''t any help right now.


    "Ready for this?" Sabiqah said softly, the first words she''d spoken in their four-hour watch.


    "No," he said. "I don''t think any of us are. But we''re going to do it anyway. Aren''t we."


    She mrowled out a warm, gentle laugh. "Yep. That''s life if anything is."


    He laughed too, and finished packing up his tent. "I suppose. And if nothing else, this promises to be a very interesting day. No Fallen''s ever set foot in this particular part of the Abwaild before, and the farther away from the Siinlan we get..." He let his words trail off, because there was too much for him to say it all, and he knew she already understood.


    "Yep," she said. "We''re the first to step here and, God willing, we''ll do it twice. I''ve resigned myself to the possibility of dying out here, but let''s try not to do it, yes?"


    "Absolutely," he said, and started in on his carefully rehydrated breakfast. "Not dying is almost always a good idea."

 Chapter Four

    Breakfast tasted strange. Marwan wasn''t sure if it was because of some lingering aftertaste from the strangely-scented water in his dewskin, or just that his mind was now in such a different place, on edge and fully present in the utter foreignness that soaked in through every other sense. Even his cup of very strong, grounds-in coffee had a distinctly strange edge to its flavor that set his teeth on edge, made his throat feel like it wanted to close up, taking him back to his childhood as a moderately picky eater. Strange taste, maybe poison, there in the ancient irrational depths of the brain.


    Shu came and sat next to him during the meal, and of course that meant that Astrud came and sat next to her, so there was both a small absurd rush of pleasure and a zig-zagging sense of annoyance to distract him from his food. Not that the pleasure was due to Shu and the annoyance to Astrud, not exactly. Most of his annoyance was with himself, and some of it was with Shu, wishing she''d stay away, glad she hadn''t, the back-and-forth of his own emotions grating on his psyche.


    God damn it all, you''re not a teenager anymore, it''s been a whole handful of decades, he told himself.


    But it didn''t help. He imagined he could smell her, though they both must smell like Mire-dredged ass; he could certainly smell himself, a sour sweaty undertone beneath all the strangeness.


    Sabiqah came and sat by his other side, but she ate her breakfast very quickly, no words, savoring the meal at speed. It was probably the last of the fresh raw meat she''d brought with her; everything after this would be dehydrated, and though he was no vegetarian himself he still didn''t want to watch her obligate carnivore''s breakfast while fighting off the queasy undertones left lingering at the pit of his stomach with every breath of foreign air.


    So he turned to Shu, and he smiled, and wondered how it must look on his face, and she smiled back, just a small thing, professional maybe, a smile between colleagues, or maybe even comrades if you considered the danger they''d already faced and almost certainly would again.


    Or maybe not. Sabiqah finished her breakfast, got up with a stretch and a yawn, and padded off in Chioma''s direction.


    "What was it like," he heard himself ask, and thought maybe he should walk back the words but what the Hell, he''d already started and he really did want to know, "growing up in the Presilyo?"


    She cocked her head, very slightly, regarding him, and there was that suspended feeling, that delicate, momentous anxiety regarding What She Must Be Thinking. "Do you have anything to add to that?" she asked. "Any particular things you want to know, rumors you want confirmed, juicy details on all the bits of did-you-know that circulate round the Caustlands?"


    "No," he said simply. "I assume most of that is crowshit, or at least has a lot of crowshit mixed in. I just want to know what it was like from your perspective. I''m an anthropologist, you know? People interest me, especially the differences, and I know damn well you can''t get close to their real raw experiences by asking other people to filter everything through a whole gauntlet of preconceptions."


    Shu''s smile spread across her face like a slow sideways dawn, crooked and warm. "You practice that speech a lot? Use it on all those Praedhc you''ve studied? Like a small disarming touch of academia. ''Hey, trust me, I''m totally objective here, I just want to know.'' "


    Marwan leaned forward and laughed. "That''s more or less it, yes. Of course true objectivity is crowshit, best you can do is track down as many of your own biases as possible and keep an eye on the little bastards whenever you can."


    "The most glaring of which," she said, but that smile was still there on her face, settled comfortably into her strong-featured and deeply-tanned face, "is religion, yes? I follow the Triune Path, and you..." She stopped, and just looked at him.If you come across this story on Amazon, it''s taken without permission from the author. Report it.


    He let her stare for a few moments, because he liked it, liked her bright-brown eyes on his. And because he needed those moments to compose a properly careful reply. And to glance at Sabiqah, make sure she was still deep in conversation with Chioma, wouldn''t be likely to overhear his lowered voice. "Mmm. I believe in something at least. Some bits I was raised with, some things I''ve come to suspect, maybe. I am small, just the one man, and the world is vast and full of perplexing lessons."


    "Not really an apostate, then, but not anywhere in the neighborhood of devout either," she said.


    He shrugged. "Depends who you ask. But I''d rather you not. Ask, I mean. Especially..."


    "Sabiqah?" she said. "Don''t worry. Though I must say she doesn''t seem like the fanatic type."


    He nodded. "She''s not, we''ve spoken at length on a few occasions before the expedition. Still, though. Some things are easier to let lie, on a journey like this with all of us in constant close quarters. And I..." he wasn''t quite sure how to put this without seeming as though he were trying to flatter, but too late now... "I''m not usually given to discussing even this much. About myself. You understand."


    She didn''t say anything, just looked at him again, and again he liked it, at least until he caught sight of Astrud standing up beside her.


    The pale-skinned nun gave them both a calm surveying look, pale eyes under white brows shining bright in the morning sun. Marwan felt some ancient schoolboy part of himself wanting to shrink back, caught doing something wrong, but he hadn''t really, they were just talking and anyway the Somonei rules weren''t his. So he kept his face as neutral as possible, no smile, no scowl. Took another bite of bread from his breakfast, even.


    Shu turned to face her partner, and Marwan couldn''t see her face, but Astrud''s expression went slightly stormy, then closed off entirely. "I''m going to start morning meditations, if you''d like to join me," she said. Her tone was lethally light.


    "In a few minutes," Shu said. "Marwan asked me a question. It would be impolite not to answer it."


    "It''s important that we¡ª"


    "I know what''s important, Astrud," Shu said. Her voice was deadly soft.


    Astrud pulled a deep breath of Abwaild air through her nose, and looked as though she were ready to breathe it back out as a sort of calming ritual when she made a small gagging noise, coughed, and turned to stalk away.


    Marwan nodded slowly despite himself, putting on his best mock-wise expression. "Smell out here can hit you when you least expect it."


    The laugh took Shu slowly, breaking up the remnants of calm on her face, and then she had her head between her knees, shoulders shaking as she attempted to keep the volume down.


    "Seven Hells," she said once she could manage it. "Don''t want Astrud to think I''m laughing at her." She sat up straight, looked him in the eye. "I''d say I''m sorry you had to see that, but really it''s a pretty good answer to your original question. That, that''s what growing up in the Presilyo was like, mostly. You have to understand, Marwan, that I''m a very good fighter. That''s not pride, it''s not really something I''m always happy about. But it''s also, I think, the only reason the Presilyo ever let me graduate as a Somonei. What just happened with Astrud? There was a lot of that, growing up."


    He nodded, feeling the lingering warmth of what was probably a very foolish grin. "I believe you. I know a serious veteran when I see one. You and Astrud both."


    "Yeah." Shu sighed. "I do respect her, you know? I''d trust her with my life. I just..." she stared at him a moment, then shrugged. "Hells, you shared, I''ll share too. I just don''t know if she trusts me with my own soul. That''s nothing new, for me. You understand." It wasn''t a question, that last, more an expression gratitude.


    "I do," he said. "And at the risk of sounding like yet another person telling you what you should do, I should let you get to your morning meditations. This isn''t a big group, I don''t want to piss your partner off too badly because I''m, I don''t know, corrupting you or something."


    She shrugged, then smiled, crooked and and small, one of her knees jostling up and down as her leg went restless in time with her thoughts. "You''re not. Corrupting me, I mean. I make my own decisions. But you''re right about keeping the peace. It was nice talking to you, Marwan."


    She glanced over to where Astrud sat in the lotus meditation position, back to them. No possibility she could see when Shu clapped a hand on his shoulder, let it linger just a moment too long, just a moment long enough, and stood up.


    "You too," Marwan said to her as she left.


    "Damn it," Marwan said to himself, quietly once she was out of earshot.


    This could be one Hell of a complication.


    But maybe some complications are worth it. Selfish thing to think.


    Didn''t make it untrue.

 Map of Solace + Glossary

    Glossary


    A Few Useful Definitions


    Abwaild


    All territory outside the Caustlands, apart from the territory of the Sovereign Nations to the northeast.


    Inhabited by the Praedhc (also called Pelos, Antepas, Tuzhu, and Dezya in various other Fallen languages.)


    Abwarren


    The extensive system of tunnels and caverns beneath the surface.


    Aldonza


    Capital city of the Caustland State Sal¨ªa.


    Amb¨¦rico


    One of the two major languages of Sal¨ªa, the other being Gentic.


    Antepas


    Amb¨¦rico term for the Praedhc (see also Pelos, Antepas, Tuzhu, Dezya)


    Ashlit Mire


    The embertree bog that lines the inner and outer banks of the Gyring Ash. Part of the Siinlan.


    Auraramad


    The northernmost Caustland State. Very linguistically diverse, though FusHa is the most widely spoken


    language. Contains the Zulanar mountain range, which has some Praedhc tribes on its northern slopes.


    Basa


    A family of languages spoken mainly in Tenggara. While there is a "Standard Basa" in widespread use,


    the individual "native" dialects vary in their mutual intelligibility.


    Basa Mala


    One of the major Basa dialects.


    Basa Taga


    Another of the Basa dialects.


    The Black Fence


    A ring of giant obsidian shards in Sal¨ªa. Guarded by the Nowhere Watch.


    Carvers


    Dissident sect of the Triune Path. One of the Sovereign Nation Compacts. Term themselves the "only


    true Michyeros."


    The Caustlands


    The circular territory where most of the Fallen reside. Its borders are defined by the Siinlan, through


    which the Gyring Ash flows. Contains the six Caustland States (Tenggara, Sal¨ªa, Nainadion,


    Aurarumad, Zhon Han, and the United Admiralty) whose own boundaries are defined by five major


    rivers along with the Wave-Rest Berm (which forms a smaller circle in the center of the Caustlands.)


    Cenicebu


    Capital city of Tenggara.


    Common


    Dominant language of Zhon Han. Also highly influential in Tenggara.


    Cropr


    Unauthorized use of content: if you find this story on Amazon, report the violation.Gentic term for a Caustland Crow. See also Corvaso.


    The Deisiindr


    Independent city-state located within the borders of Tenggara.


    Eychi


    Amb¨¦rico term for a person who uses the Fathom for martial purposes. See also Haeliiy, Wira, Xiake.


    Fallen


    Term used to describe the peoples, flora, and fauna of the Caustlands and Sovereign Nations.


    The Fathom


    Commonly conceived as a "layer" situated beneath ordinary reality, though this is a massive


    oversimplification. Consciously accessible with training.


    Gatoparlo


    Amb¨¦rico term for a Caustland Cat. See also Pircaat, Lingmao.


    Gentic


    The de facto lingua franca of the Caustlands, with a great many native speakers in Sal¨ªa.


    The Gyring Ash


    Strange sludge-river that flows clockwise around the edge of the Caustlands, through the middle of the


    Siinlan. Surrounded on both banks by the Ashlit Mire.


    Haeliiy


    Gentic term for a person who uses the Fathom for martial purposes. See also Wira, Eychis, Xiake.


    Lingmao


    Term in Common for a Caustland Cat. Also used as a loanword in Basa. See also Pircaat, Gatoparlo.


    Manhc


    Most widely-spoken language in Nainadion.


    Michyero


    Follower of the Triune Path faith.


    Nikoka


    Protectorate of Tenggara located on the the northeast border.


    The Nowhere Watch


    Special detachment of the Sal¨ªan Army tasked with guarding the Black Fence.


    Pelos


    Basa term for the Praedhc. See also Antepas, Dezya,Tuzhu.


    Pircaat


    Gentic term for a Caustland Cat. See also Lingmao, Gatoparlo.


    Praedhc


    Gentic term for the peoples who inhabit the Abwaild. See also Antepas, Dezya, Pelos, Tuzhu.


    The Presilyo Ri''Granha


    Home of the Somonei warrior monks and nuns, run by the Triune Path religious sect.


    Ragado


    Forbidden according to the Triune Path.


    Sal¨ªa


    Southwestern Caustland State. Very diverse, but its most widely-spoken languages are Gentic and


    Amb¨¦rico. Contains the Black Fence. Capital is Aldonza.


    Saepi


    Gentic term for a person or thing related to the Sovereign Nations, e.g. "Saepi woman" or "Saepi territory."


    Silado


    Permitted within the Triune Path.


    Somonei


    Warrior monks and nuns of the Triune Path. Based out of the Presilyo Ri''Granha, an island monastery


    within the Mindao River that runs between Sal¨ªa and Tenggara.


    The Sovereign Nations


    A confederation of Fallen separatist groups located outside the Caustlands, northeast across the Siinlan


    from the United Admiralty.


    Tenggara


    Southeastern Caustland State. The various dialects of Basa are its predominant languages. The


    Deisiindr, a large independent city-state, is located within its borders. Has a protectorate called Nikoka


    along the eastern part of its border with the United Admiralty. Capital city is Cenicebu.


    The Triune Path


    Minority religious faith. Adherents are called "Michyeros." Found mostly in Sal¨ªa, Tenggara, and Zhon


    Han. Its dissident Carver sect forms one of the Sovereign Nations.


    The United Admiralty


    Easternmost Caustland State. Is bordered by the Sovereign Nations on the other side of the Siinlan.


    Official State Language is Qhziic.


    Wira


    Basa term for a person who uses the Fathom for martial purposes. See also Haeliiy, Eychi, Xiake.


    Xiake


    Term in Common for a person who uses the Fathom for martial purposes. See also Eychi, Haeliiy, Wira.


    Zhon Han


    Central Caustland State. Border defined by the Wave-Rest Berm, a huge circular ridge. The five major


    Caustland rivers meet around the island on which the capital city Wu Jian is located.