Patrick Stuart's Blog, page 16

would a depressed man be watching this much Anime?

(Or "Weebery Four: I Went back for More) One, Two and Three here
People say I'm depressed, but would a depressed man be watching this much Anime? I think not. After mainlining even more of this stuff


Themes

Still Upset About WWII
'Dororo', which was basically a psychogeography of living with/under a Fascist power structure
FullMetal Alchemist - oops we did a genocide
Attack On Titan, especially last season - heroes are arguably the baddies, oops we did a genocide, generational shame
Slime had an affecting and strange one with a child transported from Japan during the WWII bombings meeting someone from modern Japan who tells her the country is doing well and they re-built which makes her happy, (he does not go into specifics about the US bases and half of SEA still hating their guts)



Now Prussia Is My Best Friend
There is one nation in occidentalist nihon imagination and unlike the anglo-influenced occidentalist blur that I may have been expecting; friendship broken with anglos, now Deutschland ist mine best friend



Nihon simps hard for Prussia, so smart, so disciplined, so PURE. is the feeling reciprocated? hard to tell.


Tragic Bad-Guy Point-Of-Death Backstory FlashbaacksA technique which according to my amygdala, can simply never be overused. I just never seem to get tired of these. That orc you just killed - they had an abusive orc family they rebelled against but ended up as a mercenary with a drinking problem, they were looking for a way out before you CUT THEIR FUCKING HEAD OFF.


THERE'S A VIRTUAL WOOOOORLDI'm thinking more of 'summer wars' and 'Belle', in which the Virtual world is .. basically the same thing?
In the better fictions this is like the dreamy forest bits in Midsummer Nights Dream, or the Maze bits in whatever play, or Masqued Ball stuff - all the characters we know can meet and interact in different identities across a different reality.


Anime Mans BurdenHow many Isekai shows are there with some nerd colonising a fantasy world, based on computer game logic, and 'improving' everything with the power of their enlighting civilisation. It’s interesting, in its entirely unconscious belief in the power of reason and a decent person from a particular cutlure 'uplifting' a band of simple foreigners. It’s a hell of a lot like Victorian fiction. THANK YOU FOR IMPROVING US SEMPAI!

Boner For Tha PehhpeAye, they do have the best costumes and architecture and won't directly kill you for criticising their beliefs - it feels like there is a LOT of fantasy/sci-fi dark Catholicism in Anime or is that just me?


Seriously the Vatican needs to contact the Japanese government and start charging copyright on this stuff, there are more cathedrals, conspiracies and weird priests in Anime than in Italy.

Breath FetishismNot as a sex thing, but Demon Slayer, and MHA (which are almost the same show some of the time), and I think a few others, this deal where you do ritually controlled breathing and learn to super-breathe, and then learn to super-breathe ALL OF THE TIME to become super-charged, AND it’s in the first bit of Jojo as well
is this a Japanese body-awareness thing? big history of breath control? lots of concentration on breathing, I mean more than equivalent martial traditions?


The Word for "Hero" in Anime is "Hero"Not a surprise to see a lot of boys fiction with a focus on heroism, BUT - lot of these make a point of the word 'Hero' being the western word, so, is there not an exact equivalent in Japanese? Is that precise Western construction a slightly novel thing in Japanese culture?


Pure Boys and Decency PornRanking of Kings - seriously disabled but VERY PURE boy takes on all and warms and changes their hearts with the power of his kindness and purity
MHA - VERY Pure and only slightly Berserk boy warms hearts and cares for others
Slime - Extremely decent, no EXTREMELY Decent and in fact virginal, and now a-gender reincarnated pure boy Kiplings the fuck out of a society of Fantasy monsters and impresses all with his capability, decency and purity
Demon Slayer - Literally the purest of very pure boys, so pure that if you INVADE HIS MIND his subconscious is literally a blue peaceful ocean, SO FUCKING PURE, absolutely murders the fuck out of a bunch of evil demons who, in their sad-boy flashbacks, turn out to not be so bad after all
Mob Psycho - bowl-cut Pure Boy just wants to do the right thing and be a normal teenager while happening to be the most insanely powerful psyker ever
MHA & JoJo have this too, even Odd Taxi a bit
It’s not that they do this, it’s the intensity and prevalence of the theme, or is that just my viewing habits and the algorithm shaping my experience? Am I secretly a pure boy fetishist? 
Speaking of which;


Exciting levels of PederastyFrom mild but continual hebephilia to "I look twelve and dress like a stripper but I'm 1,000 years old oops I've FALLEN ON YOUR FACE". Nihon rarely fails to live up, or down, to expectation.


Tha Shows

Ranking of Kings



I am a MASSIVE simp for this show. If you often find you share my taste then watch it.
Quasi-Disney aesthetic. Deaf-mute weak boy-prince heir to the throne in fairytale-paracosm faces the 'Ranking of Kings', basically a league table of kings, except that is barely the subject of the first series, instead it’s a mythopoeic deep-dive into the conflicting characters and paradigms of a range of characters rooted in Fairytale archetypes but which grow far beyond their simplest incarnation without losing that essential rootedness.
The first interview I googled about this had the interviewer banging on about "how you subverted the Fairytale elements" FUCK OFF YOU FUCKING DRONE, DOING THE GOOD VERSION OF A LOW-STATUS FORM IS NOT FUCKING 'SUBVERTING' ANYTHING.
(ZERO Pederasty so far, GET EXCITED BOYS LETS GOOOOOOOO)
Purity of the Boy - 10000000000% FUCKING PER CENT BABYYYYYYYY


Odd Taxi



Good. Basically a Tarantino film made into a series, or more an Elmore Leanoard novel made into a series. The people are animals.
Method of Victory;Decency - 90%Specific Brain Damage Perceptual Superpower - 9%Breath Control - 1%
Boy Purity - subtly conveyed but hitting 80 or 90% purity


Fire Force



Absolute banger first few episodes. Fairly good follow up. Semi-sci-fi near-future cathspolitation. Everything is on fire apart from Japan and even that is on fire a bit. Pyrokinteics are being born and the better ones are trained to stop the victims of a plague of apparently-random auto-combustive zombie demon outbreaks. Could the giant powerful catholic new religion that controls everything somehow be behind things yes probably. Can the creator keep coming up with new ways to use Pyrokiniesis. Yes again.
Method of Victory"Going Beyond" - 60%Breath Control - 20%Power of Friendship - 20%
Pureness of the Boy - mid-range purity


My Hero Academia


The old X-Men cartoon but its anime. Feel like this is a normie take. Maybe I should be ashamed that I am still this into capeshit but I am who I am I guess. Fatherless neurotic gets SUPERMAN AS HIS DAD!! AND HE TRAINS HIM TO BE THE NEXT SUPERMAN!!!! Combined with the X-Men danger-room sections but that’s the main story, plus tacit analysis of 'heroism' and how a collectivist society deals with Burgerland levels of freedom and individualism because now everyone effectively has a gun all of the time. Answer - everyone is banned from using their superpowers except a cadre of Heroes who are basically celebrity cops taking down anyone who breaks the rules.
Method of Victory"Going Beyond" - 95%Breathing/Energy Control 2%Power of Friendship - 3%
Purity of the Boy - High level. 99%


One Piece
There are a thousand or something episodes of this, I have seen five, it was ok
No stats on this so far. But also no Pederasty. 
Boy Purity - highish, say 75%



Jojo
This is very popular with the yoof about two years ago? I have seen some of the first season, it was ok, people say that’s not the best one? Just go and re-read Sontag on "Camp" and "Kitsch"
No Pederasty so far but very, very very gay. Acceptable.
Method of Victory
"Going Beyond" - 50%Breathing Control - 50%
Purity of the Boy - 90% at least
Check the stats, he's far from the goodest boy




Attack on Titan
Hans are we the baddies? Yes and so is everyone else. basically Fullmetal Alchemist with Giants. I am loving it and waiting for the second part of the last series to be done so I can watch it on one go. NO SPOILERS!
Purity of the Boy - oh no






Mob Psycho 100
"Indy" feel, (whatever that means in anime), Psychic boy deals with school and psychic warfare with the help of his conman-with-a-heart-of-gold boss who pretends to, but has no, psychic powers. I like this one.


I have only seen the first series so NO SPOILERS
method of victory;
"Going Beyond" - 95%PURE HEART - 3%Power of Friendship/mentorship - 2%
Boy Purity - 85 to 95 per cent



Slime
I became a Rudyard Kipling Poem In Another World. 
Decent but virginal semi-failure becomes low-level monster in a fantasy world BUT HE IS SECRETLY THE MOST SUPER-POWERFUL CREATURE EVAARRRR HOW IS THIS DIFFERENT TO ANY OTHER ISEKAI POWER FANTASY? Its basically decency porn. What if a good person tried to do the right thing in everyone’s best interest and somehow it worked. If the FullMetal Alchemist/Attack ON Titan and somewhat MHA are the historical-moral-maze, generational-guilt, no-sane-escape themed animes this is basically Little House on the Prairie, or early Superman. "Ha ha I like you slime, at first I thought you were just a slime but you have impressed me with your courage and decency, I will reconsider my evil ways". You fucking bet you will buddy. Increasingly besieged by anime titties, and also a Lolli. Thanks Nihon.
method of victory;Decency - 90%"Going Beyond" - 5%Metagaming - 5%
Boy Purity - a straight 90% if you are willing to ignore the elf tits


Pederasty - high




Demon Slayer
The purest possible boy with a tragic past and insane weapons and sucide fetish FIGHTS DEMONS. But WAIT, did this particular Demon ALSO have a sad and tragic past which lead them to be easily redpilled on becoming a demon and will we get a flashback as they die in which they recognise and come to terms with their past and perhaps also thank the CHILD who just SLAUGHTERED them? Yes, yes we will.
Method of victory; 
"Going beyond" 60%Breathing    25%Magic Sword  15%



Purity of the Boy - an absolute clear 100%
(Pederasty levels - he carries around his sister gagged in a box)




Belle


If I hadn't seen 'Summer Wars' and 'Your Name', and/or was a teenage girl, I would think this was the most amazing animation of the last ten years but I have and am not so I just think it was very good. Beauty and the Beast, Virtual World, Young Girl, Tragic Backstory, Coming of Age. Good anime. No complaints.
Method of victory; 
Decency 20%Hyperintelligent best friend    30%Singing  50%

Friendship ended with....

 whoever my previous favourite sculptor was. No idea really, Hepworth? Some un-named Medieval gargoyle-former?

Because now Akishi Ueda is my best sculptor

Twitter isn't completely awful, I actually knew nothing about this artist, not even their name, but was drawn in through the algorithm showing images, links and suggestions presumably based on people I was following. 


(This guy in particular reminds me of myself.)




From the links and images I saw an art book was being made and that it was not horribly expensive, and so a purchase was made and thence utterly forgotten about while the book slowly germinated and then slipped across the seas.



Ueda (Akishis?, I can never get Japanese names the right way round), work runs from the beautiful nightmare to the somewhat sugary, probably you can guess which arc of that I prefer more, but all of it is dreamlike, somnolent, the halls of Morpheous open up and processions come forth, all quietly intent upon their own journeys and purposes.



Children dreaming of kings or kings dreaming of children, comfortable terrors.



Many such snouted creatures, they remind me of Baku the dream snaffling monster.



Many Fairytail Riders, creatures like men riding wonders sprung from the impossible paradoxes of a peasant grandmothers descriptions of an impossible beast, yet made real.



Or common figures and characters from parallel-world Fairytails, or visions of us in the dreams of the impossible creatures that might exist obverse to us across the wall of sleep.



There is an instagram here
And you can get the book..

here

Corpse Fishers

 

Art by Alcopopstar but if you have been following "Queen Mab" you know that.

Hear 

Tapping on the pipes, poking and prodding. Muttering and rambling. Otherwise they move quiet, even with a corpse across their back. 

 

Smell 

Even in the crypt, the stink of drowned rotting meat is particular and strong. 

“Ay the scent sticks to thee after a while” 

 

See 

Tottering, staggering, smiling. Grinning and whistling. Tall for a crypt-dweller, strong and rangy. Holding their hook of office. Bestrewn with twine and hooks, straps and bindings. Who knows what they have in that mess on their back? Rank with shit yet unashamed, they’ll give you a wink. 

 

 

Names 

Flexible James

Tankard Fools

Grit Feeble

Twist Valve

Small-Bird Chips

Nit-Fiddler Franz 

 

The Honest Corpse-Fisher 

Happy fellows(?) who take payment in corpses, always thrilled to be given one “for free”.

Cheery types who likely won’t necessarily try to eat you if they randomly bump into you. 

“Corpse Fishers not Corpse Farmers, that’s the Guild way” 

Pretty great guys or whatever they are, unless they find you poaching. 

“Seen any meat my lovelies?” 

“I’ll take that off your hands, no questions asked.” 

“Now that would be telling..” 

“Whats this thingy now? Now that’s a tricky thing….” 

“Well now, what say thee, what see thee? Hows thy meat?” 

 

 

Gossips 

Eager traders of information, they want to tell you the news, and they want to hear your story. 

They will listen your tales and share a few of their own. If you need information, they may know where to get it, or know something else useful. 

This is all to get a clear picture of your doings – they don’t care at all about the High Ladies or politics, all they care about is threats to the Saints. If you don’t pose a threat to the Saints, and hold nothing that might do so, then they don’t care at all what you do – except as gossip and tales to chat and trade over. 

Only malificarum matters to them. 

 

Maleficarum 

The semi-secret duty of the Corpse-Fishers is to stop any dangerous tech before it reaches the saints. Specifically any radioactive material, active nanites, bio-phages, causality weapons – maleficarum. 

“Whats this then my lovely’s? Looks a bit tricky…” 

if a Saint is damaged they will pay in their own flesh. 

The Corpse-Fishers have an ‘arrangement’ with the Hydraulic Church and Court of Melinoe. All malificarum is handed over and in return they keep the Corpse-Fishing rights. 

 

 

Abilities 

“Identify”; Can spot and identify dangerous hypertech. Is that magnetic bottle full of deadly nanites? Is that butterfly a secret carrier of a viral plague? They will spot it. But they won’t necessarily tell you this. 

Their aim is to control and restrict these things, especially to stop them reaching o damaging the Saints. They will only tell you what something is if that is more likely to get it out of your hands and into safer ones. 

 

“Disappear”; In the Crypt a Corpse-Fisher can always find a way to hide or sneak away, if they have but a moments distraction to work with. 

 

“Survive”; A Corpse-Fisher will survive one apparently-lethal attack per round. They usually play dead and use the time to “Disappear” 

 

Schemers 

If they can’t take Malificarum from you directly, they will manipulate others into doing so, or directly inform the Hydraulic Church who will then set themselves against you en-masse. The Corpse-Fishers are well-respected and can destroy the reputation of others in the Crypt if they so choose. 

 

 

The Corpse-Fishers Guild 

You have to be part of the Guild to pull corpses out of the flow. Unless caught in the act this is near impossible to prove. 

The Guild gets angry if they hear of anyone breaking their claimed monopoly. 

 

Joining the Guild 

Need; Good relationship with Corpse Fishers, Hydraulic Monks and Melinoe. Proven skill in Corpse Fishing and keeping secrets. No claims against you of eating the uneaten things. 

The Test; Find and bring three specific corpses to the testing ground before the hourglass turns. The Guild places these in advance and the placement tests the situational knowledge, cunning and luck of the applicant. It’s possible for an applicant to bring other corpses so long as they match the description given, this considered the “luck of the pipes”.

I; Midwit

Corrosive reality and the slow abandonment of my illusory self means I am half-comfortably sinking back into midwitism. I can no longer be bothered with the self-pretence, and am "opening up" to become "stunning and brave". I am basic. Or more basic than I had hoped. My attention span is fucked. I get tired looking at the sky and am relieved when I get to go to bed. What have I become. Blame it on Covid. Fuck how long has Covid being going on now? And seeing as it hasn't *directly* affected my lifestyle much, can I reasonably blame it for anything.
What purpose does this illusory self serve? It must do something, because everyone has one, do our positive and negative illusory selves duel in the night? Is it just essentially impossible for us to truly know ourselves so all we can do in reality is vaguely triangulate between our positive and negative illusions? By what necessity is our true self hidden from us?
As an act, perhaps of penance, or as a stunning and brave confession of being neither stunning nor brave, here are my most recent midwitisms THIS IS WHO I AM AND I ACCEPT THAT



Failing to finish Daphne Du Mauriers 'Rebecca' because it was "stressing me out".Being unable to sit all the way through two-hour films on streaming services even though I was somewhat enjoying itPersistently watching anime, and not even the classy stuff but the normie shit. I am still watching My Hero Academia and have not completed 'Odd Taxi' even though it is verifiably more complex and original.Being concerned how my hedge looks from the street.Being pleased at neatly compressing recycling into bin.Other books given up on - several.No longer writing reviews for each book I read, happy to have "gotten through them".Getting wasted to watch Marvels Shang-Chi and enjoying it...Putting "shower" on a daily to-do list for an "easy win" and still not showering."I need to finish reading my twitter stream.""I could have a YouTube video on while...."Sort-of enjoying Amazon Primes 'Wheel of Time' series. (I'm pretty glad I don't actually know anything about Wheel of Time because if I did I'm sure I would be STORMING about whatever the fuck they did to it...

Having a mapping-and-navigation problem on recent project and eventually going "fuck it, just use Apocalypse World". (Pre-lapserian Patrick worked out an entire method for navigating three-dimensional space in VotE).


This post is a no-shame zone. The confession box is open below. Feel free to comment with your own confessions on sinking  into comfortable normiedom

The First Amber Court

Before it was an Empire, the Court was a Kingdom, an Ideal, a warren of rooms in the Crypt of an unbuilt Cathedral, and before that, a room, panelled in Amber, the birth point of the concept, and the conspiracy which begat that strange devising.

 

"What is known was once suspected, and what suspected was once known." - Kausker Wood.

 

Yet this we think we know; K-----1 the Duke of Lataam, possessed a chamber2 panelled in amber, and it was here, shortly after the 'Miracle of Hoögst' that the first secret meetings3were held, and the germination of the Amber4 Court began.

 

   Apocryphal image of the Amber Court in its Late PeriodFrom 'In the Memories of Stars'

1.      On Redactions

 

Mind-plague and Cursethought still hover round the record of these times, especially of the later wars of the Amber Court, the Otherworld Wars and the Red Shift, such that only the most pure of our order are permitted to read, write or even consider these matters. The more conservative amongst my order would happily launch a Mnemarchy Crusade to conceal or destroy allrecords - so greatly do they fear the contagious notions, the "vermin tales", of the Red Shift - that they may spill over, hide themselves in nearby concepts and thereby slowly and subtly re-infect the Lords Causality.

 

Here no such redaction has been made. The son of Duke K----- of Lataam, he who would become "The King Beneath the Mountain", "The Twice-Redacted King" and "Lord of the Amber Court", possessed such power over the Lords Causality that, along with many of the higher-ranked members of the Amber Court itself, his name may not be directly written, remembered or considered. This enchantment, or alteration, was, and is, so powerful that it has overflowed even to the identities of that individuals parents and nearby relatives. All we can say of Duke K---- was that his name began with K. His name is written in some of our records but neither I nor any conscious being may read or comprehend it.

 

  

2.      On The Chamber

 

A room  in the Ducal palace or fortress of Lataam panelled in amber and fossils. A twin-walled room, silent due to its inner amber walls, paved with polished trilobites. Servants and guards moved behind the amber panels, in the space between the walls  bearing lamps.

 

The shadows of strange insects, curls and spatters of ancient catastrophe and that of one creature something like a mouse, along with the warping and shifting of light as it smoked, more than shone, through the wavelike  thickness of the amber walls and was refracted through the carvings, passed across their features of those who met within. Both the sound and nature of the occupants was disguised. The vague shape - but not identity, of those within could be perceived, and nothing heard.

 

 

  

3.      On The Meetings

 

One door lead to the dukes apartments and the other to the hedge maze in the garden - a petty labyrinth - but many early meetings were held during parties and gatherings and being "lost in the maze" was sufficient reason to excuse an absence. The great variety of guests and the double-disguise of a masked ball, along with the covering social camouflage of a hist of petty intrigues, clearly sufficed to disguise both the participants, and even the very existence of the meetings themselves.

 

 

 

4.      On Amber

 

The room was an assembled treasure of the Dutchy of Lataam - partly inherited from the lost Dutchy of Latöm - partly received in dowry on the marriage of Lady Z----- of Frost to Duke K-----. Duke K----- dedicated himself to collecting such amber treasures for much of his life, finally completing the room roughly 15 years before his death.

Born of strange places were they, torn from seams and tipped from fossilised trees on shores left bare by suboceanic shock. The treasures of tribal kings, smoke-stained, ancient even to them. The amber panels dated from many ages and even the panels themselves were composite elements of a composite room.

 

Duke K----- allowed re-carving for a more coherent whole. The leering, primitive ancient carvings of the amber mixed and jumbled, overwritten with the forms and shapes of many faces. The ghosts of those primeval forms remained hidden in the shifting yellow light, waiting only the just-so crossing beams to reveal themselves again, and beneath these overwritten patterns watched the still-more ancient emissaries of deep time - the only witnesses to a new era of hope and fear.

 

"In the Memories of Stars"

 I write of ruin unbound by the past and the unravelling fates of men for you have recalled to me a dream wherein I saw, in the future of my people, a record of the ruin of your own. A vision, not of tumbling towers or oceans folding over the pennants of Knights but of books, and silence in an empty palace where snow drifts through the halls
There wrote a scholar in a voided land. The armies tipped into the rivers to stain the sea red, the peasants ploughed into under their furrows, starved in their hearths, the nobles withered, twitching from the teeth of gnawing rats.. all tumbled away to nothing like a cup emptied from a towers top, leaving beneath it not a splatter, nor a stain, wine drunk by the howling wind
In my dream, which came strangely like a memory, I knew this place. It was the Solar of Irrilyia, a once-sacred chamber I was taken to as a child, built by a long-fallen Prince as a sad offering to his unmarried mistress so that, though she may never be Queen and her children bastards all, yet she might occupy the topmost place in all the lands of Frost. In time, and as dynasties rolled each upon the other it was abandoned, transferred, preserved first as a power, then memory. 
When I saw the Solar, once and still the highest room of the tallest tower of the most sky-deep city of Frost, I recall it full of sunlight as a jewel is full of shine. Yet in my vision no sun wheeled nor stars shone, only a pale lantern and a guttering fire
In my dream I entered quietly, as a child, yet I was no child and moved as if I knew this place well, had walked it before, not once but many times.
In the Solar one black figure sat, robed in black made darker by the shadow of the lamp. They did not turn to me but stayed, sitting, crouching, hunched across the desk which occupied the centre of this room. All else was shadow and gloom, glimmers of firelight catching on the tumbling flakes of snow which drifted from a fissure in the roof
Near the black scribe was bound an orange flame, one locked in the belly of a stove, an iron tripod of the kind soldiers use, one leg was gone, it was propped, I saw on piled books of ancient make with slate and wooden covers though the topmost charred slowly, pressed against the pig-black iron. All was unsteady, the stove wavered, the chair and table tapped, shifting a little under the pressure of each written line as it crawled towards the parchments edge, and the weight of this black writers outstretched hand tilted the table, and so the scribe put out the other arm to grasp the tables side.
The scratching of the pen, like whispers, followed by a soft "thunk", a wheeze, as of from ancient lungs or cleft lips, then "thunk" the table tipped to rightness as it seemed the writer rode it through the black night like a ship in storm. And with this, a squeal, very small, as the chair tipped and bowed a little at each movement. Ill-made tools for an ill-made man for under all was breathing which seemed sore labour.
The whispering pen, the "thunk-thunk-squeal" and the labouring lungs, all sounds bound like slaves or spirits to the fierce unending flow of the text, unseen to me, a hidden river yet it pushed and rode the writer and commanded every effort of this desolate and fractured place as if a demon, possessing but one vile and ancient servant, unable elsewise to touch at all our material world, stood invisibly and with imperious will, lashed, howled without sound and commanded "Write. Write! Write!!" Such was strangely fearful in this little sight; a  black robed-man writing in a high castle.
I stepped within, or I remember that I had stepped in so, in that old-old story of the Pale Scribe which surely I remembered now. 
Cold was the Solarium, yet not bare. Books were piled against the walls, scrolls tacked and jammed in gaps and between piles. The wind panted outside and pressed fingers against the windows, once clearest glass, now blocked and shuttered, curtained by rags and browned tapestries. Yet still some wind keened and a whispering slip across the darkened floor like a carpet of snakes. Papers and scraps, pages and letters, fragments, skittered like leaves, flowed like embers on the cold air.
Why this word-hoard? Were they relics? Treasures? How? In the whole of Samaris were these charred and misbegotten scraps somehow stolen, or preserved?
"What do you here? What place is this, and when?"  
So I wished to scream and cry out, to ask this grim librarian.
Were they mad this hermit? Or was this all, the last remains of Samaris and Frost? Was there anyone still who knew the story of Illyria, or that this was her room and why it was made? But I remembered, or saw, I had seen somewhere or been told, that in this scene, this story, nothing was spoken or said, for one would not, one could not, and so both were silent.
He sighed then, and the black shape paused, shifted. It writhed I think. The Demon did not want it to be still. The words called, like a black river of ink which if dammed must burst. But I think there was a moment of silence, of recollection, as of an old, sad memory, a stillness of regret. Then again, "scratch-thunk, scratch-thunk-squeal" and the labour of breath. I think if this scribe knew of me, and I felt somehow it did, and yet did not, but that it cared not at all, intent upon his text here at the end of the world.
It.
Was it truly pale?
I did not want to see its face, or to be seen, but I knew that, as dreamers know, that I must read.That was how the story went and would go, that was the reason for the memory, why it had been passed on. Or the vision... But I must read nonetheless, for to do otherwise were like a joke half-told.
Though I saw and could see nothing of the outside world I imagined a black horizon and red fires burning under stars which swam and melted like ice, like tears.
The wind stirred and in the shadow of its sound I crept. I breathed through open mouth as a child does creeping in a game, and like a child I felt great dread, so much that my thighs itched and quivered as if holding on a climb, for all that my tread was soft.
He stank, though the cold hid it. He stank like a leper. Rags folded him and he was hunched beyond belief.He seemed to be in pain, or past pain, for I think for him no deed or moment lacked it.
I was within the fires red glow, and little heat it gave. I saw the surface of the table.
"Scratch-scratch-thunk"
And the "skree" of the chair as he leaned his bowed body and reached, forcing limbs which seemed to which to curl upon themselves, like ferns, pushing them, his withered self, bowing to force the grey half-bitten quill to the edge of the table, the edge of the page.
The hand.
Was, could this be a mans hand?
So white. White as the moon and vile as a wound.
What had been done to him? What had he done?
A punishment? Burning. Perhaps acid, or feathers and tar. Were those still fingernails or something else?
I looked down, in the vision, in the memory of the tale I remembered that I had done this, down at my own right hand. It was normal, and shared no mark or blemish with that thing. There was no way, it would not, I would not become…
So, unspoken fear assuaged, I stepped, only a little step. The rank beast stink and the pitiful breath. The "scratch-scratch-thunk" resounding now like hammers. I was right behind him. Right behind his shoulder, invisible, unseen and even if he should rise, should turn and see me, I could hurl him down like a dog, withered as it was. This was the secret I was bound to see. The black words crawled across the cracked palimpsest.
It was my tongue, not the one in which I write to you, but that of my birth, in an educated, elongated secretary style. My eyes darted, sections, headings, repeated phrases, amber, the amber court, chrysalis wars, ruin, great working, the names of great nations. 
What dark history was this? Not mine, thank god, but some names I knew. Oderlane, Day and yours, or your title at least.
"The Ruin of the Amber Court"
All this was written in past tense, and grimly, as if too long done, but I saw horror, vague and terrible as if from scripture or nightmare. I read of shapeless legions, of lands I knew yet "turned from any Path and Broken", of rains of corpses, of generations cursed by dark foreknowledge, of lands where the babes were born dead, yet sentient and grieving themselves, of cities tipped into the "Fabric" and make alike unto curses, or worms or dragons of myth; "and Redgaar turned then at the time of Third Turning and broke its Path and the Cord of its Peoples and moved behind the Fabric as a hungry ghost which swims in black water and was cursed". I read of dreams made vampiric, of tilted skies which spilled forth quicksilver men that hated all, of the harrowing of Time and ever and again, repeated; "The Ruin of the Amber Court".
I leaned forwards, puzzling and darting, lost in dark wonder and frustration. What was the Amber Court? For then I had never heard the phrase. 
I leaned and He turned, and saw
Or just remembered. His eyes searching mine, or looking through them. Could he see me at all?
What before I feared in horror I saw now in inexpressible sorrow. A face so altered and unmanned, eroded by tortures and sculpted in pain, yet, regret, regret and yearning unto madness, as if in in a call or heralds cry, his face alone begged me; Do not let this be.
Did our eyes meet?
I woke from my vision, or came from my memory, weeping. So sad, so sad and fearful yet I knew not what for. For a fantasy. I could neither be consoled nor speak of what I had seen. What could I say but that I wept for a dream I could not well recall?
All this lay within me, for how long? A week? A month? Though the memory slowly faded, I wrote notes, made images and verse for, though I could not speak of what I had seen directly, I could freeze instants of it through art, like nails in my soul.
Only weeks I think.
Can you imagine now, or begin to, what flowed through me as I deciphered your letter? (By my own hand, for I would trust no other). Letter by letter, phrase by phrase. Of what slow nightmare, no, for there was no shadow or enchantment to it, but only horrid clarity, like a deadly sentence handed down by a mediocre judge.
Those Self Same Terms
The Exact Words
And the very concept! Not in history, but as a plan! A yet-to-be! Can you understand? I wish I wish I wish that you could see my visions as I saw them, but I know you will doubt, and if not doubt, defy. Such is your nature. You are fearless, and there is a great terror in that. God made fear for a reason, we do not think it is a blessing but it is. You will doubt and see only a warning, and you will plan and devise, thinking to overcome. Such is your way, your nature to the core.
Still I implore you. I beg you, if you have ever respected my talents, as your words would suggest, if you can believe me in any way. Do not do this.
There is still time! Fate is not yet set. Whatever horrors you have seen since Albraneth and the Canticle, whatever winding paths your Seers have put before you, I know you are outraged by these times and their falseness, by the ignorance and hypocrisy, and yes I agree with you that Oderlane is mad and likely a Sorcerer, and his beasts both fanatical and corrupt. Tet still, I beg you, do not do this thing. I have seen it and it is terrible.
I will not join you beneath your mountain.
I wish I knew words to move your soul but I fear none such exist.
Peace to you in all love.



---------------------------------------------------
Apocrypha of "In the Memories of Stars". Copy of a document said to have been recovered, year 672, from the ruins of lost Samaris. Transcribed and included in the 732 First-Block-Printed edition. Retained only as Apocryphal as all dates and names either removed or lost and provenance of original impossible to ascertain.

A Glossary of the Amber Court

 Great swathes of time and chaos separate us from even the Age of the Later Court. Much has been lost, the Court itself was swathed in deep secrecy during its Early Period, purely as a matter of survival, and in its Later Period became riven with intrigue, factionalism and obscuration. Nevertheless I can present to you a brief list and explanation of some of the more obvious terms which will directly apply to your studies.

 

 

 

Aiguilletage 

Needing. A simple catch-all term used by Seers to describe their work in altering Courde or Fate Lines. Anything from the subtlest Notching to the most brutal Galon would be described so, usually within an ‘Atelier’. i.e. “What’s your aiguilletage today?”

 

 

 

Almoner

See ‘Haptic Ranks’ 

Broadly responsible for the well-being of an ‘Atelier’or specific tasked group of Seers. Originally based around consumables, food, shelter for them and their families, though also interrelated with security and perhaps ultimately a political role. Of necessity, the Almoner must be well versed in Amber Court politics. Whether the Almoner is protecting, controlling, imprisoning or supporting the Atelier is up for debate. 

 

 

Amber Mystery Disciple

See ‘Ocular ranks' 

The fifth ranked grouping of Amber Court Seers. The last rank at which one would be resident commonly outside the Court itself and the lowest rank at which one might lead an Atelier. 

 

 

Amber Soul Disciple

See 'Ocular ranks' 

The third rank of Seers in the Amber Court. Almost never seen outside the Court itself until the later part of its history and those individuals have their own names and legends. An Amber Soul Disciple would be the leader of at least one Atelier and possibly several. 

 

Autocephaly 

A single Seer or a group of such, freed from organisational hierarchies and instructions on where and to what ends they should focus their attention. Very rare at lower levels of the Amber Court but in some sense all highly-promoted Seers attain a degree of Autocephaly in their prognostications, though they are expected to dedicate their secular or Hapticattentions to their Court Duties. 

Since most, perhaps all, highly promoted Seers engaged in meta-prognostication of the groups and matters under their immediate purview, it’s clear that even from the start, any strong divide between secular or ‘haptic’ responsibility and transcendent or Ocular duty, melted away towards the top of the pyramid. 

See ‘Blind Melody Disciple’ for a Court Rank assumed to engage in a high degree of Autocephaly. 

Degrees of Autocephaly are thought to be one of the main divisions between early Houses. 

 

 

Atelier 

The core organisational grouping of the Amber Court. An Atelierwas a group of Seers under the direct instruction of a Seer of Amber Mystery Disciple or Amber Soul Disciple Rank at least. 

Ateliers could be dedicated to particular situations, groups, individuals or fate lines by the Pursuivant or Grand Pursuivant, or might be part of a larger, distributed array of Ateliers working under a common leader of Preceptor level or above, or may even have some degree of Autocephaly. 

One can think of an Atelier as a closed room, or group of chambers in the Amber Court where a select group of Seers gathered to plumb the depths of a specific Warp or Courde. This room, and their work in general, would be separated from the outside world and from the Amber Court as a whole by two guards, the Poignard Disciple within the chamber and the Tyler without. 

Information control was deeply important to the Amber Court and Ateliers were not meant to intra-communicate, neither were the instructions sent to them or the information issuing from them meant to intersect with the instructions or perceptions of any other Atelierexcept via the correct and singular authorities dedicated to that task. 

In the early years of the Court this method seems to have held largely true (though with some gaps and loopholes even then), by the Later Period the Court was so riddled with intrigue, factionalism and complex webs of meta-prognostication that its widely assumed the Ateliers were “wide open”, though the forms of Poignard Disciple and Tyler were still followed. 

 

 

Bias 

Has very specific meanings highly dependent on context, but very generally, a term used to describe the range of possibilities in which a particular Courde or Warp either express itself, or diverge. (Though, oddly, almost never referring to the Selvage. 

Usually when referring to a single Courdewith a hard Selvage, the bias describes the potential range of ways in which the known fate may be expressed. i.e. if Duke X has a Courde with a hard Selvage in two weeks, but with a great Bias, then the Seer, or Atelier, is strongly certain that this individual will die on or within that timeframe, but very uncertain of how that death may occur. 

Conversely, an uncertain Selvage with a short Bias, would mean that Duke X may live a very long period of time, but when he does die, it is almost certain to be by the method or in the manner predicted. 

When referring to Warps, Fate Lines for larger groupings, the definition and usage of 'Bias' becomes more complex and situational. 

 

 

Blind Melody Disciple

See 'Ocular ranks' 

The fourth ranked grouping of the Amber Court. An unusual and unspecific rank. Almost never given leadership roles but neither required to be resident within the Amber Court itself. Blind Melody disciples were expected to rove far and wide across the world, taking on many roles. They may be a form of intelligence agent of direct action operative for the Court, or head up or advise groups of such. 

Technically this should never have occurred as, according to Court Law analysis and effect are separated into the Ocular and Hapticarms of the Court and should not intermix. What 'intelligence gathering' looks like to a society of Seers one can only guess. Some individuals advanced quickly to 'Wild Melody Disciple' rank and remained there all of their lives while others skipped the rank entirely.

 

 

 

Broderie 

Altering or managing the appearance or 'seeming' of events regardless of the Courde, Warp or Fabric. i.e in classic Broderie, the manner or seeming of events might change a great deal but the fate of not one insect will ultimately alter. Seers disagreed deeply on the importance of Broderie, initially it was a low-status art and those of mid to high rank eschewed it, yet ultimately many High Preceptors were initially deeply skilled in Broderie and maintained silence on the subject, speaking neither in defence nor condemnation of the art 

 

 

Celestial Master

See 'Ocular Ranks' 

Actually the seventh and probably lowest ranked grouping of the Amber Court. Still considered to be by far superior to the common weal of Seers in capacity. A ‘Celestial Master’ might primp themselves about amongst the colleges of lesser Seers who gathered around the Amber Court, particularly in the Later Period, but would ultimately be regarded as an apprentice within it, perhaps a joke by the Rightly-Guided King in this naming. 

 

 

Coudre, Thread, Fate 

A Fate line, classically conceived as the destiny of a single individual or some other simple, unitary identity, of perhaps an object, like a sword, or in some rare cases larger identity groups so long as some other very strong element unifies their fate lines i.e. a group of individuals in a single lifeboat on an empty sea, or trying to survive in the snows of Nehei. 

 

 

Decatize 

'Priming' Courde, checking for existing Warpsand Wefting, if necessary, cutting any warped Courde. Preparing a fate for Alteration. In many cases to Decatize is assumed to be much easier in the case of nonentities, newborns, unimportant individuals they young etc, and to get harder and harder to the degree in which people age, gain status, form connections with others and become more individual. There are however, many counterintuitive examples. Complaints over failures to Decatize proliferate in the Later Period. 

 

 

Edge 

Philosophically the conceptual barrier of inter-related fates beyond which no Seer can meaningfully alter anything. More commonly used in the manner of specific Atelier and Seers remarking on the limits of their own ability regarding a single weave "I/We have hit an edge". 

There were always debates within the Court as to whether there was actually an Edge in the conceptual sense and these ultimately added to the fissured which accelerated the proliferation of Houses and which, in part, defined the structure of the Later Prescience Wars. 

 

 

Entoilage 

To 'Augille' a Warp into the Fabric, the structure of causality, producing strong feedback loops between the structure of the desired fate and highly non-alterable events, beginning with things like the actions of the sun and stars, vulcanism, etc. Entoilagecan effectively seal the fates of large Warps but carries enormous risk as the nature of the feedback loops means that if the Warp does shift, instead of being strengthened by the substructure of Causality, it may instead alterthat substructure. 

Entoilage was considered a high and subtle skill for much of the History of the Amber Court. 

 

 

Fabric 

Causality. Fate or time itself. The structure and direction of events regardless of human action. Though in many cases Seers will refer to 'Fabric' or 'The Fabric' as being simply a deeper and more certain, less alterable layer of causality than the one they are currently working on. 

 

 

Galon 

A method but more usually described as an action, i.e. “I/he just galoned the fuck out of it. Don’t put it in the report”. 

Jamming a pre-existing small Warp or Courdeinto another larger warp with little preparation. In a sense a form of crude Entoilagebut instead of interweaving the chosen Warp with deep Fabric, one simply appends one smaller Warp to another not much deeper and stronger than itself in the hopes that “Nothing will go wrong”, or if it does, that no-one will notice it was your fault. Carries all of the risks of Entoilage but with much greater chance of failure. 

 

 

Grand Pursuivant

See ‘Haptic Ranks’ 

Administrator of all Pursuivants throughout the Amber Court. The seal of the Grand Pursuivant guarunteed physical access to any Atelier, at least technically through the Tyler, though the Poignard Disciple, in thier capacity as member of the Atelier, may potentially deny such access. A rank with only grew in power over the Ages of the Amber Court and which clashed often with the Almoners. 

 

 

Great Emptiness Disciple.

See 'Ocular ranks' 

The sixth ranked grouping of Seers of the Amber Court. Little is known of the titles meaning. 

 

 

Haptic Ranks 

The procedures of the Court were initially designed to strongly separate the ‘Ocular’ arm, made up of Seers an dealing only in information under highly controlled circumstances, and the ‘Haptic’ arm, made up of non-Seers and largely tasked with the security (and perhaps control) of the Seers and Ateliers. 

There were many more than described here, including whole schools of Scribes, (its estimated there were perhaps five Scribes for each Seer). More details can be found in the respective entries. 

Almoner – in charge of welfare of Seers or Ateliers

Tyler – originally a guard to the door of an Atelier

Pursuivant – originally a backup to the Tyler or assistance to the Almoner

Grand Pursuivant – Master of Pursuivants 

 

 

Houses 

Seem to be socio-political groupings within the Amber Court itself, crossing between Ateliers and Ranks. In the Early Period of the Court these are referred to as intellectual and philosophical concepts, though in the Later Period they grow both in number and the extent to which they are mentioned. Some later correspondence seems to place the various 'Houses' above even the Ateliers and Preceptors in importance. In either case, little is known of their nature, purpose or views. 

 

Dominant in the early period and continuing to the middle period; 

The House of Glass

The Bright House

The Tripartate House

 

Minor or non-existent during the early period, growing in power and dominance from the middle to the Late period 

The Deep House

The Suns Perfection House

The House of Peace

The House of the Orthodox Sun ('New' Bright House)

The Glass Blade (abjured)

The House of Ghosts (abjured)

Final Clarity House

Perfected Mystery House

The Lemniscate House (abjured)

The Ouroboros House (‘New’ Lemniscate, twice-abjured and records purged)

Flowing Blood House (abjured)

House Invisible (denied)

House of Amber Flies (abjured, condemned) 

 

 

 

Notch

An action and method; ‘to notch’. 

Cutting or removing fate lines at the 'edge' of a Warpto produce a 'Neat Warp', more stable and less likely to fray and produce Bias. Essentially shifting or breaking the interrelationships at the edge of a shared Warp so that the fate of the Warp is more strongly separated from the common Fabric. A very difficult and subtle art as in many cases, notching can also make a warp unstable, yet to perform it exactly encourages a warp to curl in upon itself yet without any obvious trauma. 

 

 

Ocular Ranks

 (counting upwards in importance)

 

?. Poignard Disciple

7. Celestial Master

6. Great Emptiness Disciple

5. Amber Mystery Disciple

4. Blind Melody Disciple

3. Amber Soul Disciple

2. Preceptor Numinous

1. Preceptor of Glass 

 

 

Patron / Plan 

Few Aiteliers would begin the Aguilletagewithout first assessing the shape of the Corde, Weft, Biasand Selvage. This done they form a collective plan both of the desired fate and of the Aguilletage used to attain it. The nature of these Patron/Patterns/Plans is different for each Aitelier. 

 

 

Pattemouille 

An expendable Warp, a grouped arrangement of fates used to the point of destruction purely to alter or Decatize the prime Warpor Courde intended. Not always physically destructive as the Court would say, to destroy a fate is not necessarily to destroy the person, (though a fair amount of time it means destroying the person). Intra-Aitelier arguments over Pattemouille could be savage as a Warp carefully conceived by one Aiteliermight be used by another simply as Pattemouille by another. 

 

 

Preceptor of Glass

See 'Ocular Ranks' 

Title of the first rank of the Amber Court. Nothing more is known of them. 

 

 

Preceptor Numinous

See 'Ocular Ranks' 

Second ranks of the Amber Court Seers. Presumed masters of meta-prognostication. Perhaps allowed to directly advise the Rightly-Guided King. Little is known. 

 

 

Pursuivant

See ‘Haptic ranks’ 

Has administrative control of entry and exit from the Atelier, though direct control is held by the Tyler and the Poignard Disciple. The Pursuivant might control anything up to a small paramilitary force dedicated to the protection of a specific Atelier or Seer. 

Pursuivants were initially intended to remain separate to the Atelier and in some sense subservient to the Tyler, initially conceived as little more than armed backup for the Tyler. The appearance in the  Later Court Period of armiesof Pursuivants gives the ultimate lie to that. 

 

 

Poignard Disciple

See ‘Ocular Ranks’ 

An unusual role of the armed Seer. The Poignard Disciple was initially a low-ranked,  perhaps not even Celestial Master level, member of an Atelier who literally guarded the door from the inside, armed with a Poignard. The same door being guarded from the Outside by the Tyler, an entirely haptic Rank. 

This provided a good opportunity for the Poignard Disciple to learn about the work of the Atelier and also about the structure of the Amber Court. Over time the position clearly changed and was often filled by a wide variety of individuals, becoming more of a role than a rank. 

 

 

Point droit 

Jamming something into a Courde or jamming a Courdeinto or around another at the last minute, either due to failure in planning or unforeseen complexities. If someone Point droits your Courde you will usually know about it. The results are usually ‘Miracles’, truly bizarre coincidences, obvious loops and various other obvious non-causal elements. 

One Atelier requesting a quick "point droit" from another would be regarded an admission of embarrassing failure. However, in later years it is clear that the Almoners were forced to suppress an informal underground 'trade' in Point Droit between Ateliers. 

 

 

Selvage 

The length of a Courde or Warp in time. For an individual, in most cases, the point of death or discorporation, for a group, the point of breaking up, giving up or evaporating, or death. Though as with all court matters, there are subtleties. Death may not be the end of Selvageand Selvage may not end in death. 

 

 

 

Surfiler 

if 'Notching' is a subtle and graceful method of separating a chosen Warp from the Fabric and creating a mutually-linked fate, Surfiler is a hasty, even brutal method of sealing a Warpby 'curving back' its edges and using dense, closely arranged fate lines to ensure that no decision pattern allows exit. 

Surfiler was not well regarded and if applied to more intelligent Courde-dwellers, would often produce effects highly noticeable even to those bound within the Fabric, such as individuals and elements leaving and then quickly returning by unusual means, rings and totems being thrown away and then being found in a potato, individuals falling into a river and washing up at the next bridge, individuals being ‘lost in fog’ and returning to wherever they came from. 

Various forms of crude Surfiler were likely elements in simple Hedge Workings. 

 

 

Tyler 

They duty of the Tyler was initially to guard the door of the Atelier from the outside with force. In the middle and later court periods the Tyler evolved into a more political role, as opposed to the Pursuivants who eventually became a military force and in competition with the Almoners who maintained a purely administrative authority. Tylers were usually highly competent and intelligent non-Seer individuals who traded both on what they did know and could do and on what they might know and wouldn’t do. 

There is no equivalent role for the later Tylers in other polities. Armed duellist /ambassador/ factotum/ bodyguards? 

 

 

Warp 

A group of unified or grouped Courde or fate lines, as for a city, a village, a family military force etc. A ‘shared fate’, either occurring naturally or Wefted into being. 

 

 

Weft

To ‘weft’, wefting together. 

Both the means of tying together Courde into grouped fates or Warps and also describing the expressions and extent or 'size' of the resulting Warp. 

The means of tying together threads into grouped fates or expressions; In Haptic terms, a general recruiting for an army, putting them all in the same uniform and marching them as a unified group to a particular engagement, has 'made weft', but most Seers use 'Weft' to describe the tying together of Fate lines in ways usually not detectable by mortal senses. Wefting can take place long before those involved in it become aware of it. For instance, two boys born far apart but in particular social and personal circumstances may be 'wefted' with a hard bias, to join the aforementioned military group before the general who eventually leads them even conceives of the idea 

The extent or 'size' of the Warp. The number of Fate lines involved; their geographic distance of the individuality of their Fates. To Weft together the fate of a single homogonous village into one Warpis considered relatively simple (the "curse" of Folk Seeing in which a Seer or Wonder-Worker is killed or offended and brutally Wefts their accusers into one Warp with as short Selvage and slim Bias, would be a narrow (easy) weft). 

By comparison, Wefting together highly intelligent and individuated persons scattered across the globe, with highly different world views and aims, into one Warp, would, classically, be a wide(difficult) Weft and an act of great skill. 

 (However, views on this seemed to differ bewteen Houses and many highly ranked Seers disagreed on the relatively difficulty of Wefting)

 

 

What Reads Like Shit But Plays WELL?

 At some point this blog had something to do with Dungeons and Dragons or something,.. tum te tum the OHHH ESSHH AYR? I think I found those words scratched behind a pillar in a forgotten language in a sertaline dream I had.

In an act of remembrance for whatever this Blog used to be, and out of interest - plumbing, dredging the minds of my audience, and from my own curiosity, I have a query;
What reads badly but plays well?
Here is a picture for you;
Marcel Roux Offering to Moloch, 1908(ripped off from the blog 'Monster Brains')


A few examples, largely from discussions I have had with friends who read and used things I didn't like the look of. Castle Xyntillan did not appeal to me at all from the text but multiple people have told me "No it plays like hot shit at the table, great fun." Likewise Ravenloft, the villain-is-ASDA-Dracula, sounds awful to me but again many many people say the opposite in play.
(I leave the definitions of "bad", "plays well" and the discussion of what we are talking about exactly (I'm imagining adventures but willing to accept a reasonably wide spectrum of 'similar things' around that), deliberately open. If you want to talk about what 'bad' means to you so you can define it better then do so, please don't argue with each other over definitions of what 'bad' is, its tiring for me.)

a footnote on the Water-Horse Wars

 Main Text

 

 

 

Historiographies of the Water-Horse Wars* have waxed and waned like tides from age to age. In the first magisterial histories of the opening battles of the Prescience Wars; "Our World War" by Kausker Wood, "The Dharma of Care", scrolls 3 to 333 by Priest-Viscount Apsanalan, and the epic poem "The Chaos of the Waves" by Chevalier Eastscource-Tan, (a much later work but one drawing upon direct sources long since lost to us), the Water-Horse wars are regarded as the _ending_ of a period, not its start.

 

For those alive at the time, or recording in the years directly afterwards, it must have seemed that the resolution of these conflicts had brought an end to what Apsanalan called "Our wars of twisted fate"

 

What few writing at the time could guess, that the shattered Pathist consensus which resulted from the Wars and the long-delayed counter-reaction to their resolution by elements which had so far, played little part, were instrumental in the initial formation the Amber Court of the King Beneath the Time, which would dominate the early-middle period of the Prescience Wars as a whole, and secondly, that the methods used to close the Water-Horse Wars only heralded, in vitro, strategies, weapons and sacrifices that would become all-too commonplace in "The Time of Great Workings"

 

 

 

 

*I believe I must make a brief footnote and regress in time somewhat for the benefit of those few for whom this book might be their firstHistory of the early Prescience Wars and who may have little, or no, knowledge of the strange endings of the Water-Horse Wars. I will make a small description;

 

In two quite different wars, and three battles across two continents, cavalry groups, largely Pathist, though only one, under Flax and his Conclave can be truly said to be 'Canticaleers' at least at the start of their battles, (though, arguably, all three were by the end), faced opposing naval forces, formations they were unable to reach, let alone attack, and while the Naval forces, (some have said proto-Auric though at this time it is more true to call them "Secular" or simply "early" or "pre-prescience" forces), were able to bombard or assault the Pathists, this was likewise ineffective as the mounted warriors would simply retreat.

 

In three different and seemingly disconnected battles, and on nearly, through not quite the same day, all the Pathist Cavalry forces attacked and defeated the naval forces opposing them. It is this strange event that gave the Wars their name.

 

 

 

The Three Stalemates As They Stood

 

In the North, at the bay of Hoöghst , the Peasant-General Marshall Oderlane (Originally "Tom-Of-The-Lane", his story, appropriately enough, now told only through a cycle of folk tales), with perhaps between 5,000 and 20,000 Pathist Cavalry and Dragoons, faced the Expeditionary Fleet of the Southern League (which was not Southern, or a League), under Her Ladyship Vice-Admiral Fosse.

 

(These numbers may seem paltry but it must be remembered that this was long before conscription en-masse, of even mortal and sentient population, let alone the Dreaming, the Dead, the Imagined and the Other. Artistic relations of later periods inflate the numbers and alter the nature of the participants in accordance with their expectations drawn from the battles of the Later Prescience Wars. Nevertheless, these somewhat Gogmagogic paintings and engravings may well accurately represent the psychological impact felt by the participants. For most of those involved these were the largest armies they had ever seen and, for those in the North, this was to be the first of the Great Workings, though at the time they, the common soldiery at least, remained blissfully unaware of the true nature of events.)

 

An Hundred miles South the Pathist Siege of Regaar was fracturing. After flooding the lowlands around the Three Cities to, in some way, make up for their own paucity of troops, unable to exercise an encirclement, the "Iron Conclave" under the tenuous command of Flax, found they had merely displaced their siege into a different form. Facing, perhaps fifty to a hundred square miles of flooded lowland, interspersed with islands of villages and mills, impassable for oceanic ships, near-impossible for infantry and difficult for cavalry and river vessels, the Crafstmen of Redgaar famously deconstructed many of their own homes, taking down the roofs and re-purposing the beams and timbers into shallow-draught boats and canoes, the famous 'House Boats' of Redgaar. This small fleet was used as a guerrilla force to preserve communications with the outside world and to smuggle vital supplies through the siege.

 

While the Redgaar forces were starving and demoralised, the Pathists were little better off and the siege had decayed, or evolved, into a semi-aquatic war with Pathist cavalry swimming their horses between small hills, now islands, in an attempt to hunt and repress the Houseboats of Redgaar.

 

Much further South, at the ends of the earth, the distant stronghold of the mountaintop Star Kingdoms, allies to, supplying, and being re-supplied by, the southern League, a very different Proto, or Pseudo-Pathist leader faced a very different challenge.

 

While the Warlord Milgar Reeve had somewhat unified the Plains Tribes beneath the Star Mountains under a somewhat-Pathist creed, and rampaged almost from sea-to-sea, he had been unable to either attack the Star Kingdoms in their mountain fastnesses, being driven back by massed fire, or to sever the link between the Kingdoms and the League. The continent-spanning Pen-Meol river remained highly navigable  (Reeves forces attempts to block or damn it had been swept away or easily destroyed by League ships) and the League was able to sail from Hoöghst, across the world-ocean, up the deep Pen-Meol almost to the borders of the Star Kingdoms themselves, blasting away with cannon at any attempts to raid or hinder them

 

 

 

 

 

The Battle Of Meteor Falls

 

The Pen-Meol narrowed and branched as its tributaries climbed and spread into the river-valleys at the base of the Star Kingdoms. Here the Kingdoms must send down columns and carts to make the vital exchange of materiel with the ships of the Southern League. This accomplished they could quickly retreat into their networks of defensible valley cantons and mountaintop temples, now converted into fortifications which had faced down the bravest assaults of Reeves horde.

 

It was amongst this maze of valleys and winding tributaries that both Reeve and his opponents identified their weakest point, and it was here that Reeve concentrated his efforts, sending out riders into the difficult country, looking for any sign that might indicate to him when and how the forces of his enemies would meet.

 

Guided, perhaps by intuition, by signs (Apsanalan claims "by the movements of birds") or perhaps simply by reasonable prediction or good scouting, Reeve discovered the League forces in the rapids abovethe meteor falls.

 

This should not be considered as necessarily as ill a position for the Leaguers as some have claimed. Commodore Schott, (claimed to be corrupt, bilious, mad and drunk, though a careful analysis of his actions belies this over-negative view), in charge of the Leagues small fleet, had ordered the portage of all available small boats, up around the falls, to an island on the brink of the falls themselves, and moved all necessary goods into them, to be convoyed upriver, pulled by pack beasts on each shore and aided, and warded from rocks by strong crews.

 

A risky endeavour but not without reason. Schott would have known that if he were to await the Eagle Columns of the Star Kingdoms, who would reinforce his efforts and guard any zone of portage, the movement of the column itself would expose their position to Reeves riders, then a battle would have to be fought, likely under complex and uncontrollable circumstances, and perhaps the Eagle Columns would have had to fight, as well as carry cargoes, all the way back to their nearest defensive line, losing men and materiel all the while.

 

By porting his own cargoes he could do so un a so-far undiscovered position, directly under the shadow of his own guns. Sending his forces up the cliffs of the Meteor falls would have been supremely difficult, but Schotts sailors had exactly the skills and equipment to attempt such a difficult piece of vertical logistics, and the vertiginous and rocky nature of the cliffs meant that, if discovered, it would be very hard for Reeves cavalry to directly attack. He would be oing so, across a rocky cliff, while in range of Shotts cannon. It was a risk, but a risk of like type would have to be taken somewhere and this was the one Schott chose.

 

Neither was it a poor one. As Reeve saw the League convoy carefully pulling and picking their way up through the rapids below him he would have been aware of the steep banks of the bending river and the complexity of the terrain which would impede any interruption from his aggressive but under-equipped force. He sent forth skirmishers who were able to overwhelm the shore groups on both sides, driving off and killing the draught animals pulling the convoy upriver. This prevented their progress but the Leaguers responded well, they immediately cut the cables between their heavily laden boats and in an piece of fine watercraft, the whole group re-oriented and reversed course, carefully fending off the rocks. No easy task in such difficult conditions.

 

This attempt to join with the Star Kingdoms had failed, but by adding their oars to the rivers flow and navigating speedily, but with some risk, downstream, the Leagues knew would reach again the isle on the brink of the Meteor Falls, an imperfect defensive spot, yet one very hard for Reeve to approach. The convoy could refuge there while mortars and cannon fire from the ships below could disperse Reeves formations, already broken up by the difficult terrain. Perhaps even waiting for the Eagle Columns to arrive, turning the tables on Reeve and catching the notoriously slippery rough rider between the guns of the League and the Columns of the Stars. As much as Reeve had trapped his enemies in position, he in turn was trapped, he could not afford to simply leave them be.

 

Wood relates Reeves subsequent decision  to the 'flokks of birds' seen earlier that day. Wood claims that, as Reeve believed the League and the Star Kingdoms to communicate via birds, that the Kingdoms may have already received a message of the Leagues position and intent and that the Eagle Columns were already on their way.

 

They were not. At least, not yet, but it is curious that this slight over-estimation of his opponent, in a way, thinking ahead of their strategy before they themselves had finalised it, impelled Reeve into his suicidal course.

 

Another element in informing Reeves decision is the phycology and the nature of the morale of the Plainsmen he lead. Hard riding, incredibly tough and capable of journeys which would cripple more organised formations, the Plainsmen wore almost no armour, carried only swords, light lances, bows and slings, (short-ranged instruments, though with these they could be monstrously accurate). They would hold to no steady defence, could not be left on guard (they would leave or fall asleep), could barely be disciplined by anything other than death or mutilation delivered directly from the hand of a superior, and were almost impossible to organised on a strategic scale, needing to be lead from the front, in person, by a highly charismatic and personally dangerous general. Insanely greedy and rapacious when raiding, they eschewed monetary pay as "cowards sweat". But, if lead directly, they would attack anything. Plainsmen had jumped off cliffs to catch eagles flying below and, though they died in the attempt, were accounted heroes for doing so, their mangled bodies scraped off the rocks and untangled from that of the flattened raptor, were propped up and feted in great ceremonies before being tearfully burnt.

 

They were men of a kind such that, to turn back before their friends, they brothers, from a risk, or a doom, with their sworn captain visibly hurling himself into its teeth before their eyes, would have been a deeper death than that of just the flesh.

 

All this must be considered when we examine Reeves decision. And we must remember that, though educated, Reeve had been born, and lived the first few years of his boyhood, as a Plainsman.

 

As the League barges began to reorient and turn back, Reeve gave a great howl and lead his force, in full and fully mounted, over the lip of the river, into the rapids, and into the fleet of barges.

 

What death and chaos there ensued, the broken bodies, screaming horses, cracked bones and moaning timbers in the roaring waters, can barely be described. The river choked with the bodies of men and horses, dead and alive, horses screamed and thrashed through swimming and drowning crowds of men, men clambered over the backs of screaming close-packed horses while other men were crushed between them. In all this someone cut the rudder of the lead, now rear, craft. As crazed plainsmen clambered over its side, it listed and began to spin. Desultory musket fire from the crew did not save them from the plainsmens whetted blades and nothing saved either as the barge crunched, splintered, capsized and was smashed against the rocks of the rapids, cushioned only by the drowning bodies which covered its surface.

 

The barges were still closely arranged. A chain reaction set in. The wreckage and chaos of one catastrophe piled with all the rest and thundered into the undamaged, un-boarded boats, stoving in sides, crashing against hulls, carrying like ants on flood-borne leaves their cargo of crazed and screaming barbarians, mad to live, mad to die, mad to kill.

 

Reeve did not survive perhaps even the initial charge, yet his last command as leader of what passed for the Iron Path forces under the shadow of the Star, had yet to play out as the tide of blood and screaming flesh surged downriver.

 

The Leagues Main ships, anchored in the deep tributary by the Meteor falls, anxiously kept watch, awaiting news of their relief attempt and trying to avoid sand backs in the river. Even largely unloaded the Galleons were operating much further upriver than their builders had ever intended and for their captains comfort. Only Schotts exuberant and damming speech of a few nights previously had impelled them, out of shame, to proceed so far. They must have realised that to run aground in such circumstances would mean their deaths.

 

Can we truly blame the reaction of Commodore Schott when, as evening fell, the river spoke its truth and the Meteor falls vomited forth the wreckage, the screamed-bloody horses, the bodies, the glot of foul and bloody stuff that was the death of all their hopes? And, riding and clambered onto the hulls of the capsized boats , clinging to barrels and clutching the corpses of enemies and friends, the blood-man survivors of Reeves Last Charge? Swimming now, beneath the ships big guns, crawling up anchor lines and rudders as the river filled with wreckage. and in that foul and darkening bricolage, who amongst the Captains could say how many there were or how much threat they represented? or if this were the disaster it seemed or yet another of Reeves mad schemes playing out?

 

Some have represented the retreat as cowardice, the ships weighing anchor and, blasting off clinging plainsmen with small arms fire, marking time downriver, as "fearful tigers fleeing half-drowned mice" (Wood). In truth, with their supplies, barges and men lost, even if Schotts fleet had met with the Eagle Columns, only now just setting off, there is little they could have done but exchange letters.

 

Schotts tragic and epic journey back down the Pen-Meol, across the world-sea, in search of home and the harbour of Hoöghst , would not end well for him. he would return, but to a homeland he no longer knew.

 

When the Lords of the Star Kingdoms arrived, they found the river empty but for the dead, the Pen-Meol had eaten their greatest enemy and most of his army, along with all of their own needed supplies. But in the place of Reeve, the river had birthed something even more dangerous - his memory. The Last Charge of Milgar Reeve and his defeat of a Navy of the Living with the Riders of the Dead, spread across the plains like wildfire.

 

In life Reeve had shown that the plains tribes could be wielded, however tentatively, as a unified force. In death he gave the Plains something more than a hero, unifying in deed and action, in ways a thousand scratched screeds had been unable to accomplish, the culture of the Plains with the creed of the Iron Path.

 

 

 

 

 

The War Upon The Flood

 

Far to the north, in another half-sphere of the world, yet only an hundred leagues south of Hoöghst, Flax, and the Conclave, harried their men in pursuit of the House-Boats of Redgaar. Moving by night and silently going from hilltop isle to hilltop isle, the smugglers of the Three Cities dodged the swimming cavalry patrols of the Pathists. The small remaining population of the Hill-Isles was by firmly in favour of the Three Cities, the humiliation and dispossession of their lands via flood and subsequent patrols had destroyed most willing support for the Pathist cause and most of those who might have supported it had already enlisted in the months after Albraneth. The Pathists found few informers and the boats of Redgaar many allies. The damp, cold and sick cavalry of the pathists struggled, walked and swam across the fields they themselves had drowned, spreading out in small patrols.

 

The Redgaarese had, perhaps grown too casual in their deceptions, or perhaps their plans were too far in advance. Winter was coming and the forces of the Three-Cities realised they stood in nearly as much need of heat and light as of food. Clearly they intended to take one great risk, and to move a large amount of smuggled fuels, together, in a series of leapfrogs from isle to isle. The Burghers of Redgaar must have realised that combining their forces in this was a matter of extreme danger. Likely we shall never know what prompted them to the decision.

 

It was at this time and on this night that they were discovered by the Pathists. The location of the incident was unusual, two old hilltops, close together, were now islands, and a stretch of water ran between them, hidden by the curve of the isles from easy view. One patrol, under Captain Mead, approached the larger of the two isles in question from the opposite side and, perhaps by stealth, or by accident, and the foolishness of their foe, encountered the nearly-complete transfer of goods to the House-Boats of Redgaar, along with a substantial number of smugglers.

 

A battle broke out in the half-lit dark on the top of the hilltop-isle. The Pathists quickly drove off the smugglers who retreated, down the slope to their boats, leaving behind only a few barrels of pitch.

 

Realising that the smugglers must surely have completed the majority of their work, and that all they now to do was escape into the darkness, Mead, our one source on his thinking claims for religious reasons, made a radical decision. He ordered his men to tip the barrels of pitch down the hill and light them. Then, singing canticles, his patrol blindfolded their horses and charged them down the hill, into the burning flood.

 

The utter chaos and terror they created simultaneously destroyed the discipline of the houseboat fleet and also trapped the divided it as crew alternate tried to escape the fire, before bravely rowing and punting back into range in attempts to rescue survivors and recover material, itself usually flammable and dangerous. The location of the fire itself lit up the smugglers fleet for miles around. The Flax was not slow to summon his forces and all of the Conclaves remining cavalry elements converged.

 

Firsthand accounts are lacking but Wood, Apsanalan and Eastsource-Tan all include variations on the phrasing "They swam the smoke on smoke-black steeds" or "on black steeds swam". (It is unlikely the horses were truly all black though the Pathists, an irregular force, had come to favour black armour and barding where they could get it.) The Conclave forces were able to isolate and destroy one half of the surviving fleet before riding through the smoke of the dying flames and assaulting the remaining force

 

Winter, in the coming months, finished the siege for them. With a major component of Redgaars supply, fleet, and able men, destroyed, the Three Cities had little ability remaining to defend themselves, or even to heat their homes, many of which now had no roofs, the joists being removed to make boats.

 

Two of the Three Cities sued for peace before the winter equinox and, seeing them possessed by the enemy, the last surrendered a few days later.

 

Flaxes men recovered the bodies of "The Burninge Charge" and valorised them, refusing to removed them from their burnt black armour.

 

They must have been surprised indeed when one moved and spluttered. The survivor, as historians of the Wars will know, was Ensign Day, later Marshall and Commander Ovram Day, or "Burned Black Day" to his enemies, of whom there is much to be told at a later time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Miracle Of Hoöghst

 

Oderlane and his army had entered Hoöghst with ease, able to rampage at will through the town they were unable to control ground there, lest they be blasted by the heavy guns of Fosse, whose fleet matured freely and well in the Bay of Hoöghst.

 

At low tide the riders of Oderlane advanced into the city,, but should they pause to fortify or make camp, signals would be sent by means-invisible and as they tide came in any such hideaways would be imperilled by the cannons of Fosse, creeping closer as the waves made safe the way, or appearing as a sudden storm after the Admiral held her fire

 

Neither did the League fleet forbear from bombarding even the wonders and treasures of Hoöghst , its great temple, ancient guild hall and Library, all smashed to bits, raining stone and burning books upon the riders of Oderlane

 

Nor did the people of Hoöghst  hesitate in signalling the destruction of their home, such was their hatred for the Pathist forces that they eagerly signalled to the fleet the exact location of any resting or fortifying Pathist groups (It should be remembered that it was the citizen of Hoöghst  who had spiked and drowned their own guns as Oderlannes forces overran their initial positions). Unable to defend their own city they proved adept at making the same city indefensible for their oppressors

 

Oppression there was. The initial investiture of Hoöghst  had been accomplished by the standards of civilised war for that perhaps, simple yet more enlightened time. The first signal to the waiting fleet by partisans (initially only a small minority) and the bombardment which collapsed the Library, Guild Hall and Guild stables where the army of Oderlane had set up their initial billets (with possible strange consequences later described), signalled also an end to the civil conduct of war. Oderlane instituted a policy of summary execution foy any suspected of partisan activity, as well as hunting parties set to rove through the town in an attempt to stop signals to the fleet.

 

The incompetent and over-brutal effect of these orders, in fact hugely stiffened and deepened resistance to his presence in the city. Successive bombardments and repeated purges had cycled the investiture of Hoöghst  into an utterly brutal , personal and close-quarters grind. The civilian partisans of Hoöghst , unable to directly face concentrations of Pathist forces, could still signal their position, should they pause to fortify any position to rest, and soon cannonballs and mortar shells would rain down (if the tide allowed it). As the Pathists broke for cover, the citizens of Hoöghst  would worm from the ruins of their homes like rats, flocking isolated soldiers, inflicting terrible mutilations and shameful deaths. This in turn provoked brutal punitive raids in response.

 

So wound the war in Hoöghst , the city itself gradually becoming more and more uninhabitable and both sides hardening and changing in character so much that, if either were to pee across the bridge of time and encounter their younger self, they would find themselves unrecognisable. (So much for "Tom-of-the-Lane who, as a young man years before has been startled by a vision of "A manne moste blacke and terribil, hewed well wyth scarrs as cut wood, and he haubeurk and gorget blacke with bloode and spirites did sircle him as whyrling shadowe mighte"- Tan. A vision which had set him on his way even before the massacre of Albraneth. Such are the ways.)

 

A third commander, and a greater army, haunted the thoughts of all belligerents - General Winter.

 

Hoöghst, located an hundred leagues north of besieged Redgaar, already suffered the cold which would collapse the defences of the three cities in a month or so, and here as there, warfare had severely depleted the Pathist forces. The same was not true of the ships of Fosse, they had been prepared and equipped by the League to perform a trans-oceanic crossing and, at the end of it, to lend the support of their guns to the settlement of Xap (a thorn which would bedevil all sides for many year to come, see later chapters). Exactly such a journey and support Oderlane had suspected and rushed to prevent, (his forces minimal artillery would spend winter trapped in the snowbound passes of Nihei and suffer their own tragic fate as described in the song “Snows on Nihei”).

 

Well armed, well provisioned, well supplied, animated by a state of righteous anger and soundly lead by the careful Fosse, the League ships lacked the power to contest Hoöghst  on land, but, with the cities guns spiked and drowned, they could tack and bombard at will and Oderlane could nether reach nor hinder them.

 

Here, time favoured the League. The people of Hoöghst  had suffered and were prepared to suffer more, but having no place to retreat to, they could equalise that suffering with the Pathist occupiers. All things being even, Oderlane and Winter would annihilate Hoöghst . In return, Hoöghst , and Winter, would eat Oderlane and his army, and when all the spinning coins had fallen, Fosse would re-enter Hoöghst  and with her healthy and wrathful sailors, complete the destruction of the Pathist force and succour what remained of any civilian survivors.

 

Such is likely to have been Oderlanes calculation also. The city untameable, his enemy unreachable and his forces whittling away as the trap of his victory slowly closed around him. Perhaps he hoped for his slow, small artillery, currently labouring in Nihei, but even if they were to arrive, how would they perform in a duel with the ships of Fosse?

 

Here sorcery enters out history, with it come it baggage train of sacrifice and the long, deep stain of ruin in its lee. This was the 'Miracle of Hoöghst '.

 

Of the true 'Great Workings before this time we know little but that they occurred, that they happened long ago, as history is counted by the chroniclers of these wars, they speak of them little, and then as archea, legend, or myth. These myths would now be real once more.

 

Of where and how Oderlane, or whomever, or whatever, was advising him, gained the knowledge and understanding to perform the Working, we can only speculate. Eastscource-Tan outright sates that Oderlane was the Seventh Son of a Seventh Son, that his mother was a Witch and that he was fated to bring about a black dawn. Wood produces the most detailed theory; he points out that the first camp of the Pathists in Hoöghst  was its famed library (perhaps hoping that Fosse would hesitate to fire upon it). The building was bombarded in the early hours of the morning, with cannon, mortar and incendiaries. As the books burnt and the library collapsed into its old foundations, the Pathists running for safety, Wood claims that certain "ancien techts" describe an older incarnation of the library at "Hoost", accepting many "fragmentary recordings" and "strange device" from a refugee group fleeing south (unlikely as no great cities or meaningful nations exist in the freezing lands directly north of Hoöghst). Wood makes much of little and interprets the terseness and paucity of his "techts" as a deliberate act of coded secrecy, in that "Lay these by ye said that many and speak not nor dream of what so lies" - indicating some old, sealed and deliberately forgotten vault beneath the library in the old foundations, exposed only by the chance of war and explored in foul and brief circumstances - Pathist troopers being dumped into the cells below as the place burnet and collapsed, with some of the more witful few grabbingg, in an opportunistic way, what may have seemed like treasures or valuables, as they climbed to escape the disaster. All of this he draws from a handful of lines in a source Wood himself refuses to name "for thine owne care and cleen sleepinge". Apsanalan says simply that "With Winters Knights a working came upon them" .. "and was made". The reader may choose their preference for interpretation, or even persist in the pleasing but foolish claim of a kinder, more secular age, that of a "rare climatological event".

 

Very rare if so, for while little comes down to us from the age of the Prescience Wars, the Ice of Hoöghst  is still there, and the keels of the Ships of Fosse, still held within, though Hoöghst  itself is but a memory. The reader may visit if they wish, though it is not a sight for kind souls, or those who desire "cleen sleepinge".

 

On the 23rd night of the investiture of Hoöghst , (the same night as the Burning Charge of Redgaar), the entirety of the Pathist forces advanced their camp to just outside the range of Fosse's guns. Deep enough into Hoöghst  that their pickets suffered continual attack from partisan bands. They burnt there great pyres of supreme scale and gathered around them in close order "In vile patterns" - Apsanalan "Flank to flak and tooth to tooth" - Wood. A wind sprang up from the shore but despite this, Fosse tacked against it, maintaining range and watch on Hoöghst . Then began "A great winde and a tumulte which came done oute of the empty aire" - Wood. Fosses' ships lost formation and nearly scattered. “Then came Drythelms Men, Winters Knights" - Apsanalan.

 

The temperature around Hoöghst  plummeted quickly. As observers of the ice may see today, fast enough to freeze some people in place, trapping boots and horses hooves beneath its surface.

 

It must be assumed that Oderlanes fire-bound army suffered the least for this, though even they must have taken casualties.

 

Then "the see kraked" - Wood. No simile is inferred, all sources report the terrible crackling, smashing unearthly sound as the waters of the bay of Hoöghst  froze solid in the time it takes to sing a song.

 

The terrible noise had not ceased when Oderlane signalled a full charge. The Pathists hurled themselves though Hoöghst  in a great mass, thundering and thudding, smashing through the ruins of once great buildings, trampling any who stood before them, crunching over frozen ash, followed by the chiming of tinkling bells as the great gusts of their panted breath rose up over the charging army and froze in the air, falling to the earth behind them as a triling rain of crystals.

 

They did not pause even to kill but carried their charge to the harbour and then out over the ice, towards the frozen fleet.

 

It is to the credit of Foss that several ships resisted and overcame both the shock of the cold and the terror of the charge and maneuvered their frosted cannon enough to bombard their attackers as they advanced across the ice. They inflicted meaningful damage upon the Canticaleers, but not enough.

 

The weight in numbers and the prepared ladders of Oderlanes troops were enough. As he rode his black horse back and forth over ice so hard and so cold that some said his horses hooves "struck fire from the ice", roving from ship to ship and screaming orders and imprecations at his men, the Pathists surrounded, boarded and assaulted each in turn, climbing their hulls like wooden walls.

 

One by one the ships of Fosse burnt in the frozen night, a second constellation of bonfires to match that beyond the gates of the frozen city. Of the Admirals fate, no record remains. Perhaps she is in the ice still.

 

Come daybreak and the ships no more than black columns of smoke barring the air, Oderlane lead his remaining forces back across the ice, into Hoöghst , cavalry coming from the sea. All remaining resistance was crushed. Hoöghst  was denied to the League for the rest of the war, and whatever became of it is little spoken of. The ice of the bay, imperishable, still remains.

 

 

 

 

So fell out the last major battles of the Water-Horse wars, those for which those wars are named. And happy indeed were the chroniclers, though they laboured now under strange kings, yet at least, finally, they all hoped and assumed, the cycle of violence which began with a scratched message on the temple door of Albraneth was now closed and cut. Peace would reign.

 

O foolish hopes of mortal men.

 

 

Who shall rid us of these Seers?

Sitting, as I do in my tower, in the peace and (relative) safety of our twilit Kingdom, in the one-thousand and sixth-hundredth Year of the Sleep, I face the testing question of any History; where to begin?
For if History teaches anything, it is that beginnings are not beginnings and endings not endings. There are no subjects in Nature or chapters in Time.
A question double-mazing for even our memories and records of the Prescience Wars, which raged for uncounted years before the Coming of God and the Years of the Sleep, are partial, deeply affected by the shattering events of the Wars themselves, which sallied forth across the collective unconscious of mankind and  which besieged unreality itself - dragging continents of dream into the waking world, not to mention the ever-partial records and histories which descend to us from those times.
Many great events, strange terrors and storied names pass through those Histories. 
Of the Siege of Red Rock, which hung like a vile tooth in the wounded air, with men climbing and dying like ants as they clambered over the red stone and fell in ropes.
The Synopticated Legion, ever-drumming, their banners and totems glitched and maddening -  for to see their sign and hear their drums was to be infected, altered on the spot, so that one must fight the legion deaf or blind, and how they were fought, and defeated by a general both deaf and mute, who spoke their strategies by touch.
Of the half-fictional armies of the King in Yellow, which could never be defeated while the memory of them remained, (and so still do remain, in-potentia at least).
Of those who made compacts with fire, or who promised the darkness all things.
Of those who raised the dead and the fractured terror-memories that those dead raised, for they had slept beyond the veil and, hearing in their slumber, the music and tapping of that infinite realm, dreamed in their black sleep, things of which the living should have never been aware. Of the Legion of ghosts who moved through nightmares and burst from the mouth of dreamers like vomit.
Of the five hundred sons of the moon who married the sky and who each walked with a star-wife, ladies of constellations, voids of great beauty and inexpressible hunger.
Of the devil-binders who bred with demons, and their self-bound half-demonic daughter-son dauphins, their abyssal half bound by spellcraft in the womb to their mortal flesh.
But History, or at least Historiography, has answered me already, for in all the Chronicles of the Prescience Wars, there is a rare meshing of viewpoint at the start, and while not all historians agree, all at least mention to begin with, "This Plague of Seers", and the birth of the Iron Path, in Albraneth, (a city of which no other record or ruin now remains), in the early morning, on rest-day, the citizens awoke to find, scratched with an arrow-head into the wood of the Temple doors;



THIS PLAGUE OF SEERS
"Who shall rid us of these Seers?
they kill the day
our hours are not our own
neither king nor slave
but are a great trikery
that a man shall look at his sufferings as nought but a tumble of dice
his works as the turn of a kard
these reeders of dreems take more than can be took
they whore us to the future and we krawl
they pik the poket and unpik the seem
taking more than is within
leeving less than emptyness
a space which even Nothing passes through
shame shame on the reeders of dreems and the dreemers of deeds
who heer is not among the foul?
who has not feerd its tricks
take the Iron Path
this path is cold but it is pure
the iron path chilleth the soul
but what you have you hold
what you are, you have done
a road not to be tilted or cast aside
and it is Straitan arrow without twist or branch
let what is, be
let what was, stand
and that which is to be remain unknown
stand for the Iron Path
and water it in the blood of seers
the teeth of witches are its seed
and the ashes of astrolagers charts its soil
shattered bones of prophets are its keys
cursed be all fortune tellers, prognosticators, haruspex,  diviners, soothsayers, oracles, augers, elfin tricksters, ponderers of orbs, changers of fates and reeders of dreems
there is One Fate, One Truth
and it is Iron"




So with these words was the Iron Path born, appropriately enough, in blood. 
The words were discovered first as the sun rose and before the Temple Authorities were even aware of them, had spread throughout the city. Initially the only response was a great gathering of crowds and a general hubbub, fevered discussions in corners, fights in taverns, (which may have a more accurate claim to be the first casualties of the Prescience Wars, though no record remains of the individuals in question). 
By mid-afternoon the Temple Authorities had removed the doors themselves, which proved to be an error they would pay for later that night.
By evening several fights had coalesced into a riot in one part of town. 
It was about this time that the first printed broadsheets bearing copies of "A Plague of Seers", had left the city in the packs and wagons of various merchants and travellers. (For type to be set and printed that quickly some printers must have gone straight from the Temple Doors in the morning to their print shops and begun work immediately).
By this point it is likely that only the destruction of Albraneth and the all remaining copies of, or knowledge of, "The Plague of Seers" could have prevented what was to come.
By nightfall the city authorities lost control of the streets, in part due to several desertions and the evaporation of many formations of the City Watch who had joined the riots they were send to quell.
The pogrom which engulfed Albraneth that night was only a drop of blood compared to the oceans which were to come. Perhaps twenty alleged Seers, along with their families, defenders and a handful of individuals who tried to stop the violence, or who simply got in the way or said the wrong word, were killed, beaten, burnt in their own homes or lynched in the street.
This earnt the Pogrom its tavern name in years to come; "They-Didn't-See-That-Coming-Day".
Though, as the land was to learn much, much later, several of the more capable Seers very much did see it coming, and had fled Albrenath in the hours, days, months and perhaps years preceding the Iron Path massacre.
(The lateness of their leaving Albraneth eventualy became something of a mark of power among Seers, "an hour out of Albraneth" meaning a Seer so weak they could only escape the massacre by the skin of their teeth.)
It would be later still that some began to think in terms of meta-prognostication, and it became evident that "She who sees first, acts last", for among the very last prescient refugees to leave the city were a handful of the most powerful known, disguising the depth of their prescience even from their own kind by the lateness and hurry of their action. Prescience hiding from Prescience itself.
As for the Iron Path, its nature changed and shifted as the Prescience Wars ground on, the massacre became a movement, a cult, a crusade, a philosophy, an alliance of peoples and an alliance of things which were not men. So many changes that Historians could, and still do argue over whether or if one expression of the Path was truly related to another. Yet in whatever form it took, it kept at its heart,  the Canticle of the Temple doors;
"Who shall rid us of these Seers?"