09/24/2025 Snippet, IRONGHOSTS.

One thing to remember about this setting: the USA didn’t fall. It was murdered, and people remember that. Oh, my, yes, they do.

“We are not exactly golems,” Nu told them. “Or at least, we were not supposed to be. We might be anything by now.”

She had taken them to a set of rooms underneath the ground, likely some sort of cellars before the end of the world. There was light from ancient ceiling lamps, however dim; no food, but another stream now ran through the rooms, bringing fresh air with it. Best of all, Nu had collected some of the fabled foam cushioning of the Old Americans. It was a little stiff at first, but softened wonderfully after a few moments. There were worse places to have a palaver.

“So, no chem, then?” asked Nat, as he rooted through his pack for the last of the dried giant spider. “No memories of a rabbi, chanting the Name and inscribing life into your limbs?”

“You are familiar with the most ancient legends? I had to teach myself to read, in order to learn the few that were still written down when the world ended. — But no, we were made, but by men, not gods. What do you know of the Old Americans?”

“I know what most do,” Oxman replied, stretched out on a couch and looking appraisingly at his boots. “They ruled over these lands, from sea to shining sea, from time out of mind. Fell fighters in war, kindly in peace: quarrelsome, yet generous. Their empire fell with the coming of magic, but remnants survive, here and there on the continent.” His face grew hard. “Fewer now than before, thanks to the cursed Dominion.”

Nat nodded. “To that I’ll add: the Old Americans knew many secrets, and were great crafters. They dug deeply, flew through the skies, could travel above and below the waves, and even put cities on the moon. And all without magic! They lived in an age of wonders.”

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