The Ruin of Kings

by Jenn Lyons

  * Besides the Dana Jewels, one of the only recorded sales of a star tear was from a retired Quuros military officer named Duvos. He somehow acquired one and traded it to House D’Kard in exchange for the construction of what is now Sileemkha Palace in Khorvesh. By such standards, this exchange is rather extravagant: just a single star tear would have been an adequate stand-in for one million ords.

  * One presumes not literally.

  4: BUTTERBELLY

  * Every record of dues or fees paid to House D’Erinwa lists this particular pawnshop owner’s name as . . . Butterbelly. I can find no record of any other identity.

  * The Temple of Light is dedicated to the Vishai Mysteries, which are considered something of a heterodox faith dedicated to a solar deity named Selanol, who dies and is resurrected with the passing seasons. The religion is extremely popular in Eamithon and looked at oddly everywhere else.

  * The implication here is that the Shadowdancers are sophisticated enough to train those they find with talent, but not advanced enough to train their students to memorize tenyé signatures. Just enough knowledge to be useful, and not a shred more.

  * It’s not diamond.

  * Harder.

  5: LEAVING KISHNA-FARRIGA

  * “Going south” is a Quuros euphemism for dying. I suspect the saying goes back to Emperor Kandor’s ill-fated attempt at southern expansion into the Manol.

  * This is a common mistake. In fact, the first spell one learns can be quite sophisticated. Not knowing one’s limits is occasionally a marked advantage.

  * Obviously, I am not dead. I also reject the idea that I’m responsible for his situation here. I am at best an accessory.

  * The beds on board an average Zheriaso-built slave ship can comfortably accommodate a person under 5'2" tall. By comparison, the average Quuros is 5'6" tall, the average Zheriaso is 5'8", and the average vané is 6'2" tall. So in answer to the question “Who could possibly find such accommodations comfortable?” the answer is “No one.” This only highlights the desire of Zheriaso slavers to squeeze every possible bit of space, even from their paying passengers.

  6: THE ROOK’S FATHER

  * I can’t help but wonder just what Surdyeh thought would happen on Kihrin’s sixteenth birthday. A more distressing idea: what if it all happened exactly as Surdyeh had originally planned?

  * There are many variations of the Maevanos, but they all follow the same basic story: the hero dies, travels to the underworld, is judged by Thaena, and is allowed to Return to life again. The Archetype of the Dying God, by Qhadri Silorma, plays on this theme in detail—further elaborating a theory in which Thaena is just one part of a cycle of spiritual reincarnation vital to all existence. This is along with goddesses Taja and Tya, each ruling one of three coexisting realms of reality. These conform to Physical, Magical, and Deathly metaphysical states. Silorma’s book is hugely hated by followers of the Goddess of Life, Galava, who object to being pushed aside in favor of the triplet goddesses.

  8: THE ANGEL’S BARGAIN

  * I don’t think it should be assumed that Surdyeh wasn’t trained by the Gatekeepers, although it’s possible that the Revelers were responsible for Surdyeh’s musical training. He seems to have known spells that aren’t officially in the Reveler repertoire. Let’s simply say that it would not surprise me to discover Surdyeh had ties to the Gatekeepers, or rather House D’Aramarin.

  10: DEMON IN THE STREETS

  * Believed to be named because the road marks the spot where Simillion killed the god-king Ghauras. In fact, it’s so named because it marks the spot where the First Emperor’s murdered, mutilated corpse was put on display by the Court of Gems as an “object lesson” to anyone who would defy them.

  * Probably not. Demons are not natural creatures, although they can, temporarily, take on physical forms. As such, demons do not possess any gender beyond which is assigned to them, or sometimes, the gender they decide has the most utilitarian value.

  * Demons are, naturally, poorly understood entities, and despite the amount of research that has gone into deciphering these creatures, huge gaps in our knowledge remain. The Lesser Key of Grizzst is an obvious beginner’s treatise, but I also find The Cold Invasion by Killus Vornigel to be an excellent perspective on these monsters and their interactions with the physical world.

  * Compare with the following prophecy from A Study of Demonic Possession in Quur: “Hail to the Lawbreaker; Hail to the Thief of Souls; Hail to the Prince of Swords. Long will we search for the lion, Until at last we find the hawk, Our king who will free us from ruin, The long suffering of our souls unlocked.”

  * Demons are not generally locked into a single form, although they are not the same as mimics such as Talon who shape-change with disconcerting impunity. However, once a demon enters the physical world, they seem to keep their form for the duration of their stay. A demon’s form may be dictated by the sorcerer who summons it, who might declare that a demon should only appear with “a seemly and handsome form” or demand that a demon appear “hideous and terrifying to scare his enemies.” The Lesser Key of Grizzst, for example, recommends demanding a form the demon would find unpleasant, as a way of determining if the demon is truly under control. (I don’t put much stock in this personally, since a demon is more than capable of putting up with a few hours as a cuddly puppy—if it means ripping his summoner to tiny pieces later on.)

  * One wonders if Kihrin occasionally forgot that he had a great deal of money saved up, or if he just lost himself in a role, that of a musician’s young apprentice. I suppose the easiest way to keep from spending that money would be to forget he had it.

  11: THE COMING STORM

  * One hundred and twenty-five years ago, the King of Zherias, Shogu, attempted to outlaw the practice of slaving, traditionally one of the primary Zheriaso tradecrafts (along with piracy and mercantilism). He survived less than five days past his declaration, and his eldest child, Sinka, promptly legalized it again.

  12: BEHIND THE VEIL

  * “Willing” is a debatable term given Morea’s status as a slave.

  * The Joratese culture, and particularly their god-touched nobility, survive in large part because they were created as a servitor race to the centaurs that ruled that area. When Quur invaded, the Joratese eagerly sided with the Empire to overthrow the god-king Korshal. The Joratese were quick to offer their sons and daughters to Quuros soldiers, who were entitled to landholdings in the new dominion. Eventually, this resulted in the current Jorat dominion. It takes a dim view of outsiders, or the magic that resulted in their original enslavement.

  * Speaking of old, dead god-kings . . . but I really don’t need to provide a history lesson on old Laregrane’s god-king, do I? It’s been a mandatory class at the Academy for the last two centuries.

  13: THE DETERMINED WIZARD

  * There have been any number of servitor races created by the god-kings during their supremacy. Some, such as the centaurs of Jorat or the snow giants of Yor, are extinct or nearly so. The Daughters of Laaka have flourished, in large part because Laaka invested them so heavily with resistance to magic, but mostly because their preferred habitat, the ocean depths, is far from the dominion of man.

  * She means the Celestial Concord, perhaps? Very little is known about the Celestial Concord, save that it was a binding agreement between the Eight Immortals and certain god-kings. They all decided it was better to play nice and promise to behave than be hunted down and slain by the Emperor—using his preferred weapon for such, Urthaenriel. Presumably it was some kind of treaty on acceptable behavior. And afterward, the Concord gods did not physically rule on earth. This had previously been a common occurrence during the Age of God-Kings.

  14: BEDTIME STORIES

  * Citizens of the Kirpis and Kazivar dominions like to insist that only wine made from grapes should be called such. The presence of the Academy in Kirpis means that generations of wizards have returned home with a taste for grape wine and the quirk of preferring it for rituals.
While Ola never attended the Academy, she must have picked up this association from her time spent in the Upper Circle.

  * And poisons. The heart-pumping, excited state nakari powder is famous for inducing can be created through poisonous mushrooms, aconite, and the thorax of the red dragon beetle. In small quantities, these are harmless, but I would be careful to buy nakari powder from a trusted source.

  * Is it paranoia I suspect that was the whole point?

  * Eamithon is home to some curious exceptions from Quuros law, due to the fact that of all the dominions of the Empire, Eamithon (under the reign of the god-queen Dana) was the only one to join the Empire willingly, with the full cooperation of its ruler. Technically speaking, slavery is legal in Eamithon, but since virtually no one in Eamithon seems to realize this, slaves brought into the dominion have a habit of “vanishing” and turning up in isolated villages where the natives swear that the person has lived there for their whole life. There is also enormous peer pressure on anyone settling in Eamithon with their slaves to free them.

  15: THE ZHERIAS MAW

  * “Like trying to drown a Zheriaso” is a colloquial expression for attempting something impossible. The phrase’s origins are believed to be tied to one of the many Quuros pirate wars, when Zheriaso were often seen to simply jump overboard and abandon ship rather than fight the superior Quuros navy. They later turned up whole and hale back on Zherias, even in instances where ships were scuttled miles from the coast.

  16: THE GENERAL’S REWARD

  * Since he was never licensed, this technically makes Kihrin a witch.

  * House D’Talus.

  17: WAKING THE OLD MAN

  * According to eyewitness reports of the eruption of Mount Daynis in the southernmost edge of Khorvesh, the main cause of death was not the lava or giant boulders that blew upward from the volcano, but a surge of hot gases and smaller debris that behaved like water, flowing downhill and engulfing entire towns and cities in its path.

  18: WHAT JARITH FOUND

  * Felicia Nacinte’s masterpiece The Rape of Thoris has regrettably since been destroyed, but some of her other paintings, particularly The Morgage Rout, The Courtship of the Duke’s Daughter, and A Rose for Thaena, are on display at the Duke’s palace in Khorvesh. I highly recommend their viewing if you ever have the opportunity.

  19: DREAM OF A GODDESS

  * Radiation of what? I would give much to be able to ask Taja for elaboration on these points. Assuming that this dream was really an encounter with the goddess herself (for the record, yes, I am assuming exactly that). However, in substantiation of these claims, I’ve been able to find no mention of any celestial phenomena resembling Tya’s Veil prior to the God-King Era. And prior to the God-King Era, poetry involving the sun and sky did indeed use “yellow” and “blue” as central color motifs.

  20: VALATHEA

  * I rather suspect that statement is wrong on all possible counts.

  * The closest translation of Valathea is “the exquisite sorrow that comes from understanding great truths.” It is a female Kirpis vané given name, currently out of vogue.

  * Not better at all, I suspect. “Notrin Milligreest allowed me to examine the Valathea harp, which by family legend traces back to Elana Kandor, widow of famous Quuros Emperor Atrin Kandor. It was said that the harp only plays notes in a minor key, no matter what the skill or intention of the musician. I wished to see this for myself, and Notrin humored me. The harp is in excellent condition, and has been well maintained, and yet, as predicted, I could not coax any music from the harp not best fit for a dirge. When I asked how this had been accomplished, Notrin shrugged and informed me that there was no great skill to it: Valathea only played brightly for those she loved.” —A Study of Enchantment, by Darvok Hin Lora

  23: MORNING SERVICE

  * An exaggeration. There are, at most, several hundred deities. Maybe twice that many counting dead god-kings.

  * No. But the architecture might appear older by virtue of being more primitive. Many relics come from eras technically younger than the vané.

  * Although most popular in Khorvesh, Thaena is worshipped in every dominion in the Empire and outside its borders, usually in the form of propitiatory offerings meant to turn her attention elsewhere.

  24: THE HAWK’S TALON

  * For my own reasons, I admit to a fascination with mimics. Little is known about them, largely because they’re difficult to find: understandable when dealing with a race that changes their shape and coloring. Most scholars dismiss them as the remnants of some mad god-king’s experiments, which may be the case, since mimics neither age nor reproduce in any traditional sense. As mimics have no interest in illuminating matters, we may never know their true origins.

  * This gives the strong implication that his real name is some variation, or rather, that Kihrin is but a mispronunciation of his proper name.

  * Although most people are used to calling the strip of land that circles the Imperial Arena “Arena Park,” it’s never been officially named such. Other nicknames in common usage include “Blood Grounds,” and of course the ever-popular “Culling Fields.”

  25: INTO THE JUNGLE

  * I must admit, I too thought it was a nude dance. Now I understand why that priest of Thaena stormed out of the room when we saw it performed at the Winter Festival, two years previous. Someone really should tell the Revelers Guild.

  27: SISTER KALINDRA

  * I have met the witch-goddess Suless while visiting Duke Kaen in Yor. She’s a deeply unpleasant woman. Also, don’t ever eat anything she bakes. Trust me.

  * Urthaenriel, otherwise known as the Ruin of Kings, Eclipser, the Emperor’s Sword, Godslayer, Map Burner, Saetya, Tyasaeth, Vishabas, War’s Heart, Sun’s Shadow, the Severer, Zinkarox. These are all names given by one group or another to the sword of the Quuros Emperor, one of the great artifacts of the world. At school, they teach that the sword was manufactured by Grizzst the Mad for Emperor Simillion at the request of Khored the Destroyer, but I am skeptical.

  29: TERAETH’S RETURN

  * The Manol vané as a race are well known for their skill with archery, but most particularly for their use of poisoned ebony arrowheads. Arrowheads that have slain important enemies of the vané are often taken as souvenirs by the archer who fired the arrow.

  30: FAMILY REUNION

  * As if the Lord Heir had any right to cast nominating votes for Voices of the Council. Darzin was getting ahead of himself here.

  * One does hear rumors, on occasion, to the effect that there are still Kirpis vané inside the Kirpis dominion, despite their diaspora and exile from their homeland after the Quuros conquest, but I have never found any conclusive evidence.

  * Technically, no vané’s coloring is “natural,” but it’s a fair question if one is unaware of the mercurial nature of vané appearance.

  31: TYENTSO AT THE BEACH

  * One could argue that the Royal Houses benefit from monopolies of scarce resources, but since demand far outstrips supply, Kihrin’s argument has merit from a purely economic viewpoint.

  * The definition of “witch” is one of the most hotly contested words in the Guarem language. According to the Academy at Alavel, a “witch” is “an uneducated magical adept who operates without official license from the Royal Houses.” But since women are never given licenses and are forbidden to attend the Academy, the gender-neutral term is almost exclusively applied to women.

  * And technically only qualifies as a witch because of a lack of formal licensing. Must be infuriating.

  * I’m not convinced the Scrolls of Fate aren’t a clever hoax perpetrated by someone trying to muddy the water—or simply profit off the fascination so many hold for prophecies.

  * He still does. And it’s still profoundly boring. On the plus side, mentally replaying one of his lectures is the best insomnia cure I’ve ever discovered.

  32: LADY MIYA

  * Note the wording here. I am inclined to interpret this literally: no
t that Miya didn’t know, but that she had been ordered to keep silent. Questioning someone who is gaeshed is a bit like talking to a demon—and for the same reasons.

  * Lady Miya just made a slip of the tongue here, since, technically speaking, Quuros royalty are forbidden from “ruling.”

  * At a guess, probably Sarin D’Mon’s Anatomy of the Human Body, which I understand is still used as the basic primer for entry-level study.

  33: THE DRAGON’S DUE

  * There is a story concerning the dragon Baelosh where he promised Emperor Simillion he would hunt him down and kill him after “a short nap.” The short nap lasted twenty-five years, and when Baelosh woke, Simillion was dead.

  35: RED FLAGS

  * It’s not uncommon. The vast majority of guildsmen only know one spell, not because they have no desire to learn more but because they have no ability.

  38: THE HIGH LORD

  * Not technically true. There is quite a trade in illegal practice, primarily in Yor, Marakor, and Jorat.

  * Not true. A witch gift depends on talent arriving before skill, so that a child stumbles onto a power before they’ve learned the rules of how that power works, including what might otherwise be self-imposed limitations. Sometimes, particularly when a child is part of a Royal Family, it’s entirely likely that they will receive formal training to use magic before they stumble onto such a gift themselves.