Compiled by Scholar Valerius Thorne, with practical observations from Kael Redfern, and theological commentary from Shaman-Chronicler Silt-in-River
Written in Threshold, Year 287 Post-Breaking
I write this document as an outsider looking in, which means I will inevitably fail to capture something essential. I am human, raised in the rigid hierarchies of the Confederation, where magic means power and power means rule. The Northern Lanxes, who call themselves Hjarnsýr in their own tongue, operate on principles I am still learning to comprehend even after five years of residence in their territories.
My assistant Kael, being from Threshold, which sits at the cultural border between Hjarnsýr and the human lands, provides a bridge perspective. Silt-in-River, who has graciously agreed to annotate this work, offers the indigenous view I cannot achieve alone. His contributions appear in the marginalia where my own observations prove insufficient.
What follows is my attempt to document a culture that lives in the shadow of the Lacuna yet refuses to let that shadow define them. A people who practice magic as naturally as breathing yet do not let it become the foundation of tyranny. A civilization that maintains feudal structures without the crushing weight of absolute power that I grew up beneath in the Confederation.
I must confess a personal unease in this work. I am human, and the relations between my people and the Lanxes have been fraught at best, violent at worst. The Confederation views non-humans with suspicion ranging from distrust to outright hatred, and I was raised breathing that atmosphere. It has taken years to recognize how deeply that poison sank into my thinking. Even now, I catch myself making assumptions, harboring prejudices I thought I had shed. I document them here not as excuse but as acknowledgment: I am trying to see clearly, but I see through a glass darkened by my upbringing. Where I fail, I hope Kael and Silt-in-River’s voices provide correction.
They are not perfect, these northern people. No culture is. But they are fascinating, complex, and achingly human in ways that make the term “human” seem insufficient and provincial. I hope this account does them justice.
— V.T.
Hjarnsýr occupies the northern territories, stretching from the Lacuna’s southern boundary to the frozen wastes beyond the inhabited world. It is a land defined by its harshness, shaped by cold and proximity to the wound in reality itself.
The forests dominate: dense pine and birch covering the majority of arable land, broken by clearings where villages cluster like islands in a dark green sea. The trees here grow with peculiar straightness, their trunks rising like pillars in some vast natural cathedral. When I first remarked upon this to a local woodcutter, he said the trees “remember the old Song still humming in the roots.” I pressed him on whether this was metaphor or literal truth, but he simply shrugged and said both, or neither, or that the distinction mattered less than I seemed to think. After five years, I am beginning to understand what he meant, though I cannot adequately articulate it.
The Spine of Winter, a mountain range running north-south through the eastern portions of Hjarnsýr, creates natural boundaries between baronies and duchies. These peaks are formidable: sharp, snow-crowned year-round, home to isolated holds where noble families maintain fortified retreats. The mountains are also home to shamanic retreats, places where those seeking deep communion with the Ideals withdraw from society for months or years at a time. I have been told that Fae also dwell in the high lonely places, though I have not personally ventured far enough into the peaks to confirm this. Kael has, and he assures me the tales are true.
Rivers cut through the landscape, numerous and cold, fed by mountain snowmelt that never entirely ceases even in summer. They serve as trade routes when the weather permits, frozen highways in the depths of winter. Nearly every settlement of significance sits on a river or lake; water is life here, both as transportation and as the practical source of survival. The rivers also serve a magical function I do not fully understand: Silt-in-River has attempted to explain that flowing water carries Song more readily than still air, that the rivers are “threads in the Weaver’s pattern made manifest,” but I confess the theology eludes me.
The entire western edge of Hjarnsýr runs along the Lacuna’s perimeter. This proximity shapes everything. You can stand in some border villages and see the shimmer of the Boundary itself, that terrible membrane between narrative space and void. The air tastes different near it, though I cannot describe how. Colder, perhaps, but not in a way that relates to temperature. Emptier. By ancient law and universal custom, no permanent settlements exist within five miles of the Boundary. The land there is considered cursed, or holy, or both; again, the distinction seems to matter less to the Lanxes than it does to my Confederation-trained mind that insists on clear categories.
The climate is harsh in ways that make the southern territories of my homeland seem like paradise by comparison. Winters last six months, sometimes seven in bad years. Snow accumulates in depths measured by feet rather than inches. I have seen drifts that reached the second-story windows of stone buildings. The cold is not merely uncomfortable; it is actively hostile, a force that kills the unprepared within hours. Summers are brief and intense, a desperate scramble to grow and harvest and preserve enough to survive the next winter. This rhythm shapes everything: the architecture that prioritizes insulation and heat retention, the agricultural practices that focus on hardy crops and extensive preservation, the culture itself that values preparation and community survival above individual ambition.
[Silt-in-River’s note]: The scholar is correct that the land is harsh, but he misses the deeper truth. The land remembers the Breaking. Even now, three centuries later, you can feel it in the stones. They are colder than they should be, and I do not mean temperature alone. The winter winds blow from the Lacuna, carrying absence with them. We plant our fields facing south and east, backs turned to the wound, but we feel it always. It has made us what we are: people who live beside death and choose life anyway. The cold is not our enemy. The void is. The cold is simply what the void feels like when it touches the world.
Hjarnsýr is organized as a feudal confederation, but I must immediately clarify that this term, borrowed from human political theory, captures only the surface structure. There is no central monarch, no supreme authority that could command absolute obedience from the nobility. Instead, power flows through a complex web of vassalage, ancient treaties, personal relationships, magical lineages, and reputation that took me three years to even begin mapping.
The formal hierarchy begins with the Baronets, called Friherre for males and Frukona for females in the northern tongue. These are rulers of single estates or small villages, the lowest rank of nobility. They hold land from a Baron in exchange for military service, taxation paid in goods or labor, and maintenance of the roads and bridges within their territory. A typical baronetcy might encompass a single village of two hundred souls, perhaps three hundred acres of arable land, and a modest fortified house that would barely qualify as a manor in the Confederation. Yet I have met Baronets who commanded more genuine respect than Counts in my homeland, because respect here is earned through deed rather than inherited title alone.
Above the Baronets stand the Barons, styled Jarl or Jarla. They rule over multiple estates forming a barony, which might encompass anywhere from three to twenty baronetcies depending on geography and history. Barons command their own household troops, usually numbering between fifty and two hundred soldiers, and coordinate the military contributions of their vassals. Most practical political power rests at this level. A strong Baron with loyal vassals, competent mage-knights, and good relationships with neighboring nobles can effectively function as an independent power. I have witnessed Barons negotiate treaties with one another as though they were sovereign states, and in practical terms, perhaps they are.
Counts, called Greve or Grevinna, are considerably rarer. They rule over multiple baronies organized into a county, and usually only exist in the most populous or strategically important regions. There are perhaps thirty Counties in all of Hjarnsýr, compared to hundreds of Baronies. The Count’s role is primarily coordinative: mediating disputes between Barons, organizing regional defense, maintaining major infrastructure projects like the Great Roads that connect the duchies. They possess more ceremonial authority than practical power, though a skilled Count can wield significant influence through careful diplomacy.
The Marcher Lords, styled Markkjarl or Markkjarla, hold a special position that cuts across the normal hierarchy. These are nobles, of varying ranks from Baron to Count, who hold territory directly along the Lacuna boundary. They carry additional responsibilities: maintaining the Boundary Watchers, coordinating evacuation protocols should the wound expand, monitoring for entity emergence, and serving as the first line of defense should something catastrophic occur. Marcher Lords receive special dispensations and tax exemptions in recognition of these burdens. They also, I have observed, carry a certain haunted quality. Living that close to the void changes people, even those who never cross the Boundary.
At the apex of the structure stand the Dukes, Hertig or Hertuginna. Only three exist in all of Hjarnsýr, each ruling over vast territories equivalent to several counties. The Duchess of Iron-Pine commands the eastern mountain territories. The Duke of Frozen-Rivers rules the central plains and waterways. The Duchess of the Last Watch holds the western marches along the Lacuna itself. These three coordinate macro-level defense, mediate disputes between lesser nobles when personal negotiation fails, maintain the Great Roads that connect the duchies, and serve as the closest thing Hjarnsýr has to a central government. Yet even they cannot issue commands that a Baron must obey; they rule through consensus, influence, and the weight of tradition rather than absolute authority.
The reality of power, however, is far more complex than this hierarchy suggests. Titles mean less than one might expect coming from the Confederation, where rank is everything. I have watched a wealthy Friherre with strong personal relationships, a reputation for fair dealing, and three talented mage-knights in her service wield more practical influence than a poor Greve whose ancestors received their title four generations ago but whose current holdings have diminished to a single drafty castle and debts across three baronies. Military prowess matters tremendously; a Count who cannot defend his own lands commands little respect regardless of title. Magical ability carries weight; a Baron who can invoke Song that brings rain in drought becomes invaluable to neighbors and vassals alike. Reputation for fair dealing, for keeping oaths, for wisdom in judgment, these intangibles often matter more than the formal rank one holds.
Furthermore, and this is crucial to understanding northern politics, vassalage is not absolute or exclusive in the way it functions in the Confederation. A Baron might owe fealty to multiple higher lords simultaneously for different reasons: land tenure to one Duke, magical training and lineage obligations to a Count in another duchy entirely, marriage alliance obligations to a third noble family, and debt obligations to a wealthy Friherre who loaned them money to rebuild after a fire. This creates a web rather than a pyramid, with obligations flowing in multiple directions simultaneously. Trying to chart these relationships, I have filled three notebooks with diagrams that look less like organizational trees and more like deranged spider webs.
Each duchy holds an annual gathering called the Council of Voices, where nobles of all ranks assemble to debate matters of collective importance: trade agreements, defense preparations, magical research priorities, disputes requiring arbitration, responses to Fae activity, and countless other concerns. These councils have no formal legislative power; no vote is taken, no law is passed. Yet their consensus carries immense weight. When the assembled nobles of a duchy agree that something ought to be done, it gets done, not through command but through collective action. Those who ignore the Council’s consensus find themselves isolated, their vassals questioning, their neighbors uncooperative, their petitions unanswered.
[Kael’s note]: The first time I attended a Council of Voices as Valerius’s guard, I expected formal proceedings with strict protocols like the Confederation’s courts. What I got was three days of organized chaos: nobles arguing in three languages simultaneously, mages demonstrating competing theories with light-shows that left afterimages burned into my vision, shamans singing prophecies that may or may not have been serious, and absolutely everyone drinking heavily. By the third day, two minor trade disputes, a succession crisis, and a border disagreement over fishing rights had been resolved through a combination of passionate debate, ritual combat that was non-lethal but brutal to watch, and a drinking contest that somehow settled the fishing rights question in a way that satisfied both parties. They adjourned with everyone reasonably satisfied, or at least too hungover to continue arguing. It shouldn’t work. Somehow it does.
The Lacuna defines northern identity whether the people of Hjarnsýr wish it or not. Every family has a story that connects them to the Breaking. Ancestors who fled the initial catastrophe, carrying what they could and leaving everything else to be consumed by the expanding void. Relatives who approached too close decades or centuries later and came back changed, speaking in contradictory memories, unable to maintain coherent identity. Heroes who fought entities that emerged from the wound in the early years before the Boundary fully stabilized. Martyrs who died holding defensive lines when reality itself was still bleeding. These stories are not ancient history; they are living memory, passed down with the weight of sacred text, recounted at winter gatherings when the cold presses close and the wind from the west carries that particular emptiness that comes from the Lacuna.
The diving of the Lacuna, the extraction of void-materials for profit or study, is considered the gravest possible transgression in northern culture. It is not illegal in the formal sense; no law explicitly forbids it, no punishment is prescribed. But it is socially and theologically unthinkable. To become a Diver is to commit what the northerners consider a form of suicide, or perhaps apostasy, or perhaps both concepts merged into something worse than either alone.
The reasoning, as I understand it after extensive conversations with Silt-in-River and other shamans, operates on multiple levels. Theologically, void-materials are unreality itself, things that should not exist within narrative space. To bring them into the world is to introduce corruption at the ontological level, like adding poison to a well that everyone must drink from. Practically, Divers risk bringing degradation back with them: memory fragmentation, identity dissolution, all the terrible effects I documented in my Lacuna study. A Diver returning to their home village doesn’t just endanger themselves; they potentially carry contagion that could affect everyone they interact with. And most profoundly, to willingly erode one’s own being for profit is seen as spitting on the sacrifice of the Boundary entity, that transformed individual who maintains the division between reality and void. The Boundary suffers eternally to keep the wound contained; to profit from breaching that boundary is viewed as the deepest disrespect imaginable.
A Northern Lanx who becomes a Diver is treated as already dead. I do not mean this metaphorically. There is a ceremony performed in many villages when someone announces their intention to take up the trade. The community gathers at sunset and sings what is called the Ending Song. They speak the person’s name one final time. They acknowledge what they were: son, daughter, friend, neighbor, whatever roles they held. And then they let them go, because the person has already let go of them by choosing unreality over reality, void over narrative, dissolution over coherence.
The person’s name is struck from family records. Their property goes to their heirs immediately, distributed as though they had died. If they return to their home village months or years later, degraded and desperate, they are not recognized. Not spoken to. Not acknowledged as existing. This is not cruelty, Silt-in-River has explained to me repeatedly, though my Confederation-trained sensibilities initially recoiled from it as monstrous. This is grief. This is mercy. The person they knew is gone, has chosen to slowly unmake themselves. The community mourns them and moves on, because holding onto someone who is gradually ceasing to exist is its own form of torture.
[Silt-in-River’s note]: The human scholar struggles to understand this, and I do not blame him. His people do not live beside the wound as we do. They do not feel it in their bones. But we do, and we know: the void is hungry. It wants to spread. It wants to consume. Every piece of void-material brought into our world is a seed of that hunger. Every Diver is a crack in the boundary, a place where unreality leaks through. We do not hate them. We grieve them. And when they return, hollow-eyed and fragmenting, we feed them in silence. We offer shelter for one night. We do not speak their former name because it is not theirs anymore; they have traded it for void. In the morning, they leave again, and we do not watch them go. This is mercy. This is love. This is all we can give to those who have chosen to unmake themselves.
Yet despite this taboo, or perhaps because of it, Hjarnsýr maintains careful monitoring of the Lacuna with a thoroughness that exceeds anything I have seen in other territories. The Boundary Watchers are a specialized order of mage-knights who patrol the perimeter in rotating shifts, documenting any changes in the membrane’s appearance or behavior, reporting entity emergence immediately through a network of signal towers, maintaining warning beacons that can be lit to alert entire regions should catastrophe threaten. These Watchers are drawn from volunteers, typically younger sons and daughters of noble families seeking to prove themselves, or occasionally commoners with magical talent and a calling toward service. The duty is considered honorable, essential, and deeply dangerous, not from physical threat so much as from the psychological weight of spending months at a time walking along the boundary of reality itself.
Every settlement within twenty miles of the Lacuna maintains detailed evacuation protocols, updated annually, practiced in drills that the entire population participates in. I have watched these drills: organized chaos as villagers gather essential supplies, marshal livestock, form columns by family group, and march along predetermined routes toward designated rally points further east. The speed and efficiency are impressive, born of centuries of preparation for a catastrophe that has not yet occurred but might at any moment. Children learn the evacuation routes before they learn their letters. Everyone knows exactly where they should go and what they should carry. The underlying terror that motivates this preparation is never spoken of directly, but I feel it every time I witness a drill: these people know that their homes could become uninhabitable within hours if the Boundary fails, and they live with that knowledge every day.
Quarantine laws address the threat of degradation spreading through the population. Anyone exhibiting signs of semiotic erosion, memory inconsistency, identity flicker, narrative incoherence, or any of the other symptoms I documented in my Lacuna study, must report immediately to a shaman for evaluation. Failure to report is one of the few crimes that carries severe punishment in a culture that otherwise tends toward restorative rather than retributive justice. The infected individual is isolated, sometimes for weeks, while the shaman determines whether the degradation is temporary or permanent, whether it poses risk to others, whether treatment is possible. I have interviewed several individuals who underwent this quarantine. They describe it as simultaneously caring and horrifying: kept in comfortable quarters, well-fed, visited regularly by the shaman and sometimes by family, but absolutely forbidden from leaving until cleared. The isolation is meant to protect the community, but also to protect the afflicted person from making their condition worse through continued exposure to whatever caused it.
There exists what I can only call a Silent Agreement regarding Divers from other nations. Hjarnsýr does not prosecute foreign Divers who operate within northern territory along the Lacuna boundary. They do not arrest them, do not drive them away, do not interfere with their work. But neither do they trade with them, speak to them, acknowledge their presence in any way. You can dive from northern soil if you are not of Hjarnsýr, but you are invisible while doing so. Shops will not sell you supplies. Inns will not rent you rooms. If you are injured, no healer will treat you. You exist in a strange liminal space, technically permitted but utterly unsupported. This arrangement seems to satisfy both parties: Divers get access to the Lacuna, and Hjarnsýr maintains its taboo without actively engaging in violence to enforce it. I find the arrangement philosophically troubling, a kind of collective turning away from something everyone knows is happening, but I cannot deny its effectiveness as a compromise between principle and pragmatism.
To understand Hjarnsýr, one must understand that magic is not exceptional here. It is not the province of specialists and scholars as it is in the Confederation. It is not a mark of power or a tool of control. It is simply part of life, woven into daily existence as thoroughly as cooking or carpentry or conversation.
Song magic, in particular, is so fundamental to northern culture that calling it “magic” almost seems to mischaracterize it. It is not spell-casting in the sense that I learned ritual magic. It is invocation: speaking in the language the universe understands, resonating with the Ideal forms that underlie reality, calling things into manifestation through perfect alignment of intent and utterance.
Every child in Hjarnsýr learns basic Song alongside their letters. The first Songs are simple, practical, embedded so deeply into childhood that most adults perform them without conscious thought. I have watched mothers sing to candles and seen them flicker to life: “Fire come forth, from the hearth, bring your warmth to prove your worth.” The rhyme is not strict, the meter is loose, but the invocation works because the singer understands what they are asking for. They are not requesting fire; they are declaring Fire-in-itself into localized manifestation, and the universe complies because the request is properly formatted.
Children learn to sing to water, purifying it for drinking: “Water flow clean, make this well serene, wash away what should not be seen.” They sing to bread dough, encouraging it to rise: “Bread grow high, reach toward the sky, prove your nature, do not lie.” They sing to wounds, minor cuts and scrapes: “Flesh remember wholeness here, close the gap and make it clear.” These small Songs are domestic magic, kitchen magic, the magic of daily survival. No one considers them remarkable. They are simply how things are done.
The Songs work because the singers have some understanding, however intuitive, of what they are invoking. A child singing to fire does not need to comprehend the Platonic Ideal of Fire-in-itself in its totality, but they must grasp something of its essential nature: warmth, light, transformation, hunger. The Song creates resonance between the singer’s understanding and the Ideal, and the Ideal responds by manifesting in the specific instance requested. It is, in some sense, not unlike ritual magic; both are methods of formatting requests to the Weaver. But Song feels more direct, more personal, as though you are speaking to reality itself rather than submitting a written petition.
True Song Incanters, those who can channel deeper Ideals and invoke more profound transformations, are rarer and command great respect. These specialists serve essential functions in northern society. War-singers are military mages who can invoke Storm-in-itself to rain lightning on enemies, or Stone-in-itself to raise defensive barriers, or Fear-in-itself to break enemy morale. Healing-singers serve as medical practitioners, resonating with Life-in-itself to knit bones and purge infection and occasionally pull someone back from death’s threshold through sheer insistence that they remain alive. Building-singers are architectural mages who sing structures into stability, their voices literally holding stone and timber in configurations that should collapse but don’t because the Song says they won’t. Weather-singers serve agricultural communities, entreating storms to break early or rain to fall when drought threatens, though this is delicate work; storms are not puppets to be controlled, and the Weather-singer must negotiate with Storm-in-itself rather than command it.
The physical transformation that accompanies deep Song practice is expected and unremarkable in Hjarnsýr. Most specialists develop avian features over years of practice: hair that stiffens into something between hair and feathers, skin on the arms that stretches into membranous structures reminiscent of wings though rarely functional for flight, fingers that taper into points more claw than nail, eyes that brighten and sharpen until they reflect light like a bird’s. This transformation is seen as proof of dedication, evidence that the practitioner has contemplated Song-in-itself deeply enough to begin embodying it. There is no stigma attached; if anything, the visible features serve as certification of expertise. A War-singer with fully developed wing-membranes is assumed to be formidable. A Healing-singer whose eyes have gone bright and predatory is trusted to handle difficult cases.
The risk, of course, is always present. Everyone in Hjarnsýr knows the danger: if you channel an Ideal too deeply, if you resonate with it too perfectly, you may cease to be yourself and become instead a token of the Ideal. The cautionary tales are numerous and told regularly, not to discourage Song but to instill proper respect. There is the story of the War-singer who channeled Fire-in-itself so completely that he evaporated mid-battle, becoming flame itself, burning until there was nothing left but scorch marks and the smell of burning feathers. There is the tale of the Healing-singer who merged so thoroughly with Life-in-itself that she could not stop healing; she regenerated constantly, growing tumors and excess tissue, her body rebuilding itself in grotesque ways until her students had to end her suffering. There is the legend of the Weather-singer who became Storm, dissolving into wind and rain, still singing somewhere over the northern wastes if you listen carefully during thunderstorms.
Children are taught early: “Sing the thing, do not become the thing.” The distinction is crucial. You invoke Fire-in-itself to produce fire, but you maintain your own identity throughout. You are the conduit, not the destination. You speak the language of reality, but you do not forget your own tongue. The moment you lose that distinction, the moment you become what you are invoking, you are lost.
Yet despite the risk, Song continues because it must. Hjarnsýr could not function without it. The climate is too harsh, the proximity to the Lacuna too dangerous, the land too unforgiving. Song makes survival possible. Song turns winter from certain death into manageable hardship. Song keeps the Boundary monitored and entities at bay. Song is the difference between a house that stands and a house that collapses under snow load. It is not optional. It is essential. And so the children learn, and the specialists practice, and the cautionary tales are told, and life continues in the shadow of both necessity and danger.
[Silt-in-River’s note]: The human scholar understands Song better than most outsiders, but he still thinks of it as a tool, a technique, a skill to be learned. He is not entirely wrong, but he misses the deeper truth. Song is relationship. When you sing to Fire, you are not commanding it. You are inviting it. You are saying: I know what you are, I respect what you are, I ask that you manifest here in this specific way. Fire-in-itself can refuse. Usually it does not, because the relationship is old and strong, because humans have sung to Fire for millennia and Fire has grown accustomed to answering. But it could refuse. Storm does, sometimes. Death does, often. The Ideals are not servants. They are principles of reality that choose to respond when called properly. This is why becoming the thing you invoke is so terrible: you are accepted fully into the relationship, you become part of the Ideal rather than its caller. You wanted to speak to Fire; instead, Fire speaks through you until there is no “you” left to speak. We teach our children to be respectful but distant, intimate but not merged. It is a delicate balance, and some cannot walk it.
If Song is the art of speaking reality’s language, then Linear Magic is the science of writing its equations. This is, I confess, the form of magic I find most comprehensible, perhaps because it resembles most closely the ritual magic I was trained in within the Confederation. Linear Magic consists of mathematical micro-rituals, formulae prepared in advance and executed with precision to produce specific effects. It is the closest thing Hjarnsýr has to what foreign scholars would recognize as traditional spell-casting.
A Linear mage begins with geometry. Circles, triangles, sigils, all drawn with exacting precision using specialized tools: compasses that never slip, rulers etched with measurements more accurate than any mundane instrument, inks mixed with specific materials that hold magical significance. The geometric forms serve as containers, as focusing mechanisms, as the syntax of a language that reality will parse and execute. I have watched Linear mages spend hours preparing a single circle, checking angles with obsessive precision, because a deviation of even one degree can cause the formula to fail or worse, to succeed in unexpected ways.
Within the geometric framework, the mage inscribes mathematical relationships. These are not arbitrary numbers but ratios, progressions, formulae that describe the transformation they wish to invoke. A healing spell might be expressed as a formula relating the current state of damaged tissue to its proper whole state, with variables accounting for the severity of injury, the patient’s natural healing capacity, the amount of magical energy available to fuel the transformation. A defensive ward might be expressed as a geometric proof demonstrating why hostile forces should be deflected, with the angles of the protective circle corresponding to angles of deflection. The mathematics are often complex enough that I cannot follow them even with my own ritual training; Linear mages study for years to master the theoretical foundations.
Once the formula is prepared, execution requires channeling magical energy through the geometric forms while speaking the equation aloud. The speaking is crucial; this is where Linear Magic intersects with Song, though Linear practitioners would bristle at the comparison. They insist their verbal component is recitation of mathematical truth rather than invocation of Ideals, but I suspect the distinction is less clear than they believe. Regardless, the mage speaks the formula, pushes energy through the prepared geometry, and if everything is correct, the spell executes. Reality parses the equation, finds it valid, and performs the transformation described.
Linear Magic has significant advantages over pure Song. Formulae can be prepared in advance, during safe quiet moments rather than in the chaos of combat or crisis. They can be standardized, shared, taught from master to student with minimal variation. A successful formula can be copied exactly and will work for any practitioner with sufficient skill and energy, whereas Song is more personal, more intuitive, more dependent on the individual singer’s relationship with the Ideal being invoked. Linear Magic is also safer in some ways; you are less likely to merge with what you are invoking because you maintain conceptual distance through mathematical abstraction. You are not calling Fire-in-itself directly; you are specifying a mathematical transformation that results in heat and light manifesting in a defined space. The Ideal is involved, certainly, but at greater remove.
The disadvantages are equally significant. Preparation time can be prohibitive; a formula that takes three hours to properly inscribe is useless in emergency situations. The geometric forms must be physically present, which means Linear mages carry bags of chalk, portable boards, or in some cases wear their most important formulae tattooed onto their skin so they are always available. The mathematics must be perfect; a single error in calculation can result in spell failure or catastrophic mishap. I have documented cases of Linear mages whose formulae were ninety-nine percent correct producing effects that bore no resemblance to their intention, because the one percent error cascaded through the equation and created something entirely different.
Linear mages in Hjarnsýr tend to cluster in certain roles. Military applications are common; siege engineers who can calculate formulae for breaking stone walls or reinforcing friendly fortifications. Academic researchers who push the boundaries of magical theory, seeking new formulae, more efficient geometric configurations, deeper understanding of the mathematical relationships that underlie reality. Healers who specialize in precise interventions, knitting bones at exact angles, purging toxins with calculated precision. Architects who work alongside Building-singers, using Linear formulae to reinforce structures in ways that complement the Song-based stabilization.
The training is rigorous and lengthy. A Linear mage typically begins their studies in adolescence and does not achieve mastery until their thirties or forties. The initial years focus on pure mathematics: geometry, algebra, calculus, branches of mathematics I do not have names for because they are specific to magical theory. Only after the mathematical foundations are solid does the student begin inscribing actual formulae, and even then under close supervision. Too many apprentices have lost fingers, eyesight, or sanity to poorly executed spells for masters to allow unsupervised practice. The survivors of this training emerge as some of the most technically skilled mages in the known world, their mastery of mathematical magic exceeding anything I have witnessed in the Confederation’s academies.
There exists, I have been told, a philosophical divide between Song practitioners and Linear mages, though it seems to be more academic rivalry than genuine hostility. Song Incanters view Linear Magic as overly rigid, mechanistic, lacking the artistic beauty and intuitive flow of proper invocation. Linear mages counter that Song is imprecise, unreliable, dependent on talent rather than learnable skill, and dangerously prone to transformation of the practitioner. Both sides acknowledge the other’s usefulness, and in practice many northern mages learn at least the basics of both traditions, but the philosophical debate continues in academic circles and apparently has for centuries.
[Kael’s note]: I’ve watched Song Incanters and Linear mages argue about magical theory while drunk, which happens at every Council of Voices. The Song people say Linear is “mathematics pretending to be music.” The Linear people say Song is “screaming at the universe until it gives you what you want.” They insult each other’s techniques, challenge each other to demonstrations, and then usually end up collaborating on some project because it turns out combining Song and Linear produces effects neither can achieve alone. The rivalry is real but friendly. Mostly. There was a fistfight at one Council, but they were really drunk and it was about a romantic entanglement, not magical theory. Probably.
The third pillar of northern magic is less formalized, more difficult to document, and entirely beyond my ability to practice myself. Shamanic magic, which incorporates elements of divination, spirit-work, communion with Ideals, and what I can only describe as ontological negotiation, operates on principles that defy the structured approaches of both Song and Linear Magic.
Shamans in Hjarnsýr serve as spiritual guides, healers, prophets, and occasionally as political advisors to nobility. Their training is less standardized than Song Incanters or Linear mages; each shaman teaches in their own way, drawing on personal revelation as much as transmitted knowledge. Silt-in-River has attempted to explain the path to me multiple times, and I confess I grasp it only imperfectly.
A shaman begins not with learning but with listening. They spend months, sometimes years, in meditation or wilderness isolation, attempting to perceive the deeper patterns that underlie reality.
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They seek what Silt-in-River calls “the spaces between the Weaver’s threads,” the moments where reality is less solid, more negotiable, where one can glimpse the structure beneath the surface. This is not the same as contemplating an Ideal until you merge with it, though the practice carries similar risks. The shaman must maintain their own identity while perceiving truths that could easily dissolve that identity if approached incorrectly.
The shamanic practice involves extensive use of trance states, achieved through various means: rhythmic drumming that continues for hours until consciousness shifts, ingestion of certain mushrooms or herbs that grow in the deep forests, prolonged fasting that weakens the body’s hold on mundane perception, or simply sitting in meditation until the boundary between self and world becomes permeable. I have never personally induced such a state; my Confederation training emphasized control and precision, and the shamanic approach of deliberately loosening one’s grip on coherent selfhood terrifies me on a visceral level. But I have observed shamans in trance, and the experience is deeply unsettling.
A shaman in trance does not appear unconscious or asleep. They remain upright, eyes open, but clearly perceiving something beyond what the rest of us can see. They speak, but not always in their own voice. Sometimes they recite in the voices of the dead, or in languages they do not know when conscious, or in sounds that are not quite language at all but still somehow carry meaning. Silt-in-River has entered trance in my presence on three occasions. The first time, he spoke in what I later confirmed was the ancient tongue of the Ascendant Circle, the mages who created the Lacuna, though Silt-in-River has never studied that language. The second time, he sang in a voice that had three harmonics simultaneously, a physical impossibility that I heard with my own ears. The third time, he simply stared at me for twenty minutes and then said, “The human scholar writes in fear, seeking understanding to build walls. But some walls need doors, Valerius. Remember that doors exist.” I am still uncertain what he meant.
Shamans serve as diviners, though not in the fortune-telling sense that charlatans in the Confederation employ. They do not predict specific events or guarantee outcomes. Instead, they perceive patterns, probabilities, the weight of certain futures pressing against the present. When a noble consults a shaman before a major decision, the shaman does not say “if you do this, that will happen.” They say “I see weight gathering in this direction” or “the threads are pulling toward these possibilities” or “something large approaches, though I cannot see its face.” This vagueness frustrates those accustomed to certainty, but I have learned that shamanic prophecy is less about specific prediction and more about helping people perceive the shape of what is coming so they can prepare appropriately.
The shamans also serve as healers, though their methods differ significantly from Healing-singers. Where a Song Incanter invokes Life-in-itself to directly repair damage, a shaman works more indirectly. They perceive what is wrong not just physically but ontologically. An illness might be a literal infection, but it might also be a disruption in the patient’s narrative coherence, a place where their personal story has become inconsistent or fragmented. The shaman addresses both: treating the physical symptoms with herbs and poultices and mundane medical knowledge, while also performing rituals that reinforce the patient’s sense of self, that remind them who they are and insist that they continue being that person. This approach is particularly effective for treating semiotic degradation from Lacuna exposure; shamans can sometimes stabilize someone who is fragmenting, pulling them back from dissolution through repeated insistence that their identity is real and coherent and must persist.
The relationship between shamans and Fae is complex and worthy of separate study. Shamans are often the primary negotiators when a community needs to contract with Fae for labor or services. They speak the Fae’s language, not literally (though many shamans do learn to rhyme fluently), but philosophically. They understand exchange in the way Fae understand it, as ontological necessity rather than mere transaction. A shaman negotiating with a Fae will structure deals that satisfy both the community’s practical needs and the Fae’s hunger for meaningful exchange, finding creative solutions that a non-shaman might never conceive. I have watched Silt-in-River negotiate a contract with a Fae called “Root-and-Rust” where the payment for two months of carpentry work was “the memory of the first time you felt truly home.” The Fae accepted immediately, and the carpenter who paid seemed content with the trade, though when I asked him afterward if he regretted losing that memory, he said he couldn’t remember what he’d lost, which was rather the point, but he felt the absence as a kind of comfortable sadness rather than a wound.
Shamans also maintain what they call the Chronicle of Names, a practice I find both fascinating and slightly horrifying. They keep records of everyone in their community: names, birthdates, family connections, major life events, significant choices, transformations undergone. This is not merely genealogy or census data. The Chronicle serves an ontological function. By recording a person’s narrative in meticulous detail, the shaman creates a backup copy of that person’s identity. If someone begins to fragment from degradation, if their memories become unreliable and their sense of self unstable, the shaman can consult the Chronicle and essentially reinstall their identity from the backup. “You are Bjorn son of Astrid,” the shaman will say, reading from the Chronicle. “You were born in the winter of Year 253. You married Sigrid of the Frostwood barony. You have three children: Eira, Torsten, and Helga. You are a blacksmith. You broke your arm at age twelve falling from a tree. You earned your knighthood at twenty-five defending against the Shadow-Elk incursion. You are these things. These things are true. Remember.” The recitation, combined with shamanic ritual, can pull someone back from dissolution by giving them an external anchor for their identity.
The training of a shaman is not formalized in the way Song or Linear magic is taught. There are no schools, no standardized curricula. Instead, an experienced shaman will take an apprentice, usually someone who has demonstrated certain sensitivities: an ability to sense when Fae are near, frequent prophetic dreams, an intuitive understanding of other people’s emotional states, or simply a persistent feeling that there is more to reality than what mundane perception reveals. The apprentice lives with the master for years, sometimes decades, learning through observation and practice rather than formal instruction. They accompany the master on healings, sit present during divinations, participate in rituals until the patterns become second nature. Eventually, when the master judges them ready (and this timing varies wildly; I know of apprentices who studied for five years and others who studied for twenty), the apprentice undergoes some form of trial or initiation. The specifics vary by tradition and master, but the general pattern involves a prolonged ordeal: vision quests in the wilderness, extended fasting, consumption of psychoactive substances, confrontation with some truth about themselves or reality that they must integrate without fragmenting. If they survive this ordeal with their sanity and identity intact, they emerge as shamans themselves, ready to take their own apprentices eventually.
The dangers of shamanic practice are substantial and different from the dangers of Song or Linear magic. You are not at risk of merging with an Ideal in quite the same way, but you are at risk of losing yourself in other fashions. Spending too much time in trance states can make it difficult to return to normal consciousness; I have heard of shamans who became unable to fully exit trance, spending the rest of their lives perceiving both mundane reality and deeper patterns simultaneously, overwhelmed by the doubled perception. Divination can become addictive; some shamans become obsessed with perceiving futures, spending all their time in prophetic trance, neglecting their physical needs until they waste away. Working too closely with Fae can blur the boundary between self and other; shamans who negotiate extensively with Fae sometimes begin to adopt Fae-like qualities themselves, speaking in rhyme unconsciously, viewing all interactions as potential exchanges, developing a hunger for transaction that is not native to their species. And the Chronicle of Names, while useful, carries its own horror: if a shaman becomes corrupted or malicious, they possess the power to rewrite someone’s identity from the backup. This has not happened in recorded history, as far as I can determine, but the theoretical possibility exists and troubles me deeply.
[Silt-in-River’s note]: The human scholar fears the Chronicle, and I understand his fear. To know that your identity could be rewritten is terrifying to one trained in the Confederation’s worldview, where the self is sacred and inviolable. But he misunderstands the Chronicle’s purpose. We do not preserve identity to control it. We preserve it because we live beside the void, and the void erodes identity. The Chronicle is an act of love, not power. When someone fragments, when they can no longer remember who they are, we give them back to themselves. We say: you existed, you were real, you mattered, and here is the proof. Without the Chronicle, those touched by the Lacuna’s influence would be lost forever, dissolved into void with no anchor to pull them back. The scholar fears what could be done with this power. We fear what happens without it. Both fears are valid. We choose to act despite fear, because the alternative is abandoning our people to unreality.
The institution of the mage-knight represents one of Hjarnsýr’s most distinctive features, a fusion of martial and magical traditions that produces warriors unlike anything found in the Confederation or other regions I have studied. The term “mage-knight” can be misleading to foreign ears; these are not knights who happen to know a few spells, nor are they mages who have picked up basic swordsmanship as an afterthought. They are individuals who have pursued serious training in both disciplines, though typically with greater emphasis on magical ability than pure martial skill.
A typical mage-knight’s education begins with several years at a swordsmanship school, usually between ages twelve and sixteen. These schools, found in every duchy and most large baronies, teach the fundamentals of combat: blade work, horsemanship if the family can afford a mount, wrestling and unarmed fighting, tactics and strategy, physical conditioning. The training is rigorous but not as extensive as a purely martial warrior would receive. A dedicated soldier might train for ten or fifteen years to achieve true mastery of combat; the mage-knight spends four or five years reaching basic competency and then moves on.
The magical education is where the majority of time and effort goes. After completing basic martial training, the prospective mage-knight apprentices with a master in their chosen magical tradition: a Song Incanter, a Linear mage, or occasionally a shaman, though shamanic mage-knights are rare. This apprenticeship lasts anywhere from ten to twenty years depending on the tradition and the student’s aptitude. During this period, the student continues to practice martial skills so they do not atrophy, but the focus is overwhelmingly on magical development. By the end of their training, a mage-knight should be able to hold their own in melee combat against a competent but not exceptional warrior, while wielding magical abilities that far exceed what a purely martial fighter could counter.
The combination is devastatingly effective in practice. A mage-knight on the battlefield can use Song to invoke protective barriers that deflect arrows, then close to melee range where they fight with enhanced strength or speed granted through further invocation. They can use Linear formulae prepared in advance to create zones of effect that damage or disorient enemies while leaving allies unharmed. They can perceive threats through shamanic sensitivity and respond before conventional warriors realize danger is present. The versatility makes them invaluable as officers, leading conventional troops while providing magical support that multiplies the effectiveness of the entire unit.
Not all mage-knights serve in military capacities. Many fulfill other roles that benefit from the combination of combat competence and magical ability. Some serve as investigators, using magic to uncover evidence and martial skills to apprehend criminals who resist. Others work as bodyguards to nobility, providing both physical protection and magical early warning of threats. The Boundary Watchers are primarily mage-knights, patrolling the Lacuna perimeter armed and trained to fight entities that emerge while also using magic to monitor the Boundary’s stability. Some mage-knights become adventurers or monster hunters, seeking out dangerous creatures in the deep forests or mountains, using magic to track and combat threats that conventional warriors cannot handle.
The social status of mage-knights is complex. They are respected, certainly, for their dedication and capability. But they occupy an ambiguous position in the hierarchy. In the Confederation, a powerful mage is automatically a person of status and authority; magic equals power equals political standing. In Hjarnsýr, this equation does not hold. A mage-knight from a common family remains a commoner unless they are granted nobility through some exceptional deed or achievement. Conversely, a noble who trains as a mage-knight does not gain additional status from that training; they are respected for their skill, but their rank derives from their birth and holdings, not their magical ability.
This creates interesting dynamics. I have observed mage-knights from common backgrounds commanding noble-born soldiers in battle, their superior magical ability and tactical competence outweighing formal rank, while the noble soldiers accept this command without resentment because combat effectiveness matters more than status when your life is at stake. I have also watched noble mage-knights defer to common-born shamans in matters of spiritual or magical importance, recognizing that wisdom and expertise do not correlate with birth. The culture values competence and merit in ways that my Confederation upbringing still finds somewhat disorienting, accustomed as I am to rigid hierarchies where birth determines everything.
The equipment of a mage-knight reflects their dual nature. They typically wear lighter armor than pure martial warriors, prioritizing mobility over maximum protection. Full plate is rare; more common is reinforced leather or chain, sufficient to turn aside casual blows but not so heavy as to impede the gestures and movements required for spell-casting. Their weapons are often custom-made, incorporating materials that complement their magic: blades etched with geometric formulae for Linear mages, hilts wrapped in materials that resonate with specific Ideals for Song Incanters, weapons blessed or consecrated through shamanic ritual. Some mage-knights carry multiple weapons for different situations: a sword for conventional combat, a dagger with void-iron edge for fighting magically protected opponents (though this is controversial given northern attitudes toward Lacuna materials, and such weapons are usually acquired from foreign sources and kept quiet), and various tools needed for their magical practice such as chalk for Linear formulae or drums for shamanic work.
The culture of mage-knights includes certain traditions and expectations. They are expected to maintain their training in both disciplines throughout their lives, never allowing either combat skills or magical ability to atrophy. They are expected to serve their community when needed, whether that means military service during conflicts, helping with agricultural magic during planting and harvest, or investigating supernatural threats when they arise. They often form informal networks, mage-knights maintaining contact with others they trained alongside, sharing information about threats or magical discoveries, providing mutual support. These networks sometimes transcend political boundaries; I have seen mage-knights from different duchies, technically potential enemies if their lords went to war, treat each other with warm camaraderie based on shared training and professional respect.
[Kael’s note]: My cousin trained as a mage-knight, Linear tradition, before she decided military life wasn’t for her and became a bridge engineer instead. She can still fight well enough to discourage bandits, and she uses her Linear training to design bridges that shouldn’t be possible with conventional architecture. The combination of skills is useful for all kinds of things beyond combat. That’s something outsiders don’t always understand about mage-knights: they’re trained to fight, yes, but the real value is having people who can think strategically, act decisively, and manipulate reality when needed. Those skills apply to a lot more than just warfare.
To understand daily life in Hjarnsýr, one must first understand the tyranny of the seasons. This is not poetic exaggeration. The climate shapes every aspect of existence with an absoluteness that those from temperate regions cannot fully grasp.
Winter arrives in the north like an invading army, sudden and overwhelming. I experienced my first northern winter during my second year in Hjarnsýr, and despite warnings from locals that I thought were exaggerated, I was unprepared for the sheer brutality of it. The temperature plunged to depths that made exposed skin dangerous within minutes. Snow fell in quantities that buried houses to their eaves. Winds carried a cold that seemed to cut through any amount of clothing, straight to the bone. Going outside required elaborate preparation: multiple layers of wool and fur, face coverings that left only the eyes exposed, constant awareness of how long you had been out because frostbite could claim fingers or toes with shocking speed.
The entire culture reorients around winter survival. Summer, the brief warm months that last perhaps three months at best, is a time of frantic activity. Fields must be planted, grown, and harvested in this compressed timeframe. Food must be preserved: smoking meat, salting fish, drying fruits and vegetables, fermenting anything that can be fermented, storing root vegetables in cold cellars. Firewood must be cut and stacked, enough to last six or seven months. Buildings must be repaired, insulated, made ready to withstand the coming cold. Clothing must be made or mended. Tools must be crafted or fixed. There is no leisure in summer, not truly. Every hour of daylight is precious, a chance to prepare for the dark months ahead.
Autumn is transition and anxiety. The harvest must come in before the first serious snow. Animals must be slaughtered before they become too expensive to feed through winter; the meat is preserved, nothing wasted. The community comes together for these tasks because individual families cannot manage alone. I have participated in harvest gatherings where fifty people worked together bringing in grain, then shifted to a different farm the next day, everyone helping everyone else because survival depends on it. The collective interdependence is not philosophical; it is practical necessity. A family that fails to bring in their harvest will starve unless neighbors share, and everyone knows they might need that sharing themselves someday.
Winter itself is a time of endurance. The cold is so intense that outdoor work becomes nearly impossible. People retreat indoors, sometimes not leaving their homes for weeks at a time during the worst periods. This enforced proximity breeds its own culture. Families live in close quarters, multiple generations often sharing a single main room that is kept heated constantly. Privacy is minimal. Tensions can build. But the alternative is freezing, so people learn to navigate the social complexities of winter cohabitation.
The darkness compounds the cold. In the depths of winter, the sun rises late and sets early. There might be only six hours of dim daylight, with the rest of the day spent in firelight or darkness. This affects mood profoundly. I noticed during my first winter that people became quieter, more withdrawn, prone to melancholy. The locals call it “winter sickness” and treat it as a medical condition requiring intervention: specific herbs brewed into tea, increased social activity to combat isolation, sometimes shamanic rituals that seem to help though I cannot explain the mechanism.
But winter is also the season of story. With outdoor work impossible and daylight scarce, the long dark hours are filled with tales. Elders recount the histories of their families and communities. Bards perform epics that last for hours. Shamans recite the Chronicles of Names, reminding people who they are and who their ancestors were. Young people learn the stories that will eventually make them part of the continuity of the culture. I have spent winter evenings in village halls listening to stories I barely understood, performed in rapid northern dialect that my limited grasp of the language could not fully follow, yet the emotional weight of the performance transcended language. These were not mere entertainment; they were cultural transmission, identity maintenance, the community telling itself into continued existence.
Spring is release and rebirth. When the snow finally begins to melt, when the first green appears, the collective relief is palpable. People emerge from winter confinement blinking like creatures from burrows. The season brings its own dangers: flooding from snowmelt, spring storms that can still bring lethal cold, hunger because winter stores are depleted but new crops have not yet grown. Yet the mood lifts. Hope returns. The cycle continues, and everyone has survived another winter, which is never guaranteed.
[Silt-in-River’s note]: The human scholar describes the seasons as I would expect an outsider to see them: as hardship to be endured. He is not wrong, but he misses the beauty. Winter teaches patience. It teaches community. It teaches that you cannot survive alone, that you need your neighbors as they need you. The long dark teaches us to value light, to create warmth together, to share stories that keep us human when the cold wants to freeze us into silence. Spring teaches gratitude for simple things: green shoots, birdsong, the sun warm on your face. Summer teaches industry and preparation. Autumn teaches generosity and trust. The seasons are harsh, yes. But they have made us who we are: people who know how to endure, how to help each other, how to find joy even in hardship. The scholar fears the cold. We respect it. There is a difference.
The buildings of Hjarnsýr reflect the climate that produced them. Every structural choice prioritizes heat retention, weather resistance, and efficient use of space.
The typical northern house is built low and solid, often partially sunken into the ground to take advantage of earth’s insulation. Walls are thick, sometimes two or three feet of stone or tightly packed timber, with insulation of moss, clay, or whatever materials are locally available stuffed into gaps. Roofs are steeply pitched to shed snow rather than accumulating dangerous weight, often reinforced with Song or Linear magic to ensure they do not collapse under extraordinary loads. Windows are small and few; every opening is a place for heat to escape. The windows that do exist are covered with oiled parchment or, in wealthier homes, expensive glass panes, and shuttered on the outside with heavy wooden boards that can be sealed tight during storms.
The interior layout follows a common pattern born of necessity. The main room serves multiple functions: cooking, eating, socializing, working at indoor crafts, sleeping for much of the family. A large hearth or stone stove dominates the space, kept burning constantly through winter. The heat from this single source must warm the entire dwelling, so the room is often smaller than one might expect, concentrating warmth. Sleeping areas are typically raised platforms or built-in alcoves near the ceiling where hot air collects. Wealthier families might have separate sleeping chambers, but even then, these rooms are small and positioned near the main heat source.
Storage is crucial. Every house has a cold cellar, often built into a hillside or dug beneath the structure, where root vegetables and preserved foods are kept. The temperature in the cellar stays just above freezing even in winter, cold enough to preserve food but not so cold as to freeze it solid. Wooden barrels, clay pots, hanging dried goods, smoked meats wrapped in cloth, these fill the cellar floor to ceiling in autumn and gradually deplete as winter progresses. Running out of food before spring is a death sentence, so storage capacity is not luxury but necessity.
Animal spaces are often integrated into the building or immediately adjacent. Livestock provide heat, and keeping them close to human habitation means their body warmth contributes to overall temperature regulation while also making it easier to care for them during winter storms when going outside is dangerous. The smell can be considerable, but warm and smelly is preferable to cold and clean when survival is at stake.
Wealthier homes and noble residences incorporate more elaborate features while maintaining the same fundamental priorities. Multiple hearths allow for separate heated chambers. Thicker walls provide better insulation and also serve defensive purposes; a baronet’s manor is often fortified against both weather and potential violence. Windows might be larger and more numerous, the luxury of heat loss offset by greater access to fuel and more sophisticated heating systems. Some incorporate what Linear mages call “thermal circulation formulae,” geometric patterns inscribed into the walls themselves that distribute heat more efficiently throughout the structure, turning the entire building into a kind of magical heating system that requires less fuel to maintain comfortable temperatures.
The truly impressive defensive structures, the seats of baronies, counties, and duchies, represent architectural achievements that still astonish me despite years of study. These are not castles in the style of the Confederation or the southern kingdoms. The northern climate and magical traditions have produced something different, something I have come to think of as fortified compounds that blend practical defensive needs with the particular threats posed by both human enemies and supernatural dangers.
The ducal seat I have studied most extensively is Jernhall, the fortress-city that serves as the center of the Duchy of Iron-Pine in the eastern mountains. It sits on a rocky prominence surrounded by steep valleys on three sides, with only one practical approach from the east. The basic structure is star-shaped when viewed from above, though the points are not symmetrical; they extend or retract based on the terrain, creating irregular angles that nonetheless follow clear geometric principles. I initially assumed this was aesthetic choice, but a Linear mage explained that the angles are mathematically calculated to create overlapping fields of fire and magical effect. Any point along the walls can be supported by at least two others, and the irregular star creates pockets where attacking forces become compressed and vulnerable.
The walls themselves are massive: forty feet high at the lowest points, sixty feet at the towers, and twenty feet thick at the base, tapering to twelve feet at the top. They are built of granite quarried from the mountains, fitted so precisely that you can barely slip a knife blade between stones. But the stone is only part of the fortification. During construction, Building-singers sang the walls into stability, their voices literally binding the stones together in ways that transcend mortar. Linear mages inscribed formulae into the foundations, geometric patterns that distribute force and make the structure resistant to both physical impact and magical assault. The walls are not just stone; they are Stone-in-itself made manifest, the Platonic Ideal of barrier and defense given physical form. I have watched demonstrations where mages hurled devastating attacks at sections of the wall during training exercises. The attacks dissipated against the stone like water against rock, absorbed into the structure without leaving a mark.
The star points serve as bastions for magical artillery, which is the proper term though it took me time to understand why. At each point, platforms are built to accommodate teams of mages, usually a mix of Song Incanters and Linear specialists working in coordination. During a siege, these mages can invoke destructive forces, rain fire or lightning or stone down upon attackers, or create barriers that protect the walls from enemy magic. The geometric positioning ensures that no approach to the fortress is undefended; any attack must face multiple angles of magical fire simultaneously. The similarity to artillery forts from more technologically advanced regions is not coincidental; the problems of warfare are similar, and whether you solve them with cannons or with mages who can invoke explosive force, the optimal architectural solutions converge toward star-shaped fortifications with overlapping fields of effect.
The interior of Jernhall is a city unto itself, capable of housing ten thousand people during emergencies. The design prioritizes vertical space; buildings are stacked against the inner walls, sometimes four or five stories high, creating dense habitation that maximizes the protected area. The central keep rises another hundred feet above the walls, a massive structure that serves as the Duke’s residence, the final fallback point, and the symbolic heart of the duchy. Every building is connected by covered walkways and tunnels, allowing movement throughout the compound without exposing defenders to arrow fire or hostile magic. Water is supplied by deep wells and supplemented by magical purification systems that Linear mages maintain; a siege cannot cut the water supply because the source is internal and independent.
Food storage is distributed throughout the fortress in multiple cellars and granaries, ensuring that even if sections of the compound are overrun, the remaining defenders still have access to supplies. I have been told that Jernhall maintains enough preserved food to feed its peacetime population of three thousand for two years, or its emergency capacity of ten thousand for six months. During harvest season, caravans arrive from across the duchy bringing tribute in the form of grain, preserved meat, dried fish, and other stores that are carefully cataloged and stored. This is not merely taxation; it is collective insurance. If disaster strikes anywhere in the duchy, Jernhall’s stores can feed refugees. If Jernhall itself comes under siege, those same stores keep it viable.
The defensive philosophy extends beyond physical fortifications. Every duchy maintains networks of signal towers, tall structures spaced approximately ten miles apart across the territory, each equipped with massive braziers that can be lit to relay warnings. A threat spotted at the border can be communicated across the entire duchy within hours through this system. The towers are staffed by small garrisons, usually a handful of soldiers and at least one mage capable of using Song or Linear magic to enhance the signal, creating colored flames or lights visible for greater distances. During my time in the north, I have twice seen the signal system activated: once for a forest fire that threatened multiple villages, once for a reported entity emergence from the Lacuna. Both times, the response was swift and coordinated, with forces mobilizing to the threatened areas within a day.
The integration of magic into defensive architecture creates capabilities that purely physical fortifications cannot match. Some walls incorporate what mages call “resonance matrices,” geometric patterns that absorb magical attacks and redistribute the energy harmlessly into the ground. Others have “repulsion wards” that make scaling the walls physically difficult; you can climb, but you feel increasing resistance, as though gravity is intensifying the higher you ascend. The gates are layered defenses: physical doors of iron-bound oak six inches thick, followed by portcullises that can be dropped in seconds, backed by murder holes where defenders can rain down arrows, boiling water, or magical attacks on anyone trapped in the entry corridor. Some gates also incorporate Fae-made locks, commissioned at great expense, which ensure that no amount of conventional lock-picking or even most magical bypassing can open them without the proper key.
[Kael’s note]: I watched a siege demonstration at Jernhall during a military festival. They had volunteers playing the attacking force, and they were allowed to use any non-lethal methods to breach a section of the outer wall. Thirty experienced soldiers and six mages spent four hours trying every technique they could devise: battering rams, scaling ladders, tunneling attempts, coordinated magical bombardment. They didn’t even scratch the defenses. The wall absorbed everything. The mage in charge of the fortress defenses was barely paying attention by the end, chatting with observers while occasionally glancing over to see if the attackers had given up yet. Northern fortifications are not just defended; they are aggressively hostile to attackers in ways that make conventional siege warfare nearly impossible. You would need an army many times the size of the defending force and months or years to starve them out, and even then you’d be hemorrhaging casualties the entire time.
The harsh climate that dominates northern life has produced a culture that values celebration with particular intensity. When survival itself is never guaranteed, when winter can kill and the Lacuna’s proximity reminds you daily of how fragile reality is, the community’s continued existence becomes something worth marking, worth honoring, worth celebrating in ways that transcend mere festival.
The northern calendar follows a wheel of eight major celebrations, spaced throughout the year to mark transitions and provide structure to the seasonal cycle. These are not religious in the sense that the Confederation’s Church of Light celebrates its holy days. Northern theology is diffuse, varied, personal; some houses follow particular gods, others honor different ones, many incorporate shamanic practices that predate the egregores entirely. The celebrations belong to everyone regardless of theological commitment because they mark communal survival rather than divine favor.
The year begins, in northern reckoning, with the Winter Gate, celebrated on the longest night of the year. This is not a joyous festival but a solemn one. The community gathers as darkness falls, and they light fires, hundreds of them if the settlement is large enough, thousands of candles and torches and bonfires driving back the dark. The symbolism is obvious but no less powerful for that: we are here, we persist, we have survived to this moment and we will survive beyond it. The fires burn through the entire night. No one sleeps. To sleep on the longest night is considered unlucky at best, dangerous at worst; you must bear witness to the darkness and prove that you outlast it. Stories are told, the Chronicles of Names are recited, the dead of the past year are honored, and at dawn, when the sun finally rises, there is a collective release. The community has survived another journey to the dark’s deepest point and emerged. Winter’s grip will gradually loosen from this moment forward.
I have attended three Winter Gates during my time in Hjarnsýr, and each was profound in ways that make me uncomfortable to recall. The first year, I misunderstood the gravity of the ceremony and treated it like a festival, drinking and laughing with colleagues. The looks I received from locals made it clear I had committed a serious breach of protocol, though no one corrected me directly. The second year, I observed more carefully, staying quiet, watching the ritual unfold. The sheer emotional weight of it struck me: this entire community gathering to testify that they still exist, that they have made it through another year, that they will face what comes next together. The third year, I participated fully, adding my own voice to the recitation of names when appropriate, keeping vigil through the night, feeling the exhaustion and the strange exhilaration when dawn arrived. I understood, finally, that this was not entertainment. This was collective affirmation of existence in the face of forces that want to end that existence.
The Spring Thaw comes when the snow begins its serious melt, usually late in what the Confederation calendar would call March or early April. This is celebration of a different sort: joyous, relieved, slightly desperate. The community emerges from winter confinement and discovers who survived. Not everyone does; the old, the sick, the unlucky sometimes do not make it through the dark months. The Spring Thaw honors the dead and celebrates the living. There is feasting, though on carefully rationed portions because stored food is running low and new crops have not yet grown. There is music, dancing, flirtation; spring is when many marriages are arranged or consummated, the survival of another winter making people keenly aware of their mortality and their desire to create new life. The festival lasts three days, and by the end, everyone is exhausted but lighter in spirit.
The Planting follows two or three weeks after Spring Thaw, once the ground has thawed sufficiently to work. This is the most critical time of the agricultural year, and the celebration reflects that seriousness. Shamans bless the fields, Song Incanters perform invocations to earth and seed and sun, Linear mages inscribe formulae into boundary stones to encourage growth and ward off blight. The entire community participates in the planting itself, everyone working together to get seeds into the ground while the narrow window of opportunity remains open. There is singing during the work, not Song magic but simple music to maintain rhythm and morale. At day’s end, there is a communal meal, again carefully portioned, and then people collapse into exhausted sleep. The celebration is in the work itself, in the tangible fact of having completed another planting, in the hope that this year’s harvest will be sufficient.
Midsummer marks the longest day, the sun’s zenith, the mirror to Winter Gate. This is pure joy, unalloyed by the solemnity that marks winter’s festivals. The crops are growing, the weather is warm, the days are long, and for this brief moment, life is comparatively easy. The celebration lasts from sunset the night before through sunset the day of, a full twenty-four hours of festival. There is genuine feasting because the previous year’s preserved stores are being depleted anyway; better to use them for celebration than let them spoil. There are games, competitions, demonstrations of skill both martial and magical. Mage-knights engage in ritual combats that are spectacular to watch, Song Incanters perform elaborate invocations purely for aesthetic effect, Linear mages create geometric light-shows that paint the night sky with impossible colors. This is the festival that outsiders find most comprehensible because it resembles festivals everywhere: people enjoying themselves while they can.
The Harvest Moon, celebrated on the full moon closest to the autumn equinox, marks the beginning of harvest season. Like the Planting, this is working celebration; everyone participates in bringing in the crops, and the festival is embedded in that work. Each day of harvest begins with ritual: shamans consecrating the fields, Song Incanters thanking the earth for its yield, everyone acknowledging the community effort required. Each day ends with communal meals where the food being eaten is food that was harvested that same day, the connection between work and survival made explicit. The celebration continues for weeks as different crops come in at different times, and by the end, everyone is exhausted but satisfied. The stores are full. Winter can be faced.
The Remembrance comes in late autumn, after harvest is complete but before the snows begin in earnest. This festival honors the dead, all dead, not just those who died recently but all ancestors stretching back to the Breaking and beyond. The Chronicles of Names are recited in full, which in larger communities can take days. Families visit burial grounds, leave offerings, tell stories of those who came before. There is a sense of continuity emphasized here: you are part of a chain of existence, those before you made it possible for you to be here, those after you will carry the chain forward. The celebration is quiet, reflective, sometimes melancholy, but also deeply grounding. You are reminded that you are not alone, that you are part of something larger than yourself, that your existence matters because you are part of this ongoing story.
The First Snow is celebrated whenever the first serious snowfall occurs, usually sometime in what would be November or December by Confederation reckoning. This marks the true beginning of winter, the transition from preparation to endurance. The festival is brief, just a single evening, but it carries weight. The community gathers, usually in the largest building available, and they make commitments to each other for the winter ahead: who will share fuel, who will check on isolated families, who will maintain the communal food stores, how resources will be distributed if shortages occur. These are not casual promises but binding commitments, sometimes formalized in contracts negotiated with shamanic mediation, occasionally involving Fae witnesses to ensure the exchanges are properly balanced. Once the commitments are made, there is a final meal together before winter isolation begins in earnest. You are reminded that you do not face the dark alone, that the community will support you, that you will support them in turn.
The Year’s End, celebrated in the days between the solar year’s end and Winter Gate, is a liminal time outside normal calendar reckoning. These are days given to personal reflection, to settling debts and disputes before the new year begins, to making peace with things left undone. Many people fast during Year’s End, engaging in purification rituals or vision quests supervised by shamans. Some seek prophetic dreams, hoping to glimpse what the coming year might hold. Others simply rest, gathering strength for the cycle that is about to begin again. There is no communal gathering during Year’s End; this time belongs to individuals and families rather than the larger community. When it concludes and Winter Gate arrives, the wheel turns again.
[Silt-in-River’s note]: The scholar documents the celebrations accurately, but he still thinks of them as events separate from ordinary life. He does not yet understand that the festivals are life, that the spaces between celebrations are preparation for the next one, that the entire year is structured around these moments of collective acknowledgment. We do not celebrate because we have survived; we survive because we celebrate. The wheel turns, the seasons change, and we mark each turning because marking it makes it real, makes it meaningful, makes it something we participate in rather than something that happens to us. The human comes from a culture that tries to control nature through power. We control nothing. We participate, we acknowledge, we celebrate, and in doing so, we remain human even when the cold wants to freeze us, even when the void wants to erase us. The celebrations are not luxury. They are survival.
The relationship between Hjarnsýr and the Fae is more intimate and complex than any other culture I have studied maintains with these entities. Where the human Confederation views Fae with fear and hostility, where the southern city-states regulate them through bureaucracy, where even the Mountain Lanxes keep them at shamanic arm’s length, the northern territories have integrated Fae into daily life in ways that would be unthinkable elsewhere.
This integration stems partly from necessity and partly from philosophical compatibility. The north’s proximity to the Lacuna means Fae are simply more common here; more entities cross the Boundary in this region, drawn by the thinner division between narrative space and void, and they must go somewhere. Driving them away would require constant vigilance and conflict that would exhaust resources better spent on survival. More fundamentally, northern culture’s emphasis on exchange, on reciprocal obligation, on balanced transaction as the basis of community cohesion, creates natural common ground with beings who literally feed on exchange itself.
In smaller villages and remote steadings, it is not uncommon to have a Fae in residence, contracted for specific services in return for regular payment. I have visited a village called Hrafnstad where a Fae styled “Long-Strider of the North Wind” serves as permanent night watchman, having held the position for seventeen years according to local accounts. His payment is a bowl of milk and a portion of whatever meal the village headman’s family eats, provided nightly without fail. In exchange, nothing has successfully stolen from Hrafnstad in nearly two decades, and several attempted raids by bandits have ended with the raiders fleeing in terror after encountering Long-Strider making his rounds. When I asked villagers if they feared him, they looked at me with confusion. “Fear Long-Strider? He keeps us safe. He’s part of the community.” The Fae himself, when I managed to interview him, expressed what seemed like genuine affection for the village: “The people feed me well and treat me fair, I guard their sleep without a care. We’ve made a home here, strange but true; I watch for them, they watch for me too.”
Larger towns and cities have designated areas where Fae can gather and offer services, similar to labor markets but with protocols specific to Fae interaction. I have spent considerable time observing the Fae corner in Threshold, the border city where I maintain my primary residence. On any given day, you might find a dozen Fae there, some regulars who appear daily, others transients passing through. They offer various services: labor, both skilled and unskilled; guard work; message carrying; specialized crafts that benefit from their peculiar nature; entertainment through their rhyming speech and strange mannerisms. Humans seeking to hire them negotiate carefully, often with a shaman or experienced contractor mediating to ensure the terms are clear and the payment is appropriate.
The negotiations can be fascinating to observe. I watched a farmer contract with a Fae called “Root-and-Rust” for help clearing a field of stones. The farmer initially offered three silver coins, which Root-and-Rust rejected, saying “Silver’s cold and silver’s dead, I want warmth instead.” After consultation with a shaman, they settled on payment of “the memory of your grandmother’s laugh.” The farmer agreed, they shook hands, and Root-and-Rust worked for three days straight moving stones that would have taken six humans a week to clear. When the work was complete, the farmer reported that he could no longer quite remember what his grandmother’s laugh sounded like; he knew she had laughed, could remember moments that should have been funny, but the sound itself was gone. He seemed content with the trade nonetheless. The stones were cleared, the field was planted, and he valued that tangible benefit over a memory he could no longer access anyway.
This casual willingness to trade abstract things—memories, emotions, sensory experiences—for practical benefits strikes me as both admirably pragmatic and slightly horrifying. I have pressed northern acquaintances on whether they truly understand what they are giving up when they trade such things to Fae. The typical response is a shrug and some variation of “The memory is mine to trade if I choose. Root-and-Rust needed it more than I did, and I needed my field cleared. We both got what we wanted.” The transactional thinking is so deeply embedded that the concept of things being too personal or precious to trade simply does not register for many northerners.
Children grow up learning proper Fae interaction as part of basic education. Schools and families teach the essential protocols: always be clear about terms, never agree to vague payment, respect the rhyming speech, honor contracts absolutely, watch for signs of hunger that might indicate danger. By adolescence, most northern children can negotiate simple contracts with Fae without adult supervision, having internalized the rules through repeated exposure and practice. This stands in stark contrast to the Confederation, where children are taught that Fae are dangerous monsters to be avoided or killed, full stop.
The integration is not without tensions and complications. Fae who become too hungry are still dangerous, and every community has protocols for dealing with starving Fae: attempts at feeding through emergency contracts if possible, forcible expulsion if necessary, violence as a last resort if the Fae has gone feral. The careful social contract depends on Fae remaining well-fed enough to maintain their rhyme and reason. Additionally, not all Fae are trustworthy even when fed; some are malicious or enjoy causing harm through technically-fulfilled-but-deliberately-destructive contract completion. Northerners learn to recognize reputations; Fae who abuse the trust placed in them find themselves unable to secure contracts, which leads to hunger, which eventually forces them to leave the territory or face the consequences of starvation.
The northern approach to Fae has spread certain practices to other regions, particularly the use of Fae as mediators in human disputes. A Fae contracted to serve as judge in a disagreement is bound to find equitable solutions by the terms of their contract. They have no stake in the outcome beyond the payment they receive for their services, which makes them more impartial than any human judge with personal relationships and biases. Some Fae have built entire careers around dispute resolution, traveling from community to community offering their services. I have watched one called “Balance-in-All-Things” mediate a complex inheritance dispute between three siblings. The Fae listened to each party’s claims, asked clarifying questions that cut through emotional tangles to reach factual issues, and then pronounced a division of property that satisfied all parties despite none of them getting exactly what they had originally wanted. The payment was “a year of certainty,” which apparently meant the contracting family would not face any major unexpected disruptions for twelve months, a kind of stability that Fae can somehow provide or at least promise credibly enough that humans value it.
Fae-made goods are common in Hjarnsýr to an extent that would scandalize the Confederation. Fae-locks secure many homes and businesses. Fae-blades are carried by soldiers and mage-knights who can afford them and accept the maintenance burden. Fae-built structures dot the landscape, instantly recognizable by their peculiar durability and the faint sense of purposefulness that emanates from them. Wealthy families commission Fae craftsmen for heirloom pieces: furniture that wants to support, tools that want to work, clothing that wants to warm. These items are prized not despite their hunger but because of it; an object that wants to fulfill its function will do so better than an object with no such drive.
The most unusual aspect of northern Fae integration, from my perspective, is the occasional adoption of Fae into family structures. This is rare but not unheard of. A family that contracts regularly with the same Fae over years or decades sometimes extends an invitation to become part of the household more formally. The Fae receives regular payment in the form of food and shelter, and in exchange provides ongoing labor and protection. This arrangement benefits both parties: the Fae has stability and consistent feeding, the family gains a tireless worker and defender. Some of these relationships span generations, with a single Fae serving a family line for centuries, becoming as much a part of the family identity as the bloodline itself. I have interviewed descendants of such families, and they speak of “our Fae” with the same casual possessiveness they use for “our land” or “our trade.” The Fae, for their part, seem to develop genuine attachment to the families they serve, though whether this is actual affection or simply deep satisfaction from a perfectly balanced long-term exchange is difficult to determine and may not be a meaningful distinction.
[Kael’s note]: I grew up with a Fae in my extended family’s household. Her name was “Whisper-in-the-Walls,” and she’d been with my great-great-grandmother’s line for at least a hundred and fifty years. She told stories at night, fixed things that broke, kept the house warm through winter in ways that had nothing to do with the hearth. When my baby sister was born premature and weak, Whisper sat with her for three days straight, just being present, and my sister survived when she probably shouldn’t have. When I asked Whisper years later why she’d done that, she said: “Your sister’s life and mine entwined; I keep her whole, she keeps me mine.” I still don’t fully understand what she meant, but I know she loved us in whatever way Fae love. She left when I was fifteen, said she needed to “walk the world and see what’s new,” promised she’d return someday. I hope she does. I miss her.
The question of names in Hjarnsýr carries more weight than mere identification. Names are ontological statements, declarations of who you are and where you belong, and the culture has developed complex naming conventions that encode tremendous amounts of information in compact form.
The basic structure for common-born northerners is straightforward: personal name, patronymic or matronymic, and place of origin. So you have names like “Bjorn av Astrid av Frostwood,” literally Bjorn, child of Astrid, from Frostwood village. The “av” functions as a possessive or connective, marking relationship and origin. This immediately tells you three crucial things: the person’s identity, their parentage, and their home community. In a culture that values family connection and communal belonging as survival mechanisms, encoding this information in your name makes practical sense.
For those of noble birth, the structure shifts to incorporate house affiliation and title. A baronet might be styled “Erik av Hus Järnbjörn,” Erik of House Ironbear, with the “av Hus” construction marking noble lineage. Higher nobles add their territorial title: “Katarina dam Hrafnstad,” Katarina of Hrafnstad, using “dam” (which I understand to be cognate with “of” but carrying connotations of authority and possession rather than mere origin). A full formal address for a high noble might be “Greve Torsten av Hus Stenfall dam Nordvakt,” Count Torsten of House Stonefall of Northwatch, encoding rank, house lineage, and territorial holding in a single construction.
The use of epithets is more restricted than one might expect from a feudal culture. The truly great historical figures are remembered with appellations: “Astrid the Shield-Breaker,” “Harald the Wise,” “Yngrid the Boundary-Walker.” But these are posthumous honors, assigned by historians and bards after death, not titles one claims for oneself. To style yourself with an epithet while living is considered presumptuous at best, possibly offensive to those who actually knew the historical figure whose epithet you might be appropriating. The single exception is military commanders during active campaigns, who sometimes acquire field names based on tactical styles or notable actions: “Erik the Hammer” for a commander fond of overwhelming assault, “Signe the Patient” for one who preferred siege and attrition. These military epithets are temporary and situational, dropped once the campaign ends, though particularly memorable ones sometimes stick in informal usage.
The prohibition against self-styling with epithets has interesting philosophical underpinnings that Silt-in-River explained to me. In northern thinking, your name is not truly yours alone; it is the community’s name for you, the label by which you are known and remembered. To declare yourself “the Great” or “the Magnificent” is to insist that others see you as you see yourself, which violates the principle that identity is relationship between self and community. The community will give you a name that captures how they understand you, and if that name is honorable, you should be satisfied. If it is not, perhaps you should reflect on why the community sees you differently than you see yourself.
This has led to some entertainingly contradictory situations. I have met a baron whose given name is “Ragnvald the Reasonable av Hus Stormfell,” where “the Reasonable” is actually part of his given name, bestowed by his parents at birth, not an earned epithet. Technically this violates no conventions because it was given rather than claimed, but it creates amusing confusion when people encounter him. He has reportedly grown weary of explaining that his parents named him that, hoping he would grow into it, and no, he did not give himself the epithet through presumption. He is, to be fair, quite reasonable, so perhaps his parents’ aspirational naming succeeded.
Changed ones typically maintain their birth names without modification, but informal usage often adds descriptive terms that reference their transformation. A bovine cleric might be referred to as “Lumi av Gentle-Hoof av Borg,” where “Gentle-Hoof” is not part of his formal name but a community recognition of his nature. These descriptive additions are affectionate rather than insulting, acknowledgment of the dedication required to achieve transformation. Only in cases of extreme or unusual transformation do these additions become formalized into the person’s official name. I have encountered records of a War-singer who merged so deeply with Storm that she was struck from the rolls as her birth name and re-entered as “Thundervoice,” the transformation complete enough that her original identity was considered superseded.
Changelings face complicated naming politics. In communities that accept them, they typically retain full naming rights identical to the non-Fae parent’s species. In communities that discriminate, they might be denied house affiliation or territorial connection, reduced to just a personal name as though they were property rather than people. This marks them as other, as not-quite-part-of-the-community, in ways that are socially devastating in a culture built on communal belonging. Some Changelings in such situations adopt Fae-style compound names: “Red-Eye-Marcus” or “Bright-Gaze-Sienna,” claiming their difference openly rather than attempting to pass. Others leave their birth communities entirely, seeking places where their mixed heritage is less stigmatized.
The act of name-giving is ceremonial and carries weight. Infants are not formally named until they survive their first month; the mortality rate, while improving, is still significant enough that communities have learned not to invest full identity in a child who might not survive. The naming ceremony involves the parents, a shaman who records the name in the Chronicles, and ideally the entire community as witnesses. The shaman speaks the name three times, the community repeats it, and the child is thereby declared to exist as a recognized member of the community. This is not merely social ritual; it has ontological significance in a world where the Weaver maintains reality through narrative consistency. To be named in ceremony, witnessed by the community, recorded in the Chronicles, is to be compiled into the pattern. You are real. You persist. You matter.
Conversely, striking a name from records is the gravest dishonor short of death. This is the fate of those who become Divers, who commit certain unforgivable crimes, or who betray their community so thoroughly that continued association is impossible. The shaman removes the name from the Chronicles, the community gathers to witness the un-naming, and the person is declared to no longer exist as far as that community is concerned. They still physically exist, obviously, but they have been ejected from the narrative. Whatever they do afterward, wherever they go, they are no longer part of the community’s story. This fate is considered worse than execution in many ways; at least the executed are remembered and mourned. The un-named are simply… gone.
[Silt-in-River’s note]: The human scholar asks about names as though they are labels applied to objects for convenience. He does not yet grasp that names are being itself. To name is to call something into existence within the community’s shared reality. To un-name is to declare that existence ended. This is why we are so careful about naming, why we wait to ensure the child will survive, why we record names in the Chronicles with such precision. The Weaver maintains reality through narrative consistency, and names are the anchors of narrative. You are the story the community tells about you. If the community stops telling that story, if your name is removed from the Chronicles, then you cease to be part of the reality that matters. You might continue existing in some physical sense, but you are no longer real in the sense that we understand reality: as relationship, as recognition, as being-known-by-others. To lose your name is to lose yourself.
I have saved for near the end a discussion of those who serve on the Boundary itself, the Watchers who patrol the perimeter where reality ends and void begins. This topic deserves careful attention because these individuals face psychological and spiritual burdens that exceed anything required of soldiers, mages, or even Divers in some respects.
The Boundary Watchers are drawn primarily from young mage-knights seeking to prove themselves, though occasionally older warriors join seeking redemption, purpose, or simply steady employment. The duty is volunteer-only; no one is conscripted into Boundary service because forcing someone into such work would be cruel and potentially dangerous. A Watcher who does not want to be there, who resents the duty or fears it excessively, is likely to make fatal mistakes or succumb to the psychological erosion that the work inevitably causes.
The practical responsibilities are straightforward enough. Watchers patrol the perimeter in rotating shifts, typically four hours on, eight hours off, working in pairs or small teams rather than alone. They document any changes in the Boundary’s appearance: shifts in color, fluctuation in the membrane’s solidity, sounds emanating from the void side. They watch for entity emergence, maintaining constant vigilance because while most entities appear in predictable patterns, some emerge without warning. They maintain the signal towers, ensuring the braziers are stocked with fuel, the mirrors for amplifying light are clean and properly angled, the magical enhancements are functional. They check on the isolated steadings that sit near the perimeter, ensuring the inhabitants are well and have not been affected by proximity degradation. On paper, it is straightforward security work.
The reality is more complex and more harrowing. Walking the Boundary is not like patrolling a conventional border. You are walking alongside unreality itself, the place where the world simply stops. The psychological impact is cumulative and unavoidable. You feel watched constantly, though not by anything you can identify. You experience the sense that something vast and suffering exists just beyond the membrane, which is accurate given what we know about the Boundary entity, but knowing intellectually that you are in the presence of transformed consciousness does not make the feeling less disturbing. The air tastes wrong near the Boundary, though I cannot adequately describe how; it has a flatness, an absence of the subtle scents and flavors that normal air carries. Time feels uncertain; your internal sense of duration becomes unreliable, which makes maintaining regular patrol schedules more difficult than it should be.
Extended service produces observable effects on Watchers. After six months, most report increased difficulty sleeping, frequent disturbing dreams, a sense of dissociation from their pre-service life. After a year, memory becomes slightly unreliable; not severely enough to indicate serious degradation, but enough that Watchers begin keeping detailed journals to compensate. After two years, the longest term typically permitted before mandatory rotation away from the Boundary, significant personality changes are common. Watchers become quieter, more withdrawn, prone to philosophical rumination about the nature of reality and existence. Some develop what shamans call “void-sight,” a heightened sensitivity to unreality that makes them uncomfortable in normal society; they can sense minor inconsistencies, small gaps in narrative continuity that most people never notice, and this awareness is both useful and maddening.
The Watchers have developed their own culture and traditions to cope with the psychological burden. They use humor extensively, dark jokes about dissolution and void that would horrify civilians but provide necessary emotional release for those who face these threats daily. They maintain meticulous personal rituals: specific ways of donning equipment, particular prayers or invocations performed before each shift, small actions repeated precisely because consistency provides psychological anchoring when your environment is defined by the absence of consistency. They form bonds with their patrol partners that exceed normal friendship; you entrust your sanity to your partner, depending on them to confirm that what you are experiencing is real, that your memories are accurate, that you are still coherent. These bonds often last for life, Watchers maintaining contact with former partners decades after leaving the service.
The order maintains strict protocols for identifying and addressing degradation among their members. Watchers undergo weekly evaluations by shamans, checking for memory inconsistency, identity flicker, reality disagreement, any of the symptoms that indicate dangerous erosion. If problems are detected early, the Watcher is pulled from active duty immediately and given intensive stabilization treatment. If degradation is advanced, the Watcher is honorably discharged and provided with ongoing support. The order does not abandon its members; the culture of collective responsibility extends fully to those harmed by their service.
The greatest risk is not entity attack or physical danger but what Watchers call “the pull.” This is the feeling, which grows stronger with prolonged exposure, that you should cross the Boundary. Not from suicidal impulse or desire to become a Diver, but from something deeper and harder to articulate. The Boundary entity itself may be exerting some kind of attraction, or the void beyond may call to consciousness in ways we do not understand, or the proximity to unreality may create a kind of ontological vertigo where dissolution seems preferable to the tension of maintaining coherent identity near the place where identity dissolves. Watchers describe it differently: “like standing at the edge of a cliff and feeling the urge to jump,” “like a voice whispering that I would be more comfortable on the other side,” “like homesickness for a place I’ve never been.” The order trains Watchers to recognize and resist the pull, to anchor themselves in their identity and mission, but it remains a constant danger.
I have interviewed twenty-three former Watchers during my research, and their testimonies share certain consistent elements. All of them describe their service as the most difficult thing they have ever done. All of them express pride in having served and believe the work is essential. All of them report continuing psychological effects years after leaving the duty: difficulty with crowds, preference for solitude, heightened awareness of philosophical questions about existence and meaning, occasional moments of dissociation where they are not certain they are real. And all of them, when I ask if they would do it again knowing the cost, answer yes without hesitation. The Boundary must be watched. Someone must walk beside the wound. They chose to be that someone, and they would choose again.
[Kael’s note]: I served as a Watcher for eight months before deciding it wasn’t for me. Not due to fear or inability; I could do the work, I just knew it would break something in me that I wanted to keep intact. Eight months was enough to understand why Watchers are revered in northern culture, why they receive special honors, why communities celebrate them when they visit. These people walk daily along the edge of annihilation so the rest of us don’t have to. They stare into the void and report back: “Still there. Still holding. You’re safe.” The psychological cost is immense, the physical danger is real, and they do it anyway because someone must. I have fought in three battles, survived two near-death experiences, and spent years in dangerous trade. The eight months as a Watcher remain the hardest thing I have ever done, and the former Watchers I know carry that hardness with them forever. Respect them. Honor them. Support them. They have seen what lies at the edge of reality and chosen to stand between it and you.
Living beside the Lacuna creates not just practical challenges but existential ones. The northern territories exist in constant awareness that reality is fragile, that the world can break, that the Weaver’s pattern has already failed once and might fail again. This awareness permeates northern philosophy, theology, and daily thought in ways that shape the culture fundamentally.
The dominant philosophical school, which I have heard called the Edgewalkers though they do not formally name themselves, holds that existence is tension between order and chaos, narrative and void, being and unbeing. Reality is not a stable state but an ongoing achievement, continuously maintained through the Weaver’s work and through our own efforts to remain coherent. The Lacuna is not an aberration but a reminder of what underlies everything: the void is always there, reality is always thin, we persist only through continuous effort and collective will.
This philosophy produces what outsiders sometimes interpret as fatalism but which I have come to understand as something different. Northerners are not resigned to inevitable doom; they are simply realistic about the fragility of existence and committed to maintaining it despite that fragility. When I asked a farmer why he worked so hard preparing for winter when the Boundary could fail at any moment and render all preparation meaningless, he looked at me as though I had asked why he breathed. “The Boundary might fail,” he said. “It hasn’t yet. Until it does, I prepare for winter, because winter is certain and Boundary failure is only possible. I deal with what is, not with what might be.”
This attitude extends to larger questions of meaning and purpose. In the Confederation, philosophy often concerns itself with grand questions: the nature of the soul, the purpose of existence, humanity’s relationship with the divine. Northern philosophy is more immediate: how do we maintain coherence in the face of forces that want to dissolve us? How do we create meaning when the foundations of meaning are demonstrably fragile? How do we build community, love, art, civilization, knowing that all of it could cease?
The answer seems to be: precisely because it could cease. Because existence is fragile, it is precious. Because reality could fail, maintaining it matters. Because winter will kill you if you do not prepare, preparation becomes sacred work. The philosophy embraces the precariousness rather than denying it, finding in fragility itself the reason to cherish and protect what exists.
This manifests in distinctive approaches to mortality and death. Northerners do not fear death in the way I was taught to fear it in the Confederation, where death is failure, defeat, the ultimate loss. Here, death is simply part of the cycle, the moment when your individual narrative ends and you return to the void from which all things emerge. This is not nihilism; people still mourn, still grieve, still fight to survive and to keep their loved ones alive. But there is an acceptance underlying it all, a recognition that death comes to everyone eventually and that is acceptable, even necessary, because death makes room for new life, new stories, new existence.
The Chronicles of Names serve partly to address this. By recording people in meticulous detail, the community ensures that even after physical death, the person persists in narrative form. You continue to exist as story, as memory, as part of the community’s ongoing tale. This is not the same as physical persistence, but in a culture that understands reality as narrative maintained by the Weaver, story-persistence is a form of reality-persistence. You are remembered, therefore you continue to matter, therefore you have not entirely ceased.
Religious practice varies widely across the northern territories, as I have noted, but certain themes recur across different theological traditions. Gods are honored and propitiated, certainly, but they are not viewed as ultimate authorities or sources of absolute truth. The gods themselves are part of the pattern, subject to the same fundamental fragility as everything else. They are more powerful than mortals, more knowledgeable, longer-lasting, but not infinite or invincible. This produces a relationship between worshippers and gods that feels more transactional, more practical, than the devotional fervor I witnessed in the Church of Light. You honor the gods because doing so is wise and because they can help you, not because they are perfect beings deserving worship by virtue of their perfection.
Shamanic traditions that predate or exist alongside god-worship emphasize direct engagement with the Ideals, with reality’s underlying structure, with the patterns that the Weaver uses to maintain existence. This approach views human consciousness as capable of perceiving and even slightly manipulating the fundamental nature of being, not through command or control but through understanding and cooperation. We are part of reality, not separate from it or opposed to it, and by aligning ourselves with the deeper patterns, we can navigate existence more successfully.
The combination of these approaches creates a culture that is simultaneously deeply spiritual and pragmatically material. Northerners take the divine seriously but do not let religious concerns override practical necessity. They engage with profound ontological questions but ground those questions in daily experience. They acknowledge that existence is fragile and mysterious but respond by building sturdy houses, storing food diligently, maintaining community bonds, doing the concrete work that survival requires. Philosophy and theology matter, but they matter because they inform how you live, not as abstract intellectual exercises.
[Silt-in-River’s note]: The human scholar has perhaps understood us better than any outsider I have met. He still views through the lens of his upbringing, still struggles with concepts that are self-evident to us, but he tries genuinely to understand rather than to judge or dismiss. This is all we can ask. To his analysis I would add only this: we live beside the wound not because we chose to but because this is where we are, where our ancestors were when the Breaking occurred, where our descendants will be after we are gone. We could flee south to safer lands, abandon the north to the void, seek survival elsewhere. We do not. We stay because this is our home, because someone must watch the Boundary, because if we do not maintain reality here then perhaps no one will, and the wound will spread. We stay because we are stubborn, because we are bound to this land through love and duty and the simple fact of having lived here long enough that we cannot imagine being elsewhere. We stay because leaving would mean abandoning the Boundary entity to eternal solitude, and we will not do that to one who suffers for our benefit. We stay because this is what it means to be Hjarnsýr: people who live beside death and choose life, people who know the world is fragile and maintain it anyway, people who walk the edge and do not fall.
After five years of residence in the northern territories, conducting research, attending festivals, interviewing hundreds of individuals, living through five winters and learning what that means, I find myself profoundly changed by the experience. This is not the conclusion I expected to reach when I began this study.
I came to Hjarnsýr from the Confederation carrying assumptions I did not recognize as assumptions: that magic should be controlled by those wise enough to wield it, that hierarchy should be rigid and clearly defined, that non-human sapients were fundamentally other and probably dangerous, that civilization required strong central authority to prevent descent into chaos. I have learned that all of these assumptions are, if not wrong, then at least not universally applicable.
The northern territories function, and function well, despite violating most of the principles I was taught were essential to civilized society. Magic is widespread rather than controlled, yet mage tyranny has not emerged. Hierarchy is flexible and relationship-based rather than rigid and absolute, yet order is maintained. Fae are integrated into daily life rather than expelled or exterminated, yet communities remain safe. Authority is distributed and consensus-based rather than centralized and commanding, yet decisions get made and enacted. The culture works because it is adapted to its environment and its people, not because it follows some universal template of proper civilization.
This realization has been uncomfortable. I have had to confront my own prejudices, examine beliefs I held unconsciously, acknowledge that the Confederation’s way is not the only way or necessarily the best way. The northern approach to magic makes it a tool for communal survival rather than an instrument of power. The northern approach to governance prioritizes competence and relationship over birth and authority. The northern approach to the non-human recognizes sapience and personhood rather than assuming alterity equals threat. These are not revolutionary insights; they are simply different ways of organizing society, but they challenge the supremacist attitude I absorbed growing up in the Confederation.
I do not wish to romanticize Hjarnsýr. The culture has flaws, blindnesses, cruelties. The treatment of Divers, while understandable given the philosophical and practical concerns, remains troubling to me; I believe there could be more compassion even within the taboo. The integration of Fae, while impressive, sometimes seems to treat these entities as useful tools rather than beings with their own complex inner lives, though perhaps that says more about my need to sentimentalize than about actual mistreatment. The climate is genuinely harsh in ways that produce suffering I cannot dismiss as character-building hardship; people die from cold and hunger, children do not survive winter, the survival focus leaves little room for those whose needs are not immediate and material.
But these flaws exist within a culture that has also produced genuine goods: communities bound by authentic interdependence rather than coercive hierarchy, magic that serves collective welfare rather than individual power, philosophical traditions that engage seriously with existence’s fragility without descending into nihilism or despair, festivals that celebrate survival and connection with sincerity that my homeland’s elaborate ceremonies never achieved. The northerners are not perfect, but they are trying in good faith to build meaningful lives in one of the harshest environments in the known world, immediately adjacent to a wound in reality itself, and they are largely succeeding.
I will likely remain in Hjarnsýr for the foreseeable future, continuing my research and learning what I can. The people have been generous with their time and knowledge despite my status as outsider and member of a culture that views them with hostility. I am grateful for that generosity, and I hope this document honors it by presenting their culture with honesty, complexity, and respect.
To any who read this: Hjarnsýr is not the frozen wasteland of brutal savages that Confederation propaganda depicts. It is a living culture of resilient people maintaining civilization in conditions that would break softer societies. If you ever have the opportunity to visit, go with open mind and warm clothing. You will be cold, you will be challenged in your assumptions, and you will likely emerge changed if you pay attention.
And if you encounter a Northern Lanx in your travels elsewhere, treat them with the respect they have earned. They come from a place where survival is never guaranteed, where reality itself is demonstrably fragile, where the forces of dissolution press constantly at the edges, and they persist anyway. That persistence deserves recognition.
— Scholar Valerius Thorne
Written in Hrafnstad, Northern Reaches
Winter, Year 292 Post-Breaking
[Final note from Silt-in-River]:
The human scholar has done well. He sees much and understands more. To those who read his words, know that we are as he describes: neither noble savages living pure lives of mythic virtue, nor broken peoples crushed by our environment and our proximity to doom. We are simply people, doing what people do: surviving, loving, creating meaning from chaos, maintaining our small corner of reality against the void that wants to consume it. If you come north, you will be cold and you will be challenged, as he says. You will also be fed, if you are hungry, and sheltered, if you need refuge, and welcomed, if you come in peace. This is our way. This is what it means to be people who live beside the wound and choose life anyway. May your thread be strong, your pattern clear, and your name be remembered when you pass into the silence beyond the Weaver’s light. The Chronicle continues. We continue. Come north, if you dare. There is work enough for everyone, and the cold teaches lessons that soft lands cannot.
[Kael’s final annotation]:
If you’ve read this far, you understand the north better than most who visit. Valerius did good work here, even if he still gets weird about some things. The culture is what it is: practical, magical, cold as balls in winter, and more alive than anywhere else I’ve been. Come visit Threshold if you make it to the border territories. First round is on me, and I’ll introduce you to Long-Jack if he’s in town. He makes terrible jokes and is excellent company. Welcome to Hjarnsýr. Try not to freeze.