The peoples
Two peoples. Neither of them human.
The Hornbound grow their halls from bone under a low amber sun. The Tidecrowned grow their towers from shell beside a sea that cannot drown them.
Concept art
The Vael
In developmentThe Hornbound
Broad and warm-skinned, with spiralling ram horns ringed in brass: the strength of the hearth.
- People
- The Vael
- Land
- The Hornbound highlands, in the west
- Capital
- Cradlehorn, on the plateau's crown
- Held hour
- The Long Ember, a low late-afternoon sun
- Colours
- Amber, ochre, rust, oxblood and brass
- Starting land
- Emberfold and its town, Hearthrib
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The Hornbound call themselves the Vael. They hold the highlands of the west, a warm plateau under the Long Ember, where the sun has hung low in the west-south-west since the gods left. They tell the hour by the shadows of their horn spires, which never move.
They are broad and terracotta-skinned, with spiralling ram horns ringed in brass, short lower tusks, braids and beards. Their pennants carry a spiral horn ringed in brass, oxblood on ochre.
They grow their towns from the bones of the land. Paired rib arches rise from the ground, joined along the ridge by a spine of vertebrae; hide stretched between the ribs glows amber when the sun is behind it. A town is round: halls round a hearth court, dwellings round the halls, and the halls' low throat-singing carries across the court.
The gods left us one hour. We grew everything else.
Concept art
The Hushborn
In developmentThe Tidecrowned
Tall and pale, scaled in nacre, with translucent fins fanning behind the jaw and over the skull. They never drown, and they do not breathe.
- People
- The Hushborn
- Land
- The Tidecrowned coast, in the east
- Capital
- Whorlhaven, on its lagoon
- Held hour
- The Pale Noon, a high sun behind sea cloud
- Colours
- Pearl, chalk and teal-black, cyan glow in shade
- Starting land
- Saltglass Reach and its town, Shellmoor
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The Tidecrowned call themselves the Hushborn. They hold the coast of the east and south-east under the Pale Noon, a high, cool sun behind a thin veil of sea cloud. They keep time by the tide, the one thing in their world that still moves.
They are tall and pale, their scales the colour of the inside of a shell, their fins thin enough for light to pass through. You will never hear one draw breath; they sing without words through shell horns. Their fin-silk pennants carry a whorl under a crown of fins, pearl on teal-black.
They grow their towns from the sea: spiral-shell towers with a ramp winding round the outside and an open, nacre-lined eye at the top, coral terraces climbing from the water, sea-glass windows and doors of nacre. Their streets are shell ramps with a channel down the middle that the tide fills and empties, and when the sea breeze crosses the towers' eyes, they hum a slow organ note.
The sky forgot how to move. The sea did not, so we keep our time by the sea.
At a glance
You can tell them apart across a valley
Broad and horned against tall and finned: the two peoples read apart at eighty metres, and their lands at two kilometres, warm ochre against cool pearl.
Hornbound: warm, heavy, round
Everything in their land is grown in curves and ringed in brass: horn, bone, hide and resin under amber light.
Tidecrowned: tall, cool, spiralling
Everything on their coast tapers and whorls: shell, nacre and sea-glass in pearl light, wet and quiet.
Side by side
In developmentWhere the two peoples meet
The highlands and the coast meet at the Seam, along the Brackwater, where the amber hour turns to pearl. Neither people builds there; its only walls are ruins from before the gods left.
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The Rift is the enemy of both. Its creatures fall on highland and coast alike, and its violet belongs to neither land.
In play the two peoples are allies: you can group with either and fight Rifts side by side. Duels and arenas, when they come, are a choice you make, never a war between sides.
What lies between the Hornbound and the Tidecrowned, and why the gods left them, is a story we are still writing.