Field
:
The diffuse (or weak) force surrounding and permeating (and presumably generated by) a
node
. It is the source of a mancer’s
power
. Various stronger forces are also known to exist, although no one knows how to tap them safely. Non-nodal stress-fields also occur, though on Santhenar these are weak and little-used.
Flesh-forming
:
A branch of the Secret Art that only lyrinx can use. Developed to adapt themselves to the ever-mutable void where they came from, it now involves the slow transformation of a living creature, tailoring it to suit some particular purpose. It is painful for both creature and lyrinx, and can be employed only on small creatures, though the lyrinx seek to change that.
Gate
:
A portal between one place (or one world) and another, connected by a shifting trans-dimensional ‘wormhole’.
Geomancy
:
The most difficult and powerful of all the Secret Arts. An adept is able to draw upon the forces that move and shape the world. A most dangerous Art to the user.
Hedron
:
A natural or shaped crystal, formed deep in the earth from fluids that circulate through a natural
node
. Trained artisans can tune a hedron to draw power from the field surrounding a node, via the ethyr. Rutilated quartz, that is, quartz crystal containing dark needles of rutile, is commonly used. The artisan must first ‘wake’ the crystal using his or her
pliance
. If it is too far from a node, a hedron will be unable to draw power and becomes useless. If a hedron is not used for long periods, it may have to be rewoken by an artisan, though this can be hazardous.
Kalissin
:
A spire of foamed meteoritic iron arising from the centre of the meteor crater of Lake Kalissi. It has a powerful node and is a centre for lyrinx flesh-forming.
Nennifer
:
The great bastion of the Council of Scrutators, on the escarpment over Kalithras, the Desolation Sink. Nennifer is home to countless mancers, artisans and artificers, all furiously working to design new kinds of Art-powered devices to aid the war against the lyrinx
Nigah
:
A drug used by the army under extreme conditions to combat cold, fatigue and pain, though addiction can make users aggressive, paranoid and delusional.
Nodes
:
Rare places in the world where the Secret Art works better because of the field surrounding the node. Once identified, a
hedron
(or a mancer) can sometimes draw
power
from the node’s field through the ethyr, though the amount diminishes with distance, not always regularly. A
clanker
operator must be alert for the loss and ready to draw on another node, if available. The field can be drained, in which case the node may not be usable for years, or even centuries (cf.Torgnadr). Mancers have long sought the secret of drawing on the far greater power of a node itself (cf. Power, Nunar’s
General Theory of Power
) but so far it has eluded them (or maybe those who succeeded did not live to tell about it).
There are also anti-nodes where the Art does not work at all, or is dangerously disrupted. Nodes and anti-nodes are frequently (though not always) associated with natural features or forces such as mountains, faults and hot spots.
Nyriandiol
:
Gilhaelith’s home, fortress and laboratory on top of Booreah Ngurle. The entire building is a geomantic artefact designed to protect him and enhance his work.
Patterner
:
A semi-organic device developed by the lyrinx to pattern
torgnadrs
and other artefacts used in their Art. The patterner essentially copies a particular human’s talent into the growing torgnadr, thereby greatly enhancing the talent and allowing it to be controlled by a lyrinx who is skilled in the Art.
Pliance
:
A device which enables an artisan to see the
field
and tune a
controller
to it.
Port-all
:
Tiaan’s name for the device she makes in Tirthrax to open the gate.
Power
:
A mancer, Nunar, codified the laws of mancing, noting how limited it was, mainly because of lack of power. She recognised that mancing was held back because:
- Power came from diffuse and poorly understood sources.
- It all went through the mancer first, causing aftersickness that grew greater the more powerful the source. Eventually power, or aftersickness, would kill the mancer.
- The traditional way around this was to charge up an artefact (such as a mirror, a ring) with power over a long time, and to simply trigger it when needed. This had some advantages, though objects could be hard to control or become corrupted, and once discharged were essentially useless.
- Yet some of the ancients had used devices that held a charge, or perhaps replenished themselves. No one knew how, but it had to be so, else how could they maintain their power for hundreds if not thousands of years (for example, the Mirror of Aachan), or use quite prodigious amounts of power without becoming exhausted (Rulke’s legendary construct) ?
Nunar assembled a team of mancers utterly devoted to her project (no mean feat) and set out to answer these questions. Mancing was traditionally secretive—practitioners tried (often wasting their lives in dead ends) and usually failed alone. Only the desperate state of the war could have made them work together, sharing their discoveries, until the genius of Nunar put together the
Special Theory of Power
, which described where the diffuse force came from and how a mancer actually tapped it, drawing not through the earthly elements but via the ultradimensional ethyr.
The ultimate goals of theoretical mancers are the
General Theory of Power
, which deals with how
nodes
work and how they might be tapped safely, and, ultimately, the
Unified Power Theory
, which reconciles all fields, weak and strong, in terms of a single force.
Secret Art
:
The use of magical or sorcerous powers (mancing).
Snizort
:
A place in Taltid with a potent and concentrated node, near the famous tar pits and seeps.
Strong forces
:
Powerful planar fields that are speculated to exist at nodes, though no mancer studying them has survived to prove their existence.
Thapter
:
Tiaan’s name for the flying
construct
she and Malien created in Tirthrax.
Torgnadr
:
Also called node-drainer. A device patterned by the lyrinx to drain a
field
dry, or to channel power from the field for their own purposes. Torgnadrs are extremely difficult to
pattern
and most attempts fail, though some result in weak devices such as phynadrs which can draw small amounts of power for a particular purpose.
Well of Echoes, the
:
An Aachim concept to do with the reverberation of time, memory and the Histories. Sometimes a place of death and rebirth (to the same cycling fate). Also a sense of being trapped in history, of being helpless to change collective fate (of a family, clan or species). Its origin is sometimes thought to be a sacred well on Aachan, sometimes on Santhenar. The term has become part of Aachim folklore. ‘I have looked in the Well of Echoes.’ ‘I heard it at the Well.’ ‘I will go to the Well.’ Possibly also a source; a great
node
.
The Well is symbolised by the three-dimensional symbol of infinity, the universe and nothingness. A Well of Echoes, trapped in Tirthrax, is held there only by the most powerful magic.