Welcome to the page set aside for the second in this sequence of novels devoted to the Tatchlan System and the Planet Anu. An immense period separates Amarel Mountain from the first novel of this Anu Awakes Series, Hesha Vira’s Challenge. Summaries will be given below of the Primary Epoch and The Interim, separating these two novels, along with profound changes to the populations of Anu during these extended and tumultuous periods. This material will contain links to more detailed information elsewhere on this site. A summary of the characters and themes specific to this novel will follow. While presuming an acquaintance with the first novel, it is hoped this tale also stands alone with the support of expository material introduced throughout the story and the background provided on this page. Four sets of characters and numerous secondary characters closely associated with them are profiled here. Each chapter is named for the principal character appearing in it.

Hesha Vira’s Challenge presented the birth of the Tatchlan System and the transformation of Anu. This second novel dives deep into most ancient and modern examples of Cluster-of-Cluster Nations reigned over by a succession of Majastas. It also allows the reader to take their first step into a cluster and begin to discover the intricacies of life within a Circle of Eight, including the introduction of some of the Spokes of the Cluster Wheel. All this will continue to be explored for the remainder of this series. While most characters are part of their Circle of Eight, only a few take on prominent roles in the action of this novel; hence, only some will be outlined on this page. They can conduct their inspired and brilliant lives in considerable measure due to having the love and support of their circle and the larger cluster surrounding them. 

Novel Characters

First and Second Koru Majastas

Koru Majastas Zudaz I

Emergence, New Mecalan Colonies, Beginning of the Suvuka’s End, Troubling discoveries, Living Mountains commenced, Yelda and The Two Majastas Hands, Yakku disappointment, Majastas Zudaz I untimely end

Koru Majastas Zudaz II

Peaceful continuity, Reign and Legacy, Zudaz Dynasty

Koru: Zudaz-Shushum

Submissive Enumerator Maja Zudaz-Shushum, Complete Zudaz-Xoduth, Archeologist Vogum-Mul, Acclaimed Professor and Teaching Academic Xumb-Chulash, Suv-Unua (Koru mother of Hiten and Grivel)

Koru Yelda (Sumudin): Yuna-Monu

Sumudin and Yuna Cluster, Yuna-Monu (Fresh Adult Male), Yuna-Monu’s Moment of Disturbance, Yuna-Monu’s Yelda and Yakku experience, Yuna-Nobov (MAJA/Male), Yuna-Nobov’s fear and frustration, Yuna-Mosum (Female LAPIS BETWEEN), Path to becoming an Esteemed Librarian, Lifts herhis toes and drags herhis heels, Lapis Between Yuna-Mosum and the Moment of Disturbance, Yuna-Yuyuz (MAJA/Female), Yuna-Honos (MAJA/Male), Crate chronology error

Yakku: Foremost Moval Jovikel

Dramatic yearly years, Jovikel becomes heir, Yesosel and Suv-Unua, Fateful year, Demise of Newborns League, Fathers of four, Vivavem witness to history and family discord

Yakku of Rho-Jashun

Kekavil Nest of Kalasek Regional Tree

Viperfer: Mature pedigree, Surveyors General and Estate plantings, Daughter radicalizes mother,

Sensarab: The Telling, Lure of two Doubles, Sensarab following and leading

Field Yelda: Sama-Andam

Sama-Andam: Sudden Ripe Adult, Spice Driver Cluster, Precious Fraternity, Sama-Lavan, Sama-Vara Fragments form new cluster, Epic migration across the Marachla, Agricultural tools and rites, Double Sama-Vara

Background

Primary Epoch

One Hundred and Twenty Aeons, Domesticated Suvuka, Blossom becomes Burning, Killing Swath

The Interim

Dramatic interval between the Epochs, Guardians, Amassment and Treasuries, The Koru, Second Suvuka Onslaught on Rho-Jashun, The Tolku to Koru Change, Early Invocates and Operants, Healing Vats innovation 

The Yakku

Mystery of remaining, Paramount Barrier, The Yakku version of The Change, Moment of Disturbance

Koru, Yakku and Yelda

The Happy Century, The Yakku Rift from the Koru, The Yakku's Swaying Wajah, Contention over Yelda, Yeldic Colloquium, Yakku response to Koru’s Yeldic Bulletins, Majastas Crisis

The formation out of the cumulative body of Maja and the progress of Her finalizing the complete Quickening of Tatchlan was, as with most Majastas, what would come to be called the Primary Epoch. The most notable exception was the first Majastas of the Tolku, Thakadush-Satwa, as detailed in the first novel of this series, Hesha-Vira’s Challenge. In one way, Zudaz-Vozev and Thakadush-Satwa, the first Majastas of the Tolku, shared something in common. Due to the formative nature of Her Estate, The Throne possessed Her to a far greater extent at once to imbue Her with the wisdom and strength of will to forge the entire Cluster-of-Clusters Ministry structure out of what had been the Central Triumvirate within the first ten years of Her Reign. It must also be noted that when this new Majastas entered the Living System for the first time, four hundred and ninety-three Operants presented themselves to Her. While less than the six hundred Operants recorded generations earlier during the first wakening of the Faces, this considerable population of Operants represented a vast percentage of the Koru population (given Primary Epoch norms). This mighty company of Operants, along with many hundreds of thousands of Invocates, was the apogee of what the Central Triumvirate could offer Her in laying the foundation of the future.

While vast Suvuka herds still roamed the surface of the Marachla Plain, Majastas Zudaz I initiated a multitude of Generational Plans deep within the Mulungu Mountains. The first to reach fruition was the recovery and improvement of the Mecalan insect colonies within Tatchlan. These beings had formed the foundation of the Tolku’s surface transit system throughout the Primary Epoch.

The Mecalan had degraded during The Interim due to Swath damage and subsequent lack of purpose. In Twenty-Eight UKC, it was proclaimed that a new version of Mecalan, now joining the ranks of ‘Recovered Ones,’ was perfected. This icon was minted at the time, showing both the modified version of the creatures and the new icon border of the Koru. This ‘mountain border’ shape evoked their home mountains, where all life thrives.

These revitalized Mecalan would fuel a vast new underground transit system that would come to be known as ‘Continental Lines.’ The Circulation Bureau of Her Preeminent Works Ministry conducted the surveys, followed by wondrous excavations at significant depths, to commence this first of many majestic enterprises. Due to the survival of technical materials and tools, much of the original craft for such specialized industry was utilized.

These prodigious mass transit corridors, containing compound public and freight tracks, would form branching and entwining spines of a new Cluster-of-Clusters Nation on Rho-Jashun and across The Skin of Anu. This icon illustrates this expansion with three lines radiating off a central one to travel over land, underwater, and through stone.

By the year Thirty-Five UKC, a vast network was proposed for all of Anu, even crossing under the Panchala Sea to Thermistal. Honoured Historians now see how another Generational Plan had led to the comparatively modest population of the Central Triumvirate’s three core mountains surging beyond all capacity, necessitating new settlements throughout the Mulungus. Majastas Zudaz I took this momentum to move the Koru north to repopulate the traditional centre of Tolku governance on Rho-Jashun.

Majastas Zudaz I declared:

“As the babe leaves the cot, so shall the Koru move beyond the sheltering confines of the Central Triumvirate. We shall begin to repossess the Thithanu Capital Region.”

None of this would have been possible without these fortified Mecalan Colonies.

In the year Sixty-Four UKC, another Generational Plan was finally realized. While most were dedicated to formulating new life, this was committed to extinction. The most-ancient modifications to the Brangnam Plague, brought about by Master Duamang in the Lesser Era of the Primary Epoch, were once again brought into fullness by the new Majastas within Tatchlan.

The release of these agents, riding on their Blood Midge ‘chariots,’ would once again render entire brutish herds of Suvuka sterile. The Muraharoma Dynasty of the Primary Epoch chose not to terminate the Suvuka then but sequester them for potential purposes behind the Vettencore Passage. As with so much else, the Killing Swath brought the once mighty Suvuka Domestication Ministry and its noble aims to a close. A clean break from this legacy was enacted in the sixth decade of the Secondary Epoch. Majastas Zudaz I declared:

“Our history dictates we must expunge Anu of our former companion, ally and nemesis.”

This time, the plague was to be unleashed across Anu. By far, the largest concentration of herds was on the ‘boundless Marachla Plain’ west of the Mulungu Mountains on Rho-Jashun. Waves of blood midges carried their charges out of the mountains and across the plain. Herd movements were monitored for the next twenty years, as Master Duamang had done from Mount Anchaphron to the south of the Mulungu range. Fourteen years later, in the year Ninety-Eight UKC, over thirty years after the last confirmed birth of a Suvuka pup took place, Majastas Zudaz I took what would become the celebrated walk through Enimik Round under Nu’s ‘Baleful Eye’ at noon. This was the largest Suvuka ‘mesmerizing run’ site on the northern Marachla Plain. Her Commandant Ministry completed extensive sweeps and found no living Suvuka left. By now, the reduced herds had begun to disburse and move north. Ministry operants gathered all the Suvuka bones they found and were able to bury the tall Suvuka boulders at the centre of the round within a huge mound of ‘long-dry’ Suvuka bones. In this same year, the many thousands of Yakku, descendants of those who emigrated to Rho-Jashun from The Happy Century onward, began to migrate toward the Royran Valley. At the same time, the Engineering Bureau of the Commandant Ministry conducted small groups of Yakku out to predetermined locations across the Marachla Plain to begin planting what would become the Yakku Estates. Just over one century later, all Yakku were encouraged to move out onto the freed Marachla Plain and settle in the mature stands of Mernet trees in compact forests.

The Breathing Seals Conglomerations also divulged the most unsettling disclosure of all - the true nature of The Killing Swath itself. Unforeseen by even Her was that a Treasury crate would shortly be opened within the Kodrapum Grotto within one of the three Central Triumvirate mountains of Mount Arnom, revealing a volume detailing this long-standing arrangement. This story is told in this second novel of the Anu Awakes Series.

While much unfolded through careful design, sudden inspiration also played a profound role in the emergence of the Koru Cluster-of-Clusters Nation under its first Majastas. A notable example was the formulation of the Living Mountain. In the year Twenty-Eight UKC, a babe was born into the Majastas Cluster. Young Zudaz-Kupat became noted for several distinguishing intellectual features within his first eight years. Operants brought his presence within Tatchlan to the attention of the Majastas, and excitement grew as it became evident he would likely become the first Living Jewel of the Zudaz Majastas Cluster. Even in his raw state, he demonstrated an aptitude in his play to analyze structural problems and find innovative solutions. He also grew into a deep love for the Ketukku and was fascinated by their intricate mound structures. As a Fresh Adult within the Zudaz Majastas Cluster, he was put in charge of the care and maintenance of their nineteen Ketukku Mounds while embarking on an apprenticeship to become a Master Rock Crafter and Excavator.

Pictured here is the Koru icon for all Living Mountains. The central image is the upper and lower pyramid open on one side. Within is the Koru White Hand image, itself holding the Tatchlan Face of Alatanda, representing the Koru’s possession of the now revitalized Tatchlan System. The swirling Living Loam surrounds the Lower Pyramid. Just visible at the border are two other Living Mountains on either side. At the lower point of all three is the connecting Continental Line. The Upper Pyramid is surrounded by the Velvet Night, filled with the four moons and a collection of ‘fixed and roaming stars.’  It may be noted that all elements are in immediate proximity to each other, reflecting the ideal of ‘comforting closeness’ and eschewing any reference to the Upper Abyss.

Zudaz-Kupat's meticulous attention to minute details and fervent devotion to intricate, sequential procedures were regularly noted. None may now say when the concept of a Living Mountain first occurred to a still very young Master. However, the notion was well formed when he made his now well-studied Humility Petition to his august Majastas Sister in the year Fifty-Four UKC at six and twenty years of age.

All his documentation is now preserved in the Zudaz Mantle Museum in Kupat Queens One Living Mountain. These and subsequent written materials, drafting work and hundreds of models display a sweeping vision built on meticulous calculation and encyclopedic knowledge of diverse materials and techniques. Before the first spade went into the loam, these original Humility Petition plans ensured his official designation as the most cherished of all Living Jewels - a Genius in the first year of his Ripe Adulthood.

The treasured Living Jewel Genius badge he would have worn for the rest of his life is pictured here. A medallion of precious materials would have joined other honourifics, emblems, crests, and insignia surrounding the main gateway into the Majastas Cluster for as long as he lived.

As said elsewhere, these marvellous developments occurred while the Koru were still sheltered from the Suvuka within the Mulungu Mountains. Despite the perfection of the sterilizing agent for the Suvuka still being ten years into the future, in close association with his Majastas Sister, Master Zudaz-Kupat, along with a growing company of other Geniuses and Masters, finalized all aspects of not only the first Living Mountain but laid out the disposition of both pyramids and infrastructure of what would in the distant future become the Kupataron Living Mountain Cluster of District One. The Mulungu Continental Line had been under construction for nineteen years. Initially, the line was envisioned to service communities limited to the Mulungu Mountain Chain. Now, a portion of this completed line was reworked to become the first terminal for what would be named Kupat Queens One, in honour of this first supreme Genius of the Secondary Epoch and his abiding love for this ‘Venerable Insect Society.’ It is also well appreciated how the Ketukku, as the ’exemplar of a perfect nation,’ had provided efficient design aspects to this first generation of Living Mountains.

Genius Zudaz-Kupat was eighty years of age in One Hundred and Eight UKC when excavations finally began on Kupat Queens One Living Mountain. The inverted lower pyramid was to be built first, with the upper pyramid rising above the Skin of Anu. At the same time, Majastas Zudaz I instructed the Ratio Bureau of Her Wellbeing Ministry to orchestrate a sequence of incremental population surges in subsequent generations to eventually occupy the first of what would become a series of these vast new marvels. The lowest level of this lower pyramid was connected to the terminals for the two Continental Lines, the ‘Mulungu’ and the ‘Thermistal’ (which would pass under the Panchala Sea to connect Rho-Jashun to future settlements of Koru on Thermistal). Due to a multitude of challenges and the range of unprecedented innovations, this first Living Mountain was not completed until the Year Two Hundred and Fifty-Two UKC, one hundred and thirty-six years after the death of its namesake, in One Hundred and Sixteen UKC, and thirty-four years before the untimely demise of Majastas Zudaz I. Kupat Queens One Living Mountain had been fully occupied for thirty-four years when our Yuna circle tours it in Chapter Twelve of this novel.

Early in The Interim, the Central Triumvirate was inspired to see the potential of the surprise issue of ‘The Happy Century,’ when the Yakku and Koru's discovery of each other caused the birth of a new hybrid, the Yelda. This led to the formation of the Yeldic Colloquium within Mount Chraxan, one of the original three mountain Sanctuaries.

Majastas Zudaz I took up this cumulative endeavour, which had already produced the loyal Sumudin and Kudurapala Yelda. She focused on the third class, known then as the Field Yelda. In the year Ninety-Eight, UKC, Majastas Zudaz I conducts Her ‘Enimik Round Walk,’ demonstrating the success of the most-ancient Master Duamang’s weapon in defeating the Suvuka through the drying of their wombs. Preparations commence looking to the future with the Field Yelda.

In the year One Hundred UKC, the first autonomous clusters of Field Yelda were planted within the enclosed Royran Valley within the Mulungu chain in central Rho-Jashun to begin their existence. A permanent garrison is stationed between Mounts Phorie and Mengung to ensure no stray Suvuka locate them.

One century later, when all traces of Suvuka are gone from Rho-Jashun and Statos-Vey, the first waves of Field Yelda are sent out in an orderly fashion from the Royran Valley onto the broad Marachla Plain. Most were settled by now mature forests composed of Yakku Estates established a century earlier. Groups of Sumudin were tasked with maintaining ongoing relations with these Field Yelda. The Sumudin become regular visitors as they bring resources and expertise while they study and report on their growth and development.

For all Her many accomplishments, the initiation by Majastas Zudaz I of the first of a long series of Epochal Generational Plans to bring about the ultimate goal of ‘The Two Majastas Hands’ had the most profound impact on the remainder of the Secondary Epoch.

Yakku disappointment

There are many memorials, literary works, and theatrical and musical productions on the storied life of Majastas Zudaz I. Her Majastas Annotations have been the subject of numerous publications and analyses through subsequent generations. The year One Hundred and Fifty UKC sees many references to Her dealings with the Yakku Collective of Thermistal. In that year, solemn pacts were signed between representatives of the Yakku Primary Movals of the Twenty-Three Regional Trees of Western Thermistal and the Koru Cluster-of-Clusters Nation in the Yakku tree city of Gye Sonin, capital of Bithen Regional Tree. For centuries, exchanges of resources and expertise had flowed south and north, along with significant populations from each nation settling on the other continent. This traffic culminated in One Hundred and Fifty, the seven-hundredth anniversary of a historic friendship between the ancient Yakku and the Koru of the Central Triumvirate early in The Interim period. This act was an official invitation to those Koru wishing to settle in the Viracocha Mountains to join their Yelda living within the Yakku Collective.

Notwithstanding this Majastas Progress to this Collective, a mere fifty years later, Two Hundred UKC, nearly all references to the Yakku ceased in all forms of Majastas Documentation. Going forward for the remainder of Majastas Zudaz I Dominion, She makes little mention of the Yakku.

On Day One, Foremost Day, of the first two-week, Atra, the Flame of the year Two Hundred UKC, Majastas Zudaz I publicly ensured Master Duamang’s weapon reached all Thermistal. The Brangnam Plague had travelled across the Panchala Sea from the southern lands, where it had seen to the end of the herds there. Nevertheless, it was weakened and did not entirely affect the massive Suvuka herds surrounding the Grand Lake Teval in central Thermistal. Now, Majastas Zudaz I travelled into the Viracocha Mountains of western Thermistal and released the Suvuka’s doom. Along with opening the door for the Field Yelda to fulfil their destiny in the south, She had hoped this would also reopen the door between the Koru and Yakku.

The so-called ‘Happy Century’ had taken place over five hundred years before the Mantle embraced the feet of Zudaz-Vozev. As detailed below, there had been a gradual decline in relations between these two descendants of the Tolku after The Killing Swath for many reasons, primarily related to their disparate views of Tatchlan. The complexity and discordant variations of the Yakku response to many aspects of the Koru Cluster-of-Clusters Nation proved increasingly challenging for the Koru to comprehend. Their objections to the Koru cultivation of their Yelda into Sumudin, Kudurapala and Field Yelda only increased with time. It is known that the Majastas had expended much consideration and effort to address these concerns and reach an accord with the Yakku, leading to the Her Progress to Gye Sonin. While the initial jubilant response in the Crown Rises to this news of the Suvuka’s impending demise met Her expectations, the subsequent groundswell of seemingly irrational fear dismayed Her. The movement to punish the Suvuka, despite their already being consigned to extinction and the appalling and despicable war that followed, led to Her becoming assiduous in her muteness to all subsequent developments within the Yakku Collective.

While subsequent dynasties would choose larger and, in other ways, modified versions of Living Mountains for new series, the original number and configuration of Genius Zudaz-Kupat were loyally adhered to in the completion of District One, the Kupataron Interlaced Dependency.

Pictured here is the official icon for the entire Dynasty. It was formulated during the reign of Majastas Zudaz IV and referenced a distinctive refinement to living minutiae within the Living System.

Submissive Enumerator Maja Zudaz-Shushum

A member of the Zudaz Majastas Cluster, sixty-seven-year-old Zudaz-Shushum is the head of her Circle of Eight, representing one of the deepest ranking levels of the Enumerator Ministry. She has dwelt within the first Living Mountain of the Kupat Series for nearly half her life. She is part of the Majastas Cluster of Zudaz the First and now Zudaz the Second and lives much of her life within the monumental statue of the first Koru Majastas. Her Circle of Eight is ranked twenty-fourth within the Majastas Cluster and is the Prime Ring of the Erudite Bureau (the Primary Epoch icon shown here was one of many used by their most-ancient Tolku counterparts). All Ripe Adults of a Majastas Cluster are Maja. As with the most profound rings of all Ministries, her Circle is distinguished for being entirely composed of Invocates. This is essential for service within the Dallamaplan to make the necessary contacts with distant agents anywhere on Anu and, on infrequent occasions, their Majastas.

For the last forty-two years, Zudaz-Shushum has served within this prestigious bureau of the Enumerator Ministry. Until the unusual dispatch from her Majastas Zudaz-Vozev, the Prime Erudite Ring’s service occurred within the Living Mountain and the surrounding Mulungu Mountains of central Rho-Jashun.

Before she arrived at the Bhampay location, apart from visiting the original Sanctuary grottos and numerous Treasuries, Submissive Enumerator Maja Zudaz-Shushum had no prior experience with Primary Epoch sites. Despite this lack of background and training in archeology, her Majastas, Zudaz I, deemed her and her Circle the primary contact with the isolated clusters working for generations on the distant Bhampay site on Statos-Vey. Submissive Enumerator Maja Zudaz-Shushum was declared ‘Field Head,’ representing her Ministry and Cluster-of-Cluster’s Nation of this previously secret project. It may be speculated that the particular focus of her deep education and decades of experience fortified her for the mysteries she encountered at Amarel Mountain. She was also surprised at the findings at the Bhampay site and her unforeseen friendship with the chief archeological liaison for the extensive workforce, Mul of Vogum Cluster.

It must be said that prior to arriving at the Bhampay site, the fifty-one-year-old Complete Zudaz-Xoduth had led a privileged and contented life. As with herhis cluster mate, Submissive Enumerator Maja Zudaz-Shushum, Xoduth wanted for nothing within their Majastas Cluster. Shehe had given birth to one daughter, now a Ripe Adult, and likely sired several other children within herhis circle. Along with fulfilling this and different roles as a Complete within herhis circle and cluster, by herhis assiduous application of passionate intellect, shehe had achieved a measure of academic and professional distinction beyond herhis preeminent cluster.

Complete Zudaz-Xoduth was also a contrast to Shushum in herhis more emotional temperament and opinionated disposition. This is particularly apparent in herhis outspoken views on the contents of The Treasuries. While of equal depth to herhis cluster-mate, shehe is more reticent to let go of habitual thinking and more inclined to complain about inconvenience and discomfort.

This general position is softened by herhis growing respect, followed by admiration and affection, for their archaeologist contact on the site, Vogum-Mul. This leads to an increased comprehension of the enormity of Bhampay’s many revelations. Herhis growing appreciation for the significance of the discovery of the Dream Guides around Amarel Mountain may be said to bring a measure of peace to herhis previous disquiet about many unanswered questions encountered with herhis work over the last three decades.

Pictured above is a Primary Epoch icon of the Sister City of Bhampay. It is often speculated these enigmatic figures are portraits of an unknown Majastas Multitude early in their Dominion, but no documentation has been found confirming this interpretation.

Pictured: Renderings of two of the more famous double faces within Amarel Mountain.

Mul is a study of dedication and patience. Several generations of her and other Koru clusters had laboured in this remote setting. Amarel Mountain was discovered in Two Hundred and Sixty-One UKC, twenty-five years before our story begins. Vogum-Mul, who played as a child among the hills before becoming fully trained in her cluster’s uses, was thirty-eight years of age at the time of the monument’s initial uncovering.

With discipline and forbearance, her circle and clusters followed the directives of their Majastas in proceeding with extreme caution and thoroughness in their work. With the arrival of the Prime Erudite Ring of the Enumerator Ministry and the revelation of their near-total innocence of the successive revelations of the Bhampay site, Vogum-Mul found herself taking on new roles as an interpreter and oversaw an accelerated program to reveal all aspects of Amarel Mountain in full. She also developed a comradeship with someone she never dreamt of meeting and working with, the Submissive Enumerator and Field Head representative of the Majastas Cluster, Zudaz-Shushum and Everlastingly Serving Complete Zudaz-Xoduth.

These three disparate personalities share one characteristic. Due to the challenging depths of their various professions, they unknowingly suffered under the Inhibition laid on the entire population by Majastas Zudaz I. With Her death, many questions began to take wing in their minds. Despite differing in many ways, these disturbed musings were brought to something of a crescendo at Amarel Mountain.

While not a member of the Majastas Cluster, fifty-nine-year-old Xumb-Chulash joins Submissive Enumerator Maja Zudaz-Shushum and Complete Zudaz-Xoduth in representing another aspect of the Erudite Bureau of the Enumerator Ministry. In her case, this takes the form of lecturing students aspiring to several academic professions, including Honoured Historians and Esteemed Librarians. Her curriculum covers late Tolku and early Koru history, emphasizing the Central Triumvirate of The Interim.

Given that the thirty-two known Treasuries were discovered during this Interim period, she has studied the works emerging from this mysterious collection, even though they largely predate her pedagogical focus. As with most of her colleagues, including Complete Zudaz-Xoduth, these efforts have led to frustration with their mystifying content. This contributes to her diminished respect for the ongoing Treasury work, including the Yuna Cluster’s generational efforts in the Parayad Treasury within the Kodrapum Grotto of Mount Arnom. In assuming this largely unconscious attitude, she is following the intellectual trends of her time.

This informal and largely unspoken school of thought contributes to another notion that the latter Aeons of the Primary Epoch witnessed a gradual slide into mysticism. Her distaste for Auras presence in the Final Tolku Proclamation is evidence of this point of view. Notwithstanding her area of expertise, she unknowingly remains subject to the Majastas Inhibition concerning all enquiry into The Killing Swath, arguably the single defining feature of her study area.

While outside her area of focus, like her colleagues, she mourns the incalculable loss of the Mount Midin Amassment. Comfortably maintaining what may be later judged to be unfortunate attitudes, Acclaimed Professor and Teaching Academic Xumb-Chulash is also keenly aware of the many gaps in her knowledge of both The Interim and the Primary Epoch. When long-held presumptions are challenged, she admirably adapts to uncomfortable revelations, even when they overturn personal beliefs.

Pictured is one of an extensive series of Koru icons representing libraries. The diversity of elements besides books may be noted in this image that such institutions are linked to all forms of cultural expression and may be found in general reference and highly specialized collections within every Mantle Establishment.

Suv-Unua was born in the year 238 UKC of the Secondary Epoch. This was one hundred and three years after the Thermistal Continental Line had linked the Koru of Thermistal to those on Rho-Jashun (135 UKC) and eighty-eight years after Majastas Zudaz I made Her Progress to Thermistal (150). She was also born thirty-eight years after the Majastas returned to release the Brangnam Plague on Thermistal (200). She was the second generation to live with the reality of the Suvuka finally being undone. She was also steeped in the Koru culture of the Viracocha Mountains and the Yakku Collective of the surrounding forests. However, being part of a circle of eight containing a Maja within a larger cluster, she was rooted in the Cluster-of-Clusters Nation of Rho-Jashun and the first Majastas of the Secondary Epoch. From the inception of this Koru colony on Thermistal, the Koru and Yakku produced Yelda together. Suv-Unua found joy in one handsome lad by the name of Yesosel. This Yakku youth was fast friends with Jovikel, the second son of the Foremost Moval Velparun of the Girasem Nest of the Bithen Regional Tree, within the Central Yakku Collective. Hiten was born in 272 and Grivel in 274 UKC. During ‘The Happy Century,’ a custom had developed where these children would have spent half their time with their Yakku father, Yesosel, among the trees and half with their Koru Mother, Suv-Unua, within the mountains. This was known as the ‘Half Year Rite.’ Due to the incremental building of tensions over many issues, the Yelda of Thermistal was increasingly limited to either one realm or the other. It was decided that the two girls would live with their Yakku father while continuing to visit their Koru mother. Foremost Moval Velparun had reinstituted the Yeldic Newborns League to provide camaraderie and support for Yakku parents of Yeldic children throughout Bithen Regional Tree, and Yesosel became a leading member of this revived institution in Gye Sonin.

Suv-Unna was but six years of age at the start of the Suvuka war in 244 UKC. Yesosel was ten. While these events immediately impacted neither, both grew up with the calamitous aftermath for both their societies. In 271, when Suv-Unna was thirty-three, and Yesosel was thirty-seven, they met at a Gifting in her cluster. The following year, she gave birth to Hiten and two years later to Grivel. Both girls, products of a Koru and Yakku coupling, were Yelda. Two years after Grivel’s birth, their father, Yesosel, died in the Newborns League fire of 276 UKC in Gye Sonin; he was forty-two. Yesosel's childhood friend, Jovikel, had followed the custom of standing as Guardian to Yesosel’s two girls should anything happen to him and now found himself taking on their care. Upon his father's death earlier that year, Jovikel assumed the Foremost Moval title. These events would change and intensify the relationship between the then thirty-eight-year-old Koru Suv-Unua and forty-two-year-old Foremost Moval Jovikel. Vivavem would also depend on Suv-Unna to provide additional support in his new roles as Foremost Moval Consort and father of four young children.

The Sumudin is one of the original two branches of Improved Yelda cultivated by the Central Triumvirate’s ‘Yeldic Colloquium.’ They hold many distinctions, including their rapid completion, manifesting all Spokes of the Cluster Wheel before the beginning of the Second Century of The Interim. The Sumudin were the first and closest of all Yelda to living the whole Koru life. Their Uses saw them integrated into all Triumvirate ministries as they took up permanent residence within the Mulungu Mountains by the end of the Second Century. It was determined that as the populations of Anu continued to diversify, the Sumudin would have conferred on them the Designating Honour of being ‘Paramount Contacts’ between the Koru and other organized gatherings of cluster subjects and inhabitants.

During this novel’s events, Yuna Cluster comprises Forty Circles of Eight (320 Ripe Adults) based in Kodrapum Grotto within Mount Arnom. This is one of the three original Sanctuary Mountains and later one of the three seats of the Central Triumvirate.

The cluster emerged among hundreds working on the Mulungu Continental Line in 97 UKC. Upon completing the Mount Arnom Terminal, two cluster fragments formed the new cluster. They petitioned the Supervisorate Bureau of the Chancellory Ministry to settle within the ancient mountain, which both originating fragments had called home in the distant past of The Interim. Among other favourable indicators, impressive scores on many pre-adult Depth Tests ensured their entry into the mountain and their successive generations’ increasingly prestigious Uses within Kodrapum Grotto.

This would lead a portion of this cluster to be inducted into the profound Defining Use of continuing the generational task of opening the Parayad Treasury. Over one thousand years earlier, this site was the first Treasury to be discovered by the First Generation of Guardians at the outset of The Interim. The Parayad Treasury takes the form of the ‘Wise Spider’ glyph and contains two thousand and sixteen crates filled with bound volumes and loose documents from the final Aeon of the Primary Epoch.

They are divided into nine sets of two hundred and twenty-four. Eight of the nine groups are contained in the eight ‘legs,’ and the ninth in the walls of the central Wise Spider formation of the Treasury, containing an indeterminate number of most-ancient volumes. This current generation of Sumudin had begun to suspect the relatively recent age of this collection. While this was the first Treasury to be found, it was now determined it was the last to be sealed, thus containing the concluding material of the Tolku before The Killing Swath.

Yuna-Monu’s Circle is ranked thirteenth up in depth of the forty within this Yuna Cluster for containing two Maja, one Complete and one Between. This circle was further distinguished for having profound abilities leading to clearly Defined Primary and Secondary Uses. Their Primary Use involved participating with many other Yuna Cluster circles in recovering materials from the Parayad Treasury. Over one hundred and eighty years ago, this was approved by the Erudite Bureau of the Enumerator Ministry. Their Secondary Use was as Paramount Contacts with the Field Yelda. This was approved for the previous generation of this circle after the settlement of the Sama Cluster by the Regions Bureau of the Grandee Secretariat Ministry.

While this remarkable lad had already distinguished himself in several ways, they all pale compared to his profound response to the Moment of Disturbance that followed the death of Majastas Zudaz I. His novel musings appeared beneath the surface before this event, but once She had died, the perceived delay in the Mantle possessing a new Majastas moved him to speak them aloud. In doing so, he revealed what had long been suppressed out of thinking for most: the need to discover the origin and nature of The Killing Swath. It may be difficult now to appreciate what a revelation his open enquiry had on the rest of his circle. Their lives were dominated by events leading up to, and following after, The Killing Swath. As with the rest of their generation, and many preceding it, few pondered why so little effort had been devoted to this explosive punctuation in Anu’s narrative. It is revealed in this tale that this was due to many factors. Immediately after what was formally known as ‘The Rectification,’ the Tolku survivors travelled to the Sanctuaries in the Mulungu Mountains of Rho-Jashun. Little documentation of any kind survives from this challenging period.

What characterizes this participating event is a term that would have sounded strange to the last generation of Tolku - ‘The Killing Swath.’ This is one of the earliest distinct expressions coined during the First Generation of The Interim. For the remaining seven centuries of this period, little to nothing survives dealing directly with any speculation or explanation of this event. This despite clear evidence, provided mainly by what is now called ‘The Final Tolku Proclamation,’ that the general population was well aware of what was about to happen and why. This apparent inhibition remains a subject of discussion and debate to this day. There is no dispute about the source of this continued silence during the first two centuries of the Secondary Epoch. The first Koru Majastas of the Secondary Epoch, Majastas Zudaz I, placed a Majastas Inhibition on the subject. By design, such inhibitions, as many features of most Generational Plans, are invisible to the fleeting generations of the Cluster-of-Clusters Nation. It is now known that the first Majastas discovered the Breathing Seals Conglomerations buried deep within the folds of The General Plain within Tatchlan. They contained profound instruction from the Primary Epoch Majastas Dynasties, and many of their revelations were unsettling to Majastas Zudaz I. There is little indication of this in Her Majastas Annotations. Still, other evidence suggests She spent much of Her Reign attempting to shore up the new Koru presence within the Living System to be ready to learn the truth of their origins and what brought them to their present state.

All this ended with the sudden death of Majastas Zudaz I. As all those deeply linked to Her through their Maja, young Yuna-Monu was profoundly affected by this. Something of a seismic shift took place within The Living System of Tatchlan. This first Moment of Disturbance of the Secondary Epoch affected all those under the Majastas Hand to varying degrees, some immediately and some incrementally. Our Fresh Adult’s urgent enquiries led to an opening within his circle, particularly his beloved Yuna-Nobov and Lapis Between Yuna-Mosum.

Very few Fresh Adults are inducted into two Defining Uses. However, while delving into the arcane world of their Parayad Treasury, he also joined his new circle as ‘Paramount Contacts.’ As with the rest of his circle, initially, this meant regular visits to the Sama Cluster out on the vast Marachla Plain. Yuna-Monu found this assignment challenging for many reasons. The first was being exposed to the Daymaker on unprotected land under the ‘Upper Abyss.’ The Field Yelda knew the Sumudin’s sensitivities well and endeavoured to conduct most meetings during the ‘Velvet Night.’

Yuna-Monu found much to fascinate and mystify him in these Field Yelda and continued his education during this tale. Far more surprising and challenging was his circle becoming Paramount Contacts for the Yakku of the nearby Kalasek Estate. While there had been sporadic contact before our story, the general policy was to allow the Field Yelda to be their primary link to the Koru Cluster-of-Clusters Nation. Yuna Circle was now thrust into an enormous arena examining the previously unheard-of notion of a Yakku Double requesting a Healing Vat Egg. In this matter, Yuna-Monu’s circle shared his profound innocence of all aspects of this novel situation.

Acclaimed Professor and Teaching Academic Xumb-Chulash correctly declared this circle was leading an exotic life.

There are eight Spokes in the Cluster Wheel: Maja, Elders, Touched, Doubles, Betweens, Completes, Dreamers and Mundanes. All Betweens share specific characteristics. Unlike Completes, all Betweens are born either female or male. Nevertheless, it is evident in early pre-adulthood that they possess an enriched gender spectrum within them. This means they are endowed with unique sensibilities and serve as ‘bridges’ in daily cluster functions and particular ceremonies. There are Seven Aspects of Betweens, each manifesting and emphasizing certain features and attributes. Lapis Betweens, the fifth of the seven Aspects, is known for being one gender while presenting prominent physical and mental characteristics of the other.

Female Lapis Betweens are generally broad and tall and possess deep voices. Male Lapis Betweens tend to be relatively small and fine-featured compared to Mundane males. Pictured here are two Danam Yeldic icons for Betweens. One is the general icon for all Betweens and shows a male Between with a woman on one side and a man on the other. The other icon is specific to the Lapis Aspect, pictured as their gem name, Lapis, would suggest, as blue. Lapis is closely associated with the Sixth Principal Face of Tatchlan, Neferdush.

At the time of this tale, Yuna-Mosum is a forty-four-year-old female Lapis Between. Evident traces of ancient Koru ancestry add to herhis imposing stature. Shehe is affectionately said to possess wide and somewhat square ‘Koru Hands.’ Shehe is broad and robust with a deep voice and a confident manner. Like herhis fellow circle mate and academic, Yuna-Nobov, shehe was nourished by the Primary Use of herhis circle and enthusiastically worked within Kodrapum Grotto’s Parayad Treasury. Herhis strength was organizing existing collections of recovered Treasury materials, cataloguing, and series moderation.

Shehe also proved a valuable resource for scholars, researchers and students accessing this material. Shehe found herhimself in Kupat Queens One Living Mountain pursuing herhis designation as an Esteemed Librarian. Shehe arrived four years before Yuna-Nobov but was only ready for herhis own certification and ceremonial recitation at the same time. This was due to herhis bearing two children. These two girls arrived later in herhis studies at the Living Mountain. At the time of this novel, Yuna-Mosofu is seven, and Yuna-Mosumu is four.

As with all child-bearing scholars at the Living Mountain, ample provision had been made for herhim to return to Mount Arnom and for herhis birth travails and subsequent feeding and weaning. Herhis circle, attended by two other Yuna circles focused on pre-adult care, had caressed and maintained them since. These pre-adult tenders are known by many names, including Nurturing Circles and Support Circles. At different times in the life cycle of a cluster, the number of circles devoted to this task may reach one-third of the total.

One of the councils Maja Yuna-Honos attended was known as the ‘Standards Advisory.’ It grappled with what was a challenging issue for all Treasuries. In none of these thirty-two known sites was there any guide as to the chronological disposition of the crates. In each case, extensive work was initially done to solve these riddles. The aim was to open each box to provide a sequential framework for Esteemed Librarians and Venerable Scholars to examine the material.

At the outset of the Secondary Epoch, sixteen, or half, of the Treasuries were found to have laid down their contents in the following order, termed ‘Treasury Standard.’ All Treasuries are positioned north, meaning the ‘head’ of the formation was always precisely oriented. This meant the ‘body’ could be easily divided into cardinal points. Within Treasury Standard sites, the outmost tunnels, or ‘legs,’ on the western side were filled during the Primary Epoch from the back to front, starting at the hind legs and moving forward. Then, the hind legs on the eastern side were filled from the southernmost to the northernmost leg, culminating with the central body cavity, which was last.

Unfortunately, the other sixteen Treasuries diverge from this pattern in several ways. While Parayad was the first Treasury discovered nearly one thousand years ago at the commencement of The Interim, for many reasons, the intensive regime to explore its contents systematically was not established until early in the Secondary Epoch. When this began, earlier generations of Yuna Cluster found, to their dismay, that Parayad appeared to be one of the ‘chaotic Treasuries,’ not adhering to Treasury Standard. It was eventually determined that the three back legs on the western side were filled in order, but then the central cavity was filled. Then, the three back legs on the eastern side were filled before the front west and the front east leg. This is not the most unorthodox Treasury of this ‘chaotic’ class.

All these terms camouflage the fact that these designations were imprecise at best. In the case of Parayad Treasury's case, it is determined that its title was incorrect during this novel, and it conformed to Treasury Standard. This meant the previous and current generation, who had worked on opening the central cavity crates, revealed the site's final works. Due to evidence within this Treasury and works in many of the others, it had just been determined that Parayad was the final Treasury to be sealed. Maja Yuna-Honos participated in the work of the Standards Advisory, leading to this determination. It must be appreciated that this was a significant chapter in his life that is only briefly touched on in this novel. What is rightly focused on is that the final crate in this section had the most significant document of the age added to it, the ‘Final Tolku Proclamation.’

Dramatic yearly years

Even before this story begins, there can be no doubt that fifty-two-year-old Foremost Moval Jovikel had led a noteworthy life. He was born in the year 234 of the Secondary Epoch. At ten years of age, he experienced the chaos of the movement to ‘punish’ the already defeated Suvuka on Thermistal. During this youthful period, as the second son of Velparun, the Foremost Moval of Bithen Regional Tree, the young Jovikel witnessed the gatherings of many elders and captains of every field of endeavour within their capital of Gye Sonin.

Three years later, at thirteen, he witnessed the survivors' return, including his elder brother Jakapil, aged twenty, from that terrible campaign. He sat in on his brother’s extensive public declarations to various forums and gatherings as a ‘Dissenter.’ Jakapil detailed what he had witnessed. He repeatedly spoke of his profound regret for defying his father and joining what he now called an act of genocide.

The following year, 248 UKC, Jovikel accompanied his ailing brother and their father on a strange pilgrimage. They travelled to the ‘Ring Lakes' formation shared by the Medebe and Watejas Regional Trees in northwestern Thermistal. The siblings viewed several towering Wajah, heard their booming yet muffled words, and watched as the Djingal priesthood, in their yellow robes featuring the silhouettes of three Wajah, made a great show of interpreting these enigmatic utterances. Velparun wanted his two sons to witness what he viewed as the source of much that had gone wrong in the Yakku Collective. Despite his eldest son and heir’s deteriorating health from his injuries from a persistent Tarops infection, Foremost Moval Velparun rushed to prepare both sons for eventually assuming his position. He lavished the best care available on his eldest, Jakapil, while his younger sibling, Jovikel, now received full briefings and sat in on all councils as the second heir apparent. Jovikel also began to serve as an apprentice administrator in the Judicial Hand of Service. Shortly before Jovikel turned fourteen, his brother Jakapil died.

Above is an example of ‘Backwoods Art,’ depicting one of their favourite subjects, the Wajah. This traditional expression persists in the thickets outside of the Crown Rises. It emphasizes a mystical union between Yakku and the trees, often depicting them as blending one into the other. As for the Wajah, they are commonly shown as Yakku bodies rooted in the ground and sprouting branches out of their bodies.

Yesosel and Suv-Unua

Yesosel, born the same year as Jovikel, was a childhood friend whose family also served within the same Crown Rise of Gye Sonin. Although since Jakapil’s death, the two friends tread very different paths, their friendship continued. Given Bithen Regional Tree’s proximity to the Viracocha Mountains, it was customary for Yakku with various academic, governmental or professional standing to have relations with the Koru Clusters living there. Foremost Moval Velparun himself made a point of regularly travelling to a designated location to conduct business with the Koru, and during this time, Jovikel was often in attendance. In the year 270 UKC, Foremost Moval Velparun, aged sixty-one, began relinquishing various offices to his son. The following year, Jovikel and Yesosel, now thirty-seven-year-old adults, found themselves on separate business at a Gifting at the Suv Cluster within the Viracocha Mountains. They happily engaged in all customs at this event, but Yesosel was particularly struck by one thirty-three-year-old Koru Ripe  Adult named Suv-Unua. Long after Jovikel had moved on to other business and relations, Yesosel found reasons to return. The Leadership Ring of Suv-Unua’s cluster deemed Yesosel a ‘benefit,' the following year, 272 UKC, Suv-Unua gave birth to a daughter named Hiten. As with all unions between Yakku and Koru, Hiten was born a Yelda. Bithen Regional Tree’s Foremost Moval and his son celebrated this new chapter in Yesosel’s life and regularly welcomed this new family into their Moval Residence. Foremost Moval Velparun even publicly mused that this public display would pave the way for others to re-enact what was known as ‘The Happy Century’ during The Interim long ago.

It had been the custom in earlier times for such offspring to spend half the year with their father and half with their mother, known as the ‘Half Year Rite.’ Only in the past few centuries had this earlier observance become less common. Suv-Unua subsequently gave birth to a Koru child within her Circle of Eight and urged Yesosel to rear their Yeldic child in Gye Sonin. Yesosel and daughter Grivel made frequent visits to their ‘Mountain Mother.’

While the Foremost Moval regretted not observing the ‘Half Year Rite,’ he revived another ancient institution known as ‘Yeldic Newborns League.’ This once well-established organization supported families of first-generation Yeldic children to gather and celebrate their heritage. Centuries ago, they had several prominent settings throughout Gye Sonin, but now all were given over to other uses. Despite knowing others were in the same situation, Foremost Moval Velparun and Jovikel were disappointed with how few came to join this revived association. They extended the mandate of the League to include Yakku with second and third-generation Yelda in their midst. While more came, there was also muted but growing criticism of the revived affiliation, once celebrated in story and song, from several quarters within Gye Sonin. Beyond such overt commentary, it was noted how a growing number of Yakku expressed quiet discomfort over what had been a common occurrence only a few centuries earlier. Two years later, in 274 UKC, Yesosel would take home their second daughter, Grivel. As was the custom at the time, Yesosel had formally requested that his lifelong friend, Jovikel, assume the legal position of Guardian of his two daughters in the unlikely event of his premature death.

A fire broke out suddenly on their Mernet Landing, fed by sudden gusts of ‘Racing’ and ‘Bowing’ Winds. Despite heroic efforts, the conflagration was sufficiently profound and intense to cause the entire platform to come apart, causing all four hundred and forty-five adults and children to fall, burning to their deaths. An investigation determined this was an act of premeditated murder by a single deranged individual who hated not only Koru but all Yelda, being ‘tainted’ by Koru seed.

She had coated all walkways leading to the platform, along with the venue itself, with an illegal accelerant. She covered it over with pungent chips that sufficiently masked the accelerant’s odour, which was also dissipated by the windy day. She had started the fire before seating herself at a vantage point to watch the horror she had caused while singing Siv-Sa songs. A subsequent examination of her determined she was profoundly delusional.

While her effects revealed extensive Djingal Votary material (Koru emblem of the Votary shown here), there was no proof of this organization having any direct involvement with this frightful woman. To his credit, the horrified and grieving Foremost Moval Jovikel, after closely reviewing all the evidence, was forced to conclude she had no plausible link to an organization he despised. This was followed by an extensive inquest where the Chief of Police and Chief Litigator Office both declared the Djingal Votary, despite their expressed aims, had no active role in this atrocity. While senior commentators at the time drew a solid causal link between the Votary’s outspoken positions and this individual, stating they provided the conceptual focus to fuel her crazed obsessions, no charges were ever laid against them.

During this tragedy, a young officer in the Sonin Police force named Chekuvan made regular reports to the mourning Foremost Moval. A mutual respect and regard grew between them, continuing up to the events of this novel, by which time Chekuvan had risen to become the Sonin Commander for the city.

While none of these youths succeeded in joining the war, his young ears were still stung by these terrible rifts breaking out within this family during the final Suvuka war. In the year 247 UKC, Vivavem, aged eleven, witnessed some of the first waves of survivors returned and heard their disparaging narratives of the war and the crimes committed by the ‘despicable Tarunachit.’ That same year, he and most of his family attended a large forum and heard the first-born son of their Foremost Moval Velparun, named Jakapil, tell his tragic tale. They all then saw subsequent waves of triumphant Tarunachit return and marvelled at their contradictory accounts of the same events. The elders of his family agreed that the best course in such dangerous times was one of quiet neutrality. As the years passed, the youthful Vivavem watched the growing tumult within his Yakku nation while continuing to cultivate his family’s impartiality.

Nevertheless, in such extreme times, nuanced neutrality was no match for blind fanaticism, and two of his siblings broke with the family. Vivavem remained loyal and devoted himself to his studies. Upon graduation, he moved through various positions as a young adult until he arrived at the Judicial Hand of Service in the year 267 UKC at thirty-one years of age. He established himself and conducted a distinguished career for the next seven years. As a handsome and likeable young man, he made many friends and conducted several romantic liaisons during this time. However, the one who struck him was the brother of the famed Jakapil, son of the Foremost Moval, who had died twenty-five years earlier. Vivavem was formally introduced to Jovikel, who was two years Vivavem’s senior, in the year 274, when he was thirty-eight. Already possessing the air of the next Moval, this initially intimidating figure quickly warmed to Vivavem, and they progressed swiftly from friendship to intimacy. He was conducted to the Foremost Moval Residence and was received warmly by Jovikel’s wise and kind father, Velparun. Two years later, in the fateful year 276 UKC, when Vivavem was forty years old, his life was forever changed by Velparun’s anticipated death, followed by the tragic Yeldic Newborns League fire.

Vivavem became a nurse and comforter for his Jovikel and their four children. Jovikel was thrown entirely into his Foremost Moval role while dealing with a personal, and a Regional Tree, calamity. His days were long, and when he returned, he struggled to meet his new family’s needs. Vivavem found a dear ally in dealing with all this from the girls' mother, Suv-Unua, who provided care and counsel to him. His own Yakku family also provided what respite they could to this battered family. With time and their relocation outside the capital, everyday life commenced. For the next ten years, leading them to that fateful Agility Trial at the beginning of our tale, Vivavem devoted himself to caring for his beleaguered husband and joining Jovikel to provide their children with a safe and calm home.

Viperfer

Mature pedigree

While Viperfer, the Foremost Moval of Kalasek Estate, represented the third adult generation of Yakku arriving close to the same time as the ancestors of Sama, Danam, and other Field Yelda Clusters to this portion of the broad Marachla Plain in the year 200 of the Secondary Epoch, their pedigree was far more mature. Over seven hundred years earlier, during what came to be known as ‘The Happy Century,’ beginning in the year 178 of The Interim, the first Yelda were engendered within the heat of the Koru and Yakku discovering each other. Along with the professional and curious, those Yakku wishing to join their Yeldic progeny crossed the Panchala Sea to Rho-Jashun. Despite the vast Suvuka herds reigning supreme on the open Marachla, hundreds of small and secure valleys within the Mulungu Mountains became their new home. There, the Mernet and other Yakku specialty seeds they brought took root and flourished, allowing for a collection of small Yakku settlements to thrive securely within the bosom of the Central Triumvirate. This coincided with the Koru establishing themselves deep within the Viracocha Mountains on Thermistal. The Yakku of the Mulungus and the Viracocha forests had regular contact for the next hundred and forty years. Even in this short period, significant changes in culture and perspective began to be noted by visitors from Thermistal.

In the two centuries leading up to the extinction of the Suvuka and subsequent dispersal of both the Yakku and Field Yelda on the liberated Marachla Plain, the new Majastas visited many of the valley enclaves as part of her Generational Plan to establish Yakku Estates. Her Majastas Annotations make clear Her intention that these Estates would create healthy links between both halves of the former Tolku and serve as focal points for the Field Yelda clusters. She also stated in more ambiguous language that a deeper aim was to ensure the Yakku would find Tatchlan within themselves.

Shortly after Majastas Zudaz I's famed walk through Enimik Round in 98 UKC, the Surveyors General institution was fortified to serve a new arm of Her existing Commandant Ministry, the Land Stewards Clusters. Encircled by Calamity and Engineering Bureau corps, these Surveyors General cohorts spread across the Marachla Plain to exhaustively survey an immense landscape scraped to nearly nothing by the Suvuka. All of what had been a vast Primary Epoch Tolku patrimony, both urban settlement and infrastructure, was found to be ground to dust.

In many places, the cumulative pounding of Suvuka paws for seven hundred years radically altered the landscape. Nevertheless, this raw topography displayed the promise of rich loam for Yeldic cultivation and the scope for deep Yakku Mernet tree roots. An intricate map of intersecting locations was established across the enormous plain. A century before the Field Yelda issued out of the Royran Valley in 200 UKC, the future Yakku Estates were planted. Foremost Viperfer’s adult grandfather and very young father would have arrived at a tall stand of mature Mernet and other Yakku trees designated as the Kalasek Estate. Among themselves, they referred to it as Kalasek Regional Tree and divided it into four nests, one of which was Kekavil Nest, where Viperfer was born and now reigns.

Pictured here is the Field Yeldic icon and one of many Koru emblems representing the Yakku.

Above is the Danam Yeldic icon for all Doubles, closely based on the Venerable Koru’s original, also thought to be an icon of the first Double, Pomona-Uma.

This novel introduces readers to one of the Spokes of the Cluster Wheel - the Double and details the mystery of the Healing Vats’ formation.

Sama-Andam

Sudden Ripe Adult

Nine days before our story begins, nineteen-year-old Sama-Andam was informed by her body that her first pregnancy would be her last. The past eight two-weeks had proven increasingly difficult before she suddenly emitted a mighty ‘Scent Wash’ declaring to the amazement that she was a Double. Unlike all other Spokes of the Cluster Wheel, this manifestation of the Living System of Tatchlan is not manifest until a woman’s initial gestation. Immediately, she was relieved of her many difficulties as the child was swiftly absorbed into her body, which began to manifest a new potency. Sama Cluster’s Leadership Ring promptly declared her new status as a Ripe Adult, five to ten years ahead of her previous expectation of such an honour. There were two other Doubles in her Sama Cluster, composed of sixteen Circles of Eight containing one hundred and twenty-eight Ripe Adults.

This historic migration and establishment formed the backdrop of Sama-Vara’s childhood. Once settled, she joined her circle and cluster in putting the land in order and beginning the time-honoured traditions of agriculture, as practiced on the same spot by uncountable generations of Tolku during the Lesser and Greater Era of the Primary Epoch. The Sumudin bestowed upon this new Rural Cluster the first generation of Patzku and other pastoral animals to serve in their many rural endeavours.

Due to their northern location, Salarish was provided as their primary crop. Of equal importance, the Sumudin ensured vital Baby Mother and other Lesser Era agricultural traditions were fully linked to seasonal activities. Pictured here is an interpretation of the Salarish Agricultural Calendar. Such devices would be mounted on public walls with a great pointer fixed to the centre with an arrow moved to indicate the current two-week for each season. This simple device governed much of the activities of the Sama Cluster.

Being an Elder, she was slow to embrace novelty and so met with profound skepticism the two young Double’s initiative to aide Sensarab, an unheard-of Yakku Double. Despite this, in their well-constructed proposal, she was favourably impressed at the intelligence and maturity of Sama-Lavan and even Sama-Andam. Her days ended shortly thereafter peacefully, and we all witnessed her Conclusive Offering to her Healing Vat. Pictured here is the ancient Koru icon, crafted shortly after the Conclusive Offering of Pomona-Unna, of this merging of a Double with her Healing Vat.

The increasing power of these cycles turned deadly at the beginning of the Sixtieth set of Aeons. What will come to be known as ‘The Burning Blossom’ will receive far more detailed treatment in the fourth novel of this series. Its importance to this story lies in the catastrophic error of opening up the Living System of Tatchlan during these early cycles. While initially beneficial, the Blossom became harmful.

This led to subtle and increasingly damaging results before Tatchlan was entirely shut to what was now called the ‘Baleful Eye of Nu.’ It is known that this took place within Aeon Sixty-Two. By then, the damage had been done, and the second half of the Greater Era was increasingly devoted to attempting to repair this unwitting injury to the most precious Living System of Tatchlan.

While the term ‘Killing Swath’ is of unknown origin, there is clear evidence of its general use by the First Generation of Guardians during the opening century of The Interim. This benighted population is also viewed as among the last generations of Tolku, who, by the Second Generation, began to note their offspring beginning to undergo ‘The Change’ into the Koru and Yakku. What is revealed in this novel is the proper name of this event, The Rectification, and the profound renouncement it represents. Readers are told that during the second half of the Greater Era of the Primary Epoch, an extensive series of ‘Corrections’ were undertaken within the Living System to ameliorate increasing incidences of cascading errors within Tatchlan. While modest versions of such Corrections had always taken place, The Resplendent Work is an immense and dynamic entity on occasion requiring assistance to function fully. What was now enacted were desperate measures to shore up and repair great rends within the Living System. In time, these massive projects became known as ‘Generational Plans’ and, finally, ‘Epochal Generational Plans,’ all dedicated to forestalling the last extreme measure.

Notwithstanding these efforts, it was finally determined that the only way to save the Living System of Tatchlan was to arrest all functions and force it to sink beneath all awareness before waking and rising again. According to what is now known as the ‘Final Tolku Proclamation,’ discovered during this novel, this radical solution was termed the ‘Rectification.’ This proclamation leads to a review of all existing literature from later in the Primary Epoch. Such efforts uncovered many things, including the previously misunderstood meaning of another term, the ‘Ultimate Panacea,’ also referring to this terrible solution. Such an operation would cause Tatchlan to fold in on itself beneath its foundation, known as ‘The General Plain,’ before it emerged and commenced rebuilding. Such a profound undertaking would unavoidably lead to the near extinction of the Tolku and most, if not all, of the physical manifestations of the Tatchlan System on the Skin of Anu.

While not explicitly stated, this ‘final’ proclamation (there are no other copies of this same document, and it appears no previous editions of this series survive) makes clear that all of this was, to some degree, made known to the entire Cluster-of-Cluster’s Nation. By the time of the Final Proclamation’s issuing, it is evident that this culminating charter was greeted with resigned acceptance. Among other extraordinary initiatives, the entire city of Bhampay was buried to ensure the survival of the Amarel Mountain site and its enigmatic contents. The implications of these events and the clear evidence of the general population’s participation in the concluding actions of their lives and everything they knew for the sake of Tatchlan would not be lost on their heirs. The Koru and Yelda would reverence ‘The Foremost Ones’ for their nobility and sacrifice for Tatchlan. They dedicated all their efforts to rebuild the Living System to the Tolku’s honour. Initially, the Yakku refused to accept this narrative and clung to their own, suggesting the Swath was a catastrophic mistake based on Tolku's hubris. They would not tolerate the notion of an entire civilization voluntarily extinguishing themselves for the sake of a system they viewed as evil. At the time of this second novel, this belief formed the foundation of the many anti-Tatchlan movements within the Yakku Collective of Thermistal, leading to the creed within the Siv-Sa religion declaring such teachings represented an ‘Abhorrent Doctrine.’

Long before the time of this tale, a discovery was made deep in the folds of The General Plain by the first generations of Koru Operants. They would come to be known as the ‘Breathing Seals Conglomerations.’ The first Koru Majastas, Zudaz I, and Her successor, Majastas Zudaz II, would ponder these enigmatic living documents.

These were the intended modes of communication between the last Majastas of the Primary Epoch and their Majastas heirs of the Secondary Epoch on the Rectification mechanisms and many other profound matters. While the general population grew into ‘National Maturity’ regarding such abstruse Primary Epoch legacies as The Treasuries, we may dare say a similar process of greater depth was required by the first dynasty of Koru Majastas to comprehend the contents of these Conglomerations fully.

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Amassment and Treasuries

What became known as this same Fourth Generation rediscovered the Mount Midin Amassment in the year Ninety-Seven of The Interim. This vast repository of Primary Epoch scholarship was preserved and studied for the next one hundred and forty years. The ‘Pauloman Grotto,’ named after the primary cluster devoted to this service, became the hub for research and ongoing work to reproduce critical texts on the verge of disintegrating due to the extended neglect after The Killing Swath. All this ended when the Suvuka managed to break into the Amassment, killing 2,557 Koru and destroying the contents of the most-ancient library and most of the summaries, research, and reproductions of the Pauloman Cluster. An unlikely remnant from this collection, the ‘Everlasting Ennui,’ happened to be removed from the site at the time. Another survivor was the ‘Pauloman Catalogues,’ which had assisted the new generations of Koru Venerable Scholars and Esteemed Librarians in making requests, now serving as an agonizing list of all lost. The first of the two icons above represents this tragedy, with fire blossoming out of pages defiled by Suvuka paw prints.

The First Generation discovered the first three Treasuries long before they entered the Sanctuaries. Before the Central Triumvirate was established, the three Sanctuary Mountains, Rongu, Arnom and Chraxan, revealed this mysterious construction deep within their survival chambers. These Treasuries were found to contain hundreds upon hundreds of sealed crates. When these were opened, perfectly preserved volumes were revealed. Twenty-nine additional Treasuries would eventually be discovered throughout the central Mulungu Mountain range. The last generations of Tolku made these initial three discoveries before The Change. Despite being only a few generations away from the Primary Epoch, it is now apparent that much conceptual sophistication had yet to be recovered. While the value of some material was immediately apparent, the profound richness and depth represented by most of this strange collection of volumes proved beyond these Fresh Koru of The Interim’s ability to comprehend. At the time of this novel, nearly one thousand years later, the first glimmerings of what would come to be known as the ‘National Maturity’ were becoming manifest. This was due partly to two discoveries made during this book’s fleeting timeline, the ‘Final Tolku Proclamation’ and the uncovering of Amarel Mountain at the Bhampay site. The second of the two above icons shows three stone books with cavities carved out as Ketukku insects, as the Treasury chambers are.

Due to the chaos of the times, several conventions developed, characterizing events of this period within clear boundaries. One of these involves what is known as the ‘Four Generations.’ Traditions have it that the refugees came in three well-defined waves or ‘generations,’ separated by several decades. The First Generation arrived within the first ten years of The Interim. They were said to have the most resources, and a famous emblem for them was a ship, suggesting many could sail to their destination. The surviving land and coastal notices guided them to Mount Chraxan, where they found chambers, a network of connecting tunnels, and supplies prepared for them. 

The Second Generation reached Mount Chraxan roughly forty years later from the combined migrations of refugees across the ruined continents. Their emblem was a cart, indicating they had fewer resources than the First Generation. By this time, all three Sanctuaries had been fully explored and opened. Thirty years after this, a Third Generation appeared in a long wave. Their emblem was a pair of footprints, clearly indicating their desperate situation. Between these more significant diaspora surges, smaller ones also made it to safety, although they are now characterized as belonging to one of these three primary populations. The first three Treasuries, and later the Mount Midin Amassment, were discovered during this early and desperate period. They were not explored until later in Interim history. That series of tragic, mysterious, and enlightening discoveries is detailed here.

They began to attain Ripe Adulthood in the tenth Year of the Suvuka’s filling the Marachla Plain and are lauded as heroes for braving the bestial herds to retrieve whatever ‘Living System Elements’ and ‘Primary Epoch Attainments’ they could to assist in rebuilding a new Cluster-of-Clusters Nation. Despite their hardships, these populations retained knowledge and reawakened skills to employ Tatchlan servants such as the Varku and Krall to assist them in this dangerous work. Along with what the first three generations managed to bring with them, this Forth Generation is known for risking their lives to specifically seek out and rescue what is now called the ‘Recovered Ones.’ These included various living beings refined and improved by Tatchlan during the previous Primary Epoch. This collection of treasured entities would eventually be grouped into three categories: Converted, Modified and Innovated.

A Fresh Adult of the Fourth Generation was taller than the original Tolku of the First Generation and nearly twice as wide at their shoulders. This Forth Generation also began seeing the entire population shift gradually from a diurnal to a nocturnal existence. At some point during this courageous Forth Generation’s activities, the term ‘Koru’ appears to have, by popular acclamation, become the new name these populations gave themselves. The origins of this term have never been determined.

While much had been foreseen and prepared for, there is no indication of any foreknowledge of these startling developments. Despite the First Generation being direct witnesses of the preparations before the advent of The Killing Swath, there is a puzzling lack of informed discourse surrounding many aspects of their situation. This is well illustrated by using the term ‘Killing Swath’ instead of the one clearly in circulation before the event, ‘The Rectification.’ In time, The Change was included in many other alterations known as ‘Swath Changes’ and seen as an extended impact of The Killing Swath on the survivors and their descendants. Following a period of confusion concerning these alterations, there appears to be an acceptance and welcoming of this transformation as a representation of their new beginnings in a new epoch.

A brief note about the Koru icon for the Change featured above: all Koru icons are within what is known as a ‘mountain’ or ‘pyramid’ border. This signifies their nocturnal, underground life. The other elements, as all Koru icons, are to be read from the top going down. At the top is an image meant to be interpreted as the depleted life of the last Tolku. What grows and blossoms out of the bottom is meant to signify the new and vital life of the Koru.

Surviving documentation painted a very different picture of what these new Invocates encountered within Tatchlan, and a great deal of effort was expended in navigating this altered terrain. They found a surprising ally in the Principal Face of Hesha Vira. Unlike the other Principal Faces, the Face of Raw Life was animate and swiftly responded to their invocations. It is now understood that by the design of both the most-ancient Tatchlan Masters and Tolku Majastas, a deep connection existed between Hesha Vira and the Suvuka. They worshipped her and thus sustained her through the seven long centuries of The Interim. 

On the Skin of Anu, the Koru experienced an unprecedented surge in the number of Invocates who displayed the supreme manifestation of their craft - Operants. At no other time in recorded history of the Primary or the Secondary Epoch has such a large population of Operants been consistently sent into Tatchlan from the Fourth Generation onwards. These Operants, able to enter Tatchlan without recourse to a Living Instrument, successfully awakened all of the slumbering Principal Faces and, with their assistance, set about to reestablish full functionality between themselves and the Invocates within The Resplendent Work. It is known that the Principal Face of Humma, the Face of Recollection, conducted them to where the Breathing Seals Conglomerations were established. The Operants found they lacked sufficient depth to comprehend their multitude of messages. This was left to the coming Majastas dynasties.

Even living with the ever-present Suvuka threat, the adaptations to now being Koru instead of Tolku, and their prodigious efforts both on the Skin of Anu and within Tatchlan, the first of the two most significant works of the Koru still needed to be accomplished. One seemingly humble member of the Recovered Ones was an entity known to the Tolku as ‘Healing Jelly.’

This topical application was used for various skin ailments for most of the Primary Epoch. It had been improved within Tatchlan on numerous occasions throughout the Greater Era. It is revealed to have undergone one of the more dramatic examples of a ‘Swath Change.’ The Jelly had been primarily gathered by the First Generation, who, of necessity, broke with the Tolku prohibition of storing more than small quantities in pots to transport them to the Sanctuaries efficiently.

During the Primary Epoch, they were always kept in small jars as significant quantities tended to alter, ceasing to be of service. Initially, once settled in the Sanctuaries, the smaller-portion conventions were observed. Nevertheless, the First Generation of Guardians noted that when four jars were accidentally combined, the Jelly withstood these unprecedented concentrations, continuing to render timely ministrations to the significant number of injuries incurred among the refugees. Over time, these more abundant quantities displayed additional alterations. Most important was an increased display of the undeniable characteristics of a collective entity. It was further discovered through painstaking experimentation that prodigious concentrations in long containers seemed to optimize these new abilities. The Danam Yelda are now more willing to laud the Venerable Koru for playing a more active role in this initial development than the Koru themselves.

In the year five hundred and ninety-seven of The Interim (one hundred and forty-four years before the arrival of the first Koru Majastas), within Chandara Grotto of Mount Rongu, a confluence of extraordinary events and an unusual concentration of Genius led to the fashioning of the first Healing Vat. This breakthrough was primarily due to the introduction of two unlikely elements. One was known as Phantasm Spume; this arrived fresh from an eruption to the north that same year. While the many Vision Window and other healing qualities were well documented in the Primary Epoch, no new supply existed during The Interim. In its raw liquid state, it is lethal, but once dried and refined, it becomes a revitalizing agent for many ills and a general boon to all living beings, including those perfected by Tatchlan. The other was the eventual introduction of a tiny creature, the Takshakutan, long known for its ability to transmute toxins into medicines.

Most of the final work unfolded within a single generation among four clusters within this ancient cave. Chief among these was the Pomona Cluster. Honoured Historians would later conclude that this event was part of a larger ripening of the Koru towards the production of their first Majastas. Among other notable aspects of this unique period is that the intensive collaboration of Invocates, Operants and Doubles achieved this.

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At the same time the First Generation of Guardians on Rho-Jashun had discovered and opened the three mountains, the refugees on Thermistal found themselves in mortal danger. An incomplete account clearly states that in what would be later known as the Year Nine of The Interim, the raw Suvuka, long kept on the eastern shores of the Vettencore Passage, scaled the sheer walls, braved the strong current of the waters, and broke through the most-ancient barriers. They then began to rampage west across the continent. The Tolku somehow learned of this deadly tide despite the distance between the two groups. While a few made their way to the southern coast and set sail for Rho-Jashun, most raced towards the Lake Teval Basin and the Silvasora Mountains. Fragmentary evidence suggests they found a collection of survivors still living around the Grand Lake Teval, where most of the population had been before the Swath. With the eastern arrivals and their news, all the remaining Tolku resolved to flee to the west through the Silvasora Mountains in the Year Eleven of The Interim. Beyond these mountain passes lay the vast Viracocha forests, surrounding the westernmost mountain range of Thermistal of the same name.

Within these mighty Viracocha forests, they were surprised to find an organized body of Tolku, who survived in sufficient numbers to retain some semblance of order. Most were members of the Viracocha District Flora Ministry. While significantly reduced in numbers, this was the only governance body to persist after the Swath. This ministry retained its knowledge and resources and was able to assist the refugees beyond all hope. Long before the Killing Swath, these ministry members had established offices and residences high in these vast canopies as part of their ongoing service. They swiftly conducted most of these desperate thousands arriving on their borders into the trees before the Suvuka overtook them. In the brief interval before the Suvuka came, they healed their wounds and prepared them for battle. Generational knowledge of their complex environment was utilized to meet brute force. As a result of these extraordinary actions, the hordes arriving in the Year Fourteen of The Interim were unprepared for an organized arboreal army with deadly weapons on the edge of these forests. For the first time, their seemingly unstoppable Second Onslaught was stalled.

Named by the Yakku as the Paramount Barrier, what was now called the Viracocha Authority produced a twenty-year plan to lure the Suvuka through a predetermined route to trick them into stampeding into it. Surveillance of herd movements in the Lake Teval Basin, elaborate modifications of the intended way, and a profound measure of intestinal fortitude and patience led to this defeat of a far larger force. Great care was made to ensure no survivors returned to relate what had happened, leaving the still vast population around Lake Teval innocent of their comrade’s fate. This led to a second incursion with the same devastating result for the Suvuka. With no information of what had happened, this disappearance of many thousands caused all formal assaults to cease for ten years. A new force was divided into three parts, one heading for the passes in the mountains far to the north and south and another party unwittingly following the previous two towards their doom. By this time, the Yakku had devised new weapons and tactics and defeated the northern and southern armies, while the middle army met the same fate as the previous two forces in the depths of the Paramount Barrier. Details of the final major assault by the three troops of the Suvuka, taking place in the Year Forty-Four of The Interim, may be found here.

Much conjecture has occurred on how the creatures who possessed Thermistal for hundreds of millennia appeared to have forgotten entirely about this massive natural feature. One theory is that throughout the Greater Era, knowledge was lost among the feral Suvuka behind the Vettencore Passage. At the same time, the feature gradually widened, as it continues to do to this day, beyond all previous bounds.

As with the final generations of Tolku of Rho-Jashun within their Sanctuaries, the Tolku of Thermistal underwent their distinctive version of The Change to an even greater degree than the Koru. High in the forest canopy, the descendants of the original refugees began to show signs of significant transformations. By increments, each succeeding generation grew taller and leaner and began to display novel features such as a notable growth in the size of their ears and, in particular, a significant lengthening of their toes. They displayed the ability to alter the colour and pattering of their skin at will, both as camouflage and as an indicator of emotion. These colourations continued to become more pronounced in subsequent centuries. The entire population became double-jointed to an extraordinary degree and even displayed a remarkable capacity to slip in and out of their joints without lasting effect. All these radical adaptations benefited their determination to live permanently in the trees.

Whatever unease attended this unprecedented reshaping has subsequently been covered over by ensuing generations’ celebration of these modifications as an affirmation of their new identity. While it is impossible to map these mutations with precision, most authorities agree that the pace of The Change was close to identical to The Change experienced among the emerging Koru of Rho-Jashun. As with the Koru, this new population independently gave themselves a new name. On Thermistal, the descendants of the Tolku now named themselves the Yakku.

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Perhaps one of the most extraordinary and strange aspects of Yakku culture was the Swaying Wajah. Composed of an unlikely merging of ancient Bowvow Trees and living Yakku elders, who voluntarily joined with them after extensive preparation, the Wajah became venerated organisms. The entire process was conducted with the utmost secrecy, and many aspects of this merging remain unclear.

It has since been determined that, notwithstanding the Yakku’s public position on the Tatchlan System, Tatchlan was employed to bring about this astonishing blending. The result was a being who appeared to possess the collective life experience of the original Bowvow, with one or more Yakku able to communicate with others. These hybrid entities were seen as a form of Yakku perfection, the fusion of Yakku with the canopy. While their symbolism was clear, the reality became problematic over time.

The Yakku who joined with the Bowvow would form dark faces on the trunk. These were initially articulated clearly, but after a few decades, their speech became garbled, and their messages increasingly incoherent. Given that communities had formed around the Ring Lakes to serve these Wajah and benefit from those seeking them out, some were selected to serve as ‘interpreters.’ This is one of many developments leading to the gradual decline of Yakku culture into credulity. The more ancient the Wajah, the more esteemed their rumbling utterances. They now have many honorific titles, such as ‘Those Who Sway With all Eleven Winds.’ The more ancient the Wajah, the more unintelligible their pronouncements. This led to the transformation of the original interpreters into a priesthood controlling a growing mystical culture. The general population embraced this development and began pilgrimages to the Ring Lakes. Gradually, it became the custom for individuals, groups, and official delegations to cue before their preferred Wajah to seek advice on all issues. This, in turn, led to mystical beliefs of the Wajah possessing supernatural powers, allowing them to see into the future.

These sad developments, attended by others suggesting a rapid decline in a well-educated culture informed by the standards of the original Viracocha District Flora Ministry, were viewed with increasing alarm by the Moval leadership and literary figures, artists, academics and researchers. They joined forces to produce a chorus of critiques of these developments. Academics, historians and librarians offered extensive research into the contradictions between statements made by the Wajah not in accordance with established historical fact. One humorous volume extensively details how, over time, the Wajah had often contradicted each other and themselves. Other scholarly works made clear how tenuous was the notion of the creation of the Wajah and revealed the strange history of this innovation. More famous and popular contributions to this discussion were found in a growing body of satires, particularly in theatrical productions and song lyrics, lampooning the many absurdities of this situation.

As may be expected, while these eloquent messages influenced those not fully committed, particularly among the young and educated, to the faithful, these challenges only stiffened their blind adherence to the Wajah. This also further defined growing divides in the population along several cultural and demographic fault lines.  The urban centres of the Crown Rises became the source of most of the critiques. In contrast, the hinterlands, disparagingly called the ‘backforest,’ increasingly turned away from their respectful attitudes toward their elites. Within these ‘thickets,’ there was a descent into mysticism, best typified by the image above, an example of what would come to be known as ‘backwoods art.’ The original narrative of Yakku emergence, defeating the Suvuka, and the already considerable legacy of previous generations appeared to no longer provide sufficient cohesiveness to the Yakku Collective. Their association with the Koru unintentionally intensified all of this.

The three icons above are apt symbols for this dispute between the Yakku and Koru concerning their shared offspring, the Yelda. They represent the Sumudin, Kudurapala, and what was initially referred to as the Field Yelda. Begun during The Happy Century and continuing through the remaining six hundred years of The Interim and, to a lesser extent, during the first two centuries of the Secondary Epoch, the joyous issue of Koru and Yakku love spread through both nations. The Yelda proved adept in fitting into the mountain caverns and forest canopy. As their generations progressed, they displayed modest versions of The Change. What came to be called the Yakku Yelda ‘grew their ears’ to a limited extent and even saw their toes slightly lengthen. The Koru Yelda grew stocky, with their eyes widening for night vision. Neither Yakku Yelda nor Koru Yelda displayed these alterations to nearly the same degree as their parents. In both cases, they remained of similar height and, in other ways, distinguished themselves as a distinct and autonomous hybrid. Gradually, these differences were cultivated and augmented by each parent society in ways accentuating their living in different social environments. While the Yakku formed them to integrate into their arboreal society, the Koru went further.

Represented here is what is known as the Colloquium Completion Icon. At the bottom, from left to right, are the icons for the Sumudin, Field Yelda and Kudurapala; midway up is the terrible image of the crucible of Tich-Tushmul, which will be fully explored in the third novel of this series, Dalinantu Emergence. At the top is the Koru icon for the Danam Yelda, seen as the culmination of the original Colloquium’s efforts. As such, its formation came long after the events of this narrative.

From this point forward, the most powerful of the Koru Operants began separating and perfecting subsequent generations of Koru Yelda into distinct classes. Two of these classes, the Sumudin and Kudurapala, would grow into specialties serving the ever-increasing Koru nation within their original mountain chambers and, later, in the Secondary Epoch, their Living Mountains. The third class was eventually termed the Field Yelda. Initially, their public status was as agriculturalists and pastoralists. While they began to ply their craft within sheltered valleys in the Mulungu Mountains, eventually, they were to be settled out on the Marachla Plain. It must be appreciated that these plans were laid when there was no possibility of their realization due to the Suvuka still possessing the Skin of Anu. As such, these Yelda symbolized a hopeful future for the Koru. Much of the Colloquium’s work was publicized in what came to be known as the ‘Yeldic Bulletins.’ These were widely distributed and eagerly anticipated by the emerging Koru society. They were later bound into multiple volumes. Due to their surprisingly cerebral and elegant prose, extensive selections were later included in the first portions of the Yiz-Vayaj, celebrating the noble origins of the Danam Yelda.

What happened next varied in numerous ways, ranging from arrests, show trials and book burnings to little or no change. These variations spoke to the Votary’s varying degrees of success before this turning point. In the case of Bithen Regional Tree, where Foremost Moval Jovikel and his family lived, there was more and less disruption. Due to this region’s long history of supporting solid ties with the Koru and being a haven for scholarly and artistic critics of the Siv-Sa religion, a great deal of governmental, institutional and cultural infrastructure was destroyed. At the same time, a significant portion of the population, particularly from the capital, Gye Sonin, surreptitiously began leaving during the period of the initial Ring Lakes Declaration up to the burning of the treed avenues leading to the Koru clusters in the neighbouring Viracocha Mountains. With this dramatic culmination of events, readers will leave the Yakku Collective for several subsequent novels.

Interview about Amarel Mountain Sunday, March 31, 2024.