The air shimmered as Inro, Arca, and Cairin stepped through the stone archway, leaving the flat gray of Terminus behind and emerging to the dark, starless chill of Ziggurat. Glancing back at the limb-coated warriors emerging from the whatever between place the arches created, something about how they manifested into reality gave Inro the impression of folding. Not the Thorn mirrage-shimmer he'd become accustomed to, but something that just felt different. He couldn't explain it even to himself, but he didn't dwell on it for they were here to fight, not study.

  A sprawl of once-white, now yellowed cloth tents stretched in all directions from the archway. Groans, coughing, and snores came from within. The stench of vomit, bile, and blood hit Inro's nose hard, but not nearly so intense as the rotting meat reek of the vast rotter pens stretching beyond the tent city. For a moment, Inro stood shocked still and silent at the scope of them. Had the Legions tried to fight the Aj and faced casualty rates as high as Inro had in Sunset? How else could so many rotters be gathered here at the Book's military stronghold of all places?

  Cairin's stump nudged him as the cadre of hand-picked warriors they had selected for the initial assault pooled around them, looking between the tents, pens, and Inro. "What is? From Inro's look, another basket of snakes falls, but Cairin sees only one bright star and some smooth cliffs of man-make."

  "There's been a war or plague or worse," Inro whispered. "Those are the rotters I told you of."

  Cairin nodded, taking in the standing, rotting dead with jaded indifference. "Good for One Tribe. Enemy already weakened."

  "I don't want them weak, I want to execute their flawed leadership, then use the whatever of the Legions they haven't wasted to destroy the Aj." As he spoke, Inro motioned for the others to follow him, dropping low and sneaking from tent to tent. They all wore the darkest Limn paint they'd been able to scrape up, but even the darkest gray and black hues sparkled with the flakes of currence within. Moving with the stuff on felt strange, beyond even the texture and feel on his skin. It was as though his body weighed far more yet moved more easily.

  As his people fanned out to secure the area around the archway, Inro controlled his breathing. They'd been lucky and came during the sleep hours of Ziggurat's perpetual bright night. Arriving a few hours earlier or later likely would have led to a far more violent and rushed entry.

  "Better a lucky general than a good one," he muttered, counting his heartbeats as they waited for the second wave. A brief scuffle broke out near one of the tents as a wounded Legionnaire stepped out, glanced up, and spotted one of their warriors. Fortunately, the man proved too surprised to utter a sound before a broad-chested Stone Tribe warrior rush up behind him to club him in the back of the head with an obsidian-studded club. The warrior grinned at Inro, then motioned to the nearest One Tribe warriors. They drew obsidian knives and ducked inside the tent the man had ducked out of.

  When they came back out, they wiped blood from said knives on the bandages wrapping the now-dead Legionnaire's chest and dragged his corpse inside before returning to the shadows to wait.

  Inro regretted the losses. If the others didn't arrive soon and they couldn't move on, many more would die needlessly.

  Then the air under the arch twisted and the elite teams he'd dispatched to sever the Thorns out of Sunset and who'd loyally holed up in Terminus all these many months until Inro returned folded into Ziggurat. Though only a few handfuls of them remained, half of them carried the shadowblades Inro had spent centuries accruing and training his best soldiers with - terrifying individuals to face across the battlefield indeed.

  Though they'd refused Limn even after seeing a quick demonstration of its potency and been shocked at Inro's barbaric, tribal appearance, Inro had hammered loyalty and discipline into all of them from the time they were children. They all wore black face paint with dark cloaks to cover their well-oiled arms and armor. Their leader, Centurion Hadrien, caught Inro's eye and joined Inro in a tent's shadow.

  "To the First Tier?" he whispered.

  Inro nodded. "Whether Baka's there or not, we can easily hold it with this many warriors for the day until the others arrive if needs be."

  "Let's hope needs not be," Hadrien muttered, glancing at the otherworldly painted and glinting One Tribe warriors then to among the tents and rotter corrals. "Looks like too many Legionnaires are already dead or dying. The Ancients finally come to blows with the Fraction or the Isolates?"

  "Wish we could have taken the time to find out before coming here," Inro said, motioning the warriors and soldiers towards the gates leading to the Third Tier. "Food and water are scarce in Origin so we had little to carry and only so many clay urns to carry it with; we'd be losing strength due to hunger and thirst before anyone could make it to a populous verse and report back what we're getting into."

  "And risked them being captured and us found out besides," Hadrien said. They'd hashed all this out in a quick meeting upon their reunion in Terminus, but leading less than a hundred warriors seemed like a much better plan while sitting in the midst of the One Tribe's thousands than it did now looking at the imposing fortifications rising from the cliff-like face of Ziggurat's Third Tier. The repetition helped assuage the nerves and forestall the second-guessing that always found military leaders standing on the precipice of battle.

  Fortunately, the rotter pens provided cover most of the way to the gates. Though the sheer numbers of them standing there inert continued to shock Inro, he was grateful for them in the moment. As he and his troops moved along, he opened a few gates and nudged enough rotters towards them that the whole mass began a slow-motion shuffle out of the corrals. If they had to fight here, a few hundred rotters roaming around would add to the confusion of the battle.

  A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

  At the wide, low-inclined ramp leading up through the wide gatehouse to the Third Tier, Inro and the One Tribe warriors hunkered down in the nearest rotter pen. They collected the cloaks from Hadrien and his men. The Legionnaires stood tall, formed up a double column, and marched towards the gates with the timed tread of a Legion at march.

  At the gate, the watch officer walked out of a smaller gatehouse with a few bored-looking Legionnaires following a few steps behind. Inro couldn't make out the words of the officer's challenge, but he heard similar boredom in the man's tone. By their disheveled, unpolished appearance, Inro labeled them garrison dregs - the sorts of soldiers you left behind to guard your impregnable fortress to keep them out of the way of the real soldiers doing the fighting and dying.

  In spite of that recognition, he mourned their sudden deaths. Hadrien and his men caught them completely by surprise, suddenly shifting from attitudes of complacent negligence as they drove two or three spears into each guard and an extra into the officer. One of the men got off a short cry before a shadow blade lashed out and cleanly cut the top of his head off. Inro and his warriors met Hadrien's men halfway between the gates and the rotter pens. They tossed the bodies into the tight press of dead flesh then hustled through the looming gatehouse with sharp glances up at the murder holes gaping above them.

  Nothing. Either so many Legionnaires had been lost the ones Hadrien's men killed were all that could be spared or Baka had grown extremely lax and overconfident. Judging by the heavy layers of extra fortification tacked onto the walls about the Thorn he could see in the distance, the latter made sense. By the sheer numbers of rotters, the former. Perhaps both were true.

  While a squad of Hadrien's men took up the cloaks and positions of the guard's they'd dispatched and a couple more climbed up into the heavy structure of the gate house, the rest of Hadrien's men reformed their columns and began the march along the well-worn stone roads marking the center of the Third Tier.

  Fortunately, Ziggurat's Tier layouts and contents had changed little in the decade-or-so since Inro had been there last. It seemed the rough route he sketched in the dirt of Terminus plotted cleanly through the warehouses, smithies, armories, and granaries packing the Third Tier. In their cover, Inro and his warriors shadowed Hadrien's march all the way around to the far side of the Tier where the gates to the Second Tier rose.

  What little other traffic passed along the road - mostly messengers, wagoneers hauling bronze, cloth, or grain, and, at one point, a clunking ConMach convoy - ignored Hadrien's little company completely.

  From the shadows stretching from the lip of a giant stone cistern, Inro and his One Tribe warriors watched as Hadrien approached the Second Tier gate house. Where the Third Tier's spread stretched wide enough to host a small city, the Second Tier's footprint spanned only the acreage of a large castle. The First Tier formed a high tower at its heart. Unlike the lax watch at the Third Tier, an actual Dynast in full armor stood in the middle of the gateway. Between his long braided hair and a luminescent line traced around his hand, Inro marked him instantly.

  "Ruja," Inro growled. "Never trusted him. Must have defected and sold out Berujat to the Ancients if the civil war the Imminent have been fomenting for a hundred years finally broke while I was gone."

  "Other Dynasts hard to kill as Inro?" Arca said, taking in the lean Dynast with his good eye.

  "Not nearly," Inro said. "But still dangerous. If they all close on him quickly enough they can probably take him down without-"

  Ruja proved far more suspicious than the Third Tier guards had been. When Hadrien ignored Ruja's calls to halt to be sure they were close enough to bring him down, Ruja stepped back and unleashed a rapidly-intensifying roar that started out deafening before it turned kinetic. Those of Hadrien's men who didn't fall down clutching their ears as the sound amplified, were hurled like dolls with the booming force of Ruja's shout when he unleashed it.

  "What dark magics are these?" Arca cried.

  "Never seen its like before," Inro said, already sprinting towards the Second Tier gate. He wondered what other tricks the Dynasts had been hoarding, keeping away from each other to only be utilized now as the Book broke. "Whatever luck we had just ran out."

  Ruja tilted his plumed helmet back and grinned ferally as he admired his handiwork. A horn blasted sharply from the top of the gatehouse, echoed soon after by others across the Third Tier and likely rippling outwards towards other Tiers.

  The Dynast shook his head, his voice booming. "Rogue Legion's extinct, hadn't you heard? You're supposed to be off fucking Wretches and begging along side starving menials now."

  The sight of Inro and a few score Limn-clad, otherwise naked, shaven-headed warriors rushing towards him took the cocky Dynast back for a moment, but he soon braced himself and the hum amplified again.

  "Ruja! Bastard son of Rega. Is this any way to greet your uncle?" Inro called as he ran forward.

  A tiny fragment of confusion faltered Ruja's expression and the building resonance of his hum. It bought them one second. That one second ended up being all that they needed for Cairin and her slingers to come into range. Limn-coated stones whistled from slings. Recognizing them and, draped as he was in heavy layers of armor, Ruja ignored them, opening his mouth wide to blast them with sound.

  Instead, the whole mouth of the gatehouse vanished in a stuttering series of booms and cracks as the slings struck. Stony debris, dust, smoke, and blood-misted chunks of what had been Ruja caromed in all directions. Before the dust had settled, Irno and the others were inside the gatehouse. The stone about them creaked, popped, and groaned.

  "Quickly, come through in before it comes down," Inro shouted, motioning for the rest of the hustling One Tribe warriors and what was left of Hadrien's soldiers to stagger through. Sounds of fighting erupted in the courtyard soon after they ran past Inro. As the last came through the gate, Inro directed Hadrien's men up the inner gatehouse stairs to close it. Or rather, those who had been Hadrien's men as the Centurion hadn't made it through.

  "Hadrien. Another face to haunt my dreams," Inro muttered.

  A few half-armed and -armored Legionnaires streamed into the Courtyard or launched arrows, bolts, stones, and javelins from atop the walls, but Inro's forces held surprise, the initiative, and quickly a vast morale gulf as the Legionnaire's weapons deflected harmlessly off of or shattered against the One Tribe's Limn paints.

  Inro ignored it all even as Arca peeled off to lead a charge against a group of Legionnaires trying to form a phalanx on the far side of the courtyard and Cairin slowed to concussively pick off archers atop the wall. His focus locked on the First Tier tower.

  When Baka emerged from the heavy bronze doors atop the narrow ramp leading to the First Tier, Inro faced him alone. Baka was not only the largest Dynast Inro had ever seen, but one of the largest men, period. Coated in plated steel armor, wearing a high-plumed helm, and hefting an immense steel war axe complete with a long spike off the back, the man looked born and bred for battle.

  Next chapter: Same chapter. Inro vs Baka... fight!

  Adonissian: a Phero who poses as a traveling musician. Died of the Wretch Plague in Heaven's Tread.

  Aida: MC. Mother of Exiles. "Ender of Verses?" "Savior of Dynasties?"

  Aj: a long-slumbering, powerful being which annihilated Inro's Sunset Legions. Also "almost destroyed the Dynasty single-handedly six-and-some centuries ago"

  Alerestro: a handsome, multi-talented man from Azure. Partner of Viviana. Accidentally killed by Jaxe in the One-Eighth.

  Aliasara: servant at Ocyl's villa who befriends Aida

  Anticores: a pair of Sect representatives, off-putting and strange

  Arca: chief of the tribe that "adopted" Inro

  Asta: Tertius Dynast of Silk. Assassinated by the Rags.

  Avani: Hassani's daughter, an albino

  Baka: Dynast of Ziggurat. Huge, massively strong. Tertius.

  Balmos: Venger working for Ghulen

  "Braid"; a thug who accosted Aida in Jadeye. His face gifted to Aida by Ocyl.

  Broadaxe: large, axe-and-shield-wielding Feral protecting Aida. Killed by Jaxe in Jadeye

  Cairin: Arca's sister, slinger

  Cleft Hand: malcontent in the One-Eighth, maimed hand due to Ryk. Impaled on a broken spear by Wretches in the One-Eighth.

  Das: Rega's Immanent

  Deai: Hassani's swordmaster, renowned for killing a Paragon

  Dels: Dynast of Azure

  Denault: Hassani's husband. Shipwright, Kin.

  Eonora: a Legion officer in Ziggurat who defected with the Rogue Legions Mother's Militant

  Eth: a young Imminent

  Ghillie: a 3rd Feral who wears a primitive Ghillie suit. Carries cross between kunai and acupuncture needles

  Ghulen: Rega's "pet monster", an Inviolate

  Goboro: a fat, amiable scribe friend of Hassani's in Libriam

  Godge and Ardina: Primary Small Masters in Berujat

  Fallon: Aida's Seneschal. Died killing the Inviolate Rasofi in Jadeye

  Fatma: weakest Small Master of Berujat

  Feral: a bone-masked woman of violence (Feral) in Aida's service. Knife wielder. Killed by Ghillie in Jadeye.

  Festrin: Seneschal of Monopollis, father of Fallon

  Fetriene: Ocyl's soresearer

  Goldilocks: twitchy, spear-and-javelin carrying Feral guarding Aida. Died burning a Wicker Way in Jadeye.

  Hassani: Inviolate agent of the Black Court, sent by Fractious Fraction

  Hue: Vibrant accompanying Simon

  Huspara: minor bureaucrat in Libriam

  Ijran: Multi-minded wiz, Small Master of Berujat

  Inro: Dynast formerly ruling Sunset

  Izbali: a silent tribal shaman

  Janali: Ocyl's elegant Seneschal

  Jaxe: Dynast of Stacks. "Young" (Secounds), wealthy. Also has "the Pale" (an Albino). Ancient.

  Johine: crude slave

  Kass/Kassenia: mercenary attached to Adonissian.

  Maxem: High Parser from Ink, ambassador to Jadeye

  Ocyl: Dynast of Heaven's Tread, powerful and unpredictable

  Parathas: Aida's skinscribe. Also a mountaineer.

  "Professor, The": leader of Aida's Wretches, impaled on a tree in the One-Eighth

  Rasofi: Inviolate killed by Fallon in Jadeye

  Reck: Dynast of Chalk, "not witty enough to be clever and takes himself too seriously to be ironic". Paranoid, Fractious Fraction. Tertius. Died to a mob of menials in Jadeye.

  Rega: Inro's sister, Dynast of Monopolis. Septemius

  Riccaro: majordomo of Ocyl's estate. Hung by a looting mob in Heaven's Tread.

  Ruja: Dynast of Berujat. Killed by Cairin and company in Ziggurat.

  Rustrovan/"Rusty": Eth's old, gap-toothed skinscribe. Died of Wretch Plague.

  Ryk: "the most beautiful man Aida had ever seen", a Paragon

  Sadar: odd boy traveling with Semon, a Twine. Killed by Kass in Libriam.

  Sava: Dynast of Libriam

  Savalius: Grand Quartermaster of the Legions

  Semon "Goldtongue": white-haired, one-eyed master of cults. First Disciple of the Mother. Killed by Ghulen in Libriam.

  Sephily: diminutive Arborist from Groves

  Stiller: serving boy at Ocyl's estate. Rendered mute by psychological or head-trauma

  Strygen: a dusa traveling with Semon. Killed by Kass and Balmos in Libriam.

  Taesal: one of Rega's other Inviolates, axe scar to face

  Three Bracelets Left: "Leader" of the Mune collective

  "Toothy": leader of a group of thugs who accosted Aida in Heaven's Tread. Killed by Feral in Jadeye

  Tyrs: many-pierced Secundus Dynast of Forge. Fed into one of his own forges by the Rags.

  Valeer: a mentally challenged, unkempt individual able to manipulate Thorns. Died in Jadeye to "Braid".

  Vanyen: A crippled young woman who created the Cult of the Mother. Martyred Prophet of the Mother. Murdered by Semon Dynastic Assassins.

  Venner: Grandmaster of Optimimes in Jadeye, "best in the entire Book"

  Viviana: gorgeous, multi-talented ex-slave from Berujat. Partner of Alerestro. Killed by the Vale Legion in Berujat

  Wake: Dynast of Graves, marries even though they all die. Quintus. Isolate.

  White Spiral: an older Feral in Aida's service. Archer. Died protecting Aida in Jadeye

  36th Dynasty: A Dynasty the Anticores have met?.

  100th Dynasty: The Dynasty ruling the Book.

  Adventures of Bubo, The: popular kids story

  All, The: All the verses, even those beyond The Book.

  Ancients: a major Dynastic Chapter, an "elite number", "own Ziggurat" and "run the great bank that is Monopolis"

  Anchorites: individuals capable of creating anchor points affixed to nothing.

  Annalis compound: sprawling complex in Libriam, heart of The Book's bureaucracy. Arrivals 'Dirt' home to new dispatches, Archives 'Dust' storage for old material. Paths and Ways storage for 'nails. Burned to the ground by the Rags.

  Anticore: Sect creature which "wears convincing human skins" with "swarming insects... beneath the skin"

  Arborian: gardeners from Groves

  Arcers: a type of mancer able to summon blades of energy

  Ascen, The/The Ascendant: divinities "watching over every verse"?

  Assessor: census-taker

  Audits/"Diggers": Libriam internal affairs

  Autumn: verse rich in gold?

  Aze: swordmaker?

  Azure: An oceanic verse with blue beaches ruled by

  Berujat: "fleshmarkets"; primary seat of slave trade and home of most Lineage Masters, owned by Fraction.

  Black Court: a realm of pure darkness. Also, those who rule there. Where Partaking happens.

  Black Court Tribunal: localized Black Court authority?

  Blood, The: imbibed at Partaking, transforms one into a Dynast if they survive

  Book of Verses, The: the 1,000 verses ruled by the Dynasty. "The Kiloverse"

  Broadcliff, Tallmarket: cities in Stacks

  Bubo's Tale: Story of an ancient dyast who explored a mythical land called "Christendom" with his rats

  Calms: periods when ever-blowing winds die down in Berujat

  Canyon of Cages: cliff where slaves are held in Berujat

  Cave Dwellers: tribes that live in the underground in Origin, keep others out until "the Return"

  Century Thread: additional threads appearing elsewhere on the body every century a Dynast lives

  Cerebrist: creator of slavants

  Chalk/"Vistas": verse entirely made of chalky cliff, belongs to Reck

  Chant, The/Sacrosanct Chant: some sort of law in the Dynasty?

  Chant of Inoculation: chant supposed to protect against disease, "Mudra of Cleansing"

  Chapters: power groupings among the Dynasts of the Book: predominantly The Ancients, the Fractious Fraction, and Isolates.

  Circular Sea: an ocean abutting the Jadeye segment of Heaven's Tread

  Clock Priest: priests from Gears who track and tell time religiously

  Commu: chewed drug/herb?

  ConMach: convoy? courier? "ConMach drains the very life from the Directory's verses". Supply "ConMach machines"

  Construct: some great machine draining reality via black holes to create the All.

  Crowmen: buy corpses to return them to life and service as rotters

  Cupola Thorn: the main Thorn in the city Jadeye in Heaven's Tread, a stone dome built over it

  Currence: something valuable inside old coins? "harder than currence"? "Solid current forms currence." Currence melts to watter.

  Currency: money, gold coins once held currence inside to give value, now debased

  Current: some form of energy that powers "artifices"? "Solid current forms currence."

  Directory: "the Directory to Ink is like the Dynasty to the Book", dominating rulers of Ink

  Donative, The: Black Court taxes, taken by Legion if not offered. Don't pay, no Partaking every century.

  Dusa: people with manipulable hair of silver wire, from Gears

  Dynast: individual given rule of a verse if they survive Partaking. Ageless and hard to kill. Regenerative. Sustained by "the Blood"; no food or water necessary.

  Dynast's Tower: a massive tower at the peak of Ziggurat.

  Dynasty: the Dynasts who rule the Book

  Ebon: founder of the Dynasty and Black Court

  Ebon Saga: the tale of Ebon's foundation of The Book and Dynasty

  Ebonese: the language of the Book

  Echoseer shells: devices to allow one to "see" in the Black Court

  El: semi-insubstantial snake/remora-like creatures that follow gods (and sometimes Dynasts) around

  "Emperor of Everything": popular kids story about Inro turning down becoming emperor, then crushing those who elevated a different Dynast

  Feral: bone-masked bodyguards who require the essence of their master to survive. "Damned to Ferals" as a form of capital punishment. "the damned", "damned to a Feral"

  Fetalist: Imminent faction who believe the future is unchangeable

  First Thread/Primus: a fresh Dynast/the first luminescent silver thread etched into their foreheads.

  Forge: verse ruled by Tyrs with much metalworking

  Fractious Fraction/"DissatisFaction"/"The Renewal": a major Dynastic Chapter who "hate everyone including each other", "entice every freemancer and Lineage Master" ... "to Berujat". For those with "verses deficient in maor ways."

  Gates, The: Inter-verse travel method created by Ebon. Opened with Limn

  God, A: unique, "undying" creatures of immense size, The First Ones

  God's Rote: child's first memorization, what gods are

  God-dwellers: "monks" who live on a god

  God-touched: those who have physically touched a god (and lived)

  Gonist: organ dealers and traders

  Gons: self-sustaining organs capable of living outside a host

  Graves: a verse "Made of the dead by the dead for the dead".

  Green People: A tribe of jungle dwellers from Origin

  Groves: a forest verse, home to Arborists

  Heaven's Tread: a verse "inside a hollow rolling pin", host to Jadeye, the largest city in the Book

  High Parser: officials from Ink

  Imminent: seers advising Dynasts and shaping course of The Book

  Imminent Prophecy: something about a barbarian Dynast, Ender of Verses and/or Savior of Dynasties?

  Inevitables; faction of Imminent who believe it is their sacred duty to ensure the future comes to pass as seen

  Ink: home verses of the Skeinry, Keens, Directory, and "the Faded People". Drained of color and drained.

  Innoculist: doctors who teach chants "brought from Logos" to cure disease

  Inviolate: agents of the black court who "serve the Black Court, protect the Dynasty, uphold the Chant, root out corruption" with "unlimited, undisclosed, and untraceable budgets"

  Inviolate Vial: carried by Inviolates as badge of office

  Iode: substance that ignites when crushed

  Iris: the giant portals leading between one cylinder of Heaven's Tread to the next

  Isolates: a major Dynastic Chapter with a "unified stand for independence", "cheat the Donative, stockpil[e] currence and watter" "hire Keen mercenaries" "raise own private Legions in secret"

  Jade Eye, The: the "giant emerald" at the middle of Ocyl's Spire in Jadeye

  Jadeye: the largest city in the Book and major trade hub, in Heaven's Trade

  Jar: Name of a "gold" coin now made of brass. Once held currence within.

  Jaxeday: holiday in Stacks with boat carvings, feasts, games of Fishhead, dances, and storytelling

  Jaxestack: a whitewashed stack on Stacks home to Jaxekin

  Jutland Reach: a verse with guns?

  Gates: previous travel method before Thorns and the Kiss, opened by painting Limn on an arch in one verse and another in Terminus

  Green People: tribes that live in the jungles of Origin

  Keen: Ink warriors wearing impossibly-heavy iron armor whose power source drains color from the area about it. "Tank knights"

  Kin: descendants of a Dynast, most desperately trying to reach 100 so they can Partake

  Kiss, The: disease that wiped out "hundreds of verses", also name for the time period when Aj became active last and destroyed 100s of verses before halting in Sunset

  Lambent ram: animal whose wool glows?

  Letch: sect bred leech-like creature designed to stop bleeding on wounds

  Libriam: a swampy verse home to the Annalis, heart of The Book's bureaucracy

  Libwe: tribe possessing the "holy" Limn clay bed.

  Limn: "infused clay" bearing some sort of internal power, used by Ebon to found the Dynasty

  Lineage: a line of mancers taught by a Master

  Linemen: workers on the Stacks trolleys who pull the cars along the lines

  Lizard Hunters: Arca's people, walkers of the wastes of Origin

  Logos: "the thought realm"

  Machine Curse: something that stops machines from working between verses?

  Mancers: "no mancers arc (could) affect it", people with abilities beyond human normal, usually trained/implanted by a Master.

  Master's Markets: primary slave market in the Book in Berujat

  Menial: common folk

  Molt: person able to shed skins (see skins)

  Mon, The: "the Outsiders". "exist only to destroy the Book" with their "demonic and monstrous children" from "the Hells beyond". The same race as the Ascen but objectors to the creation of the All.

  Monopolis: the "City of Currency", bank verse ruled by Rega

  Mourne, The: something dangerous that lurks in the Vale, "the why we do not tarry"

  Mother's Faith: the relgion based on Aida created by Semon

  Mother's Militant: Formerly the Rogue Legions led by Eonora, now pledged to protect the people of the Book

  Mune: a utopist collective from Dost who mask their identities and share everything communally

  Nameday: when children are named

  Ocyl's Preserve: a garden "beyond the Circular Sea" in Heaven's Tread?

  Ocyl's Spire: the tower home to the court of Ocyl, Dyanst of Heaven's Tread

  One Tribe, The: Arca's new tribe incorporating the Libwe and whomever else is conquered or enticed to join.

  One-Eighth Shithole: Aida's verse. Unfortunately. A desolate place home to volcanoes and a giant dead turtle

  Optomime: gadgeteer

  Origin: the First Verse, from which Ebon originated, containing the "Cities Below". The "first page of The Book"

  Pale, The: light-skinned people, conquered by Ebon during the founding of the Dynasty. Alternately, albinism

  Paragon: warrior who can see the future

  Partaking: the ritual that creates Dynasts (or kills those who try). Performed by some unknown, large creature in the Black Court.

  Phero: Lineage whose scent creates overwhelming attraction

  'pillar: fuzzy Sect-bred giant caterpillar pet

  Porcelain Guard: Ocyl's white-masked Ferals

  Pure Priest of the Ascen/Blind Priests: priests praising the Ascen and back the Black Court

  Rags: derogatory name for alliance of Isolates and Fractious Fraction. Call themselves "Resistance Against the Grevious Ancient Coup."

  Reachers: massive, Sect-bred creatures that direct traffic and rescue unfortunates in the Sighted Path in Jadeye

  Reconquest: time four-hundred years ago when Inro "drove [tribals] back into civilization's fold at spear point"

  Rotters: sack-clothed, crudely-masked 'zombies' uses as pack-beasts and simple laborers. Created/sold by Crowmen.

  Royal Strider: giant striders which carry carriages of the wealthy slung underneath them

  Sect, The: breeders of useful insectoid- and/or sauroid-like creatures

  Seericide: seers capable of Knowing everything as they die

  Seneschal: chief servant of a Dynast, bear permanent strings allowing them to speak and understand any language

  Shale: a verse famous for its expensive stone

  Shore Striders: tribes that live along the oceans of Caves

  Shackle Pens: slave pens near Master's Market in Berujat?

  Shrineway: religious section of Jadeye "brailled prayers along the walls ... [and] cobblestones"

  Sighted Path: the zero-g road down the center of Heaven's Tread

  Silk: verse owned by Asta where all of verse's silk originates

  Sixth Tier Rebellion: last major uprising, in Ziggurat a century ago when "half the legions rose up". Put down by Baka

  Skeinry: iron-plated communication centers where Skeiners translate vibrations sent by wyre from other verses

  Skin/Hollow: animate skin of a molt able to move, talk, and share snatches of its experience with its molt

  Skinlife: living tattoos

  Skinscribe: individuals brailled with lore, walking libraries

  Slavant: an individual who "loses much" to be implanted with an ability

  Soresearer: individuals capable of "healing" by cauterizing wounds with their hands

  Stacks: An ocean verse comprised of tall pillars jutting up from the seas. Trolleys run on long ropes between them "affixed by Anchorites to airy nothing"

  Striders: "stilt-legged gray-skinned insect-lizard"s used as fast mounts, large enough to carry several riders

  Strings: worn or implanted wire devices that translate speech

  Stone Walkers: tribes that live in the cold of Origin

  Subterrane, The: inter-verse travel route accessed by Ebon via Limn

  Sunset: the verse where Aj was 'contained', formerly protected by Dynast Inro. The "Prison of Prisons" holds mad Dynasts, monsters and demons... vaults of dangerous relics.

  Sunset Legions/Vault Legions: Inro's Legions, wiped out by Aj in Sunset

  Surgon: person able to remove organs

  Swirl: A verse. "The pleasure barges of Swirl"

  Syphon: machine ConMach uses to "drain the very life" and color from a verse to "fuel... machinery"

  Tangle, The: the jungles of the One-Eighth

  Terminus: the verse from which the Gates all opened, hub of the Book before The Kiss and now mostly abandoned.

  Thorn: huge, curling thorns which Valeers can use as gateways to the Vale, doorways between verses. Grow into verses over centuries. The 2√3 Dynasty.

  Thrum: guide in the Black Court

  Tribunal: group of three Dynasts coming together to make ruling or pass judgment

  Twine: "one soul threaded through two bodies"

  Unkillable Swordsman: a Paragon killed by Deia long ago

  Vale: "The Place Between". A realm of high-contrast black and white full of thorns and Thorns.

  Vale Walkers: discoverers of verses

  Valeer: people capable of activating Thorns, barely functional of anything else

  Valeer's 'nail: crystals containing wafers that allow travel within the Vale to specific verses without a Valeer

  Venger: muscle man?

  Verse: a pocket universe or world

  Verser Lord/Lady: agents of an individual Dynast who rule part of a verse at the whim of their Dynast

  Vibrant: color-changing individuals from Ink?

  Watter: an energetic liquid. "Currence melts to watter. Watter's current dissipates over time, leaving water."

  Weeping Falls: Jadeye Iris flowing with waterfalls

  Wicker Way: towers of stone, wood, and rope that connect opposite far sides of Jadeye

  Wiz of Berujat: multi-minded, capable of performing multiple tasks simultaneously

  World Spear: an immense stack on Stacks

  Wretch: untouchables forced to walk on all fours, "the human refuse that cleans up the literal waste piles"

  Wretch Plague/Dynast's Plague: the flu. A horrific disease spread by Wretches.

  Wyres: lines run through the Vale between verses that allow communication between. A giant Ziggurat