Abraxas: curiosities and ancient artifacts

Having run through our lightning survey of the land of Abraxas in the last few weeks, this is a good point to give proper credit to Russ Nicholson, who drew stacks of fabulous concept art for the project. I've said before that working with Russ is not just a question of briefing him to do drawings. He's a true creative collaborator, feeding back ideas at least as fast as Jamie and I send them to him. Many of the nice cultural touches in these pictures were dreamed up entirely by Russ.

I only wish we could have turned it into the amazing MMOG it would have been, but unfortunately Eidos closed down their internal game development in early 2000 and that was the end of the Abraxas project. Luckily we recovered the rights, so we may yet find something to do with it all.

Anyway, today's feature is a look at some of the "magical" oddities of Earth circa 38,000 BC.

Daedalanths

Powerful automata, usually bipedal, that a medieval observer would describe as an iron golem and to the 20th century eye might resemble a robot. Although entirely mechanical, daedalanths have a microscopic symbiote integrated into their metal lattice. This symbiote metabolizes minerals and metal from the local environment to maintain the daedalanth. Daedalanths are therefore enormously resilient and even "heal" if damaged - albeit very slowly.

Individual daedalanths vary considerably in appearance, according to the whims of their creators. A daedalanth built as an ancient potentate's bodyguard might be fantastically decorated and gilded, with a face like a mythological mask, while one built to quarry rock might not be even vaguely humanoid.

Daedalanths can sometimes be brought under control by wizards who know the magic words to alter their programming; otherwise they remain steadfast to whatever order they were originally given.

Xoanons

Sometimes also known as "gnarls", these are wooden automata, the result of a mutation in the micro-organism designed to structure daedalanths. Hydraulic muscles provide xoanons with great strength but sluggish reflexes. They are not living creatures any more than daedalanths themselves are, the wood recycled to construct them being dead. However, sometimes flowers and fungi take root in the xoanon's "bark" giving it a bizarrely organic look.

Emulants

Human-like androids constructed right down to the cellular level from life-simulating nanomachines. Emulants are not truly alive in the sense that individual cells are just tiny machines containing no DNA blueprint for the whole. Nonetheless the creature's metabolism parallels that of a truly living organism burning food for energy which is circulated to all parts of the body by means of fluids, etc. Emulants are often beautiful and can pass for human, except for tell-tale signs like the too-regular tint to the iris, the lack of perspiration, the absence of any blemish or callus on the skin, and so forth.

Living armor

Using the same organometallic microbe that sustains daedalanths, the wizards of ancient times created armor that conformed to the wearer's body and could self-repair any damage it took. The usual form of such armor is of a breastplate with neck flanges and articulated arms, one of which (often the left) ends in a blade weapon or long claws. Despite being organometallic, living armor suits are very regular, almost machine-tooled, in appearance and do not display the asymmetry customary to living things. (This results from the very precise non-mutable makeup of the sustaining microorganism, which comprises very large but stable spherical nucleotides. Not that even the most accomplished modern wizard would have a clue about such things.)

Advantages of living armor are that the blade weapon never needs sharpening and the protection afforded by the suit is far greater than normal steel. The armor augments the wearer's strength and, in those cases where it includes a helmet and visor, also gives enhanced vision and hearing.

On the downside, any other metal the wearer carries will gradually be digested to sustain the living armor. Moreover, these suits always leave the back unprotected - perhaps because the genetically modified soldiers for whom they were designed were never intended to flee from their enemies.

Not everyone can use living armor. It seems necessary for the wearer to attune the suit for it to function properly. In some cases the attunement takes so well that the armor cannot be removed. This is random (presumably geared to some dormant gene in the wearer) and not associated with any attribute such as strength or psyche.

Energy weapons

Weapons of the distant past which, by reason of their technology having been kept secret, are regarded now as magic wands. Various types exist: neural batons, photonic staves with lasing crystals, actinic and plasma lances that can be hand-held or mounted, larger ion cannon, and huge orbiting neutron-beam weapons. In most cases the weapon's power cell is inert, but some still have enough charge remaining for a few precious shots, and a few are rechargable by wizards who know how to channel cosmic vril energy into them.

Fliers

Functioning fliers are very rare today but were previously in common use by nobles throughout Abraxas. The styles are as diverse as the natures of the men who used them. Some are sky-yachts, often of wood or light metal. Others take the form of flying arks or palanquins. Some are even more fanciful: a circular terrace complete with plants and banks of seats around the rail; a glass-like floating bubble; a canopied bed borne aloft by cherubic mechanicae; a giant cupped hand of ebonite.

Controls also differ, so that the man who is adept in piloting one flier may have no idea how to operate another. The most convenient control systems involve an interlocutor - essentially an inbuilt neural net that pilots the craft according to spoken commands. Others use an assembly of globes, rods or dials that the pilot must learn to operate. (Item of interest: the current fashion in Argistillum is for wizards to acquire an autistic idiot savant to operate their flier, the functioning of the controls apparently coming naturally to such unfortunates.)

Dragon Warriors of the Lost Continent

In case you want to try out some of the Abraxas aliens (see yesterday's post) in your role-playing campaign, I've had a go at converting them into Dragon Warriors. Of course, these creatures don't really belong anywhere near the magic-steeped, purposely illogical world of Legend, and where I have likened their abilities to magic that's purely for the sake of the rules. The people of Abraxas do believe in magic (for good reason: it exists) but the "magic" of their world is actually the psionic manipulation of cosmic forces, and therefore much more of a science than the undefinable faerie arts of Legend.

VLIS

ATTACK 15
Spear (2d4+1, 5) or kick (1d6+3)
DEFENCE 8
Armour Factor 3 (innate: 1)
MAGICAL DEFENCE 3
EVASION 6
Movement: 12m
Health Points 1d6+10

STEALTH 11

PERCEPTION 8 ("elfsight")

These are the stats for a 1st rank fighter. Vlis sorcerers are also encountered. To make its screech attack, the vlis makes no attack in melee and and at the end of the round must roll its rank or less on 1d6. If a vlis preparing a screech attack is injured during the round, the screech is aborted. If the screech is made, anyone within 3m must roll Strength or less on 2d10 or be stunned (0 ATTACK, DEFENCE and EVASION) the following round. Even if the Strength roll is made, the character is disconcerted, losing initiative for the next 1-6 rounds. Vlis are powerful climbers and can leap twice as far as a human. The strong legs (strictly speaking, the arms) can strike backwards or forwards with equal force, and anyone hit will be knocked back 1-6 metres and must roll Reflexes or less on 2d10 to avoid falliing over.

ULEMBI

ATTACK 13
Vambrace strike (d6+1, 5) +1 vs unarmoured foe
DEFENCE 8

Armour Factor 2 (innate: 1)
MAGICAL DEFENCE 6
EVASION 7

Movement: 15m

Health Points 1d6+11

STEALTH 16

PERCEPTION 8 (darksight)

These stats apply to a typical 1st rank ulembi, though most encountered will also be mystics. The ulembi's psionic ability to instil fear is resolved as a fright attack equal to the creature's rank (+1d6 if it gets surprise) effective on all enemies within 5 metres. If the fright attack succeeds, the opponent drops his weapons and tries to flee - or surrender, if escape is impossible. Even if the fright attack fails, the opponent takes -2 from ATTACK and -1 from damage for 2-12 rounds. The ulembi is able to strike in melee while making the fright attack, but must treat it as a first level mystic spell for purposes of psychic fatigue. Humans captured by the ulembi can be slowly brought under complete mental control, rather like the mystic Enthrall spell but with unlimited duration.

CHURUK

ATTACK 15
Sword, etc (d8+1, 5)
DEFENCE 6
Armour Factor 5 (innate: 2)
MAGICAL DEFENCE 3

EVASION 4
Movement: 9m
Health Points 3d6+7

STEALTH 10

PERCEPTION 10 (panoptical)

These stats would be appropriate for a full complement of the three churuk morphotypes (Strider, Brain and Worker) fighting together, assuming the gestalt's skill was equivalent to 1st rank. Churuk are rarely encountered singly in any case, and are the most tractable of the intelligent nonhuman races inhabiting Earth in 38,000 B.C., though raiding parties are sometimes sent into human territory.

NEANDERTHAL

ATTACK 14
DEFENCE 6
Armour Factor 1 (innate: 0)
MAGICAL DEFENCE 1
EVASION 5
Movement: 10m
Health Points 14
STEALTH 13
PERCEPTION 4 (normal)

Neanderthals are a valid player-character choice. Although not native to Abraxas, they are found on other land masses and could have been brought to the continent as slaves or "barbarian" bodyguards, possibly leading to a Kull-style campaign. Neanderthals get +1 on Strength and Health Points, but roll only 2d6 for Looks (as perceived by other human races) and 1d6 for Psychic Talent. Play a neanderthal character as intelligent but lacking the capacity for abstract thought; your school gym teacher would be a good model. The major difference from other humans is that neanderthals do not think symbolically and therefore have not developed a high degree of art, science, politics or religion. They are superstitious and usually fearful of magic (which to a neanderthal means anything he doesn't know about). They live in small family groups and may be wary and/or contemptuous of the large, well-organized cities of Abraxas. The stats given are for a typical 1st rank fighter. Neanderthals usually fight with spears and wear leather armour.

Abraxas: the rivals of Man

Humans are not the only intelligent species in Abraxas. There are others, some of them well organized and genocidally hostile. The eventual ascendency of Man is not a foregone conclusion.

Vlis

An intelligent pre-human Terran race descended from pterodactyline ocean gliders. When the vlis's distant ancestor adapted to life on the ground, the powerful forelimbs evolved into its legs and the smaller hind limbs became its arms. Several hundred million years on, the hind limbs moved around through a widening of the pelvic girdle and the legs moved back. The creature thus has a low hunched stance with the thorax and head supported like a table-lamp on strong backward-jointed legs; the overall height is about five feet.

Possessions are typically carried in a pan or bag strapped under the thorax; the vlis's long slender-digited arms can easily undo the flaps, remove a needed item, and reseal it with horridly unhuman dexterity. Sometimes this pan will be found to contain a freshly-severed human head; the vlis are believed to collect such heads in order to restore them to sentience in their laboratories, where the head can be maintained in a vat indefinitely while the vlis subject it to interrogation and experiment.

The vlis are man's deadly rivals on Earth, regarding humanity as usurpers of their rightful supremacy. In addition to being skilled fighters, usually with a spear held in both hands, the vlis can use magic and have a sonic screech attack which can distract or stun an opponent.

Ulembi

Creatures from a star cluster beyond the Coal Sack, who came to Earth by psychically broadcasting themselves through outer space to escape their own dying world.

Ulembi have large heads whose hard ridged integument resembles a walnut. This skull protects the creature's huge brain. A ring of dark globular eyes protected by deep recesses allow the ulembi to see in all directions at once. There is a short neck and then the ulembi's trunk bifurcates, the two stout limbs resembling large serpents. At the end, each limb divides into four tentacular fingers. The ulembi can balance on one limb or on its "elbows" while holding something in the fingers, but rarely needs to do so because all ulembi are able to manipulate small objects by telekinesis.

When fully reared up on its limbs, an adult ulembi's head can be as high as eight feet off the ground. But it can also splay its limbs out low, moving with ghastly stealth through undergrowth no more than a few feet high.

In combat the ulembi is able to bristle its scales, giving the limbs a rough jagged surface like pineapple skin. This allows it to flay the skin off an unarmored opponent. Young adults sometimes wear bronze vambraces on the lower limbs, with which they can deliver powerful whip-like blows. Older ulembi disdain physical combat altogether, preferring to use their psionic power to instill a feeling of dread and despair in a foe.

Given a short time with a subdued victim, the most powerful adepts of the ulembi can psionically rewire his brain so that he will serve as their agent. This can even take the form of subliminal commands, so that the victim does not know he has been affected. Eventually tumors form in the brain of the victim, however, and madness and death soon follow.

Eremen

The offshoot of humans altered by an ancient wizard's genetic sorcery. Eremen are recognizably human in origin but have the features required for survival in the desert: large membranous ears, heavy brows, a limber frame, folds of fat around the belly, and elongated webbed digits. A dorsal fin that usually lies flat along the spine can be erected for temperature control as well as conflict and mating displays.

The genetic changes have caused some reduction in these creatures' intelligence: you might be attacked by one wielding a metal club it had found, the club actually turning out to be an ion pistol that it lacked the wits to operate.

Churuk

Hive-dwellers, the descendents of an alien race stranded on Earth in the far past. The churuk thrive best in the sulfurous atmosphere of volcanic rifts, but are hardy enough to tolerate normal air for days or weeks at a time.

The basic body form of a churuk is of a lozenge-shaped torso armored in chitin and with three limbs arranged around the rim. This form can develop in quite different ways, however, according to chemical jellies administered to the eggs during development. Some churuk hatch as Brains, others as Workers, others as Striders. The Striders have powerful legs. The Workers have one of their limbs developed massively for heavy labor or combat; for travel they can move slowly with their other limbs or latch onto the back of a Walker. The Brains are the most intelligent; they have only limited mobility but can latch into the back of a Strider or Worker and directly take charge of its cerebral ganglion (its eyes then close in sleep).

Mottling on the chitinous shell allows a churuk to identify the members of its hive and egg-clutch.

Tamorian spellcasters

A Dragon Warriors post today for those role-players who have been patiently awaiting some rules and numbers to counterbalance all the fantasy background material.

For our long-running Tekumel campaign, Jamie and I devised a list of alternative spells intended to give each country’s sorcerers their own distinctive flavor of magic. The spells below fall under a category of magic we call Phenomenation, “the acquisition of goods and services by magical means”. We found in our Legend campaigns that these spells can also be used for sorcerers from the New Selentine Empire.

Level One: WAYFARER’S LANTERN (replaces Moonglow)

A beam of bright amber light shines from an aperture in the ether above the caster's head, turning to follow his line of sight and moving along with him. This is accompanied by a strong odor of sulfur. The light turns on and off on command, but only at fixed intensity. It lasts for one hour.

Level Two: THE GOBLETS OF THE UNKNOWN ONE

Goblets of white onyx, bearing a glyph of unknown meaning, appear in the hands of up to four people. These contain a full day's water requirement, vanishing when drained or set down. Before drinking, characters must toast their supernatural benefactor with the formula: “May he never be known!” Failure to do this is said to bring bad luck (-1 on all rolls) for a year and a day.

The quality of the water in the goblets varies cyclically according to unidentified causes. It was once believed to correspond to the position of the planet Artemis in the night sky, but this theory of the mage Alexu Nacphoros has now been disproved. The contemporary taste of the water, and speculation as to how it will change in the future, remain subjects of discussion among wizards.

Level Three: THE REPAST OF MASTER TZIMISCA (replaces Banquet)

Food is created. This is of very fine quality by aristocratic tastes, though may seem overly dainty to a commoner. The banquet appears on dishes laid out on a low silk draped table, complete with wine. There is sufficient for up to three people (depending on how hungry they are) but it is obviously intended for a solitary diner. The board is always identical, and all may be consumed with the exception of the uppermost apple in the fruit-bowl, which appears with a single bite taken from it. This is rumored to be the last morsel of food tasted by the wizard Artax Tzimisca and to eat it is taboo. Some believe that breaking the taboo would result in the diner exchanging places with the long-lost wizard, presumed to be on one of the circles of hell - hence the expression, “To share Tzimisca's banquet.”

Level Four: ACCOUTREMENT

This spell creates a single item of any commonplace (nonmagical) type. It can be a melee weapon of any type required by the caster (sword, dagger, spear, etc), or light armor, or some other simple implement such as a dish, shield or digging tool. The item remains for three hours.

Level Five: THE LABORS OF THE UNSEEN

This spell exercises miraculous invisible agencies to rapidly repair a simple damaged object such as a suit of armor or a cart-wheel. The work happens in a blur, taking only seconds. Not only is the object repaired, but it is also re-lacquered in the specific colors of the ancient Selentine house of Andronicus and supplied with archaic ostentation. Some opinions hold that the object is not in fact repaired at all, but simply replaced by a duplicate of appropriate size from the obviously capacious Andronican armory. For reference, the primary color is a thick dark bronze gold, the secondary color is white, and the trim is in light purple.

Level Seven: THE INDEFATIGABLE ONES

A team of ten laborers arrive to serve the caster for one day. These are short, lightly-built, hairless people with golden-tanned skin and green eyes. Upon appearing, one of them will come forward and ask “Do you wish us to serve you?” The caster must not reply until he has examined each worker thoroughly to ensure that none bears a vestigial rat-like tail. Only if no tail is found is it safe to give the workers a task. They will perform tirelessly and require no supervision, working with the skill of a team of journeymen directed by a master in masonry, carpentry, shipbuilding, fortifications, painting or any other nonmagical skill that the GM deems appropriate.

There is a 5% chance that one of the workers will have the vestigial tail. If so, a roll of Intelligence -3 or less on 2d10 is needed to detect it. Should you fail to notice the tail, the workers will fulfill their day's tasks but whatever work they produce will be cursed to bring you bad luck. Any rolls made secretly by the GM on a cursed character’s behalf (eg stealth rolls, the chance of finding special items in treasure, etc) are adjusted by 10% in the player’s disfavor until the construction is completely dismantled or destroyed (where applicable) and the character undertakes a pilgrimage to pray before a saintly relic or icon.

Level Eight: THE VESSEL OF THE INVISIBLE SEEKERS (replaces Destrier)

A boat or palanquin appears as though from nowhere and lasts for four hours. The boat will carry up to eight passengers; the palanquin has room for three. The rowers or bearers are invisible (so that the palanquin seems to float in the air) but they do leave footprints. The vessel's crew always know a route to your destination even if you do not know it yourself. For example, you could tell them to take you to the House of the Red Dome in Ferromaine even if you had never previously visited the city. They cannot be commanded to take you to a person or item, however, but only to a specific address that you can name. Additionally, you must always command them to convey you to such-&-such a place and no further; omitting this stipulation could prove disastrous.

A different boat or palanquin is summoned each time the spell is cast, varying in historical design and ornamentation. Seemingly the Invisible Seekers pluck any available craft from out of the time-stream - sometimes still with the original occupant.

Level Nine: THE PALE JADE PAVILION

A large tent providing shelter from the elements is caused to manifest, with room for up to ten people. This lasts nine hours. The interior is furnished with cushions, and silken drapes partition the space according to the number of occupants. The Pavilion always gives most restful sleep, regardless of the climate outside, such that any wounded character will recover twice his rank in Health Points overnight. Indeed, the Pavilion is believed to be the gift of the god Hypnos, for it can only be entered by bowing and saying, “I thank the Master of Dream for his hospitality.” Entering without saying this will move the god to umbrage, resulting in the character's immediate and permanent expulsion from all manifestations of the Pavilion. (Sensible of pious feeling, Tamorian wizards typically excuse this as a prayer to St Petrus Damiani, patron of insomniacs.)

Apparently it is also bad form to use violence against anyone else in the tent, from which comes the Tamorian saying, “It seems we must share the Pavilion,” used between two rival sorcerers obliged to a temporary truce.

Where a Phenomenation spell is not stated to replace one of the regular Dragon Warriors sorcerer spells, it is simply added to the list for that level.

It is clear from the descriptions that these spells are of pagan origin but have been given some superficial trappings of the True Faith to satisfy the Church - note the many instances of an apparent prayer to some ancient deity or other. The curse that may be incurred by use of The Indefatigable Ones can be lifted by appeal to a saint, but that does not appear to be part of the spell itself but rather a holy remedy to a pagan affliction. Tamorian priests must be well aware of the suspect origins of sorcery, but turn a blind eye to that in order to keep it under state control.

We've had an abundance of Abraxas posts recently, but if Dragon Warriors is your fancy then hang on a few weeks for more from the Invaders & Ancients books, including an all-new scenario or two, plus more Tamorian spells, creature stats, and some of the work that I did with Tim Harford on the rules for DW2.

The origins of Abraxas

Having completed our survey of the five great city-states of Abraxas, this seems like a good point to pause and explain how it came about.

A little over ten years ago, Jamie and I were freelance game designers at Eidos, publishers of Tomb Raider, and one of the projects we pitched for development was a massively multiplayer online game. We had a free rein, and at first we intended to use the Fabled Lands as the setting for our game. But we soon realized that the requirements of gamebooks and videogames were very different.

We needed a world with a very distinctive (we took to calling it "jewel-like") look and feel. A world you would find enchanting to visit, that would be accessible to more than just diehard role-players, with enough of a whiff of the familiar enough to be relatable - and at the same time brandably different from other fantasy settings. And it needed to be a world where Jamie and I weren't imposing all the history, culture, etc. We would just dress the set. It was up to the players to inhabit the world and run with the cues we gave them to make the place breathe.

To begin with we met with the truly legendary SF-&-fantasy guru John Jarrold - then a publisher, now Britain's top science fiction agent - who had had the idea of using book publishing talent to create game worlds a good ten years before Random House's IP Creation Group . John hooked us up with possible writers, and at the same time Jamie and I started sketching out some thoughts of our own. The project was in its very early stages and we were still focussing on the game rules and structure, so we had plenty of time to develop a world background. In the course of those months, we came up with a completely new "fabled land" and so Abraxas was born.

In the end, the cost of developing a MMOG was deemed too risky by the Eidos board. Bear in mind this was 1999, and nobody had any inkling of the heady heights that World of Warcraft would blaze a trail to. Our MMOG project was shut down along with the rest of the internal development teams at Eidos's Wimbledon HQ. So we never got to plug Abraxas in and see how it would have worked.

Abraxas is a lost continent from before the dawn of history. A place of high adventure, flashing swordplay, wild jungles, deserts of black sand, floating cities, classical temples, primordial animals, exotic wizardry and evil psionic aliens. When Abraxas finally sinks below the ocean, survivors will reach the mainland and seed the great civilizations of antiquity.

Abraxas is very far from the usual quasi-medieval style of fantasy. There are no orcs, goblins and dragons. Every animal and nonhuman creature is unique to the Abraxas world. Many of the fauna of Abraxas are mutated versions of mid-Tertiary animals that have survived on Abraxas itself until the time of the game, around 38,000 B.C. The cities of Abraxas are wondrous metropolises, mighty proto-civilizations of the great cultures of history such as Egypt, Babylon and Carthage. This provides a core of familiarity within the fantastic setting.

Who are the heroes?

Mighty swordsmen, gladiators, statesmen, scientists, explorers, barbarians. And wizards who watch the stars to predict threats to their homeland and their ideals. Some – the noble champions of the five city states – are born to greatness. Others achieve it despite humble beginnings, and even Neanderthal heroes are possible.

What do they do?

On the mainland, new young races of men (both Cro-Magnon and Neanderthal) are populating the world. Our heroes are destined to be remembered in legend as tutelary deities who guard and guide new cultures in the difficult struggle to survive. At the same time, they strive to confound the prophecies that say Abraxas itself is doomed.

Threats

Alien beings whose own worlds are dying have designs on the young Earth. Projecting their psyches across the gulf of space, they can influence the minds of weak mortals who worship these beings as if they were gods. The most powerful aliens such as the Churuk – and the Ulembi, whose home lies beyond the Coal Sack – are capable of physically manifesting themselves in our world.

Magic

Magic is part of daily life (like technology for us today) and comes in two types. The first is Thaumaturgy. In this period of the distant past, glittering rings like those of Saturn still encircle the Earth – remnants of a second moon that exploded. Adepts trained in the use of Thaumaturgy can draw down cosmic energy, called vril, that is focused by these rings. It is a form of magic that is powerful but unpredictable, based as it is on the solar-magnetic “weather” within the rings.

The other main form of magic is Wizardry. It is derived from the combination of the Four Substances (Earth, Air, Fire and Water – the “elements” as they were handed down to the ancient world) with the Four Essences (Aether, Life, Ur and Death). Wizardry is typically less epic in scale than Thaumaturgy, but more reliable and controllable.
Xanthus is a foating city on the back of a giant crustacean-like creature half a mile across. The people of Xanthus are at the mercy of this creature's whims as it drifts feeding on plankton. Fearing that it may one day dive under the waves, they worship it as the god Ix and make sacrifice of the old and deformed by hurling them into a crevice called the Barathron (actually the creature's dorsal gill-vent). Food comes from fishing, weeds and barnacles cultivated at the rim of the shell, and nets hoisted aloft to trap birds. On festival days holes are drilled by the priests and part of the god's flesh is then tapped, a morsel that Ix in his vastness never notices.

The buildings of Xanthus are in fact growths on Ix's shell: a hard, orange-mottled yellow carapace rising like a low island in the sea. The aristocrats of Xanthus occupy buildings at the top of the shell, where they are safe from the destructive effect of a heavy swell, but all would die if Ix sank entirely, and so Xanthic society is more egalitarian than most. The key feature of Xanthus's inhabitants is their harshness; they have had to be ruthless to survive. Thus they are a people who despise weakness, which they cannot afford, and it is considered the duty of the old and sick to make way for the young.

Cities of Abraxas: Argistillum

Standing at the confluence of two rivers, the original walls and oldest buildings of Argistillum seem the newest structures in the city, being built of an almost indestructible resin-colored stony substance comprising ceramic bonded into a microscopic metal lattice. The Argistes no longer know the secret of making this, so their more recent buildings are of somber black granite clad with bronze and yellow tiles. Every archway is flanked by statues of the winged sphinxes that are the legendary guardians of the city.

Argistillum is most famous for its hanging gardens: terraces above the level of the streets that overhang them, dangling creepers and vines to give color and life to the place. Underfoot, the refuse of the streets is hidden by a carpet of reeds brought fresh from the river each day by slaves. Also renowned throughout Abraxas is the menagerie of Argistillum, where the visitor can (for a fee) view creatures both known and unknown.

Although great scholars and lawgivers, the Argistes have a streak of callousness, if not outright cruelty. The Arena is a place where all classes of Argistillum come to watch gladiators contend against fierce monsters and each other, in battles usually ending in death.
Government: The city is ruled by a triumvirate, each with different responsibilities. The King Above is charged with maintaining Argistillum's standing with the gods. The King of the World is the city's temporal leader, responsible for warfare, diplomacy and trade. Third and most sinister is the King Below, never seen by "his" subjects - a creature from another star, kept in a glass globe deep underground from where "he" issues cryptic advice about events yet to come.

People: Argistes are average height and build, very pale-skinned (almost milk white) with a faint yellowish cast to their features. Hair is curly; brown, black or blond; often with a single silvery streak (called by other nations a "cruel streak"). Men and women alike wear their hair in long ringlets, though men often shave their brow to create a receding hairline.
Dress: Clothing for men usually consists of sandals, loose trousers and an open gown that leaves the chest bare. A wide silk belt is patterned to show the man's clan and temple connections, and not infrequently a long curved dagger is tucked into this to show the clan may not be trifled with. Women wear a sheath skirt, slit to permit freedom of movement, and a short vest covering the breasts. The vest is held loosely closed by a colored cord in the case of unmarried girls.

A new legend

No, it's not an April Fool. Jamie has written a novel and it's published today by Boxer Books. If you don't believe it, order your copy right here (UK) or here (America). In fact, even if you do believe it you should still buy one; Jamie is counting on you for his beer money.

Corvus Gunnarson is a hero in the Conan mold. He returns home after a period of exile to find his parents murdered and his two sisters captured by the ruthless warlord Wulfric Coldblood. Corvus swears an oath of vengeance and sets out to find Wulfric and rescue his sisters. His quest takes him on a journey from the fjords of Norway to the shores of Saxon England and beyond. On his journey he encounters giant sea serpents, pillaging armies, devious tricksters and shape-shifting berserker werewolves.

It's the first of a planned epic series. And, as this excerpt shows, there's a definite flavor of the Fabled Lands in the action sequences:

There were two more loud cracks in quick succession. Lightning bolts flashed down to strike the sea and the water steamed and boiled. It began to bubble, though there was no more lightning. It seemed like the storm was easing off now, fading away as fast as it had come. Certainly the rain was beginning to ease. But the bolt-struck waters nearby continued to roil and boil. Great bubbles rose up and burst into the air, releasing a foul stench of rot, like the breath of a hundred drowned sailors. The clouds parted a little and in the growing light Corvus could see something dark and indistinct rising up out of the depths.

Suddenly a great serpentine head broke the surface of the sea. Great gouts of water cascaded down its scaly ridged skull and the sides of its sinuous and heavily muscled neck. A hulking body - scaled, greenish, pitted with barnacles, finned and tailed like a demon-whale - came up behind it. It raised its head and uttered a rumbling roar that shook Corvus and Orm to their very bones. Its eyes, black and soulless like those of the squid, were wet and cruel and they glittered evilly. The sea-rot stink as of men long drowned filled the air with foulness.

‘Aieee!’ shrieked Orm at the top of his voice, ‘Jormungand, it is Jormungand!’

‘Jormungand!’ thought Corvus. Jormungand was the world serpent, the worm that eats its own tail, the gigantic sea serpent that would kill Thor himself at Ragnorak, the last battle of the Gods at the end of time. This was bad. Especially if Orm believed it – he didn’t believe in stuff like this normally. They were doomed!

Corvus looked up at the great beast, as its head reared up over the small boat. Well, if he was going to die, he would go to Valhalla fighting with the last drop of his blood. Quickly Corvus plucked the long knife from his belt and began to saw at the rope that held him to the mast. If only they’d realized the true nature of the threat. Instead of lashing themselves down, they should have been…. what? What could they do against this thing? He glanced over at Orm. The old man was desperately working at his bonds, his eyes staring in unbelieving terror at the sea-serpent.

As Corvus broke free, the diamond-shaped head of the sea dragon flashed down, great maw gaping, rows of sword-sharp shark-teeth glistening in the sun. Its jaws closed around Orm and the mast, snapping it like driftwood. Orm shrieked in agony. The serpent took him up into the air, and bit deep. His chest burst asunder, spraying blood and entrails, soaking Corvus in gore. Orm’s head fell one way, his legs another. Greedily the vile beast gulped down the rest of him as Corvus scrabbled for his axes, wiping bits of the dead man off his face and arms.

Read on in the first Corvus novel, Oath of Vengeance. "A thrilling epic of bravery, honour and revenge," say the skalds. "By Odin's lost eye, if thou purchasest but a single book this year, let it be this one!"

Verily, that was a word from our sponsor; Abraxas resumes tomorrow. And you Dragon Warriors players get ready, as we'll have some Tamorian magic for you in a week or two.