by Alex Pheby
Masks and Marionettes
A spell of possession requiring special masks. Invented in captivity by Dashini, daughter of the Mistress of Malarkoi, this spell overrides a man’s ability to own his own body, banishing him to an intermediate realm where he occupies the body of a thing which does not possess its own self – say, the discarded husk of a demon who has moved into a more suitable form. While the mask remains whole, the wearer of it may use the body of the person whom the mask represents. It is technically true that this could be a permanent transition, but the material of the mask tends to dissolve, and it would be a shameful thing indeed for a person to knowingly relegate another person to a place not proper to him, so it is best for it to be temporary.
(The) Master of Mordew
Born Sebastian Cope in the ancient times, the Master of Mordew was one of a tontine of occultists whose researches and experiments eventually uncovered God in his dwelling place above the world. Sebastian, unlike his compatriots, counselled caution to the tontine, a position which was overturned by a majority vote of the board, and efforts were made to subdue and then enslave the newly discovered deity for their joint benefit. These efforts were clumsy and too forceful, and God was killed, leaving a corpse. Sebastian, fearing the more aggressive members of the cabal would use this corpse to their own advantage and imperil the world with its magic, hid it in a subterranean chamber beneath the ancient city ‘Paris’. He thus secured the power that would eventually allow him to build and maintain Mordew. So long ago was this that Sebastian can barely recall it, and he has other concerns that occupy him, particularly the inevitable return of the Atheistic Crusade, now in its eighth iteration, the secret vanguard of which may or may not have already reached his city.
(The) Master’s ship
The Master is not a sentimental man and it is hard to see where he places any affection, so it would be out of character for him to name his ship, or to give it a figurehead. He has not done so, and thus no one should accuse him of inconsistency. Nor has he wasted any effort on its decoration, unless a uniformity in the colour black is considered decorative. The only noteworthy feature of this ship is that it sails itself, even without wind. Though, what would one expect of a Master? Should he trouble to do things the normal way when he has at his disposal the powers of a demigod? Only an idiot would opine that he should.
Master(s) and Mistress(es)
Demigods of the occult tontine responsible for the death of the weftling. Perverters and manipulators of the weft for their own purposes and engaged in a war for supremacy.
(The) Material realm
The realm proper to matter, excluding all concepts. Tied to the immaterial realm via the weft and co-productive of the intermediate realms by the law of combinations.
Medicine(s)
Liquids and powders either containing materials tied to the immaterial concept ‘good health’, or containing materials tied to the immaterial concepts antagonistic to poor-health-inducing-agents (a tincture which enacts ‘death in parasites’, for example). Much favoured in the Merchant City, whose occupants can afford a pharmacist’s prices, but rarely seen in the slums, where people must instead rely on the far less expensive services of witch-women.
Meek Street
The street on which Gam Halliday’s gang played the con The False Damsel on the haberdasher as a means of stealing his takings.
(The) Merchant City
The part of Mordew where the merchants are to be found.
(The) Mews
That part of the Southern Slums where Nathan Treeves was raised in a ramshackle lean-to.
(The) Mines
A mine is a hole bored into the landscape out of which valuable minerals, ores and other things proper to the subterranean world are taken. These things can then be used in various ways to make various other things. Mordew has a mountain range to its east, and this provides much of the raw material for its industry. Some timorous individuals warn against mining. They fear that you will hollow out the world and thereby make it collapse, which is idiotic, since there is such an abundance of stuff below the surface that it could never, even by the most industrious effort, be raised to the surface (and it is ridiculous anyway – imagine if all that was in the world was suddenly on it: there wouldn’t be room). Others say that below the ground are races whose proper place is underground and that to invade there will prompt their wrath. As yet there has been no evidence of troglodytes of this type. Still others say that the earth is a thing worthy of consideration in and of itself and should not be desecrated. Since these people still walk on it, pass faeces into holes in it, and do all manner of other things that would seem desecratory to it, then one wonders why they single out ‘mining’ for their particular censure.
In any case, mining is done and the benefits of it are obvious.
Mirror(s)
A mirror is an imperfect instrument constructed of glass backed with a shiny surface and framed in wood. The normal kind shows and reflects those things placed in front of it but this it does poorly, since it inverts what it shows. One need only hold up a page of text to a mirror and attempt to read it to reveal the flaw: the writing will be illegible without performing a translation in the mind. Magic mirrors are the same. They may show things that are not placed in front of them (often at a great distance and ignoring obstacles) and they may reflect things (sometimes the anxieties or dreams of the viewer, sometimes magical emanations) but with both a translation must be made in the mind to correct the mirror’s flaw, since who is to say whether the things it shows are accurate? Moreover, it is possible to hex mirrors so that they show things other than those which are objectively verifiable, so they should be treated warily.
(The) Mistress of Malarkoi
Former member of the occult tontine that resulted in the death of the weftling, and now Mistress of the city of Malarkoi. Named Portia Jane Dorcas Hall at birth, she was responsible for the discovery, by experiment, of the weft, and is the foremost authority on its nature. Where the Master of Mordew concerns himself with the practical application of magic, the Mistress works from first principles and spends much of her time in consideration of her theories. While this may look to an outsider like indolence, from where are innovations most likely to come? From he who runs around, with every appearance of industry, arranging and rearranging things that are known? Or from she who seeks to better understand why things are? It is surely from the latter, since nothing new can come from something already known, and only new knowledge can overcome the impasse that seems to have developed in the war between the Master and the Mistress.
Mordew
The city that the Master of Mordew caused to be raised up on the ruins of the former Paris, and the place where he now resides. Surrounded by a Sea Wall on three sides which protects it from drowning, and a range of mountains to the east that protects it from invasion, Mordew is a safe place from which to prosecute the Master’s war against the Mistress of Malarkoi.
The city also provides him with the resources he requires for his magics. He has arranged affairs so they suit his needs, and anyone who doubts this does not understand the Master. Everything in Mordew is his, and everything works towards his ends, even when it appears not to. This is a fact and must be understood before any further understanding can be had.
Mr and Mrs Sours
A husband-and-wife couple of mechanical mice charged with the cleaning of the Master’s playroom. Some may think it unnecessary, even cruel, to gift intelligence and the capacity for love to objects required to carry out such menial tasks, but the Master finds that those so gifted work harder for him, the love they share inspiring them, each understanding the threat of the other’s loss. Their labours he rewards with many comforts, which is all one can hope for in an employer.
(The) Muirchú
A ship that plies its trade, periodically, in the waters around Mordew and which may be hired at reasonable rates for tasks one’s own navy is not best suited for. If one wishes to deliver an agen
t into enemy territory, for example, it is unwise to send it on a ship bearing one’s own colours, since it will be sunk before it can reach the shore. But it is not uncommon to see neutral vessels in one’s territorial waters, so these are able to pass unmolested.
The Muirchú, different to most ships, is powered by a huge and irascible magical fish. This may sound like a good lark, but the sailors find the fish difficult to handle and wonder constantly why it was the Captain found sails a worse solution to the problem of making a ship move.
(The) Nathan Knife
A named magical weapon made from parts of Nathan Treeves by the Mistress of Malarkoi and given to Dashini. Like all weapons made from god-flesh, it is immensely powerful, though the manner of its use is not immediately obvious, and its true power may remain untapped by those who do not understand its potential.
Nathan Treeves
The son of Nathaniel Treeves and Clarissa Delacroix and inheritor of the Spark. On the death of the weftling, that part of his power extant in the material realm and not accruing to his corpse was passed to Nathan’s father. The laws of inheritance need no further explanation.
Nathan was raised in the slums of Mordew under the nose of the Master. Why? One must ask his parents, since they are the only authority in the matter.
Nathan’s book
Finding Nathan illiterate, the Master gave him a magical book to help him with his studies. But books can do more than one thing at a time.
Some books can catalyse, some books can inhibit, and some books can do both. Either function can be done with skill or without, but the Master is known for his skill, and this book, once it was made, he poured much effort into, so no-one should assume it does its job imperfectly, whatever that job may be. Moreover, it was made originally by the Mistress of Malarkoi and her daughter Dashini and their ability in such matters is unmatched.
Nathaniel Treeves
Nathan’s father and one of the occult tontine that resulted in the death of the weftling. It was Nathaniel who discovered the method by which the weft might be perverted and, using it, he attempted to gain mastery over the weftling, killing him in the process and making himself, to all intents and purposes, God.
Now he dies in pain in the Southern Slums of Mordew. Is this remorse? No-one knows, since he will not answer questions.
Niamh
The name given to a sailor on the ship the Muirchú. A very pleasant woman, always thoughtful and jolly and willing to help. This aspect of her personality can open her up to abuse, so she carries a knife and has trained herself how to use it.
(The) Northern Slums
There are slums to the south of Mordew and there are slums to the north. The name given to the slums to the north is ‘the Northern Slums’. They are very much like the Southern Slums except that they serve the Northfields and the Northfields Factorium in providing workers and not their southern counterparts. Unlike the slum-dwellers in the south, those in the north practise skull-binding and speak with a more delicate accent.
(The) Northfields
The fields to the north of Mordew used less for the growing of vegetables and more for fruits and animal feeds.
Northfields Factorium
An area of factories that draws its labour from the pool of slum-dwelling adults of the Northern Slums.
(The) North-western Peninsula
The world is a much bigger place than a slum child of Mordew can countenance – he having spent all his life restricted to a very small area of it, and that surrounded either by the Sea Wall to one side, or the rising mound of the city to all the others. The world extends an unwalkable distance in all directions and there is no man who has seen it all, or who could encompass everything there is to know inside himself. The weftling and some of the lesser gods can understand the true extent of all there is, but people carve the world into chunks, and these they name so that they can manage the task of knowing everything algebraically, assigning to places a code in words, since words are the things proper to them, which they feel intuitively and which they can keep in order. The area of the world where Mordew, Malarkoi and Waterblack are located is called by some (the Assembly, primarily) the North-western Peninsula. Such a name presumes the existence of other peninsulas, since it would contain a redundancy if there were only one such instance of this type of place.
Oestrus
That process within the woman that produces their sex’s generative seed. Some claim that oestrus is a more weft-native system than that which creates the man’s generative seed, and that consequently it will cause flux in magical work, but if this is the case then no convincing rationale has been offered to explain it, since there is Spark energy in both seeds and where should this originate if not the weft?
Bellows, and to a lesser extent the gill-men, can smell the oestrus and have been made (by the same process that made them sensitive to it) disgusted by it. Again, this is superficially to facilitate the removal of women from places where they might interfere with magic, but the same objection holds – where is the reason women are assumed to cause such interference? Think of the witch-women: how could they pursue their trade if their sex was detrimental to the conduct of magic? So, then, perhaps Bellows is made to tell if oestrus is there for another reason, and, if this is true, is it a coincidence that his enemy, the Mistress of Malarkoi, is a woman?
Oisin
The name given to a sailor on the ship the Muirchú. One of many, he has little to distinguish him from the others, and if he were put off at the next port it is unlikely even his crew mates would miss him for long.
(The) Optical pipe
A magical instrument created by Dashini during her captivity to inspect the pipework for vulnerabilities that might aid her escape. There is a tube on one end and an eye on the other. The tube is indefinitely extensible and flexible so that it can go around corners and look at what is there, transmitting this information to the eye of whoever places it on the eyepiece. A very useful device, not doubt, but, insufficient to secure Dashini’s escape, it languishes under a pile of discarded clothes.
Owls
Creatures famed for their good hearing.
Oxen-headed men
Like man-headed snakes, these people combine the physicality of one type of creature with the mentality of another. While it might seem like no advantage to take the relatively weak and small body of a man and to combine that with the mentality of a cow, this was not done for advantage but is merely a fact of their existence. They live on the Island of White Hills in herds where they make excellent soldiers, since a valuable property in soldiers is to be unquestioning and to act in concert with each other. Anyone who has seen a herd of cows migrate or watched them defend themselves from predation will know what power there is in being a hundred acting as one, and when one has an army of thousands, they are a formidable force.
(Mr) Padge
A criminal who operates out of his restaurant The Commodious Hour in the Merchant City of Mordew. He keeps the information secret, but he is not native to Mordew, nor does he work in its interests. This does not mean that he works with thought for anyone but himself, but it does widen the range of his influences, and anyone wondering at his motives must include not only those avaricious, but also those political.
(Mr) Padge’s Assassins
Assassins work rarely but are paid well, and consequently they have both the time and the resources to spend on their appearance. They go about the place in the finest garments and wear the straightest teeth, which they take out daily and whiten with bleach. This is both vanity and disguise since violence and ugliness are associated in the mind and, by the law of opposites, beauty is not associated with violence. When a man comes up to one in the night, well dressed, smiling straight and white, one does not immediately fear for one’s life (as one might if the man’s teeth were crookedly grimacing and his clothes were stained). Instead one enquires politely after this man’s business. During this unguarded enquiry it is very easy for an assassin to stick
a knife in under one’s chin and pierce one’s brain, killing one instantly. The alternative is a chase and a scuffle and much inconvenient stabbing around.
So, it is in an assassin’s interests to be beautiful and thereby make their job much easier. Mr Padge’s assassins are not ignorant of the above argument.
(Mr) Padge’s Office
A wooden shed with cellar abutting the Fly Yard at the rear of the Commodious Hour. Mr Padge does his criminal business in here. While he could afford to rent more salubrious premises, he prefers not to gild his dirty work with pretensions – he has the restaurant for that – and preserves the balance between the two sides of his persona by doing evil things in an evil place and less evil things in a less evil place.
