The rain burns off into a light mist before it reaches this low in the city, but it brings an insistent damp just the same. The light shatters and fragments from the thick air and slick surfaces, and the streets and alleyways close in on themselves. Moreso than either above or below, the city is […]

In a large, deep, hollow in the lee of the western slope the forest grudgingly gives ground to a lake with a surface like dark glass, ringed on all sides and loomed over above by ancient sprawling trees. Figs and banyans and more besides stretch branches overhead, daring no more trespass than the occasional twig […]