History & Cultures · Regions

A Gazetteer of Aropria

Subject

Named features of Aropria that recur across the corpus

Scope

Places carrying a paragraph rather than an article. Anything larger has its own page

Arrangement

By kind, then roughly by where it sits on the continent

Aropria's larger places have articles of their own — the nations, the regions, the cities worth a visit. This is everything else with a name: the river a page mentions in passing, the range a nation is described as sitting beneath, the landmark a guide navigates by.

Rivers and lakes

The Storjot River — Runs out of Lake Drazieu, through the great fertile valley, and into the sea at Rikjosom, where it makes the harbour that city is built on. Most of Nashriam's trade moves along it. Estate Ruehost of Curath holds its head where it leaves the lake, and therefore holds the flow of trade between the two nations — which is a good part of why Ruehost has produced more Emperors than any other estate.

Lake Drazieu — The lake outside Dreza in Curath. The most powerful of the noble estates ring it, which is not a coincidence.

The Bevar River — Runs north and south out of Lake Kea, through Anock.

The Bangle River — Alvania's main artery, and one of only two practical ways in or out of the country. Its mouth holds Taita.

Karanodrin — The southern sea between the Swirl and the mainland. Dead water, with a very large vortex near its centre.

Mountains and passes

The Urun Peaks — On the Curath–Caliharah border. Curath's territory runs from the north-western coast to the central plains and the foot of these. The ruins of the Empire of Iron lie beneath them.

The Casc Mountains — Northern Rowlem: valleys and glaciers where food is scarce and winter is close to year-round. Home to Misku'un. The storms here are strong enough to take a wagon train without leaving a trace of it.

The Tuasivi Mountains — Above Alvania in the tropical south-east.

The Grimmrend Mountains — Craggy peaks east of Nashriam and north-east of Vas'tek, holding Polyandrium deep among them.

The Shatterback Pass — South of the Bangle River, and named for good reason: a catastrophic mountain slide made the terrain what it is and killed a great many people doing it. Rumour puts extremely territorial monsters in the aftermath.

The Sea Spine — A strangely straight run of peaks rising from the sea between Zingare and the mainland, most of it just under the surface. It pulls water down alongside itself and has wrecked a great many ships. Some call it a mountain range. Nobody actually knows what it is.

Forests

Beteje Forest — North-west of Anock, and the subject of a persistent story that every tree in it was once a soul lost in some forgotten battle. Not recommended to the inexperienced.

Islands and coasts

Atagata Isle — Off the coast of Alvania, and known to locals as Cannibal Isle. The Alvanian story is of a stranded son who killed and ate his father; the son was never heard from again, and the island has been wrong ever since. Its plants and animals are described by everyone who has seen them as horrors. A few adventurers sail there to prove something. None has come back in living memory.

Haelast Outpost — The only settlement on the Swirl: an exploratory village and fort, technically part of Nashriam and independent in practice because of how hard it is to reach. Its people are scholars and adventurers who take turns farming and standing guard.

Landmarks of the Thundering Sands

The Mast — A huge apparently-wooden column leaning due south, and the most reliable waypoint in the Thundering Sands. It doubles as a rite of passage: a young Vas'n is blindfolded, taken to a random stretch of dunes, made to wait a full day, and then left to find the Mast alone. Groups of relatives camped at its foot waiting for someone are a common sight.

The Hills of Glass — A large mass of hills in the north that look like dunes until you reach them, at which point they turn out to have been glassed by some long-ago blast.

The Blood Sands — Not one place but a hazard found in several. Sand with congruence shards and broken cores ground into it, dull red, drawn to anything sentient and clinging like a magnet. It causes degenerative damage running from skin irritation to organ failure. Stationary sands are bad; hunting sands, which move about as fast as a crawling person and much faster within a metre or two, are worse. Very rarely they make a Strigoi.

Cities without their own article

Greenhome — Capital of Caliharah, its wealthiest settlement by some distance, and the seat of the Presider. It holds School Eos, the nation's main centre of congruence learning, and a historical library of some standing. It sits within Anock, which is otherwise thoroughly pastoral.

Dreza — Capital of Curath, on the shore of Lake Drazieu. Home of the Library of Kaas, the largest collection of knowledge on the continent.

Bello — Capital of Karg, named for the nation's founder, Karg Bellon. A humble town beside other nations' capitals, but the best fortified of Karg's settlements and the centre of its business. The Presider, elected by every citizen, governs from here, beside a volunteer security squad and modest offices of the Ion'cavar, the Guardians of Tomorrow and the Clerks. It is short of room for everyone who arrives, which is part of why Hope's Reach was chartered.

Moijavera — Nashriam's great trade city, at the crossroads between Rikjosom, Curath by way of the Storjot, and the eastern nations. It has none of Rikjosom's prestige and a far better bazaar: goods of any kind in any quantity, information and secrets, and an expedition or caravan hired without difficulty. Guides for Vas'tek are engaged here.

Taita — Alvania's actual seat of government, at the mouth of the Bangle River, where the royal council runs the country's daily affairs on the Queen's behalf.