Part MDCCIII: The City of Stone and Sorcery
The City of Stone and Sorcery
Sixth Day of the First Month 293 AC
Looking over the crowd of Greeters gathered in the marble-paved plaza that stretches out from the city gates, you are struck by an odd sort of nostalgia seeing a handful of horned bat-winged earth kin that must be some distant kin to Kraal, mephits. Among the myriad of beings who populate the outer district they alone fly... though seeing their short stubby wings that beat almost lazily through the still air you suspect that is owed more to some innate sorcery than any true affinity with with the skies.
The ungainly little creature is instantly awoken into excited chittering like the sound of gravel being shaken together at the sight of the sapphire Alyneah gave you: "Yes... yes, to the Silvery Blue-Blue Tower we go!" it gets across in the most dreadful attempt at speaking a dragon's tongue that is still somehow understandable. "Right this way..." It pauses a moment then adds solemnly, "You not try to fly without wings, yes?"
"We might have done with a less colorful and more sober guide," Malarys says, shaking his head at the tiny creature's antics.
"Bah!" Glyra spits. "If I'd had to stand for more boring rock folk I'd have gone mad and tried to chew my way out of those tunnels."
"You can't do that," Maelor said mildly. "There's no end to the place."
"Betcha no one's ever tried..."
The sounds of their conversation fades almost to insignificance beyond the noise of the crowds. You hear speaking the tongues of earth and air and water, street musicians singing everything from odes to bawdy tavern songs, though always you note sitting in carefully-marked spots so as not to obstruct traffic, and of course merchants hawking their wares to newly arrived guests.
Many of those you see around you are mortals who would not be out of place in the world you were born to, though the color of hair, skin, and eye vary more wildly than even in Braavos. Others bear a touch of genie blood as the sorceress Sher did, as can be seen in features chiseled in some distant echo of the Shaitan's unearthly grace. Of the true genies themselves you see few here in the Gate Ward beyond travelers moving quickly though the streets to reach the inner city. However, at Dany and Glyra's prompting, you do spy a few other other denizens of the realms of deep stone.
Standing by a blacksmith's stand tucked on a side street, you see two beings that recall the forms of the stone giants you met upon the Plane of Molten Skies, though shorter by far, perhaps seven or feet and with far less craggy features. A shorter breed or some manner of half-bloods? you wonder. After all, are not you living proof of even more unlikely pairings?
The farther you advance the grander the buildings to either side grow, not just in the skill of their stonework nor the heights they dare to reach, but the sorcery inherent to their frames. Figments brighter than any manner announce the presence of jewelers and tailors, stables and inns, lettering of gold that rearranges itself periodically marks grand guildhalls. Yet all throughout in the shadow of such greatness small neat flat-roofed homes lie, the dwellings of slave families, like stools besides a king's throne.
"Does this even count as slavery?" Waymar wonders in frustration when Tyene draws his attention to that self-same detail. "They live better than most smallfolk."
"Yes," Dany snaps. Then in a more moderate tone she adds, "Slavery is not about abuse writ clear upon the slave's flesh, though the two often go hand in hand. It is a matter of not being able to choose one's fate, being a pawn, a thing in another's hand. That the earth spirits care for their possessions better than most... well it does make it better, but not good."
"There is an interesting... inhabitant," Malarys interrupts smoothly. "I would have never expected to see one of them in a city."
Looking where the mage-lord motioned, you see one of the true elementals of the plane, hardly more than a pile of gleaming rocks pressed into a roughly humanoid stocky shape. What is most odd about it is that it wears a pair of iron bracelets, not as a form of binding as you had half suspected but as some manner of protective magic.
When you make the crossing into the inner city the first thing you notice is a squat unadorned basalt structure half a mile long which sits entirely at odds with the graceful towers that surround it. Seeing your curious gaze your guide explains, "That Slab, place of soldiers-for-hire, made of stolen piece of efreeti wall. Me not know how they stole wall."
You make a note to yourself to seek out a more knowledgeable source of lore regarding the place. Those who would sell their swords in such a place as this are likely cut from a better cloth than those that fill the taverns of Essos and Westeros, at least where skill is concerned.
At last you come to a slender silver bridge over a channel of acid and melted gemstones that reflects the colors of the rainbow vault above. Beyond the foot of that bridge your guide dares not advance for fear of the two looming stone 'statues' standing silent vigil on either side, in truth unsleeping guardians, any one of whom might put to flight a small mortal army.
Holding the gem tightly in your hand you advance over the bridge, relived to see them remain motionless.
How do you introduce yourselves?
[] Write in
OOC: Sorry if this feels slow, but it is after all your first visit to a true planar metropolis, if this does not deserve ample description I do not know what does.
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