You are Aster na Nuri, a farm girl born outside the Scarlet Realm-controlled city of Greyfalls. Many calamities are about to befall your homeland -- unfortunately, one of them is arguably you.
Aster na Nuri
Solar (Dawn Caste)
Our protagonist, a young farm girl of the Nuri Clan, recently blessed with the phenomenal of the greatest warriors in the Exalted Host. A little on the headstrong side, with a keen sense of justice. Raised by strictly Immaculate parents, which makes things confusing, just now.
Cynis Knife Dancer
Dragon-Blooded (Air Aspect)
The Garrison Commander of Greyfalls. His position is one ordinarily held by outcastes, to ensure loyalty to the Realm and the Empress. With her disappearance, his unexpected love affair with Cynis Verheen has born fruit in a way that no one expected. An honourable man but a cold one. Knife Dancer is respected by his troops, but not loved.
Cynis Roho
Dragon-Blooded (Water Aspect)
A young Legionary officer. Proud and aloof.
Cynis Verheen
Dragon-Blooded (Wood Aspect)
The famously pragmatic Satrap of Greyfalls, known for her shrewdness and a restraint not commonly associated with her House. Nonetheless, fervently loyal to House Cynis. Rumours are rampant as to whether her recent marriage, carried out in secret and only being announced after the fact, was born of love or convenience.
Spark of Inspiration
Dragon-Blooded (Fire Aspect)
An Immaculate monk of high standing, Archimandrite for the Immaculate Mission in Greyfalls, the Directional Mission for the East. Kind, but shrewd.
Aster na Nuri
Solar (Dawn Caste)
Our protagonist, a young farm girl of the Nuri Clan who has joined the Tributary Guard in Greyfalls, keeping her Exaltation a secret. Brave, loyal, and honest when she can be. Her faith in the Immaculate Philosophy has been tested, but not broken. Very gay.
Cal
Solar (Dawn Caste)
The previous bearer of Aster's Exaltation, killed by his Lunar mate, Winter Jasmine.
The Shoat of the Mire
Abyssal (Dusk Caste)
The sole deathknight known to be in the service of the Deathlord known as the Dowager. A child of twelve. Highly dangerous and hard to anticipate, nonetheless.
Fateful Jewel
Dragon-Blooded (Wood Aspect)
An outcaste mercenary from the South, newly arrived in Greyfalls to look for work. A warm friend, but a deadly enemy.
Parting Sigh
Dragon-Blooded (Fire Aspect)
An outcaste raised by the Grass Spiders, the notorious and secretive clan of Exalted assassins. Proud and ruthless.
Whisper
Exigent (Five Days Darkness)
The Chosen of Shadow. A strange woman always half lost in forbidden secrets and strange, prophetic knowledge. She had a connection to Cal and Jasmine.
Wandering Heart
Liminal (Breath Aspect)
The captain of the Tributary Guard, a Liminal from the North who has sworn himself to Prince Thay's service. Cold, but loyal and steadfast.
Maw Lurking Argent
Lunar (Full Moon, ??? spirit shape)
Winter Jasmine's strong right hand. A deadly swordsman. His Tell is the scents of a verdant riverbank.
Silent Pause
Lunar (Casteless, jaguar spirit shape)
An itinerant Immaculate monk staying outside Greyfalls after many years spreading the Philosophy in the East. Has offered Aster guidance. Secretly a Lunar. Their Tell is jaguar fangs.
Winter Jasmine
Lunar (No Moon Caste, Jorō spider spirit shape)
Aster's Lunar mate, who slew the last bearer of Aster's Exaltation for unknown reasons. A powerful Lunar who has lived for centuries as well as a necromancer of the second circle. Affable and gracious, but ruthless and possessing a brittle pride. Her Tell is that her shadow always has spider legs.
The Nuri Clan
Beetle
Aster's elder brother, studying as an acolyte at the Immaculate Mission in Greyfalls
Briar na Nuri
Aster's mother. Extremely devout.
Lily na Nuri
Aster's younger sister.
Minnow na Nuri
A young member of the Tributary Guard.
Mist na Nuri
A young member of the Tributary Guard, Aster's friend.
River na Nuri
Aster's cousin, an incurable worrier and not very brave, in the normal scheme of things.
Reed na Nuri
Aster's father.
Prince Thay "Small-Shadow" na Nuri
Greyfalls' figurehead ruler, as well as head of her Clan. In practice, completely beholden to the local Realm institutions, and to House Cynis in particular.
Tiger na Nuri
A member of the Tributary Guard. Aster's second cousin.
Other humans:
Jast
Proprietor of the Gentle Mist Lodging House.
Silent Pause
An itinerant Immaculate monk staying outside Greyfalls after many years spreading the Philosophy in the East. Has offered Aster guidance.
Wandering Heart
The captain of the Tributary Guard, a Northerner of mysterious origins.
A Whisper
A strange woman who has appeared before Aster, giving strange and cryptic warnings
Spirits Mentioned or Appearing:
Luna
Incarna
Goddess of the moon, the hunt, change, and iconoclasm, among many other things. Second of the Incarnae. Patron of the Lunar Exalted, attends each Lunar Exaltation personally. Has no fixed shape or gender, and rarely appears as the same one twice.
The Unconquered Sun
Incarna
God of the sun, perfection, and virtue, among other things. Highest among the Incarnae, and therefore among all the gods. Patron of the Solar Exalted.
Five Days Darkness
God
The Unconquered Sun's shadow, fated to never be able to exist in his light. Self appointed god of Calibration despite rejection by the Calendar gods, wonders Creation plotting his vengeance. Is known to aid the worthy or humiliate the wicked.
Grala
Goddess
Eastern goddess of the hunt. Blesses those who dedicate successful hunts to her name, but may scorn failure. Is prayed to by some assassins, who she accepts as hunters of humans.
Ingenious Flame
Goddess
Southern goddess of flame weapons, firedust, innovation and invention. A major war deity in the South, virtually unknown elsewhere.
The Pale Mistress
Goddess
Goddess of strife, disaster, and woe from An-Teng, in the South-West. An eater of ghosts and of the unlucky, who works to bring calamity to An-Teng.
Reflection
Lesser deity
The reflection of Winter Jasmine, pulled out into the world and empowered as a free-thinking spirit by the Lunar, Winter Jasmine.
Early Rains Kutari
Ghost
The long-dead spirit of an apefolk warrior, from one of the oldest of the beastfolk clans of Mahalanka. Servant and companion to the Lunar necromancer, Winter Jasmine.
The Dowager Of The Irreverent Vulgate In Unrent Veils
Deathlord
One of the Deathlords, monstrously powerful ghosts who control much of the Underworld between them. Dangerous and unpredictable, spends much of her time contemplating arcane and esoteric mysteries. Rumoured to be the greatest necromancer in history, living or dead.
Exalts are humans (broadly speaking) who have been blessed by some manner of powerful divinity. They're mythical heroes with a host of powers beyond the abilities of mortals. There are many different types, but I'll just cover the basics here, focusing on varieties that have been mentioned in Rising in the East, rather than presenting an exhaustive list:
Celestial Exalted:
Celestial Exalts are the champions of the Celestial Incarnae, greater deities of the sun, moon and stars that are far above ordinary gods in power and complexity. The two widely-known types of Celestial Exalts are chracterised by the Immaculate Philosophy and its offshoots as demons in human form, who must be hunted down by the Wyld Hunt and put to the sword for the safety of all.
Celestial Exaltations are granted to a worthy individual by the grace of their specific patron, with different patrons having very different standards for the kind of person they choose. When the bearer of a Celestial Exaltation dies, it leaves their body, going out to a new worthy bearer days or years later. Powerful memories from past bearers can leave their mark on an Exaltation, resulting in strange dreams and recollections from past "lives". The number of any one type of Solar Exaltation at a time numbers in the mere hundreds.
Chosen of the Unconquered Sun, god of war, perfection, virtue and light. As such Solars are, broadly speaking, the most powerful of the Exalted Host. They are masters of human endeavor, each a paragon of their area of specialisation. A Twilight Caste physician can work medical miracles as a matter of course, while a Dawn Caste warrior can very nearly shatter armies.
The majority of the Solar Exalted have been absent from Creation for the past millennia and a half, only Exalting in large numbers again within the past five years. This means that they have been a rare but dramatic occurrence in recent centuries.
Castes: Dawn, Zenith, Twilight, Night, Eclipse
Chosen of Luna, trickster goddess of the moon, change, the hunt, adaptability and iconoclasm. Lunars are the greatest shapeshifters on Creation, slipping in and out of the stolen forms of beasts and humans with equal ease. They are masters of their own shapes as well as others', capable of great feats, physical and mental both.
Lunars never stopped appearing on Creation, forming the powerful Silver Pact to wage war on Dragon-Blooded civilisation for the past millennia and a half. They are by far the most commonly encountered form of "Anathema", and are what is thought of first when the word is used in a contemporary sense.
Each Lunar has a particular "spirit shape", an animal shape that is representative of them on a deep and fundamental level. Acquiring further shapes involves the performance of Sacred Hunts culminating in the drinking of a target's heart's blood. Across all their forms, every Lunar has a "Tell", a magically-concealed feature that can always be used to idenify them if spotted, whether it's an unnatural shadow, features related to their spirit shape, or a smile that's present in every shape.
Castes: Full Moon, Changing Moon, No Moon, Casteless
Chosen of death, they are offered a corrupted Solar Exaltation by a Dearthlord in exchange for casting their names into the void, and serving the agenda of an ancient evil. Very new to Creation, having only began appearing within the last five years, and are most commonly known as "deathknights."
They garb themselves in the trappings of death, wield dark powers, and bear black versions of the Solar Castemarks, that bleed freely through any material, rather than glow.
Castes: Dusk, Midnight, Daybreak, Day, Moonshadow
Solar-Lunar Bonds:
Thousands of years ago, many or most of the Solar and Lunar hosts willingly joined together, linking their Exaltations throughout the ages in order to preserve a peace within the Exalted Host that has long since vanished. The legacy of these unions are the Solar-Lunar Bonds, still extant in the current bearers of each linked Exaltation.
Bond-mates recognise each other instantly, even if they don't know the true significance of the feeling. They are drawn to each other for good or for ill, and have throughout history frequently been great lovers, friends, and allies... or the bitterest of enemies. Whatever they feel for one another, it is always intense.
There are many names for any given Caste or Aspect within the Exalted Host. In this story, due to the protagonist's upbringing and the environment in which she lives, however, the names that are most familiar to her and which will be used frequently in narration are those used in Immaculate fables and teachings for those varieties of Exalt dubbed Anathema. This information is floating around the Internet in various places, of course, but I'm including this here as a handy reference point.
Solars:
In Immaculate fables, the Solar Exalted are a vanquished enemy. The corrupt, evil demon-kings of a fallen age, brought low by righteous and enlightened Dragon-Blooded. As such, each caste is used as an archetype to impart important lessons about morality and right-thinking, abstract concepts more than flesh and blood monsters you're likely to meet. The relative rarity of the Solar Anathema up until very recently can account for this.
Dawn Caste: Forsaken
Zenith Caste: Blasphemous
Twilight Caste: Unclean
Night Caste: Wretched
Eclipse Caste: Deceiver
Lunars:
In the centuries since the Usurpation, Lunars have never stopped being an active and serious threat to Immaculate dominance over Creation. As such, Immaculate fables depict them as monsters encountered in the dark places of the world, fangs at the gate requiring the might of the Dragon-Blooded to defend the faithful from.
Full Moon Caste: Frenzied
Changing Moon Caste: Face Stealer
No Moon Caste: Ogre
Casteless: Moon Mad
Dragon-Blooded:
Chosen of the Elemental Dragons, the most numerous of the Exalted Host. Also known as Terrestrial Exalted, Dragon-Blooded each embody the power and virtues of the five elements, with one holding primacy within them. Unlike the Celestial Exalted, the Dragon-Blooded are widely viewed as legendary heroes and champions, held up as the pinnacle of earthly enlightenment by the Immaculate Philosophy. They have dominated Creation for over 1,500 years, today making up the ruling class of the sprawling Scarlet Empire, as well as those of the Empire of Prasad, the powerful city state of Lookshy, and numerous other lesser polities and lineages. They are less individually powerful than the Celestial Exalted, but make up for this with numbers, social legitimacy, and a great capacity for heroic feats through teamwork. Each Dragon-Blood is still a legendary hero in their own right.
Terrestrial Exaltations are hereditary, with the child of a Dragon-Blooded being likely to Exalt as one themselves between the ages of 12 and 20. The stronger a Terrestrial bloodline is, the greater the chances of this occurring within the age window, with many bloodlines favouring one elemental aspect over the others.
Aspects: Air, Fire, Earth, Water, Wood
Other Exalted:
The Liminal Exalted:
Liminals, "Children of the Soil", are the Chosen of a mysterious entity called the Dark Mother. A little-known and little-understood type of Exalt, they are raised up for the purpose of safeguarding the border between the living and the dead. Though alive, they bear the trappings of death and are greatly feared for it. Their strange powers take advantage of their unique, patchwork bodies, boasting similar levels of power to the Dragon-Blooded.
Liminals are not Exalted from living mortals. Instead, they are the result of a failed resurrection. Truly returning the dead to life is impossible, and such attempts always result in failure. Occasionally, however, the Dark Mother intercedes, putting a new soul in the fallen body to create an entirely new human, born Exalted. Each Liminal is strongly linked to their "creator", and must find a new such link if it is ever severed.
Aspects: Blood, Breath, Flesh, Marrow, Soil
Exigents:
The Chosen of various lesser gods and divinities. Unique beings of varying power and natures. They defy classification, by their very definition.
The process for creating an Exigent weakens or outright destroys the deity in question. Comparatively few gods are willing to pay such a price to raise up a human champion. The exact process through which a mortal accepts the Spark of Exigence varies as widely as the nature of the patrons.
