Archive for May 2018

It was a summer night. Cicadas burred from ends of branches. Pixies rolled, tittered in their leafy beds. Silver-limned clouds passed over a porous, bloated moon. The little town in the valley kept silent, wrapped in mist.

Far over town stood an austere, hilltop tower. Ivy and wasps' nests blotted the black eyes of its windows. Creepers cracked the greening brick, nearly covered the narrow door. Bats peeped and flittered about the craggy roof.

Three figures climbed the tree-spotted path which wound to that tower. One, trailing cigarette smoke, spoke.

"Hork," she said, flourished a commanding palm. "Pass it, mate."

The bespectacled Hork tucked away a sweaty lock, jiggled a squat whiskey bottle. "S'pose." She passed it over.

"Horkheimer, you're putting that down like spice tonic," * said the third, a lank-haired boy swinging a half-brick in a sock. He grimaced. "I worked for those pence."

"Listen," said Hork. "If you can't call me Yselde, you certainly can't use my last name."

"What Hork is saying," said the first, wiping her mouth. "Is that she despises her family name."

Hork rolled her eyes. "Where'd you nick those pence, anyway, Jan?"

"Who says I nicked them?" said the boy.

"You nicked them," said a puff of smoke, handed away the bottle.

"So little trust, Dere," grinned Jan, taking it. "But, yes, I nicked them from Professor Ottleston's desk."

"Ottleston keeps coin in her desk?"

"In the faculty building."

"Seems like a trap."

"Doesn't seem to have been a bad idea to me," said Jan, tipping back the bottle. Brown liquid sloshed in the neck.

"You know what's a jolly bad idea?" said Hork. She pointed up the hill. "This shite."

"Horky Dearest, if we're to run off to Draum** and be cutters, we need to find some monsters," said Dere. She puffed, frowned at some doxbells fleeing her dart. "Or, at least, some danger. So we don't go into it fresh."

"Hey, remember, I've killed a monster," said Jan, gesturing with his sock-flail.

Hork rolled her eyes again. "Bludgeoning a topple with a broom doesn't count, dolt." ***

"It had old Grandmother Twee. Swear it was going to eat her."

"Grandmother Twee," said Hork. "Is a mouse, and even she could have killed it with less effort."

Jan scowled as they crested the hill. "Not like either of you have seen a monster," he muttered.

"Hey, we may yet, tonight," said Dere.

"Not likely, I say," said Hork, craning a glance at the tower. They were within the building's shadow, now. Nettles and the remnants of garden beds roughened the ground. "Asylum shut down a hundred years back," she said, kicked a tuft of spiny grass.

"We know, Dear. But everyone in town hears the screams. They shut it down with the afflicted still inside."

"'The screams,'" exclaimed Hork, exaggeratedly. "Are a wildcat getting shagged in the hills."

"So this isn't a bad idea, then, naysayer?"

Hork pursed her lips, looked at the tower's shadowed eyes. "Well, it can't hurt to be cautious."

Jan perked up. "You know what people say about their lifespan." He pulled to the head of the group. The tower was a few strides away. Ivy nearly obscured the cracked stoop, the pitted door, the heavy bar set from the outside. Jan set down his bottle and weapon, set to work trying to lift that girded beam. He strained, groaned. "Help?" he pronounced, indignant.

Dere flicked her cigarette away, joined him. She looked expectantly at Hork. The last girl made a show of cleaning her glasses before helping. Together, they lifted. Ivy snapped, slithered away. The beam creaked, shifted, tumbled to the ground.

"Ick, it's left me splinters," said Dere.

Hork frowned at the beam where it lay. "Someone's replaced it. That can't be a hundred years old."

"Means there's shite inside," said an eager Jan. He gave the door a kick. It shuddered, skidded inward a few inches. Jan peered through the crack. "Shite, lads, it's the King of Mildew."

Dere scoffed. "Come on, Jan. Kick it in like a real cutter."

"Right." Jan wound up, gave the door another heel, staggered back. "Bloody stuck." He set a shoulder against it, pushed. The hinges shrieked. "Finally."

Jan stepped back, picked up his rude flail, gestured to the door. "Pearls before porks," he said, looking to the girls. † Dere scowled at him, likewise extended a hand. "Brawn before beauty."

Jan shrugged, pulled a candle from his pocket. A match snapped. The tallow sputtered. "Here we come, monsters," said Jan. He raised his sock, slipped through the doorframe. Dere paused behind, lit a new cigarette. She glanced at Hork, raised a brow. Doxbells floated over her eyes. "Future cutter?"

Hork adjusted her glasses. "You two have fun."

"Suit yourself." Dere disappeared into the tower.

Hork idled about, kicked at some nettles. She looked out over town, watched candles flickering in windows, smoke beginning to rise from the bakery chimney. She looked up at the tower, watched bats flit about the windows.

From inside, Jan called energetically. "Shite, Hork, there's bloodstains! You've got to see this."

"My hayfever and I are perfectly fine outside the King of Mildew's Castle," yelled Hork.

"Fine."

Squinting, Hork peered through the rotted brick doorframe. Some wooden structures were bare visible in the dark. She neared closer, put her head in the frame. Some weird scaffold lay on its side, just meters in the door. Manacles hung there, lay from lengths of chain. Some browned stain spotted the floor. Hork huffed, grimaced, moved to slip inside.

Within the tower, there was a small shriek, Jan's voice. Then, a wet, heaving scream. It rippled in the night air; a forced, elongated bark. Hork stumbled back, clutched at her ears, fell. A crash and thumping footsteps emanated inside the tower. They neared. Dere appeared in the doorway.

Hork screwed up her face. "I told you! I told you this place was…" she trailed off, staring at Dere.

The girl was spattered face to knees in dripping, clotty red.

"Banshee," she muttered, promptly fainted.

Kin of the Hills

Once upon a certain time of superstition, folk believed in a singular monster. An otherworldly, bloody-mouthed creature with a penchant for screaming. All who heard its cries would fear, for it heralded death. Folk had a name for this herald: Banshee.

At dawn, it could be spotted by the lakeshore, washing the clothes of those to die. At noonday, it could be seen curled in the dim corners of barns, sharp knees tucked to brow, rocking, rasping doomed names. At nightfall, it'd be heard high in the hills, screaming through its bloody teeth.

Those who died by the banshee's calling met no usual end. They were said to disappear. Only long after would they be seen, thin and bloody-lipped, transformed into later seasons' banshees. It was for this lineage they were named. In old the tongue of Lothrheim, they were baen sídhe, or "kin of the hills."

While such a time of antique superstition is passed, the monster's name still lives on Coastal tongues. It now denotes the true herald of that ominous scream: Bansheeism.

Many a hilltop is host to an old banshee asylum. ‡ These austere‡‡ buildings are repositories for wretched, sickened creatures. They are home to the lingering victims to bansheeism.

Bansheeism is a slow, degenerative ague. It lingers for weeks before ever causing such minor pains as fever and restless sleep. Days later, it brings attacks of intense, barking cough. This is bansheeism's most definite symptom.

The sickness quickens thereafter. Manic confusion occurs as bleeding abscesses form in the lungs. Behavior at this stage is typified by mad attempts at washing clothes spattered by gory cough. It is at this time that most pre-banshees are identified. Most will be banished to the nearest still-functioning asylum. ‡‡‡ Though this banishment is terminal, it is viewed as a woeful mercy.

In their mania, pre-banshees refuse food and water. They grow emaciated, prone to stillness. The cough fades. Soon enough, mania gives way to torpidity. Banshees at this stage, for they are properly become banshees, are known to huddle in corners of asylum cells, knees to chin, breath rattling in fluid-filled lungs. Only if disturbed will they snap alert, viciously attack or flee. These moments of alertness are accompanied by a resurgence of cough.

This cough, once a pained series of barks, becomes akin to screaming. Banshees heave, spew gouts of pathogenic blood through shredded vocal cords. This scream is bansheeism's defining symptom. It is also its mode of transmission.

Banshee asylums were built to prevent this bloody transmission. By isolating those affected, it was thought bansheeism might be eradicated. Such an effort was necessary, as grey salt proved ineffective in preventing the sickness. § Thus, the banshees were shut away, often under the pretence that they might be later cured. Even this effort proved fruitless.

Unknown to folk at the time, bansheeism affords a boon of seemingly-endless life. Even after decades of death-thin lingering, a banshee may still cling to torpid existence. Unwilling to kill their inmates,§§ the asylum keepers of old barred their doors from the outside, abandoned the banshees to rot. §§§

Some hundred fifty years later, these asylums still stand. They loom, largely ignored, over quiet valley towns. Folk can ignore them, but they cannot forget, for on thunderous nights, they can still hear the cry of the banshee.

Author's Note

Can we cram rabies, pertussis, and tuberculosis into one monster and call it a banshee? You bet. Can we write twelve footnotes in one article? Yes, yes we can.

Fun fact: The author lives four miles from a large mental asylum built in the 19th century. Beautiful architecture, TB ward notwithstanding.

This article was made possible by Incunabuli's generous supporters on Patreon. To join them and read articles available only to supporters, support Incunabuli on Patreon.

Footnotes

* Spice tonic is a drink brewed from bark cinnamon and grey salt. Popular among young Firls.

** Draum is a frontier renowned for its venturing towns, many of which have seen great gains from the raiding of sorcerer's ruins. A romantic ideal for would-be cutters. A nightmare for those who are really there.
*** Topples are the destructive, adult form of doxbells; the tiny dust-creatures which hatch from pepperelle smoke.

† Porks are small, soft bodied rodents. They team in the gutters of Coastal cities. Southerners consider them disgusting, dirty-footed pests. Northerners do as well, but they also fry them on sticks and eat them.
†† Typical banshee tales originate from the sparsely-forested, hilly regions near Lothrhaim.
††† For the most part, it is passed. There are certainly villages where the myth of the baen sídhe has not yet been converted into fact.

‡ For whatever reason, banshees are supposed to be more comfortable, more sedate at higher altitude.

‡‡ Though it is typical, austerity is by no means the absolute rule in asylum construction. Some larger mountain facilities were particularly opulent. Some still accept patients, today.

‡‡‡ Bansheeism was last epidemic some hundred years back. Only now is a resurgence occurring. A surge in reported cases of bansheeism has forced many asylums to be founded or (dangerously) reopened.

§ Bansheeism, like pox, is a virus. Grey salt is effective only in banishing bacterial and fungal pathogens.
§§ Despite their monstrous condition, banshees were (and even are) still regarded as people. Asylums often operated under a pretence of rest and future rehabilitation. Extermination was, in any case, terribly dangerous. Only today's cutters are sufficiently mad or uncaring to murder the previous century's banshees.
§§§ But rot, they do not. A torpid banshee will, if given enough time, become sufficiently active to scrounge up sustenance. Every year or so, they crawl from asylum windows for a night of gorging. Whether they dine on stolen bread or human flesh depends only on what is most available.

"This is the first you've encountered such a thing, Coroner?" * said the man in white. He touched the brim of his wide hat, pulled it low. Beside strode a fellow in a grey apron, shirtsleeves rolled. Sweat glistened on his forearms and brown brow, coaxed from wide pores by heat and anxiety. A brick wall clad in tropical creepers staged the walking pair.

"Yes," said the Coroner, twitching a hand. "Well, not the first I've heard, Señor Investigador, but the first I've seen. The cutters at the Heron's Perch are full of tales."

The Investigator kicked a small stone over the mossy pavers. Momently, he waved away a sticky gnat.

"What is it these cutters say?"

The Coroner stopped, leant an elbow against the wall. "Investigador," he said, turning open a pink palm. "Before I speak, I need assurance. For my safety."

"May I ask why?"

Nervously, the Coroner glanced to a badge on the Investigator's jacket: A little silver eye with many points about it, like spiky lashes. "Ah," said the other man, noticing. A thin smile split neath the shadowed hat brim. "Of course. You have my assurance. Your connection to this investigation is merely incidental."

An uneasy grin stretched the Coroner's lips. "Of course," he echoed. He resumed walking. The man in white followed. Beside, the wall ended, gave way to tan brick tallhouses spidered with oily ivy. Green and yellow birds flitted cross the lane.

"The tales?" prompted the Investigator.

"Yes. The cutters speak of ruins within our island, made long ago by the dead Nôr."

"Everyone on Illa Corvoy knows this place is lousy with ruins, Coroner."

"That is not all. The cutters trade tales of a certain enclave within the deep boscage. They say the ancients lured a creature there from another place."

"What manner of creature?"

"One shaped like a great man. Some eidolon."

"Like the specimen we are going to see?"

"Yes. But head and shoulders greater. They say he is broad like the statue of Saint Tian in Giora Square."

The white hat tipped, looked at the other man. "I will admit some surprise, Coroner, your tongue is educated. And you have been to Carro. ** You are not some back-island corpse-lugger."

"I attended la Academia, Señor," said the Coroner. He pawed sweat from his brow with a handkerchief. "My mother was a merchant. She paid my way."

"You are wasted in this job."

"I enjoy it. Not too boring, not too exciting."

"And there will always be bodies to burn." ***

"Yes," said the Coroner, slowly. He stopped at a yellow door. The man in white stood behind him, noted the hanging sign. It read “Mortuorio.”

"Who first told you of this eidolon?" said the Investigator, watched the other man put a key to the lock.

"A Belvirinian mouse. Returned on venture from the interior. She had a charcoal rubbing taken from a relief. An image of a huge man with a beard of chains. Evocative."

“Abominable.”

The Coroner paused a moment, one foot through the open door. A bead of moisture crept down his temple. “Indeed.”

They stepped through the threshold. A small office lay beyond. Creamy light fell from opaque, long windows clogged with ivy, lit a desk, a sparse rug, a heavy curtain at the back. A dry tang of grey salt met their throats. “Through here,” said the coroner. They passed through the drape. “Mind the dark.”

There was a click, a spark, a greasy flutter of flaring oil. Pale light fell from an iron hood, revealed a table. There lay the bare shape of a woman, indistinct under a pale sheet.

“One hundred eighty-two centimeters in height,” said the Coroner. “And ninety kilos. Took a couple fellows to carry it in here.”

The Investigator nodded, circled the body. Bright, staring pinpricks glimmered under the shadow of his hat. “Tell me again who discovered it?”

“Customs office. Found some cutters attempting to smuggle it out of port. Poorly, at that. Had it in a crate marked 'opals'.”

“Likely no less valuable, to a buyer.”

The Investigator stopped his circling. Abruptly, he pinched the sheet, tugged. Cloth fluttered under the light. Bright porcelain and steel gleamed under the oil lamp. A twitch of disgust flared the man’s nostrils. “Like a doll,” he said, pulled a long finger over the thing’s sculpted ceramic lips.

“Yes, but perfectly proportioned.”

The Investigator traced his finger over an unyielding cheek, round an open glass eye. “If it were crude, it would somehow be less blasphemous.” He tapped the eye, sneered, withdrew his hand.

“It is undamaged,” he stated.

“Yes.”

“But it was dead when found?”

“As still as it is now.”

“You have examined it for life?”

“I suspect it never lived,” said the Coroner.

“Bien. Little more than perverse statuary, then,” said the investigator. Teeth flashed neath his hat brim. “A shame for the foolish cutters that their sentence will not be reduced.” He waved a hand at the body, turned away. “Have it crushed and slagged.”

“I will contact the smelter, Señor Investigador.”

The man in white extended a hand, took the Coroner’s sweaty palm. “The Inquisition is glad for your cooperation, Coroner. I am surprised you asked for assurance. You are a fine and righteous man.”

“Thank you, Señor.”

They passed through the curtain, back to the office. Shapes of ivy leaves, stenciled by the windows, fell over the floor. “You will, of course, report any future abominations of this variety.”

“Of course.”

“Good day, Coroner.”

“Good day.” The office door clunked shut. The Coroner locked it. He produced his handkerchief, dabbed sweat from his face and neck. He set an elbow to the closed door, leaned there. A shuddering breath pulled through him. A small smile of relief crinkled the corners of his eyes. “He is gone,” he called, softly.

Behind him, past the curtain, there was a scrape of movement. Ceramic toes clicked as they met the floor, pattered over boards. Segmented fingers with sculpted nails parted the cloth, cautious. bluebottle glass eyes peered around, flitting and alive in the unchanging porcelain visage.

The Coroner turned. “We must find you some clothes, a disguise,” he said. The blue eyes nodded.

“And we must find you an escape from Illa Corvoy.”

Thunder shuddered over the low, slaty peaks. Blue rivulets of lightning crawled, continuous, through the night. Somewhere on the slopes, a pine flared up, match-like, licked by a dripping tongue of plasma.

On one hill, a blonde head peered from the mouth of a sheltered cave. Adaline the cutter surveyed the storm-lashed scree, withdrew into the rock. She plucked up a dinged, blunt sidesword, poked her small fire of pinecones disconsolately. † There, a spitted teacup hog burbled its meager fat into the hissing flames. Smoke ran up and out along the ceiling, sucked out by wind. A crack of thunder rippled through the rock. Adaline rubbed her ears, made a face, glared into the fire.

Outside, there was a crunch of scree. Adaline startled, snapped to face the cave entrance. The grating of mountain gravel neared, louder, rhythmic. The cutter looked to her shoddy weapon, rolled her eyes at it, gripped it nonetheless. “I don’t suppose you’re a hungry ragman, come to eat me?” said Adaline. Her tone belied only a little fear.

A black-gloved hand gripped the cave edge, pulled a body into view. A tall woman in a leather coat and full casque. “No, Señora,” said she, metallic inside the helm. “Merely a cutter seeking solace from the storm. I saw the smoke.”

Adaline exhaled, put down the sidesword. “Then it seems we’re alike. Join me.”

The tall cutter stepped through. “My thanks. Few caves here are not filled with wretches.” She crunched over to the fire, tossed down a pack and a barrel-fed gunspring. Adaline ogled the expensive weapon, the spare alloy coils. “I am Ópal,” said the helmeted cutter. Adaline took her offered hand, found it hard and strong. “Adaline Northing, of Dour.”

Ópal settled to the dusty floor with a thump and a small crash of steel. “I am pleased to find a fellow venturer in these crags, Adaline. What brings you here?” She said, tugging at the laces of her helm. A glint of blue eye showed through the mesh visor.

“Ah, well,” said Adaline, glum. “Venturing, I suppose. Not much of a cutter, though. Left the family farm a winter back, thought I'd get rich.” She gazed at the fine steel and soft leather of Ópal’s gear. “Had one good job, but my partners ran off with my cu—”

She broke off, stared at the other cutter. “Is that a mask?” said Adaline uneasy.

“No,” said Ópal, setting down the helmet. She fixed Adaline with cobalt eyes, the only moving item in her pretty porcelain face. A permanent turn of amusement curled her sculpted lips. “I have afeared you,” said the metallic voice, concerned.

“No” said Adaline, trying to drop her concerned frown. “Well. A little.”

A weird, chirruping burble of a laugh emanated from the small plates of Ópal’s throat. Adaline tried to return the chuckle, grinned, uncomfortable. “I know this is very rude, but, is all of you like that?”

“Yes,” said the ceramic woman. She stripped off a glove, extended a long, creamy-pale hand to Adaline. Gingerly, the human woman took it, marveled at the statuesque detail of the digits, the weird grey cords neath every segmented finger-plate. The hand was hard, cold, but pliable at the joints. The fingertips were scratched, rough. Adaline lingered, touching them. She pulled suddenly away. “Sorry.”

“You’ve done no wrong,” said, Ópal, stripping off the other glove. She sat quite comfortably, elbows draped on knees. Outside, thunder rippled immensely.

"It’s not every day you have to ask what someone is. I feel like a child.”

"A fair question. I’m told we are not many.”

"Who’s ‘we’?

"I am not entirely sure,” said Ópal, tilting her head. A drop of sadness tinged her tone, incongruent with the glad expression. “I have been told of clockwork people, animunculi, on Illa Corvoy, where I first have memories.”

"But, weren’t there more like you, on Corvoy?”

“I suppose there must have been, but I do not remember. My first recollections are of kind Alagórian cutters. They said they found me, taught me to speak.”

“Where are they?”

“I do not know. They were caught trying to smuggle me from the island, from the Inquisition. †† I would not have escaped, but for a sympathetic coroner.”

Idly, Adaline pulled her hog from the spit. She held it up. “I don’t suppose you…?”

Ópal shook her head. Adaline noticed a spidering of little cracks in the turning skull’s base. “You’re damaged,” she said, chewing.

“Yes. It’s not so easy to find a sufficient craftsman.”

“Does it hurt?”

“No. I understand I do not hurt as others do.”

“But you can feel?”

Ópal nodded, drew her fingertips along the ground. They grated softly.

"You must be a valuable cutter."

"I am well paid by those who would pay me. I am journeying North, for this reason. Alagórians are not unkind to my face, but there are many who are afraid. They would do me no kindness. Most would rather hire a blighter."

"Yeah, but you're better to look at. Typical barmy Southerners."

"Typical, irreverent Firlesé," said Ópal, suddenly stern. ††† Surprise flushed Adaline's face. She quit chewing. She searched the impassive glass eyes.

The same burbling chuckle filled the cave. Ópal waved a playful hand. Adaline grinned, embarrassed, resumed her meal. "You must be amazing at cards."

"I have a certain advantage."

Adaline frowned, waved the spit. "How'd you become a cutter, anyway? I'd reckon a girl like a marble statue wouldn't ever have to get bloody and dirty. You'd dominate the Rue de Couture."

Ópal produced a contemplative, burring hum. "I was taught how to live by the cutters who found me. They were very much like parents. Venturing is all I know how to do." She tilted her head. "If you were raised by wolves, would you naturally become a statesman or a chef?"

"Suppose you're right," said Adaline. She nibbled pensively at the hog carcass. "Suppose I'm jealous."

"Of what?"

Adaline made a face. "It's obvious. You're beautiful and strong and powerful. You'd make it big whether you were in a Tomb raid or a ballroom. Perfection."

"I disagree," said the metallic voice, suddenly sharp.

"How?"

"Because I am equally jealous of you: Adaline Northing, who can walk in any Southern street without fear of the Inquisition, who knows her family in Dour, whose flesh moves and heals like a proper person." Ópal yanked back her sleeve, bared her forearm. Spidery lines of lead showed where the ceramic had been repaired like shattered pottery.

"Oh," said Adaline. Her gaze flitted between the arm and the cave floor. Thunder boomed through the rock. The fire popped once.

After a time, Ópal spoke. "You are also heading North?"

"Yeah," said Adaline, hesitant.

"Would you travel with me for a while?"

The blonde cutter's eyes widened. Seeing this, Ópal shifted, waved a hand. "Given you need a venturing partner and I, unfamiliar with the North, could use—"

"A friend."

Ópal hesitated only a moment. "Yes."

"I will," said Adaline.

"Good," said the porcelain woman. For a small moment, though it might have been the fire, the light of a smile seemed to glitter in those impassive bluebottle eyes.

Animunculi

Somewhere, deep in the jungle interior of Illa Corvoy, there is a hidden enclave. It is far beyond the warm port city, past the placid bluet vineyards, amidst the thick boscage and drooling lion poppies. ‡

There, in a workshop from another world, labors a singular creature. His eyes are crystal. They have gladness only for toil. His hands are gauntlets. They idle only in sleep. His beard is silver chain. Its links are worn and melted by time and the lick of kilns.

He is an eidolon artisan brought to Nören by the ancients. ‡‡ He is older than the Lord of Humanity herself, and, to those who know of him, no less deific. Though none yet remember why he was brought to the world, it is easy to judge by his toil, for his works are living beings.

Some will say he is a myth, a tale constructed to mystify the island depths. Cutters will say he is real. They have seen his carven image on countless stones and stele in the green interior. They know him as the Worker in the Past.

To the animunculi, his sentient crafts, he is known only as Father.

Porcelain Children

Some decade or so past, tales of living statues began to flow from Illa Corvoy. ‡‡‡ Creatures of smooth, articulated ceramic skin, discovered in the ruins of the ancient Nör by venturing cutters.

The tales, as they so tend to be from the mouths of cutters, were truly unbelievable: Ceramic people, come from the jungle like large children with nothing but a curious capacity for language and skill. Beautiful, sculpted men and women with glittering glass eyes and faces like idyl masks. Clockwork cutters strong as two men. Animunculi, an astounding new variety of people. Unbelievable indeed.

Most everyone came to believe, though, for the animunculi were real. Animunculus cutters appeared in island inns and consortiums, dressed with armor and blade. The banks snapped them up for their might and durability. Animunculus sailors signed on with merchants and leviathan-catchers. The captains thought them lucky. An animunculus woman appeared at a Court of Empereaux ball in blue chiffon. The aristocracy of the Isles lost their minds.

In time, higher powers took note. The distinctly aesthete Court of Empereaux declared its Sovereign Isles a friend to the beautiful creatures. Firlund, Belvirine, and Lothyrhaim made cursory recognition of this new race of people, though they were never announced. The Holy Inquisition of Alagór, incensed at these perceived mockeries of humanity spawning within its borders, cracked down on Illa Corvoy.

Only two years after they had begun mysteriously, innocently emerging from the jungle, the animunculi were threatened. The Inquisition held a series of nocturnal displays, including the affixation of a limbless, still-living animunculus to the lamppost outside the home of his host.

Rumors of the porcelain people died down, lest suspicious yammering attract a fearsome Investigador. Tales were reduced to whispered secrets in cutters' pubs. This only piqued the cutters' interest, however. Stories of an exciting trade in smuggling animunculi from the island sprouted among independent venturers.

Of course, no cutters could yet tell where, precisely, the animunculi came from. Though the rumors would suggest otherwise, that information now belongs solely to a discrete few.

The mystery of the animunculi, who cannot even themselves say from whence they came, only grows. Whispers of the Worker in the Past only grow more impressive. Stories of a legendary workshop deep within the jungle only grow wilder.

Living Steel

The animunculi are crafted by tools and technologies unknown to Litorans. Their bodies are living cords of steel wrapped round alloy bone and plated in flawless sculptural porcelain. Their eyes are irreplaceable networks of silver wire, fine as candifloss and sealed behind colored lenses. Their brains, inaccessible in craniums of the hardest metal, are unknowns.

Each animunculus, with the exception of those who remain with their craftsman-father, begins its existence a blank page, save for its appearance. They have no memory nor knowledge, merely a exceptional and rapid ability to learn which lasts throughout their first year.

New animunculi are as absorptive as a child. They take to new skills with ease. As many are discovered by cutters, venturing naturally becomes their first pursuit. The strength and durability of their bodies makes them apt venturing professionals. Of course, this line of work is a hazardous one, whether one's body is soft flesh or porcelain.

Healing is no simple matter, to animunculi, despite their durable cores. While the structures which attach porcelain body segments to steel sinew are easily replicable, porcelain is expensive, and replacing body plates is no simple matter to the animunculus involved. While some revel in a fluidity of form, most are loth to unwillingly alter their appearance. Ill-matching plates are often upsetting. Well-matched plates require a rarely-skilled artisan. As a result, most animunculi would sooner repair their shatters and cracks with leading, much like a repaired pot, than accept replacements.

To many animunculi, this irreplaceability instills a fear. While they begin their lives as flawless works of art, the vagaries of time and violence show fast on their beautiful frames. No animunculus is yet eleven years old, but the eldest among them already fear mortality, decay, or worse: A long life of ugly decrepitude. Their lifespans are truly uncertain.

In answer to this fear, some have turned to another question: Their origin. Many an animunculus, long fled from Illa Corvoy, has returned to that island to gain answers at the jungle's heart. Many believe they are sent fresh out into the world that they might some day return. Many believe their return is a grand test: A test set by the enigmatic, hidden Father of the animunculi.

Animunculi In-game

For use within retroclones and d100 systems, consider the following tentative rulings.

Animunculi are treated as human with the following alterations. They are:

Immune to starvation and asphyxiation/drowning.
Immune to blood loss.
Unaffected by effects which would heal, mutate, or sicken a fleshly creature.
Possessed of no natural healing rate.

Further, they are subject to one of the two following properties (as appropriate your system:)

For retroclones: Natural AC bonus of +2. Whenever the animunculus is hit by an attack, they must successfully save against death (or CON) or else receive a broken body plate. Each broken plate inflicts a -1 malus to base AC. Damage inflicted by this attack can only be healed via replacement of the plate. Other damage comes in the form of cracking plates. Healing may only be applied by replacement of plates or filling of cracks via relevant crafting/tinkering skill (healing applied should resemble whatever rules you use for first aid, and consume an appropriate quantity of porcelain in a suitable workshop.)
For d100: Natural armor bonus (damage reduction) of 2 on all body areas. Whenever a body area receives a wound (or a "serious wound",) that limb suffers a broken plate. Each broken plate inflicts a -1 malus to natural armor on the related limb. Damage inflicted by this attack can only be healed via replacement of the plate. Other damage comes in the form of cracking plates. Healing may only be applied by replacement of plates or filling of cracks via relevant crafting/tinkering skill (healing applied should resemble whatever rules you use for first aid, and consume an appropriate quantity of porcelain in a suitable workshop.)

Optionally, GMs may apply a sanity penalty (if they use such a stat) for missing or mismatched plates. Missing face-plates should incur the greatest ill effect. Willful alteration of appearance via place switching does not incur such a penalty.

Take care in using these stats, as they are untested. The classless Incunabuli system will necessarily include more nuanced animunculus rules.

Author's Note

While I've had some inkling of the porcelain people for a time, this article was surprisingly challenging to compose. Only at the end did the final points come together. Even yet, we may yet hear more about the animunculi (and certainty about Illa Corvoy.)

This article was requested by Nathan, one of Incunabuli's generous patrons. If you, too, wish to influence the lore, support Incunabuli on Patreon.

Footnotes

* The title of Coroner describes an official skilled in necropsy, investigation of death, and the hunting and termination of plague.
** San Carro is the capital of Alagór, the Coast's southernmost nation. Illa Corvoy is a large, island territory of Alagór.
*** Bodies are most often cremated, to combat plague

† In many areas, pinecones are sufficiently large to start and maintain a fire by their own bulk. They are useful arsonist’s tools.
†† The Holy Inquisition of Alagór, though thought to be dissolved by many, is still functioning both nationally and abroad. They pursue intensely humanocentric goals. They are categorized as a terror group by the Firlish Crown.

††† Alagórians refer to Firls as "Firlesé."

‡ Bluets are a variety of bulbous blue fruit. They sprout on vines grown on high trellises in the warm islands of the South. Their transparent flesh is truly succulent.

‡‡ "Nören" is an uncommon name given to the Coast. It is uncommonly used, spoken only by those who consider and realize this as a small and tattered realm among uncounted many.
‡‡‡ The first reports of animunculi appeared in the year 3.450.