Khuxan
2005-07-07, 12:57 AM
I'm pretty sure everything is finished with Nautili. Enjoy!
PS. The introduction is pretty long. You may want to skip it, at least until you've read everything else.
Nautili, the City of Shells
It is the city which is built of great ruined sea creatures
It is the city whose inhabitants imprison the souls of ancient dinosaurs
It is the city with a priesthood devoted to the death of mollusks
The impressive walls of Nautiliare before you, though they reach only to your chin. Mounds of tiny shells and cartilage, they glimmer pink and white and grey, like mother-of-pearl. The guards greet you, and you can smell their distinct perfumes. Their dress is dull of color, but stunning – layer upon layer of brown and black feathers. They have no requirement of you but that you offer a prayer at one of the waystones.
You have heard about these strange constructions of soapstone. The bishopae, the priests of Nautili, imprison evil spirits within them, forcing the spirits to serve those that pray and give offerings. You are not sure you believe, but the guards will not let you pass otherwise, so you buy some incense and flavored rice from them, lay them before the shrine and quietly murmur your wish – that your stay in Nautili be peaceful and learned. The waystone, this gatestone carved in the form of a fox, seems to watch you, but with what intent you cannot tell.
The guards smile at you cheerfully as you pass, but when you enter the city you hurry immediately to one of the Baths near the entrance. This buildings’ massive nautiloid shell is reinforced with basalt and marble, but the gleaming white of the polished fossil gleams still. You heard somewhere that there are more baths than people in Nautili, and as you enter these Baths, you would not be surprised to learn that was true.
The people of Nautili are usually a pleasant nutmeg or teak colour, but the demure servants who aid you, dressed in robes of gemstones, are white of skin. “Ah,” you say, with the air of a learned traveler, “you are mamluks, foreign slaves, no?”
One nods, and her headdress of topaz tinkles softly. She helps you into a jacket and pantaloons of blue and red parrot feathers, and gives you a gilded candle to burn at the waystone (a lindorm wrapped around some sort of sphere; the sun, you guess) in the changing rooms. She sprays a foreign musk on you, and you smile at her as you leave the change rooms.
Inside the actual Baths, you take off the clothes you just put on and slip into a pool of delightfully cool water. Not the salty, mineral-rich waters of the sea, this bath is fresh water covered with a layer of rose-oil. You sigh with pleasure, and graciously accept a handful of sugared almonds and ginger from a veiled mamluk.
You notice with wry amusement that the people of Nautili have placed a waystone even here, in the middle of a pool of water. The soapstone statue of a dolphin frolicking with a ring draws you, though the others did not, and you ask a mamluk what it is of and what offering it accepts. “That is of Malsha, the sea demon,” this mamluk, a rare male, explains. “He would feast on the giant unprotected nautiloids as they floated in the water, depriving the city of Nautili of their shells when they are close to death. The brave Imam, the head priest, when he was but an apprentice, swam to the deeps and confronted him, trapping him in a ring of iron. The Baths paid much to have Malsha, for any who leave a pearl by this waystone are blessed with warm, sultry weather. Sometimes,” he adds, moving to whisper in your ear, “he screams with rage during the nights, because the Celestial Bureaucracy forces all captured spirits to repair the damage they did when they were free. There is nothing he hates more than seeing a sailor return safe to his family because of a pearl left at Malsha’s waystone.” The mamluk, having confided this story to you, slips you a small purple pearl and hurries off.
More and more amazed by this culture’s intricate beliefs, you dive to the bottom of the pool and lay the pearl at the feet of Malsha. The softly undulating water makes the waystone seem to move, and you resurface quickly. A little spooked by the two-faced Malsha, you decide to leave the Baths. A groveling, elderly mamluk clothes you with practiced efficiency, reapplying your perfume and brings you the clothes you wore to the city which, he indicates with gestures, will be burnt once you remove your personal affects.
You take everything you need, and move towards the exit. A massive mamluk bars your path, bows clumsily and hands you a bill. It is staggeringly large, and seems to include tips for servants you never met, but it is within your means, and it would not do to injure your reputation on your first visit.
Now properly dressed and scented, although still obviously a foreigner, you decide to sample the city’s attractions. Hurrying through the streets, glancing apprehensively at precariously balanced nautiloid shells, you only spare a few glances at the Nau you encounter. Their dress, jackets and pantaloons covered with feathers, admirably portray their characters. Pompous, self-righteous merchants in peacock; clever, shy savants in hummingbird; and you, a hero from another land, in rosella, a raucous, trouble-making bird.
You stop a young, friendly girl in heron. “Excuse me,” you ask, touching your lips in greeting, “could you show me to the theatre?”
She touches her lips to you and nods, “Yes, of course. It’s those vast, blue-grey shells with the silk banners.” Thanking her, you continue.
When you arrive at the theatre, you are amazed. Four vast shells, one on each cardinal point, have been hollowed out, and converted into viewing stands, in which crowds of Nau are sitting, watching the stage silently.
You walk up to the mamluk, and request a ticket. Glancing at the one proffered, you see it’s for prime seats, and costs more than you’ve owned in your entire life. You shake your head and give her a soapstone amulet, all you can spare. She smiles grimly and gives you a different, rather smaller ticket.
Following her complicated instructions, you board the northernmost shell and wander through the rows and rows of spectators. While at the bottom the performers’ voices are stentorian and emotional, as you wander further and further away their voices become like whispers, and then, as you take your seat at the very top of the 100-foot shell, you can hear nothing, can’t even see the performers’ lips moving. You take a spare seat next to two boys in kingfisher, one reading from a massive book, the other watching the actors intently.
You tap one on the shoulder, and as he turns you touch your lips. “What exactly are you two doing?” you inquire. “Oh, that’s simple,” the boy replies cheerily. “We can’t hear what they’re saying, so Mirith here reads from the Annotated Codex, and I get to see what’s happening! In a while we’ll swap over, and I will read.” Sitting back and thinking it rather curious, you begin to appreciate Mirith’s reading, as you would have little clue what was happening were he not.
The play finally closes, and it seems some sort of resolution was met. A torrid love story, you think it was, but wouldn’t bet on it. You follow the crowds out of the massive amphitheatres and decide to visit the Necropolis – from what you’ve heard it’s the foundation of Nau culture.
You approach Mirith, and ask him the way to the Necropolis. Grinning with amusement at your eccentricity, he drags you most of the way, explaining he lives near there. When you ask him if many Nau visit the Necropolis he looks at you with the same patronizing amusement. “Why would we visit there, sir? We can see dead nautiloids and waystones every day!” He gestures vaguely towards the shell buildings and houses.
You try to explain, mentioning the bishopae’s curious rites and the chance you could see a real binding! He rolls his eyes and replies “I saw my first binding when I was three years old, and they needed to exorcise a spirit living in my room. I wear his waystone now.” He proudly pulls out his waystone amulet and pushes it in your face. You smile at his youthful enthusiasm, but he continues.
“And every day we see the bishopae, walking around and talking and blessing and marrying and burying and cursing and praying and explaining. They’re not terribly interesting. Not like hermit crabs! Did you know they can fight to the death! Snip! Snip!”
It is not without a sense of relief that you see the city gate coming up and Mirith scampers off home. Bemused by the sudden silence, you approach the guards and explain your interest in the Necropolis. They look at you with the same condescending glances, but let you through without argument.
With a sense of awe, you walk into a narrow, sandy bay sheltered from the ocean by sharp outcroppings of rock. Brilliantly dressed figures with sandstone masks move from behemoth to behemoth, tending and speaking to vast, tentacled beings. You approach one tentatively, and it looks at you with eyes the size of your head, imparting a sense of Piscean wisdom. All these nautiloids are old and decrepit. Their flesh is an unhealthy yellow, and their shells hang lax. Just beyond the bay is a mound of fly-ridden flesh, and you cannot suppress a shudder at the thought of these wise creatures’ cadavers sitting under the glare of the sun for days or weeks.
A bishopae looks up at you and smiles in welcome. You hear, too, a voice in your mind, quiet and persistent. “Greetings, explorer from beyond Nautili.” You look in shock at the nautiloid, whose eyes shimmer with amusement.
Just then, a commotion attracts your attention. A wispy creature is approaching you with menace in its eyes. Like a bipedal crocodile with falchions on its toes, it watches you malevolently. You look in apprehension at the bishopae beside you, but he is no longer there.
In desperation, you glance at the nautiloid, but it has swum off as well. You’re standing in a bay that was, minutes before, populated by tens of bishopae and nautiloids, but now is desolate. Except for you, and this fiend.
The creature approaches you, and you start to step backwards, but while the waist-high water slows you, what approaches you seems unaffected. The fiend crows with victory, and begins to run towards you. You trip over and fall into the water, up to your head. Those falchions slip towards your neck, but the next moment the creature is a metre away, and struggling against a net of glowing tentacles. Some sort of spell, you guess, and look towards a circle of bishopae muttering under their breaths.
The fiend gives one last, savage cry and then is gone. A bishopae approaches you, a waystone in his hand. Touching his head in a sign of respect, he gives you the stone. It is a statue of a glowering wolf. “It is the waystone of the creature that confronted you,” he explains. “Take it as a sign of our respect.”
Stressed by use as bait, you thank him curtly and leave the bay. When you get back to a tavern, and set the waystone down on the table while you order some mussels, you draw an appreciative crowd. “A powerful spirit,” a drunken elder appraises, with an air of authority. “You are well lucked.”
Another man gets you a drink, for which you thank him, and are somewhat confronted when he holds his hand out for compensation. With a guileless smile, you apologize to him and explain that you’re broke, but that if he can display the contract he had with you, you would be happy to gift him with the waystone. Scowling, he walks off. You grin to yourself as the other Nau complement you on your business sense. You’re starting to get the hang of this city.
PS. The introduction is pretty long. You may want to skip it, at least until you've read everything else.
Nautili, the City of Shells
It is the city which is built of great ruined sea creatures
It is the city whose inhabitants imprison the souls of ancient dinosaurs
It is the city with a priesthood devoted to the death of mollusks
The impressive walls of Nautiliare before you, though they reach only to your chin. Mounds of tiny shells and cartilage, they glimmer pink and white and grey, like mother-of-pearl. The guards greet you, and you can smell their distinct perfumes. Their dress is dull of color, but stunning – layer upon layer of brown and black feathers. They have no requirement of you but that you offer a prayer at one of the waystones.
You have heard about these strange constructions of soapstone. The bishopae, the priests of Nautili, imprison evil spirits within them, forcing the spirits to serve those that pray and give offerings. You are not sure you believe, but the guards will not let you pass otherwise, so you buy some incense and flavored rice from them, lay them before the shrine and quietly murmur your wish – that your stay in Nautili be peaceful and learned. The waystone, this gatestone carved in the form of a fox, seems to watch you, but with what intent you cannot tell.
The guards smile at you cheerfully as you pass, but when you enter the city you hurry immediately to one of the Baths near the entrance. This buildings’ massive nautiloid shell is reinforced with basalt and marble, but the gleaming white of the polished fossil gleams still. You heard somewhere that there are more baths than people in Nautili, and as you enter these Baths, you would not be surprised to learn that was true.
The people of Nautili are usually a pleasant nutmeg or teak colour, but the demure servants who aid you, dressed in robes of gemstones, are white of skin. “Ah,” you say, with the air of a learned traveler, “you are mamluks, foreign slaves, no?”
One nods, and her headdress of topaz tinkles softly. She helps you into a jacket and pantaloons of blue and red parrot feathers, and gives you a gilded candle to burn at the waystone (a lindorm wrapped around some sort of sphere; the sun, you guess) in the changing rooms. She sprays a foreign musk on you, and you smile at her as you leave the change rooms.
Inside the actual Baths, you take off the clothes you just put on and slip into a pool of delightfully cool water. Not the salty, mineral-rich waters of the sea, this bath is fresh water covered with a layer of rose-oil. You sigh with pleasure, and graciously accept a handful of sugared almonds and ginger from a veiled mamluk.
You notice with wry amusement that the people of Nautili have placed a waystone even here, in the middle of a pool of water. The soapstone statue of a dolphin frolicking with a ring draws you, though the others did not, and you ask a mamluk what it is of and what offering it accepts. “That is of Malsha, the sea demon,” this mamluk, a rare male, explains. “He would feast on the giant unprotected nautiloids as they floated in the water, depriving the city of Nautili of their shells when they are close to death. The brave Imam, the head priest, when he was but an apprentice, swam to the deeps and confronted him, trapping him in a ring of iron. The Baths paid much to have Malsha, for any who leave a pearl by this waystone are blessed with warm, sultry weather. Sometimes,” he adds, moving to whisper in your ear, “he screams with rage during the nights, because the Celestial Bureaucracy forces all captured spirits to repair the damage they did when they were free. There is nothing he hates more than seeing a sailor return safe to his family because of a pearl left at Malsha’s waystone.” The mamluk, having confided this story to you, slips you a small purple pearl and hurries off.
More and more amazed by this culture’s intricate beliefs, you dive to the bottom of the pool and lay the pearl at the feet of Malsha. The softly undulating water makes the waystone seem to move, and you resurface quickly. A little spooked by the two-faced Malsha, you decide to leave the Baths. A groveling, elderly mamluk clothes you with practiced efficiency, reapplying your perfume and brings you the clothes you wore to the city which, he indicates with gestures, will be burnt once you remove your personal affects.
You take everything you need, and move towards the exit. A massive mamluk bars your path, bows clumsily and hands you a bill. It is staggeringly large, and seems to include tips for servants you never met, but it is within your means, and it would not do to injure your reputation on your first visit.
Now properly dressed and scented, although still obviously a foreigner, you decide to sample the city’s attractions. Hurrying through the streets, glancing apprehensively at precariously balanced nautiloid shells, you only spare a few glances at the Nau you encounter. Their dress, jackets and pantaloons covered with feathers, admirably portray their characters. Pompous, self-righteous merchants in peacock; clever, shy savants in hummingbird; and you, a hero from another land, in rosella, a raucous, trouble-making bird.
You stop a young, friendly girl in heron. “Excuse me,” you ask, touching your lips in greeting, “could you show me to the theatre?”
She touches her lips to you and nods, “Yes, of course. It’s those vast, blue-grey shells with the silk banners.” Thanking her, you continue.
When you arrive at the theatre, you are amazed. Four vast shells, one on each cardinal point, have been hollowed out, and converted into viewing stands, in which crowds of Nau are sitting, watching the stage silently.
You walk up to the mamluk, and request a ticket. Glancing at the one proffered, you see it’s for prime seats, and costs more than you’ve owned in your entire life. You shake your head and give her a soapstone amulet, all you can spare. She smiles grimly and gives you a different, rather smaller ticket.
Following her complicated instructions, you board the northernmost shell and wander through the rows and rows of spectators. While at the bottom the performers’ voices are stentorian and emotional, as you wander further and further away their voices become like whispers, and then, as you take your seat at the very top of the 100-foot shell, you can hear nothing, can’t even see the performers’ lips moving. You take a spare seat next to two boys in kingfisher, one reading from a massive book, the other watching the actors intently.
You tap one on the shoulder, and as he turns you touch your lips. “What exactly are you two doing?” you inquire. “Oh, that’s simple,” the boy replies cheerily. “We can’t hear what they’re saying, so Mirith here reads from the Annotated Codex, and I get to see what’s happening! In a while we’ll swap over, and I will read.” Sitting back and thinking it rather curious, you begin to appreciate Mirith’s reading, as you would have little clue what was happening were he not.
The play finally closes, and it seems some sort of resolution was met. A torrid love story, you think it was, but wouldn’t bet on it. You follow the crowds out of the massive amphitheatres and decide to visit the Necropolis – from what you’ve heard it’s the foundation of Nau culture.
You approach Mirith, and ask him the way to the Necropolis. Grinning with amusement at your eccentricity, he drags you most of the way, explaining he lives near there. When you ask him if many Nau visit the Necropolis he looks at you with the same patronizing amusement. “Why would we visit there, sir? We can see dead nautiloids and waystones every day!” He gestures vaguely towards the shell buildings and houses.
You try to explain, mentioning the bishopae’s curious rites and the chance you could see a real binding! He rolls his eyes and replies “I saw my first binding when I was three years old, and they needed to exorcise a spirit living in my room. I wear his waystone now.” He proudly pulls out his waystone amulet and pushes it in your face. You smile at his youthful enthusiasm, but he continues.
“And every day we see the bishopae, walking around and talking and blessing and marrying and burying and cursing and praying and explaining. They’re not terribly interesting. Not like hermit crabs! Did you know they can fight to the death! Snip! Snip!”
It is not without a sense of relief that you see the city gate coming up and Mirith scampers off home. Bemused by the sudden silence, you approach the guards and explain your interest in the Necropolis. They look at you with the same condescending glances, but let you through without argument.
With a sense of awe, you walk into a narrow, sandy bay sheltered from the ocean by sharp outcroppings of rock. Brilliantly dressed figures with sandstone masks move from behemoth to behemoth, tending and speaking to vast, tentacled beings. You approach one tentatively, and it looks at you with eyes the size of your head, imparting a sense of Piscean wisdom. All these nautiloids are old and decrepit. Their flesh is an unhealthy yellow, and their shells hang lax. Just beyond the bay is a mound of fly-ridden flesh, and you cannot suppress a shudder at the thought of these wise creatures’ cadavers sitting under the glare of the sun for days or weeks.
A bishopae looks up at you and smiles in welcome. You hear, too, a voice in your mind, quiet and persistent. “Greetings, explorer from beyond Nautili.” You look in shock at the nautiloid, whose eyes shimmer with amusement.
Just then, a commotion attracts your attention. A wispy creature is approaching you with menace in its eyes. Like a bipedal crocodile with falchions on its toes, it watches you malevolently. You look in apprehension at the bishopae beside you, but he is no longer there.
In desperation, you glance at the nautiloid, but it has swum off as well. You’re standing in a bay that was, minutes before, populated by tens of bishopae and nautiloids, but now is desolate. Except for you, and this fiend.
The creature approaches you, and you start to step backwards, but while the waist-high water slows you, what approaches you seems unaffected. The fiend crows with victory, and begins to run towards you. You trip over and fall into the water, up to your head. Those falchions slip towards your neck, but the next moment the creature is a metre away, and struggling against a net of glowing tentacles. Some sort of spell, you guess, and look towards a circle of bishopae muttering under their breaths.
The fiend gives one last, savage cry and then is gone. A bishopae approaches you, a waystone in his hand. Touching his head in a sign of respect, he gives you the stone. It is a statue of a glowering wolf. “It is the waystone of the creature that confronted you,” he explains. “Take it as a sign of our respect.”
Stressed by use as bait, you thank him curtly and leave the bay. When you get back to a tavern, and set the waystone down on the table while you order some mussels, you draw an appreciative crowd. “A powerful spirit,” a drunken elder appraises, with an air of authority. “You are well lucked.”
Another man gets you a drink, for which you thank him, and are somewhat confronted when he holds his hand out for compensation. With a guileless smile, you apologize to him and explain that you’re broke, but that if he can display the contract he had with you, you would be happy to gift him with the waystone. Scowling, he walks off. You grin to yourself as the other Nau complement you on your business sense. You’re starting to get the hang of this city.