The Udultu Salt Sea forms part of the southern border of Shdustu, surrounded by desert to the east and west. It shares many traits with the similar Lake Tumum to the northeast but is much larger. The exact size of this vast body of water is unknown, as much of its coastline is blasted desert and very poorly mapped, but based on description by the traders who sail its surface I suspect it might well be equal in size to that of two or more imperial provinces. The sea drains the Shgutu and Shdulus Rivers. It is this massive input of water, flowing from the north, that forms it and the swampy homeland of the Rutar alike.

Otherwise, it receives water only from the intermittent mountain streams and desert washes of the desolate regions that surround its shores, including the southern spur of the Shdus desert. So far as is known, no water flows out of the sea at any point, unless it is somehow able to drain away deep in the earth, which some believe to be the case. I do not know, for the waters are far too deep to delve by even the best diver. One certainty is that the sea possesses a salty character. It is not equal in salt content to that of the oceans. I boiled away a standard measure and found less than half the salt of common ocean water. This remains a significant quantity of salt regardless, more than enough to render the water undrinkable.

In the north, especially near the mouths of the great rivers, the sea absorbs a considerable quantity of silt and till from the steppe and is quite shallow. In fact, the marshes appear to be growing in response, advancing south by some minute measure each year, something the Rutar shamans have demonstrated by planting posts on the shores and watching the swamp advance past them over generations. Elsewhere, especially in the south, the waters can be very deep, beyond the ability of the traders to measure. Lady Indili attempted to probe this secret by sending a shade all the way to the bottom of the sea, but the distance was too great for her to sustain the connection. The amount of water in the way was clearly immense. Until a better method can be devised it can be said only that this sea reaches to extreme depths.

As the conditions of the waters of the salt sea are highly unusual, so too is the life that resides within its expanse. In addition to the swamp reeds, the shores feature sand-dwelling grasses that fill the dunes and a variety of lichens that cling to barren rock. Beneath the surface grow many strange weeds, different from both common pond plants and such samples of ocean seaweeds as I have seen. My knowledge does not suffice to describe them in detail, but many grow in long, coiling strands, and in places they can growth with sufficient thickness to impede the passage of ships. This weed, combined with the fragments of ice that cloak the shores and flow down the rivers in winter, is why travel on this sea is hazardous, restricted by season, and home to strange and rare traders.

The salt sea abounds in fish, including massive sturgeon. Some of these are common, ubiquitous forms such as carp and pike that most who fish know well, but many more, especially the myriad small fishes that dwell among the weeds, are quite unusual and do not resemble those that live between the reeds of the swamp. Lady Indili set her students to practice sketching every portion the catch brought in by the local fishermen of Turva and recorded many oddities in this way, though the drawings made by children’s hands lack for detail. Other oddities found in the sea include a turtle with flippers rather than feet that dives very deep that can grow to the size of a boar and a small species of seal that I initially thought was a giant otter until I had the chance to observe one lying upon the rocks close at hand. How seals, which I have always been told are ocean creatures, came to reside in this sea I do not know. They are skittish animals and avoid the northern swamps, for the Rutar eagerly hunt them for their useful skins.

Sturgeon, by far, are the most valuable fish of the sea, taken for flesh and caviar. This is done by the traders and sold to the Rutar. While the meat is consumed locally, the caviar is preserved using salt and sent north to grace the tables of princes and khagans. These massive fish, I saw one three times the length of an oar and heavier than a large ox, grow slowly and may live as many as one hundred years. A trader told me he caught one with a hook in its mouth stamped with a mark from his great-grandfather’s forge that must have been lodged for over seventy years. The traders of the sea are careful to take only a measured number each year, as guided by their leaders, but the Rutar show less restraint and these fish are now rare near the swamps.

The sea hosts shorebirds and waterfowl that are common throughout Shdustu but also several gulls and terns normally found only in coastal regions. These nest on stony outcrops found at various points along the coast. Such rocky pylons tend to be coated with mussels below the high tide mark, this sea being large enough to feel some influence from that phenomenon. The mussels are a peculiar gray and black striped variety and are very abundant. They are not especially large, but taste perfectly palatable when boiled and spiced if the effort is made to harvest them. These animals grow quite aggressively and can easily foul the bottoms of boats if care is not taken to regularly scrape them free.

Though vast, and with tides enough to form dunes and mud flats in some places, the Udultu Sea is not an ocean. It lacks the great currents that churn those immense waters and though it may storm frequently in winter, is generally calm throughout the summer. This is the only time travel is undertaken above the waves, as the risk of massive chunks of floating ice, cracked off from the shore and blown about by the winds with the power to shatter any vessel, imperils progress at other times. The number of trade ships that ply this waterway is quite modest, and as a corridor of exchange it is dwarfed by the overland camel routes, but for the rare settlements in the desolate lands that surround this body of water it is a critical lifeline.

Trade flows across the sea between a mere handful of small ports. Each river possesses one held by the Rutar such as Tarvu. There are two in the east, one each north and south of the mountains that rise from the desert there. The northern of these forms the starting point of a long and treacherous route through the strange highland kingdoms that border the far eastern lands of Linqi. Little is known of these places, and I found no one credible who would speak of them. The southern port leads to a strange land in the southeast beyond a harsh desert that is known as the Land of Mother River, of which I was able to learn even less. The traders themselves make their home at the western edge of the sea on a spur of land that extends out from the low mountains that mark the southern border of the Shdus Desert. Strange and wild lands held by unusual tribes who know nothing of the revelation lie beyond. This western port, called Udushdugum, is the only town belonging to the traders. The nearby hills are inhabited by the same people to whom Estiqin, the mercenary’s wife who aided the expedition on the journey north, traced her ancestry. They are not numerous but are occasionally seen in Shdustu.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

Udushdugum is not a large place. It exists mostly to support the construction of the trading ships that ply the salt sea. In the era of Restored Stability there were generally fewer than a dozen such vessels at any time. Foreigners were not permitted to enter the town itself and lodged instead in a caravansary beyond the walls. The walls were stout brick works that overtopped most of the buildings within, making it impossible to describe the town. The caravansary was ordinary enough. It was controlled not by the townsfolk, but by the merchant consortium that controls Gudishgul Fortress, which lies to the north and is the only location a trade caravan can plausibly reach. In this, and in many other matters, the traders of Udultu are very secretive.

The trade ships themselves are not especially large. They are simple dhows, with lateen sails that rely upon seasonal winds and make only a handful of voyages each year. Their capacity for cargo is not vast, and they carry mostly high value goods and the occasional passenger. They serve as a conduit for news and rumor, something of considerable value to merchants with far-flung interests. Traveling on such a ship is not a comfortable experience. There are no enclosed spaces and those onboard are lucky to find canvas to shelter beneath on the deck. Such constant exposure to the open sun on the sea leaves the traders astonishingly tanned, and they wear rags wrapped about their heads at all times to avoid sunstroke.

Mysterious though it is, it is a certainty that the trader community is quite small. The population of Udushdugum is likely less than one thousand, including those who crew the ships. They primarily feed themselves through fishing. Truthfully, the mystery was unexpectedly easy to pierce, at least in part. These people are, when observed with care, Sairn. This origin is evident in the design and assembly of their ships and their language. The latter is simply a heavily accented version of the language as spoken under the Tusun dynasty. The traders deny this, claiming they come from ‘lands beyond the seas’ but I believe they are descendants of the Sairn soldiers dispatched to garrison duty in Shdustu during the Tusun eras. The centuries since have changed them into a unique population, but also a precarious one. Their tiny community is dependent upon the retention of the shipbuilding knowledge of plank boats, unknown elsewhere in Shdustu and the protection remoteness allows their isolated town. A single true disaster could destroy these people and leave the salt sea devoid of vessels for generations, as it supposedly was long ago.

Such long-term uncertainty does not seem to bother the traders. They seem to be quite content with their eerily isolated existence. While I assume their community possesses vast riches based on the goods I observed taken in trade, the sailors themselves displayed no signs of wealth. I saw no golden earrings, gemstone bracelets, or other adornments, and even their weapons were simple, unadorned creations with an obvious practical emphasis and many signs of heavy use.

Valuables must sit piled high in the vaults of Udushdugum, though to what purpose I could not say. This community did not appear to possess any mystics, nor an ostentatious temple or other means by which it might display great wealth. Many merchants had noticed the same circumstance and commented on the mystery, but none knew more than rumor. Some told stories that the traders cast gold into the depths to appease the wrath of the legendary sea serpents said to dwell there. Those serpents may well exist, the traders certainly were convinced of this though I could not find anyone who encountered one in person, but if they are present are quite rare. Such creatures are also said to be found in the depths of the oceans. Pieces of their scaled skin are sometimes brought to Crisremon, and the Udultu Sea is certainly large enough to host them. Despite this, I did not find the traders of such a mindset as to expend their wealth in such a cult like method. They were quite proper followers of the Enlightened Revelation in all other ways. My guess is that their wealth is used to support some other community elsewhere, probably on the southern shores of the sea of which they refused to speak. Given time, this would be a worthy region to explore, but the truth of these people is not easy to obtain.

The Rutar fish the salt sea, but only amid the river deltas and near the shore for sturgeon. Otherwise, the sea is broadly untouched, for the traders are nowhere near numerous enough to impact such a vast body of water and it teems with life once a ship moves away from the northern shore. It is strange to think of such a large place as a broadly unrecognized wilderness untouched by human action. I found it a most telling demonstration of the power water has over human settlements. The salt sea offers food in abundance, but as it cannot be drunk, the water-bereft shores remain almost completely empty.

Strange tales offered by those who live upon those desolate shores as hermits abound, from reasonably plausible stories of griffons and giant beetles to the considerably more dubious stories of creatures with the upper bodies of woman and the lower bodies of scorpions. The traders, like most sailors, were an endless source of stories, each more fanciful than the last. These included claims of great empires ruled by demons who once surrounded the sea. Some supported these with sketches of ruins that can be seen along the shores at points, but I did not find them especially impressive. Lady Indili suggested, instead, that the nature of the stones on the shore suggested the sea had once been much larger and the empty desert was left behind as it shrank. Plausible, though it makes one wonder if perhaps the ancient world was entirely covered by ocean.