Memory & Madness
One year after the Lizard's invasion of the Foot, the Face Bhan encounters a fifteen-year-old living in a forest in the Heartlands -- an alien environment where most things that grow are crimson. The teenager lives a hermit-like existence, assaulting villagers that enter his patch of forest and leaving them unconscious at the outskirts. Bhan manages to persuade the teenager to leave the forest and become his apprentice.
Three years later, a group of six hunters eke out a living by slaughtering monsters in the Heartlands. Four of the six are Strains -- the mutant offspring of Blooded -- while the remaining two are the Face Vin and the genius swordswoman Kit. Vin is apparently a Lizardblood. Vin expresses doubt regarding their recent recruiting of Kit, given her brutality, to which Davian -- one of the Strains -- replies they need her for their and his safety, especially considering his reckless fighting style.
Their work enables the nearby city, called 'Spires of Heltia' or just 'Spires', to harvest all resources within the monster-infested swathe of land, which combats an ongoing famine. This famine arose due to a lack of an event called 'the Aching', which replenishes flora in the region.
Vin argues with a group of harvesters who are withholding payment in an attempt to force the team to do extra work. This work would provide more food for the famine, however they wouldn't be paid proportionally. Vin intimidates the harvesters into giving him their payment.
In the city, Kit and Vin receive payment for their work that's far lesser than what non-Strain groups receive. They move through the city -- a marvel of bloodtech engineering built upon, around, and within titanic speartrees -- in order to sell information about foraged plants and buy potions. One of the potions is for Vin. Afterwards, they enter a gambling den where Vin has consistently lost most of his chits for the past year. He's attempting to win back a sword which was taken as collateral due to his repeated losses. Inside, Kit meets a hooded woman who offers them a job if they prove themselves.
After realising that the games within the bar are rigged specifically to ensure his own loss, Vin appeals to the crowd in an attempt to reobtain his sword. However, Kit begins a fight which ends in both killing several of the hunters that frequent the bar, Vin doing so barehanded. Vin burns a man alive to intimidate the rest into leaving.
Kit, somewhat erratically, attempts to tease Vin with a bloodied sword and he disarms her. The pair then take shelter in Vin's hideaway within a Spire built for sewage treatment. His room is a hoard of various mismatched objects, from which Kit takes a lute -- with Vin's permission.
Elsewhere, the now-adult Blake and Erin journey towards Spires following the trail of Face Bhan and his apprentice, the latter of which they believe to be Orvi. They are travelling ahead of Esfaria, who are also pursuing Orvi but with apparently worse intentions. Blake hopes to find Orvi and start a new life along with Erin, while Erin doubts Orvi will be the man Blake thinks he is.
The pair fight a group of two men and two children, and kill them and take their food which fends off their starvation. Blake suggests they should use the blood as a sacrifice, which Erin rejects. She expresses guilt about allowing several people to reveal Orvi as a Ravenblood during the battle four years ago, and Blake is angered that they died before he could fight them. The Foot was ravaged by Dure's Plague after the battle, which resulted in their deaths.
Back in Spires, Vin visits Face Bhan, who is imprisoned for killing a man many years ago. Though Bhan would've usually been executed, his status as a Face prevents this from occurring. He is imprisoned in the Spire 'Bars', which is also the home of Heltia's guards. He enters escorted by the Oxblood Dervin, who is friendly towards Vin due to his association with Bhan and the Strains. Bars is unusually empty and the guards are unusually frantic, but though Vin is leery of a trap, nothing occurs. Bhan and Vin talk of Divinities; a dangerous prisoner called 'the Jackal'; and his and Kit's fight within the bar. Bhan gives Vin his blessing to leave Spires.
Kit and the Strains endorse the hooded woman's deal despite its clearly suspect nature. Vin argues vehemently against their acceptance of the deal, but the opportunity to leave Spires -- famine-stricken and at the centre of an encroaching conflict -- and gain future employment is too good an offer to refuse. Kit also brings along her family -- two children and a much older woman -- and Ronnie brings her old dog.
Kit and Vin investigate the caravan they will be guarding. It contains five separate groups. Three are families: a group of three containing Aron, a man who allowed the hunter's decreased pay; and the Growers and Smiths, which are two families bound by the marriage of Odrin and Miriel, the former of which is an Owlblooded smith. It also contained three recalcitrant men, and a carriage in which an employee of Heltia and the leader of the caravan -- the scarred Tully -- resides along with her daughter -- Maddie. Vin suspects Tully is Blooded. Guarding the caravan are four well-equipped mercenaries, led by a woman named Rita. The guards are unusually defensive of Maddie.
Kit interrogates Tully, and finds they are heading to Fort Vane -- a fort on the outer edge of the Heartlands. Travelling there will take several months, and will have them following a branch of a river system. It will also take them through the season of Frost, which is a poor time to be travelling. When pressed on this, Tully says that if they stay they may starve or fall under the whims of whatever House invades.
Their payment is an incredible amount of chits, apparently sourced by pooling the resources of each of the groups and intended to purchase the hunter's loyalty.
Tully denies being Blooded, but claims to have been a former aide for General Bina, one of the generals who became Godslayers, though she perished doing so. Tully was not with the army when this occurred. When Kit inquires as to the source of her scars, Tully explains the Jackal caused them.
Vin believes they are lying about something, but accepts the deal.
They travel alongside the River Ien, facing encroaching monsters and wagons and carriages which refuse to get unstuck. Odrin and Gast combine their efforts to make a contraption that helps them get unstuck faster. Later in the week, a trio of refugee siblings approach the caravan, having followed it since Spires to make use of the protection it offers. Now starving, they are offered food from Vin's team. After Vin's offer is criticised by Tully, he steps down from his attempt to help them. Kit is angered by this. Maddie manages to persuade the rest of the caravan to allow them to stay, if they serve as extra workers to supplement Vin's team.
The caravan face a group of bandits, and Vin severs a connection between him and a dead woman. Once the bandits are defeated, he collapses with symptoms Davian believes are due to a severe head injury, despite Vin's head not having been hit during the encounter. He lies and claims it was.
Blake and Erin reach Spires minutes ahead of an 'unaffiliated' army, smaller than the defending forces of Spires. The unaffiliated army operates according to the Terms, despite overtly not being members of a House, giving time for civilians to flee. The pair learn that Orvi burned a man to death, though Blake has difficulty believing that. They locate Bhan in Spires, and manage to enter when a standoffish Dervin has an abrupt change in demeanour, making them promise to tell Ronnie that he's sorry.
They find Bhan amidst a collection of imprisoned and mutilated corpses, but manage to enrage the other survivor of the prison -- a woman who responds to both Val and the Jackal, an infamous bandit and killer. She's freed by a member of the invading force and promptly kills her rescuer, choosing to pursue the three instead.
Blake, Erin, and Bhan escape up the tower, and realise that the city and everyone in it have been destroyed by the arrival of a god. The god is close to destroying the tower they're in, however the force of its blows are spread equally over the spire rather than just at one point. Stunned at the devastation, they continue upwards, only to find the Jackal laying in wait.
Dervin arrives and attempts to kill the Jackal, giving the trio space to escape to Nests, the home of House Heltia. Inside, they find the corpses of the House including its leader, the renowned Neelam Heltia.
Now trapped in a tower on the verge of being destroyed by a god, the Jackal manipulates an unwitting Dervin into making an escape route for her, then kills him.
The trio travel to Vin's hideaway, watching Enn, the Ox, destroy its own body while it obliterates the towers in front of it. It disappears. The group infer that the mercenaries must have unwittingly led the god to Spires. They make it to their destination. Erin and Bhan sleep, while Blake investigates the box in which Orvi keeps his most precious possessions. In it, he finds carvings of Orvi's friends and family from the Foot, excepting Maja, and the Strains. Upon seeing a carving of himself, he weeps.
Two weeks after the caravan left Spires, it has settled into an abandoned farmstead. Kit plays her lute, and Vin asks her to teach him, only to find her a poor teacher. She mocks Vin in an attempt to get him to continue trying, but to her surprise he leaves anyway. Immediately after, the pair are attacked by assailants from the woods.
A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Vin infers that their attackers are members of House Baylar, and that Maddie is in actuality the new Head of House Heltia, as revealed by the jewel she carries. He attempts to persuade the other members of his team to run, certain that their defence will end catastrophically, but fails, igniting an argument between Kit and himself where they both attempt to convince the other to pursue their chosen path. Kit leaves the conversation, disappointed and disgusted, while Rita, in a failed attempt to manipulate Vin, accidentally reveals that three members of the caravan are Heltian Blooded. Vin agrees to assist the group in fleeing up the hill.
Meanwhile, Tully, Gast, and Seoras -- an advisor to the enemy leader -- observe the situation. Tully is stunned her plan has failed, given that it means Spires has fallen in a handful of days -- a seemingly impossible feat. She thinks on Kit's genius and relation to her greatest shame. Seoras internally disparages his foolish leader -- and their General's unusual and most likely foolish decision to use a god in human warfare -- while hoping that the caravan contains the person he searches for.
The caravaners use a Heltian weapon to kill a chunk of the Baylarian forces, then flee up a hill towards an abandoned village -- a far more defensible position. During the process, many of the caravaners are killed or grievously injured by the pursuing forces. Upon entering the village, they find it covered with speartrees, one of which has impaled a member of the Albrights on top of it. Given the freshness of the corpse, the impaling is seemingly impossible without the intervention of an outside entity. Whip is discovered to have been shot.
The next morning, Whip is dead. The remaining Baylarian forces move up the hill, led by Seoras, who seemingly cares little for their success or failure. Vin dons a new facet of his mask and, after a brief exchange, kills over a dozen without issue. In the meantime, Kit engages the two remaining Blooded of the group, killing one and disarming another with minor injuries.
Vin is exposed to the blood of the dying, and becomes increasingly confused, losing fine control of his limbs and, eventually, temporarily goes blind. Kit subdues Seoras, but instead of killing him outright chooses to brutalise him. The tables are turned when Seoras somehow manages to reinforce the outer layers of his body with a bone-like substance and subsequently begins choking Kit. An incoherent Vin impales Seoras.
In Seoras's dying moments, he reveals that he has been looking for the creature that is Vin. In addition, Seoras knows that Vin, as a strong Ravenblood, will eventually die if he continues to deny his blood. Vin refuses to allow the connection between him and Seoras anyway.
Moments before his death, Seoras looks at Vin and appeals to Maja's love for her son, opening the channel once again. Seoras's death transitions smoothly into a confused Vin, who temporarily believes Seoras' corpse -- skills and tattoo and all -- is his own. Left with Seoras' memories, now fragmented from the confused attempts, he sits there until Kit finds him.
They exchange a few words as Vin seeks reassurance that the soldiers' deaths were not his fault. Then, both break down and cry.
Glossary
Heartlands: A strange and alien environment where flora blooms crimson and harms itself constantly. Feeding blood to the ground yields grain in return, and a phenomena called 'the Aching' occurs frequently. The region is supposedly under the control of House Heltia, given to them by the Albrights in exchange for assistance a century ago.
Speartrees: One of the most ubiquitous pieces of flora in the Heartlands, speartrees are tall, thin, pale, and -- like their namesake -- sharp. They are also incredibly tough. The titular spires within the city of Heltia are the largest speartrees in the Heartlands.
The Aching: A phenomena that used to occur regularly. 'The Aching' is a set of quakes which are accompanied by the rapid growth of flora within the Heartlands and a changing of the region's geography. This growth can be halted by layers of stone. Heartlanders rely on the Aching for much of their food. Usually, the Aching occurs every few years. However, it has not occurred for over a decade, leaving the Heartlands in a state of worsening famine.
'Sacrifice': Term used for blood fed to the ground in exchange for food. The worsening famine has led to the impoverished bleeding themselves. Some children, dubbed 'bloodbags', are kidnapped for this purpose.
Face: A Face functions as a bard, actor, and shaman; travelling from place to place and performing 'the Artful Divinity' -- usually shortened to just 'Divinity'. A Divinity is a ritualistic performance where the gods themselves, interpreted through the body of the Face, are the central characters. Each god has its own idiosyncrasies, however each Face plays them according to their preferences. Divinities are performed for crowds, who are expected to respond in certain ways -- saying certain phrases at its end and offering food or trinkets. They are also performed for supposed spirits, in an attempt to catch the spirits and prime them for reincarnation. This can apparently occur if the spirits become trapped within powerful blood and are then released in a bloodletting.
Strains: The mutated offspring of Blooded and Godkin (monsters). Both are usually mostly infertile, however Strains are occasionally born to chance or if the concentration of divinity within the Blooded is weak. Same-sex relationships amongst Blooded are encouraged for related reasons. Strains are warped in unique, unusual ways, and are regarded with disgust by the general population. They tend to possess a weak echo of their parent's powers.
Spires of Heltia: The home of House Heltia, Spires is built upon and around sixteen massive speartrees, hollowed out by immense labour and connected with gravity-defying bridges. It is surrounded by an immense body of refugees, who have travelled to Spires in an attempt to avoid starvation. A vital part of its infrastructure is bloodtech, which enables its bridges, elevators, plumbing, and everburning lanterns. Spires is the beating heart of bloodtech on the continent, even as its people strive to harvest the surrounding monster-ridden areas to avoid starvation. Devastated after an attack by the Ox.
Bloodtech/Runes: Magic formations grasped by the minds of the Owlblooded, runes are specially carved and seem to obey specific rules. They require either an Owlblood or Godsblood to operate.
House Heltia: One of the youngest Houses, House Heltia was led by Neelam Heltia for over a century, who is believed to be the only Blooded Head amongst the Houses. They control a single city. The Vanes are their only subsidiary nobles. Most are now dead, with Maddie supposedly being its only remaining member. Purple adorns their crest.
House Albright: The monarchs of the continent, who rose to their status a century ago.. House Albright has held an alliance with House Heltia since the younger House's inception, however has recently rescinded it. Gold is a colour exclusive to the Albrights, under pain of death.
The Albright's Declaration: The Declaration officially rescinds the Albright's support of Heltia, due to charges of sheltering a Ravenblood and the unnatural ruling of a Blooded over humans. Most who speak of it believes there to be other motives.
The Terms: A collection of conditions for the conflict of Houses to avoid unnecessary civilian casualties. It was created a century ago by the Albrights, after they became the rulers of the continent.
Ichor: A rumoured substance which can supposedly fuel bloodtech in place of Godsblood. Heltia had put out a bounty for information regarding it.
Steel: A strong material that seemingly requires an Owlblood to smith, outmatching bronze or stone in utility.
Chits: Currency. Made of either wood or silver, chits are held on strings.
Gods: Powerful entities regarded with great fear. Seven are well-known, while a select few -- including Faces, for the sole purpose of subduing spirits -- are aware of an eighth.
Godsblood: Blood from one of the gods, which alters those that incorporate it into themselves both mentally and physically.
Blooded: Humans that have partaken in Godsblood. The strength of their powers and mental changes correspond to the amount of Godsblood partaken in. Past a certain point, the physical changes make a Blooded obvious.
Godkin: Also known as monsters, Godkin are creatures that have imbibed too much Godsblood, becoming dangerous in the process.
Dure, the Lizard: Also known as 'the Plague' and 'the Suffering'. A gargantuan entity, the Lizard is the carrier of innumerable parasites, and despite being in a perpetual state of rot, rapidly heals.
Lizardbloods: Humans or animals altered by Dure's blood. Lizardbloods have rapid regeneration. They are regarded as stupid by most. Lizardbloods also have strong wills. Notable Lizardbloods: Reagan, Orvi (via Ravenblood).
Enn, the Ox: Also known as 'the Furious' and 'the Broken'. As large as a house, Enn is a skinless mass of muscle and fibre that can moves at unperceivable speeds and delivers immense force to those it hits, at the cost of breaking itself apart with each impact. Certain actions can anger it, for reasons unknown.
Oxbloods: Humans or animals altered by Enn's blood. Oxbloods are large, strong, and physically imposing. They are easy to enrage. Notable Oxbloods: General Maja, Jackson, Dervin.
Kani, the Fox: Fast, capricious.
Foxbloods: Humans or animals altered by Kani's blood. Foxbloods are skilled combatants, and have enhanced senses. Sadistic. Notable Foxbloods: Aston, Bab (monstrous), Orvi (via Ravenblood).
Siik, the Spider: Calculating.
Spiderbloods: Humans or animals altered by Siik's blood. Spiderbloods are capable of rapidly assessing situations, though they are often maligned as cowardly. Notable Spiderbloods: Tully.
Wump, the Dolphin: Lives in the northern seas of the continent.
Dolphinbloods: Humans or animals altered by Wump's blood. Dolphinbloods are capable of manipulating the emotions of those around them. Notable Dolphinbloods: Representative Fedor, Serl, Holt.
Yoot, the Owl: Arcane.
Owlbloods: Humans or animals altered by Yoot's blood. Owlbloods are capable of using magic, which manifests alongside purple light, and can comprehend runes. Notable Owlbloods: Captain Vernon, Odrin (weak).
Avri, the Raven: Killed eight years before the bulk of the story, at great cost. Avri was worshipped by a cult, which held the Raven to be capable of 'saving' people. Avri had innumerable eyes and mouths, which gibbered madly.
Ravenbloods: Humans or animals altered by Avri's blood. Ravenbloods are capable of sensing the lifeforce of others, and can incorporate the &*(#!& of the dying, so long as the dying's blood is smeared across their head. Ravenbloods are known to be insane, and immensely dangerous. Notable Ravenbloods: Orvi, Sash & Dash (latent).
The Shrike: Mentioned once. Little is known about the Shrike, besides that it strikes quickly, and disappears just as suddenly. Appears little, known by few. There are no Shrikebloods.
Houses: Organisations/Families that control resources, territory and Blooded.
Heltian Conditions: A treaty between Houses for the purpose of killing the Raven and destroying its Cult.