A Beasthood · The edge
The Meadows
To be from here is to know the way out, the way home, and every name between.
This chapter turns on the Yetis →Their gift: The Fire. Tales keep names the rest let slip; walkers bring the lost home. The cost: The Edge is closest; walkers go to the Edge, not past it.
About 500 Beasts call The Meadows home.
The place
Fields, timber houses and the biggest sky in the Beastside, facing the Wilds. The neighbours call it the back of beyond; the Meadows call it the front.
Their gift, and what it costs
The Fire. Tales at the Fire Circle keep names everyone else let slip, and walkers bring the lost home through the Wilds, a knot on every post. They walk to the Edge and stop. The cost: the Edge reaches the Meadows first, and every house has someone out on the road.
What they want, and what they fear
Want: to meet the Returner at the Edge and walk them home. Fear: the Edge, and loving it.
People you might meet
- Ridley Sloane (Beagle, walker), on the furthest walk any Meadows Beast has made: "Went out. Saw some hills."
- Bertil Thorsby (Cat, cairn keeper). Wants the cairns left be. Last week the Fire told how Bertil once moved one to lead a newcomer home; Bertil stood, said "Eleven paces," and sat down.
- Wren Achterberg (Cat). Wants their sibling, a Drifter nine years out in the Wilds, home for a winter. A knot comes every season; Wren reads it like a letter: "Fine, love you, mushrooms."
- Tallgrass (Beagle, Tall Tales). Ridley saw the hill in Tallgrass's best tale and puts it at knee height. "How big a hill?" "Bigger now."
Neighbours and old business
- Nowhere Parks: one thinks, one does; Meadows walkers see Parks walkers to the Edge.
- Gaia Grove: asked for one of the Returner's seeds, was told to wait, and waits loudly.
- MoBA: the Fire keeps Grey Year names, the Unnamed Room Grey Year faces. Every match is a Calling.
Books from The Meadows
A Beast's Book is written from their holder's choices.
No Book from The Meadows is open yet. A holder of a Beast from here can begin theirs in the game.
More about The Meadows
Their scarIn the Grey Year the Meadows walked out past the Last Post for the lost.
In the Grey Year the Meadows walked out past the Last Post for the lost. The Fire's nightly roll is the Long Night kept small, and still holds Grey Year names.
What they argue aboutTall Tales against True Tales: should a tale grow every telling, like the Wilds, or stay true, for whoever out there needs it?
Tall Tales against True Tales: should a tale grow every telling, like the Wilds, or stay true, for whoever out there needs it?
This seasonAt the Return, four months ago, someone walked in from past the Edge with seeds.
At the Return, four months ago, someone walked in from past the Edge with seeds. They have no Beast name; the Meadows call them the Returner, and no two Beasts describe their face alike. They lived in the outermost hut, by the Last Post, and walked the posts at dusk, "going home." Two weeks ago they went back out, leaving their seeds with the Fire Circle; the Odd Patch is dug and waiting.
The Edge had stood still since the Long Night; this season it moved. Walk Out want walkers at the Edge every dusk; Hold the Fire want everyone home by dark.
A customThe Ugly Knot.
The Ugly Knot. Every newcomer ties a first knot on the Last Post, always dreadful. At first frost the Meadows judge them by lantern, and whoever tied the ugliest tells winter's first tale, uncorrected. Ridley's, a lump like a fist, is shown to newcomers.
PlacesThe Last Post: on clear days the Grey shows from here, hills going pale like a poster left in a window.
- The Last Post: on clear days the Grey shows from here, hills going pale like a poster left in a window.
- Outer Trail: walked in pairs; the newest prints point inward, and the Meadows' two Yetis say they aren't theirs.
- Cairn Line: where the Edge stopped after the Long Night.
- The Throat: the Bones under the fields. The Gnomes have been down, and tell it differently every time.
What they think is going on"The edges are an invitation."
"The edges are an invitation." Bravest of the twenty.