Thoughts on Chapter 66, the End of Chapter 5, & Where Things Lie
It has been sixty-six weeks since this part of the adventure on Castrovel began: one year and three months. In that time, we started traveling across the Shemez Desert and came to Ofu-Laubu (aka: Laubua Mesa), where we got to explore a remote civilization that has almost never been seen. Then we took a convenient, cross-continent elfgate back to Qabarat, maybe Castrovel’s version of Absolom, since I had always intended to explore the Lashunta’s greatest city in closer detail. We learned that Qabarat is actually two different cities: one Lashunta and one Elven grown and entwined with each other, divided into five farthings, and with at least six distinct subcultures. It is a complex, conflicted city not wholly at peace with itself, and struggling to learn where it is evolving.
It was also the scene wherein, at the very end, all the attempts to create a just, fairer, more equitable community seemed to get overturned. A parade of ~Damaelauras~ (Damaya males masquerading as Elves) was attacked by Rightkind, after which the Matronhood tried to hide the whole affair saltmarsh-style. A male Damaya who tried to run for the Matronhood got forbidden. The protest against his proscription got put down by the city’s streetwatch and the military. The city’s lone outrider-headmistress advocating greater recognition for evermaidens and Korasha got forced to resign because her fellowship became nervous of non-traditional roles jeopardizing their traditional rights. Lady Vaeol herself got mocked and jeered, first for challenging the city’s Korasha champion to an exhibition match, and then for sponsoring her flag’s two Korasha outriders to hold the Gameyard against any outriders willing to challenge them. Although she willingly took her own loss as an opportunity to celebrate her honorable opponent, the city’s upper echelons took every excuse to downplay her flagmates’ success.
So what, if anything did change?
Maybe some small things changed. The ~Damaelauras~ made contact with the Temple of Yaraesa, a relatively new but growing faith based on wisdom and learning, but who also advocates for doethalmi - starklessness, no distinction between females and males, Damaya and Korasha - as a means for self-reflection and personal growth. Furthermore, so did the ~Searaze~ -Hoodwearers; female Korasha who seek outlaw security in the Marshfarthing’s slums against the social disentitlement they face. Maybe something changed in one Damaya matron choosing to run on a platform of inclusion, which lets her embrace he lifesystyle she has always wanted. While we don’t get to see the election’s outcome, maybe it’s progress enough that she was willing to stand on her principles.
In the end, hopefully readers are left with the sense that Lashunta society is manifoldly more complex than the canon gazetteers detail. As such, we also got to visit Loskialua, one of Paizo’s most recent additions to Castrovel’s canon, and see a new, uniquely Elven culture, but which still ties into Castrovel’s theater of global continent. Ukulam, even if it is mostly unexplored, is an asset coveted by both Elves and Formians, and in which the Lashunta may feel left out. It was also fun to realize the the Elven-Lashunta Alliance may not be as solid as assumed. Maybe its rocky. Maybe it needs some active attention to keep it viable. Maybe the Elves in Sovyrian have priorities of their own that have little to do with far-flung colonies on separate continents as they resent their prestige’s loss to younger, short-lived species, and furthermore, who knows, have their resources and attention being drawn to another colony on a wholly different world, which suffers under greater crisis. Even Lady Vaeol our narrator onl y gets hints and bits fed to her from her limited, even if on-ground, perspective.
So now at the end, let me share that plans are already in the works for _A Castrovel Adventure: Part 6_. We will take a break for publishing, but will be back in August to pick back up. When we do, it will be time for Lady Vaeol’s story to come full circle, back home to Son, but also to shake things up. So let me leave you with the preamble to Vaeol’s daylog:
~Sae voe o’nisa-yei.“Words fall like rain.O’voe-ziari romaf o’aveassi,Yet I let them fall to grow,o’hoe theia shivoayela kami-shei.~lest the world falls to time.
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