Words and Phrases

WORDS
Bluesky is the term for a person from a small, ignorant place. It means an innocent, rural, sheltered, rube. Also just “blue,” which is often misunderstood as a reference to Curians, though it originally just meant a simple country folk. The term is based on the clear blue skies of the Highlands, where (according to the myth) stupid people live simple lives. In reality, there is not much space in the Highlands that isn’t at least partially touched and controlled by the city masters of Marino, and the people who live there are certainly not rubes, though they might not know some of the conventions of the big cities.
Cachet City: A Cachet (“CATCH-it”) City is a new city center, built on higher ground when an older town becomes overwhelmed by fog. Eventually the name and most of the population of the lower city moves to the higher city, as happened in the case of Curty, Tenpin, and many other Highland cities. Sometimes this process fails; High Alder is a stalled Cachet City, now more or less abandoned, because Alder is once again in the clear.
Curians: Known regionally as Curriens, Kuros, Queros, and Quieros, these people live perpetually in the fog and most families share a recessive gene that gives them white hair and blue-tinted skin. They are widely despised as bandits, but they are more like scavenging nomads, collecting trade goods from lost and abandoned places and exchanging them for necessities with the low-lying towns.
Curians have a shamanistic, matriarchal society. They travel with belled walking sticks and each has a unique sound, so they can know each other easily even in darkness.
Ironically though they may seem primitive to city dwellers, Curians possess some of the most advanced found tech in all of Skye.
Dorsan’s Bells: A Dorsan is a crewman on the top, or dorsal area, of an airship, responsible for conning, navigation, and sometimes engine maintenance. This is a higher-ranked position. The corresponding role on the bottom is Venton or Venson, working (often) in darkness in the lower decks, but responsible for armaments, whiskers, docking, and landing gear. Each role wears different bells, as do edgemen and deckhands working around the widest part of the ship (on a large enough vessel), for identification by sound in thick fog. Dorsan’s Bells are a mark of role and rank, and you know the rank of an airman by “the pitch of his bells.”
Drag Lines: Many skyships let out “drag lines,” which are sail-anchors on ropes, often resembling box kites, running out into the fog ahead of them. They will then use these lines to follow the current in the fog, which is generally downhill, rather than being blown by the wind above it, which is generally from the west. Using this technique, a ship could be crawling east for days while others pass overhead headed west. (The phrase “drag line” also has the usual connotation of a rope or line used to haul something.)
Hardhands: Pickpockets in Tenpin and the surrounding areas are called “hardhands“ or “woodarms” because of the old trick (mostly apocryphal, but captivating) of attaching a false arm inside their cloak to disguise the movement of their real hands. The latter corrupts to “woodworms” elsewhere in Dearworth, and for this reason many people don’t know the origin of the word.
Lanner Docks are a small craft dock, best suited to tiny lighter-than-air ships like Skyslips and Turalogs. The were named for Cort Lannerin, one of the original masterminds of small craft design. A Lannerin is also a type of ubiquitous small aircraft, though ironically these days they are rarely small enough to use a Lanner Dock. Lannerin Shipworks is located in Seward Lee, Marino, and is now owned by Hoarth Lannerin, great-grandson of Cort.
Sain: The adjective “Sain” refers to an elder part of a city, usually the old city center, farther downhill. This may now be miles away, depending on the geography of the region. For example, the oldest part of Curty is “Curty Sain.” There is also the newer “Old Curty,” which is close to the current location of Curty.
“Sain” is also sometimes used as a loving diminutive (if such a thing can exist) meaning “Senior,” as in the older version of the person who is now the child. If a man named Barnaus has a son named Barnaus, he’s sometimes called “Barnau Sain,” though his son is rarely called “High Barnaus.” (Note the S dropping from the first word as it moves into another word beginning with S.)
PHRASES
Bands and Hands: There is typically a stick or painted line along the center deck of certain small and medium skycraft, marked in “bands” of roughly seven feet each (80 inches, or 6’8”). In thick fog a Dorsan can stand at one end of the line and count the bands of visibility in order to rate how far into the fog you can see. Visibility is therefore described as ten bands, etc.
A band is divided into twenty “hands,” of four inches each. That degree of precision isn’t necessary or possible when sighting but “bands and hands” is a term meaning “by and large” or “in full detail” and the verbal construction “five and ten” means five bands and ten hands.
Bands and hands also has a double meaning since a “band” is a group of sailors and a “hand” is an individual sailor. Sometimes “Bands and Hands” means “to the last detail” as in “the fleet was lost in battle, bands and hands” meaning “everyone.”
Bend like a Willow: To “Bend like a Willow” is essentially to be unbreakable. It refers to the tough-as-nails marshals trained at the Academy in Willough.
Black One's Cuffs: Meaning to stay put and weather periods of heavy fog, rather than pull up stakes and move to higher ground. It is a reference to carrying torches and candles everywhere, thus blackening one's shirt sleeves. It is seen as a point of pride among die-hard city folk who quite simply have no other choice.
Every Bolt Feels Strain: The common phrase “every bolt feels strain,” often abbreviated as “every bolt,” is complicated to unpack. The idea is that while every bolt in a joint feels a part of the load, the joint would probably hold with half of them gone, and in reality is it one or two of them that do the majority of the work. This is commonly used to suggest that not everyone contributes equally to any endeavor, even when they all have the same “load.” It’s an ironic phrase that means the opposite of what it seems to; namely that NOT every bolt carries the same load, something one says when bearing more than their fare share of the burden.
Skinning the Tail: To “loose the pig while you skin the tail” is an aphorism meaning to dwell forever on an insignificant detail of a conversation rather than keeping the thread. Usually phrased as “skinning the tail” and sometimes misspelled as “skinning the tale” by people who know the meaning but not the origin. It can also mean focusing on the unnecessary small details of a negotiation while ignoring the more crucial elements. It relates loosely to our phrase “missing the forest for the trees.”
Stiff as Holly: The phrase “Stiff as Holly” means super-dead. It originated with a beloved Seaside mayor named Derear Wooley, who froze to death during a harsh winter. In the Dearworth region, “Stiff as Wooley” has corrupted to “Stiff as Holly.” Holly is a well-known northern hardwood tree.
Whiskers in a Drift: Whiskers are long wires or rods that extend from the lower quarters of an airship, acting as an early warning system for treetops, towers, and other hazards that might hide in the fog. To “drift” simply means to move without power, usually due to a shutdown or failure of the engines. The phrase “useless as whiskers in a drift” refers to the notion of knowing that danger is imminent, but being powerless to prevent it.