An ancient mage-city whose reputation is second only to
Lyonesse, Ys has a long and storied history since the days of its formation. Arcing over the bright waters of the Mirrorsea, it's long been thought to be one of the wonders of Genesis. Would-be mages travel from far and wide to live and study here.
This article focuses on the city of Ys itself; for the shard as a whole, see Ys Shard.
Location
The city of Ys is located on the shoreline of what's known as the Mirrorsea, a calm and shallow inland sea dotted with tiny isles. While the coast is generally sandy and smooth, it rises into a headland where Ys is located in order to reach the height of the city's arcing rings; Ys stands supported by a combination of this headland, several small islands, and the great magically-created sweeps of stone beneath the rings of the city itself.
The city is the primary destination for most visitors to the shard, but doesn't have a deepwater harbor of its own; the area known as the Wavefront is generally used by cargo ships only, meaning that travelers typically disembark at Gull's Harbor to the west and approach the city by land. Making the gently sloping ascent to the Queen's Gate is considered a marvelous site for newcomers, and part of the essential experience of visiting Ys.
Layout and Features
Organized in a series of great rings, Ys has a layout that's second nature to its inhabitants and often bewildering to those visiting from elsewhere. Learning to navigate the spiraling paths of the city is just another part of lying here; thankfully, the circular nature of the streets means that there's only so lost a person can get. When in doubt, it's just a matter of finding the correct ring and walking until arriving at one's destination.
The city's center, literally and figuratively, is the innermost disc commonly referred to as the Jewel's Heart. This broad disc is the hub of activity for most day-to-day activities in Ys; it's the location of commerce, worship, and some of the more exclusive craftsmen. Merchants line the streets in permanent shopfronts, but there's also a great plaza known as the Eye that hosts a day market selling everything from produce to reagents to finely crafted goods. The Heart is where a great deal of the daily hustle and bustle of Ys happens, and a resident of the city will likely visit there several times a week to sell or buy. It's also the location of Healer-specialized Rhiannon Circle, the only circle not located on the Outer Ring.
Arching around one side of the Eye is a great sweeping facade called the Conclave; it's a semi-open building that houses small temples to the
pantheon of Genesis, though other temples are also scattered throughout the city. The greatest of these is a temple to
Fate, the patron god of the city. Though Fate doesn't generally have elaborate places of worship, here his temple doubles as a meeting place for the mage council that rules Ys; it's a potent reminder of the presence of the Mirror God, and a caution to be fair and considered in the decisions that rule the lives of the city's people.
Moving out from the Heart, the first and second rings of the city are a combination of boarding houses, individual residences, bathouses, and the various mundane businesses that keep a city functional. All sorts of people rub shoulders here, and the rings are a piecemeal blend of functional and comfortable. As a whole the accommodations tend to be somewhat more working-class towards the center and more affluent towards the outside, depending on where their respective inhabitants are likely to travel for their day to day lives.
The outermost ring of Ys, home to its mage circles and the houses of the city's wealthiest members, is by far the largest and most generously spaced. It commands sweeping views of the Mirrorsea and is the easiest to mistake for natural land due to the fact that it's largely covered by a well-maintained landscape of gardens with a Mediterranean aesthetic. Magic provides what thin-spread soil can't, and makes for a lush expanse of low bushes and tree cover; orange, olive, and laurel trees provide shade from the sun, and lavender and wildflowers grow in planter-boxes of the same pale stone as the city itself. It's a beautiful area that makes it easy to forget that the city towers more than a hundred feet over the water below, and a favorite place for the people of the city to spend their free time and enjoy the ocean breeze on a hot day. The gardens of the Outer Ring are open to all, though they're most commonly frequented by mages and mages-in-training looking to gather their thoughts or just take a moment to relax and unwind.
Interspersed among these gardens are the houses of the city's upperclass, who'll often separate off their estates with tactful low walls to distinguish the private from the public. There's no true 'nobility' in Ys, and the primary social currency is both wealth and magical ability. The latter means that many of these Outer Ring residents are also members of the mage circles, which exist alongside their homes. The Circles of Ys have more room to spread out than they do in Lyonesse, and many have their own small campuses of sorts where their students can live in close proximity to where they study. A few circles have added distance from the city at large by being located on the few tall islets that help support the city.
Of the circles, Ahes Circle has the greatest reputation and history. Named for the city's creator, a long-ago Shaper mage, it's located on an island just beside the Siren's Light beacon; the mages of the circle have access to a small sandy cove below via a winding cliffside staircase, which legend says that Ahes herself once used to steal away to meet a lover who lived beneath the waves.
Though the majority of what people think of as the city of Ys exists on the iconic rings, there are a few areas that are built on the shore in a loose extension of the city proper. To the west of the Queen's Gate is Wavefront, a warehouse and dockside area where a few piers built into deeper water take in merchant ships. To the east is the Fisher District, a small and relatively ramshackle area that houses the city's fishermen and has a sandy shoreline where they launch their skiffs. Despite its poorer appearance, the Fisher District is still safe and well-patrolled due to its close proximity to a local guardhouse. It harbors a daily market in the mid-morning where the catch is sold, meaning that there's a constant and steady flow back and forth from the district to the city proper.
Population
Despite seeing a natural ebb and flow in its population due to its role as a center of learning, Ys is somewhat more stable than its sister city of Lyonesse. The people of Ys like to say that once you've lived in the great city, nowhere else can ever compare; while not everyone agrees, it's safe to say that the place is unforgettable and those who live there for any length of time are generally reluctant to leave. The gentle climates of the shard and the ease of living provided by magic means that the city's inhabitants tend to enjoy a long life, and their numbers are naturally replenished over time by apprentices who never quite bring themselves to return home once their training is complete.
Ys is a place of immense elegance and tradition, and its people tend to think of themselves in much the same way. Though being a mage city comes with a certain level of flamboyance built-in, it's a little more restrained here; people are relaxed, laid-back, and pride themselves on a certain level of casual refinement. Magic is a natural thing interwoven through the everyday, and the population of Ys don't feel any great need to flaunt their magical heritage when the wonder of the city itself does so for them.
Though there are plenty of those in the city who aren't magically inclined themselves, most non-mages who live there supplement their lives with magic via the relative abundance of magical charms and items produced by apprentice and journeymen in the Circles. The result is a population that's uniformly magical; at times a little unsettling for visitors who aren't expecting it, but it's considered beneficial in that it's quick to knock down incoming apprentices a peg and settle them into a good level of humility early.
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