On Loria Broadly:
The Seas
The waters around Loria are restless. They bind the continent on all sides, drawing food, trade, and stories into their currents. But they give nothing without demand. Storms strike as swiftly as blessings, and the triple pull of the moons ensures no tide is ever familiar for long.
The Southern Deltas
Where the Valemire empties into the sea, the rivers unravel into a maze of reeds and silt. Villages balance on stilts above brackish water, their lanterns strung across channels like false stars. The ground shifts with each flood, banks sliding away, whole islands swallowed overnight. Yet this is where Tolmir’s lifeblood flows — fish, reeds, and ferries feeding the markets upriver.
The Western Harbors
The west offers harbors broad enough to welcome fleets, but storms scour them without warning. Merchant caravans unload here, and shipwrights of House Thalen launch their sleek warships from the headlands. Their vessels are long and narrow, fitted for speed and sudden boarding. Some carry harpoon crews for whales, others pearl divers, others soldiers waiting for fog to cover their sails.
The Northern Cliffs
The northern coast is stone and fury. Black cliffs rise sheer from the water, carved into caverns where smugglers anchor and storms batter without pause. Few harbors exist here; fewer still are safe. Sailors who return speak of currents that tug at hulls from unseen depths, as though the cliffs themselves are reaching upward.
The Triple-Moon Tides
The three moons shape every voyage. Talvaris swells the seas high; Cynvara stirs them sideways; Orriven drags them slow and strange.
When all three climb the sky together, the waters move in patterns that unsettle even seasoned crews. Nets come up empty, compasses falter, and the surface itself seems to breathe. Coastal folk mark such nights with offerings or silence, depending on their faith.
Sailors and Stories
The sea is a larder, but one with teeth. Whales fuel the lamps of Tolmir. Crabs armored like iron break nets. Silverbone eels light the jewelry of nobles, though divers risk their lives to catch them. Fishermen carve charms into planks and carry salt packets against what waits beneath.
Every port keeps its own taboos. In one harbor it is forbidden to whistle, in another to speak Cynvara’s name aloud at sea. To break them is to tempt the Eye Below — the old name for whatever watches from under the waves.
The Hand of Thalen
House Thalen holds more coastline than any rival. Their fleets ferry soldiers, guard grain barges, and hunt the waters as though they were fields. Without their ships, inland Houses would starve or stumble. The balance of power in Loria rests as much on Thalen’s oars as on any sword.
Yet even they bow to the sea. Fireships may burn rivals in the fog, silent flotillas may raid villages by night — but storms scatter admirals, and wreckage drifts home with no answers.
What the Water Remembers
The seas of Loria keep their own record. Shipwrecks rise and fall with the tides, bones are buried in sand only to be revealed years later, and whole fleets are reduced to rumor. Scholars call the waters a force, priests call them a mirror, and fishermen call them a hunger that must be fed.
The truth is less comforting: the seas serve nothing but themselves. They do not forget, and they do not forgive.