The Dreamholders of Tessarna

Beyond the snowy slopes of the twin Plardo-Tylno Peaks with their ruby caps, across the Sea of Fiery Tamarinds where the trees grow out of the purple reefs to spray burning spores into the wind. Between the River Endurib’s wide delta that meanders aimlessly around the Plain of Milisino licking the plain’s fields of golden grass, and the sharp obsidian blades of the Wicklaure Mountains where the Dwerrow mine for diamonds and cut obsidian blades. At the centre of the vast and ancient Empire of Tessarna that is ruled by the mighty Lord of the City, Divine Emperor of the Manifold Blades, the Emperor-God Thah-Rast who has ruled there for ten thousand generations. There sits the many-spired citadel of Chega-Toleh, where the streets are limned in purple banners of silk and the paving stones are green marble laced with threads of gold brought up from the sea by the sixteen mighty hands of titanic Thah-Rast. Here the Guild of Dweomercraefters makes its magical vessels to store up dreams in captured form to be experienced again and again by whosoever seeks them. Dreams small and large, pleasant and horrible, all manner of dreams they ensnare in the delicate glass vessels and sell to the highest bidder.

Made of fine spun glass mixed with powdered dragon’s scales and spider silk and darker things only the guild members can ever know, the bowls of the dreamholders are made by the most secret of arts known to the dweomercraefters of Chega-Toleh and none else in the wide world. The duty is hazardous, as the fumes of the melting dragon scales are poisonous and the dweomercraefters must stir the glass with a crystal wand for hours on end. Many of them in olden days went mad from their labours so that they believed themselves to be the dragons whose flesh they smelted. Others grew painful scabs where the molten mixture touched their skin and changed it into scales like a dragon’s, only growing inward to cut into the flesh beneath.

The wealth of Tessarna grew vastly with the sale of these magical bowls to lands far and wide. From the glittering, jewel bedecked towers of the Khanate of Zathrasai, to the Sea of Purple Waves with its Ten Thousand Reefs and the flying palaces of the Fisher Lords that hover over the lambent waters humming softly, they were carried by flying caravans of pegasi. The Mathanarashat, ruler of Prangshuing, bought the dreams of seven hundred artists, paying for each fantasy with a hundred herds of purple buffalo. While the seventy-eight princesses of the kingdom of mermaids under the Sea of Fiery Tamarinds bought the dreams of farmers and merchants so they could know what working in the open air would be like. They paid in kind with dreams of their own, swimming up the River Endurib to meet the dweomercraefters of Chega-Toleh to deliver dreams of the deep sea.

But as the years went by and generations of craftsmen lost their minds or lives, fewer and fewer apprentices stepped forward, and the secrets of the old masters were threatened with extinction if young dweomercraefters could not be recruited. So the Guildmaster of Chega-Toleh sent out word that a new way to weave the bowls must be discovered before it was too late. At long last, after months of searching for a solution, one sage, the venerable Gabtellis came forward with an answer, for Gabtellis had constructed a magic vessel in which to smelt the ingredients, one that would stir the mixture on its own, without any assistance.

To demonstrate how his magical cooking bowls, with their spooned arms of delicate crystal and silver wire, would prepare a dreamholder, Gabtellis took the secret ingredients used by the Mage-crafters’ guild of Chega-Toleh, poured them into a bowl, and locked the bowl in an empty chamber of the Manifold Tower. The great tower was the floating jade-walled palace of the resplendent and mighty Lord of the City, Divine Emperor of the Manifold Blades, Emperor-God Thah-Rast, and ruler of the great Empire of Tessarna that drifted over the city in the pink clouds that billowed around the palace. Amused, the giant Divine-Emperor Thah-Rast Himself stood guard before the huge golden door to the chamber, spreading out His sixteen hands in each of which He wielded a deadly dragon-tooth kris shimmering with the light of the moon. He then intoned in a voice that rippled through the entire empire, “None shall enter here lest he surely die!”

The very next day, it was mighty Thah-Rast, His skin blazing red and purple in the dawn’s early light that opened the chamber doors and walked in to inspect the device, and behold! There above the cauldron two delicate hands of crystal held a finished dreamholder! Gabtellis followed into the room and bowed between the feet of Thah-Rast, “O mighty Lord of the City, Divine Emperor of the Manifold Blades, Emperor-God of Tessarna, it is as I had said unto You. Mix the ingredients into the vessel according to the secrets of the guild of Chega-Toleh, and the vessel will make for You a holder of dreams.” And it was then that the great god-emperor Thah-Rast ordered the sagacious Gabtellis to make and render unto Him one hundred of his magical vessels to cook the glass and spin out dreamholders. Gabtellis bowed “The mighty Lord of the City will not be disappointed, I shall make them by the next rising of the gibbous moon…” and left to begin his work.

Gabtellis returned to his home beneath the black waters of Lake Anatara that held the great dragon Taragaio whose scales Gabtellis gathered floating in the water and took inside his sunken tower of shells and coral where he had his secret smithy and lived with his apprentices. There he taught them to make dreamholders and magical cauldrons for brewing elixirs and crystalline wands for holding magical fire that could melt steel and dragon scales. He worked on the magical bowls and their delicate mechanisms, driving his company of apprentices to work day and night to finish the work and not disappoint the invincible god who had charged him with the contract. Days on end they worked, until they were ready to collapse, but at long last Gabtellis was able to deliver his vessels to the scintillating palace of His Divine Majesty Thah-Rast. He received his payment in ten thousand disks of diamond-encrusted palladium, each huge coin worth more than Gabtellis’ own weight in gold.

But all was not well. The guildmasters of Chega-Toleh could not make the vessels of Gabtellis work, but sat watching them, uttering words of power to command them to stir to no avail, and grew frustrated and outraged by this seeming trickery of Gabtellis. They went before the Lord of the City, All-Mighty Thah-Rast of the Manifold Blades, and beseeched Him to summon Gabtellis and make him pay for this affront to the glorious Empire of Tessarna. The Lord of the City, Divine Emperor-God of Tessarna, All-Mighty Thah-Rast of the Manifold Blades, roared aloud in anger and the very around Him shattered, opening a black pit in space. Thah-Rast reached through the hole with a mighty hand and pulled Gabtellis out of his tower beneath the dark waters of Lake Anatara into His palace to drop the sage on the marble floor of the palace before His royal court and the masters of the guild of Mage-Crafters. Gabtellis lay on the floor shaking in terror until he saw where he was and then knelt and bowed before the Lord of the City, Divine Emperor of the Manifold Blades, Emperor-God of Tessarna, Thah-Rast. “O, Mighty God Thah-Rast,” he pleaded, “how have I displeased You so that You have brought me here before You?” The mighty god sat upon His glittering throne carved from a single great orb of sapphire laced with iridium and gold and pointed at the head of the Mage-Crafters’ guild, “Speak…” said the rumbling voice of the god. Guildmaster Glaero glared at Gabtellis, his robes of delicate silver chainmail and interlocking plates of emerald encrusted palladium jangling as he rushed to the scene to stand between Gabtellis and the mighty Divine Emperor Thah-Rast. “Gabtellis!” the portly guildmaster growled, “You have committed a heinous fraud against the guild, the empire, and our glorious Divine Emperor Thah-Rast of the Manifold Blades! These magical vessels of yours are utterly useless; they will not operate at our command even when we use the sacred words of power to activate them! We pour the ingredients into the pots and they do nothing, we stir the ingredients and they do nothing, they do not heat up to melt the dragon scales and black pearls and pink quartz orbs, they do not move to stir the ingredients… They do nothing! We have a room full of vessels and the greatest mage-crafters in the empire, and we are waiting for even a single dreamholder to be made. How dare you perform such a fraud upon us!”

Gabtellis heaved a long sigh, stood up, and approached the glittering sapphire throne of the Lord of the City, Divine Emperor of the Manifold Blades, Emperor-God of Tessarna, Thah-Rast, and lifted up his voice, “O, mighty Lord Thah-Rast, all of this is an error of meanings, as I did only as I thought I was told in the making of my magical vessels of crystal lattices and silver gears. For was not the goal of their creation to make a vessel that would operate unattended so as not to endanger the mage-crafters of the guild of Chega-Toleh? Well, that is what I have done. For in making these magical pots they have been commanded in each and every part to not begin their labours in the presence of others, but to work at their craft only when alone and removed from delicate mortal flesh that may be harmed by their efforts.”

Well, at this the mighty Lord of the City, Divine Emperor of the Manifold Blades, Emperor-God of Tessarna, Thah-Rast could only laugh, for He saw the meaning of Gabtellis’ words immediately. But guildmaster Glaero, not as sagacious as officious, fumed like a kettle on the fire too long, “Speak plainly you fraudulent blasphemer! What do you mean by all of this?!” At which Gabtellis calmly replied, “It is simple Glaero. A watched pot never toils.”