Lashkin
Fibers of the iris that fell like lashes, took root in the white of the Eye and one day stood up to listen. Where a face should be, a Lashkin has a closed lid with a little iris of its own beneath; it opens a crack only to speak, and it speaks in a whisper, because the Eye belongs to a sleeping god, and a loud sound runs along the fibers to wake him. They call humans blinkers: a creature that closes its eyes twenty times a breath and the world still stands is, to them, either terribly brave or terribly lucky.
«Oh... a blinker. Shh, softly — you are standing on someone's dream. I see you. I am …. Your eyes close and open all the time — twenty times a breath! And the world still stands. How do you bear it?»
The settlement and its dwellers
Crafts
Looks
Where they live
Lashkin Hush. A hush of the Lashkin on the white of the Eye: low houses shaped like closed eyes, each roofed with a pale lid of sclera stone and hooded at the back with woven fiber, with lashes along the edge and a doorway that is the slit of the lid — so that the Sleeper, if he ever looks down, sees only more closed eyes. The houses gather around a knot of vessels that rises out of the White, warm and beating, and the paths between them are laid with soft fiber, so that no step rings.
Tasks
The Chambers of the Vigil· ElderGo down into the Iris Deeps, where the Wakeful kept their vigil, and come back up to the elder.
«Shh... sit. Under the iris the Wakeful cut their chambers and watched in turns, so that someone was always awake. When they left, they sealed the lower halls. We never go in: it was the loudest silence we ever heard. But you blink, and the walls do not take blinkers. Go down, read what they wrote on their lecterns, and come back up. Quietly.»
Close His Eyes· ElderDefeat the Unblinking at the bottom of the Iris Deeps.
«You have seen the chambers; now you know who hangs over the well at the bottom. He kept the last vigil and did not close his eyes for nine days, and on the tenth the Sleeper looked out through him. An eye that never shuts is a door left open in a sleeping house. We would never ask... but close it, blinker. Gently, if you can. Then the White can sigh.»
The Ring on the White· ElderWake the sleeping ring on the White of the Eye: the gate between the worlds.
«One more door, and this one we want open. The ring on the White sleeps until the Eye has closed and someone has stood through it with open eyes. It wants his lens, four tears, eight measures of pigment, and the void shards your folk collect. Wake it, blinker. A door between dreams... that is quieter than your flying boat.»
A Quiet Quarry· Pigment DiggerFind the Wakeful's pigment quarry and bring the pigment digger a brush.
«The Wakeful dug a whole quarry in the iris, in steps, with a rig and a bucket on a chain. Loud, loud work. One day they went up the ramp and never came back down. I want to dig there again, the quiet way: two taps, a pause, then a brush. Ours are lash grass and wear out fast. See if the quarry is still quiet, blinker, and bring me one of your brushes: copper, a feather and a stick.»
Bow When It Leaps· Pigment DiggerLive through a saccade of the Eye and show the pigment digger four pinches of iris pigment it shook out of the ground.
«When the Sleeper's eye leaps after something in a dream, the whole White leaps with it. Streaks run over the ground first, the way it will throw you; the beat comes twice; then the jolt. We bow, low, to the ground, and it passes over us. Afterwards pigment jumps out of the ground like startled mites, no digging at all. Ride one through, blinker. Bow. Then show me what you picked up.»
Copper for Pick Beaks· Pigment Digger· repeatableBring the pigment digger twelve copper ingots to bind the crystal beaks of the picks.
«Our picks have crystal beaks bound in copper. Iron rings, and ringing carries; copper only hums, and a hum the Sleeper takes for his own heart. The bindings wear through fast. Bring me copper when you can, blinker, and I will pay in what I dig.»
His Heart in the Closing· Vessel KeeperFind the Vessel Knot and live through the Closing of the Eye with your eyes open.
«Every keeper wants to know one thing: what does his heart do when the Closing comes? We cannot listen: we lie flat with our lids pressed shut and count our breaths. But you walk about in the dark, blinker. Find the Knot, where his vessels come up to breathe, put your hand on one when the light goes out, and come back and tell me.»
Grazers at the Vessels· Vessel Keeper· repeatableDefeat three sclera grazers that strip the vessels from the White and bring the vessel keeper two hides for patches.
«The grazers strip the vessels from the White and chew them for hours, and where they have chewed, the vessel goes cold. I bind the wounds, but I cannot stop the mouths. You can, blinker. Three of them, quickly; one blow each, if you can manage it: a long fight is loud. And bring me two hides. They make good patches, warm and wet like the White itself.»
Warmth from the Dream of Gold· Vessel KeeperGo down to the Forge and bring the vessel keeper two salamander crystals to warm a cold vessel.
«One vessel under the hush has gone cold, and nothing I do warms it. The Wakeful wrote of a dream far below everything: a sea of gold under a red sky, gold that never cools. If you can walk into his dreams, blinker, walk into that one and bring me two of the stones that keep its heat. A cold vessel is a cold spot in his sleep, and he turns, and turns.»
A Soft Lid· Lash WeaverCarry four lengths of lash cloth from the lash weaver to a sealer of the Comb Keepers, in the Hive.
«You have been to the world of wax! Shiri wants to know if the folk there really hide in their shells when they are frightened. We hide under our lids, she says, so we would get on. But a shell lid slammed shut must be loud... Take them some lash cloth to line their lids, blinker. Then they can hide as quietly as we do.»
Children of the Great Lashes· Lash WeaverFind the Lashes on the edge of the White and bring the lash weaver eight tufts of lashwort from beneath them.
«On the edge of the White grow his own lashes, the great ones: seven curved pillars leaning away from the Well. We never cut them. But the lash grass at their feet is their children, and nothing is softer. Cloth from it does not even remember it was grass. Go and sit under them, blinker, and bring me eight tufts. Cut gently, so they grow back.»
Jars for the Tear Duct· Tear GathererFind the Tear Duct and bring the tear gatherer twelve empty bottles.
«When he wept, his tears ran out through the duct, from the iris across the White and down into a chamber with a basin. Someone lined it with brick long before us. We go there in the veil, with jars, to gather what still seeps. But my jars crack in the cold of the chamber. Go down the duct, blinker, see how deep it runs, and bring me twelve of your little bottles. Yours do not crack.»
Where the Gaze Lingered· Tear GathererLive through the Gaze of the Eye and show the tear gatherer two lens crystals: tears that set where it lingered.
«Sometimes his attention wanders in his sleep: a ring of light crawls over the ground, with a column falling into it from above, and follows whoever is in the open. Where it lingers on empty ground, the ground weeps, and the tears set. I follow it with my jars, far behind. You are faster than me, blinker. Let it follow you a little, not too long, then step under a roof and gather what it leaves.»
A Tear for the Weeping World· Tear GathererCarry a tear of the Eye from the tear gatherer to a tear gatherer of the Mourners, in the Lament.
«Is it true, blinker? A world where everybody weeps? We have only one who weeps, and he does it in his sleep, and we gather what he lets go. Take them one of his tears. If a tear given away grows lighter there, perhaps his pain will be a little lighter too, once it is carried far enough. He would not notice. That is the best kind of gift.»
The Shard Through a Far-Tube· Lens CarverFind the Lens Shard and show the lens carver your spyglass.
«Your tubes that look far away... we have heard of them. Two lenses in a tube, and the far comes near. I have carved lenses all my life and never looked through two at once. Take yours to the Shard first, the piece of his lens standing in the iris, and look at it from far off. Then bring the tube to me, blinker, and tell me: does a broken lens look whole from far away?»
A New Eye for the Staff· Lens CarverCarry the lens carver's new lens to the elder, for the crystal eye on the elder's staff.
«The crystal eye on the elder's staff has gone cloudy: the elder has walked through too many veils. I carved a new one from an old tear and polished it until it saw the way he sees: a little blurred, kindly. Carry it to the elder, blinker. Both hands. And do not look through it on the way; a lens remembers the first face it sees.»
Dark for the Pupil· Gaze KeeperBring the gaze keeper six pieces of condensed void from the islands of the Interrift.
«Hush. You came in through the pupil; everything does. A pupil must be the darkest thing there is, or the gaze blurs. Bring six knots of the void. Quietly.»
What the Eye Sees· Gaze KeeperFly to the Seam Prism, the station of the Facetkin by the rift of the Facet, and come back.
«We look at one light more than at the others: a splinter that burns in a line. We have looked for a long time and still do not know what it is. Go there. Come back. Tell me only one thing: is it sharp?»
A Lens Without a Flaw· Gaze KeeperBring the gaze keeper three lens crystals from the Eye for the Tear Chamber.
«Under the floor we keep what the Eye has wept. The chamber wants three lens crystals from home, clear ones. Bring them, and I will let you down there. Once. Do not stare.»
What to talk about
Tell me about the Eye.
It is the eye of the Sleeper. He lies somewhere beneath everything, so deep that nobody has found where, and he sleeps with his eye open. We live on it: on the White, by the green of the iris. In the middle is the Well — that is where he looks from. Speak softly here. Everything you say goes into the fibers.
Why did he stay and fall asleep?
He did not fall asleep, blinker... he lay down. That is different. The oldest whisper says: he lay down with his eye open, so that something would see him watching. One who sleeps with his eye open is not resting. He keeps watch the only way that lasts. And if he wakes... ...No. Not even to you. We cover the lid with two fingers and point up, and away. That is the rest of the sentence.
What is he like?
Warm. We see through the lid by warmth, and the deepest warmth in the Eye is under the Well. Not hot — steady. Like a hearth someone banked for a long night. The Wakeful wrote that the warmth is going down, very slowly, one breath of ours in a hundred. We do not write. But we feel it. ...It is going down.
The tablet from the Ring at the Edge says: the hunger watches the road.
...Shh. Shh. Then we are not his dream at all. He looks through us... past the White, past the ring, out along the roads... at that. Something watches the road, and he watches it back, with his eye open. Two who watch. ...Now I know why we whisper, blinker. It was never about waking him.
What does he dream of?
The Wakeful wrote down the dreams the Eye showed them: a blue world with a pale moon, a rusty one, a striped giant, a ring of ice... and far below, in the heat, a sea of gold under a red sky and ash that walks. We think they are only dreams. Some of us are not so sure any more.
Far beyond the stars I saw a great eye: a blue pupil, an orange rim, and a white star in the middle.
...Shh. Shh. You stood in it? Inside? ...The oldest whisper says the Sleeper has two eyes, blinker. One is the Eye we live on: it looks in, at his dreams. The other looks out — far out, past every ring — and keeps watch where dreams do not reach. Nobody had ever seen the second one. Was the white star warm? ...Then he still sleeps, and still watches. Do not go back to stare. What is stared at stares back.
What did the Wakeful not understand about the dream of gold?
The vessel keeper laid two stones from the dream of gold in a cold vessel's bed, and the vessel beat again. So his dreams are real places, and warm ones. A sleeper who dreams of warmth sleeps long, the keeper says. Nobody argued.
What is the black well in the middle?
The Well. The pupil. It is dark because he looks out of it, and whatever looks out cannot be looked into. The glances rise out of the Well. Strangers built a pier over it, and their flying boat is still tied to it, torn open. We do not go there. If you do — do not look down for long.
And the green ridges around it?
The iris. Fibers, thousands of them, running out from the Well like the rays of a slow sun. We come from there: a fiber falls the way a lash falls, takes root in the White and one day stands up and listens. The grooves between the fibers hold pigment, and the little mites drink the light there. Walk across the ridges, not along them: the grooves are deeper than they look.
Why do you live on the White?
It is quiet. The White is far from the Well, and his gaze passes over it seldom. And it is warm: the vessels run under it, and if you lie on the White with your lid shut, you can hear his heart — slow, so slow. As long as it is slow, he sleeps deep. Our vessel keepers listen to it all their lives.
What does his heart do in the Closing?
The vessel keepers say his heart beats slower in the Closing: he is sleeping deeper, not waking. A blinker put a hand on a vessel in the dark and felt it. The young still lie flat in the Closing, but now they giggle a little.
Who are you?
Lashkin. Fibers of the iris that fell and did not wither. We took root in the White, stood up and learned to listen; then we learned to whisper. Under my lid there is an iris of my own — a crumb of his eye. That is why we keep our lids shut: if I opened mine all the way and kept it open, he would see himself in it. And wake.
Why do you whisper?
Because a loud sound does not stay where you made it. It goes into the fibers, along the fibers to the Well, down the Well to the nerve, and the nerve carries it to him. A shout is a pebble thrown at his eye. We forgive you; you did not know. But now you know.
Why do you open your lid when you talk?
Because words come from the eye. A word said with a shut eye is a word you do not stand behind. When I open a crack, you see my iris, and my iris sees you: that is a promise that I am not lying. And when we greet someone, we open it all the way, for one breath. It is a small risk. You are worth it.
Names
Shiss · Lisse · Hushe · Ilse · Shael · Esh · Fassa · Sileh · Hiss · Thessa · Liess · Hael