Furthest, the Tarshite capital since 1492, was originally intended as a showcase imperial-style city, and has since been regularly expanded and improved as successive kings assert their authority and claims to fame and, more recently, to reflect Tarsh’s new-found wealth. This is a strategically- and mythically-important place, after all, as a city has been on this site – off and on – for over six centuries. So the lunarised city build on the foundations of an old Earth city built on the ruins of a EWF city. Not only is there a spiritual layering, with old ghosts and spirits (including some bizarre EWFish one) but also a physical layering. Underground ruins, catacombs and vaults are used by followers of the Dark Earth goddesses. Unexplained holes open as foundations give way, and the remnants of the old city are an enduring hazard to attempts to build a city-wide sewerage system. Indeed, the Union of Sanitary Excavation, a rag-bag collection of mercenaries hired to spearhead this operation and clear the underways of often monstrous obstacles, is one of the toughest herobands in the city.

Approached from a distance, the city makes an undeniable impression. Enclosed by great sweeping white walls (which are regularly whitewashed rather than really being all marble), the even and well-maintained paved roads into the city pass through dramatically-carved gates. The square fields around the city are slave-worked and –managed under the auspices of the Royal Dishthane’s office, with the exception of the First Field, sacred to the Earth Ladies. Close by is Sorana Tor’s Manse of Teeth.

On the other side of the city is the sprawling military encampment, officially the Field of Swords but generally known as Phargentes’ Fort. Thanks to its position between the fort and the city, the shantytown of Furthest-Outside-the-Walls has also become the unofficial haunt of camp-followers and eager recruits, as well as the dispossessed, the foreign and the thrill-seeking.

The city’s regular population is around 20,000. The most impressive portal is the Barbarian’s Gate to the east, which looks out towards Sartar, while a loop of the Oslir lies lazily along the city’s southern walls, along which are the three sets of jetties, for the Slave Market, the Fish Market and Port Furthest.

Inside, the city is dominated by a grid-pattern layout. However, the rather less orderly plan of the Old City still survives in the maze of often temporary alleys within the blocks. While the main roads are generally paved or cobbled, between the tallhouses, courtyard villas and temples of each block are twisting and overshadowed backstreets, unexpected little squares and furtive corners. It is still quite usual for an alley mouth to be blocked one day by the erection of a new wooden building or for a new route to open when city workgangs tear down another unlicensed construction. For all the neatness of the official layout, day to day navigation through Furthest can still be an adventure!

The layout of the city is dappled by numerous squares and piazzas, with fountains, gardens and statues (including ones designed and created by the noted Cassidor and Ineldus). The seven main squares really are squares, exact Earth-cultic areas, including one dedicated to HonEel, in which each cobblestone is engraved with a representation of maize. HonEel’s Great Square is dominated by a large, verdigris-covered copper statue of a smiling man. That this statue has magic within it is undoubted, although few agree as to what or who it represents. Some even suggest that there is some link to Pyjeemsab, and that HonEel brought his spirit back over the dark river to watch over his city.

Close by the square is Berest’s Point, a hill sacred to Berest the Wallsman, original architect of the city and now its wyter. The hill is marked with a deceptively simple shrine, actually little more than the entry to a substantial underground temple in which the King leads the annual Wallsday rites to keep Furthest strong and secure. It is no surprise that the last three major disasters which befell the city – the Great Fire of 1593, the Great Plague of 1604 or the Great Blight of 1610 (in which the city was tormented for a whole season by flocks of unruly and incontinent gulls and pigeons) – took place in years in which the rituals were either disrupted by hostile heroquesters (1593, 1604) or else the King was unable to carry them out (1610).

Berest the Wallsman, Wyter of Furthest

Physical Manifestation:	A marble statue, kept within Berest’s Point
Communication Manifestation:	Cut stone within the city briefly shudders
Awareness Function:	Vigilant for Attackers, Spot Grazers 10w4.
Blessing Function:	Spotless Walls, Gleaming Spires, Clean Streets 10w4
Defence Function:	Repair Walls, Hold Gates 10w4
Festivals:	Wallsday (Earth/Harmony/Sea; when people congregate in the squares to sing and hear tales of the city and support the king in the annual rites) Axis (Wild/Harmony/Darkness; when every crossroads in the city is decorated with birch wreaths, lanterns and warm braziers, and inhabitants of the four blocks around meet to settle disputes and make merry)

As befits a city in a constant state of re-invention, there is building work everywhere and crude wooden cranes and scaffolding (and even cruder gangs of labourers) are a common sight. In the wealthier quarters, much of the new construction is in marble, where conspicuous consumption is the order of the day. It is widely said of the people of Furthest that they would rather ‘shine for a day than eat for a week.’ Even within the poorer quarters, there are clear efforts at gentrification, where wattle-and-daub or plank and log houses are re-daubed and whitewashed to look vaguely like marble. Old-style townhouses and longhouses, though, are beginning to be replaced by so-called ‘tallhouses’ – three, four, rarely even five-storey insulae built of whitewashed brick. As the building work continues, many poorer people are being forcibly resettled in hastily- and privately-built tallhouses, where they are introduced to the dubious delights of rent. However, for those who can’t or won’t pay or for whom there are still not yet houses, there are the tumbledowns and shanties of Furthest-Outside-The-Walls (‘Even Further’) and also the practice of squatting in the city’s parks, only to be moved on at the next festival or parade.

It is rightly said that no street is without its temple. These range from the small wooden shrines to Issaries and Orstan the Carpenter to the impressive new temple of Doburdun, which is close to completion. Many temples have a functional role. The temple of Selven Hara, for example, sited right by the Barbarians’ Gate, operates as much as a large inn as a church and the Temple of Uleria…has its own purpose, too, as a licensed ritual brothel The Temple of Oslira, close by the river, is a grand structure with three domes of aquamarine. The consecration of the Great Temple of Doburdun the Thunderer, intended as a symbol of imperial triumph over Orlanth, is likely to prove problematic. There are fears that it might well spark riots and plots among those still heedful of Orlanth, and the imperial and Tarshite authorities themselves are divided over how to mark the event. The King is being advised to take a triumphalist stance, with a festival, military parade and pageantry. The local lunar hierarchy, by contrast, appear to want to avoid confrontation. What about the Orlanthi?

Furthermore, most government buildings other than those directly linked with the Crown are actually part of the relevant temple. The House of Ernalda also contains granaries, while the Hall of Etyries is a large covered market and also the headquarters of the local Inspector of Weights and Measures.

One of the most unusual and distinctive temples in Furthest, made especially visible by its prominent location on Burli’s Hill, is the Temple of Lunar Resonance. The large moonstone dish on the top of the temple picks up the Glowline energy from the Temple of the Reaching Moon to power the moonglobes which light the city walls and the streets around the central Royal District. On Rufelza’s High Holy Day, people flock from all round Tarsh to the hills overlooking Furthest for the turning on of the Furthest Illuminations, when their glow is at its greatest, and the city seems converted into a gleaming red firmament.

However, when the Glowline has one of its rare ‘blue-outs’ and the moonglobes fail, this tends to create unease, even panic, and has been known to trigger riots and looting. Another prominent site, which fills an entire city block, is the University of the Provinces, founded by Moirades. This walled collection of temples, libraries and scriptoria technically operates under its own Charter, and has a student and staff body drawn across the Provinces and even from the Heartlands.

It is important to remember that the King is officially not personally the master of the city. That role goes to his underling, Bolin Bullroarer, the King’s Tonsrieve. The King is also the Uncrowned King of the Firstblood Tribe, though, with the Vassal of the Wyvern acting as his proxy in this role. Thus, Furthest is full of palaces. The King has his Royal Palace and also the Great Hall of the Firstblood, which is a symbolic location, maintained, guarded and staffed but never occupied. Instead, the Vassal of the Wyvern resides and works from the Wyvern Hall, alongside the Hall of Dominion, the Tonsrieve’s seat. Added to this are the palaces kept in Furthest for each of the tribal chiefs and the palace for the Imperial Ambassador, the local representative of the Provincial Overseer.

The King and the Firstblood tribe have also poured huge resources into prestige projects both to enhance their authority and also entertain and divert the Furthest mob. The central avenue from the Barbarian’s Gate is being widened in preparation for the triumphal parade when Sartar and Orlanth are finally beaten. The Great Theatre to be known as the Moirasseum is also near construction, with a whole week of gladiatorial spectacle promised for its opening.

Bread and circuses are, after all, a key aspect of the governance of Furthest. The Corn Dole and the Teelo Norri poorhouses are, for example, supplemented by the Royal Kitchen. On each full moon day, this provides a sack of grain, a bag of potatoes and a jug of beer to everyone attending the Grand Affirmation, a mix of trooping-the-colour in Victory Great Square and acclamation of the king. To cater for the baser appetites, the Ring of Valour holds both gladiatorial combats and also ritualised bullfights against wing-clipped skybulls.

In a combined gesture of support for the King as well as a reminder that they too had become rich and powerful, five of the most powerful nobles of the Arimites also imported Dara Happan architects to design and build the Temple of Gamara. This hosts many contests involving horses. Its courtyard is a large dirt yard, two hundred meters in diameter, that is used as a training ground most days, a horse market on Clayday and hosts the contests on Wildday. It is in the form of a circle – with no walls – formed by intricately carved pillars built in a grassy square. There is a large central pillar carved into the horse-goddess’ likeness and within the temple there are shrines to other horse and horseman gods: Hyalor Horsebreaker, Elmal Horselord and Redalda the Horse Mother.

The contests themselves include races, obstacle courses, mounted duels and matches of charadash, a Grazer game in which players try to hook a banner on a curved stick and carry it across the field to be placed within a quiver mounted on a pole. Many of the contests are won by the last man in his saddle as even the races allow striking your fellow riders with whip and fist while many horses are trained to bite and kick neighbours. Races can be sprints from one end of the courtyard to the other, a number of laps around the courtyard, or even the annual Furthest Spree. This is a challenging high-speed dash through the city streets in which many horses and their riders are wounded or even killed each year, all for the title of Redalda’s Chosen. Fortunes and gambled and won here, with the shrine to Hyalor the traditional haunt of the professional gamblers.

The people of Furthest are, indeed, notorious for their gambling, so much so that this has become something for which other Tarshites mock them. A common joke with many variations has Brandig of Furthest hearing a knock at his door (or maybe feels someone getting into bed next to him). ‘Who’s there?’ he asks. ‘Boltor, your brother’, comes the reply (or Brandige, your wife). ‘Bet it’s not.’ Then there is the time he bets that he will die in tomorrow’s battle. Brandig always, always loses his stupid bets, and other Tarshites will often work the phrase ‘bet it’s not’ into the conversations to mock the people of Furthest. But they don’t mind, they are too busy gambling. For those looking for less visceral entertainment than that provided by the Temple of Gamara, for example, the Grand Theatre of the Furthest Dramatic Re-Enactors has a year-round programme of events, from high epic to low farce. Even here, though, gambling is rife, from the length of the applause to the size of the audience. (Although Brandig once reportedly gambled that Mikhil, the tragic hero of The Lay of Mikhil’s Doom, would live happily ever after.)

Sometimes, though, diversion must give way to enforcement. Furthest is a heavily militarised city, with a garrison and royal forces inside the city, as well as the encampment of the Field of Swords. Law-enforcement within the city is handled by a regiment of royal troops under Royal Shieldman Saperides, cousin of the king, based at the Black Ram Barracks. After all, despite Drofats’ typically positive portrayal, this is not a city without its dark side. It has its own underworld, Orlanthi rebels, Exile sympathisers, conspirators and chaos cultists, and for all the open wealth, a growing number of dispossessed and disgruntled citizens, who have lost the traditions and security of their family longhouse for the anonymity of the tallhouse and the charity of the King.

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