Chain-Binders

Overview

The Chain-Binders are among the Turnkeys of the Soul Anchor, serving under its Gaoler. They reinforce the tethers of the Anchored, the trapped Echoes pinned within a few paces of where they died, so that no Echo pulls free.

Appearance

A Chain-Binder is a low, broad, crouching thing the size of a large dog, grey as old lead, with many short jointed limbs ending in hooks and clamps, so that it looks half beast and half smithy tool. It has no clear head, only a ridge of small dark pits along its back. It moves over the iron-hard ground with a clicking scuttle, from tether to tether, and where it works, a faint chain of light shows for a moment between an Anchored and the ground. It makes the sound of links being drawn tight.

Habitat and Range

They move over the whole Anchor, among the broken headstones, and gather where Echoes strain hardest. An Anchor holds a number of them, more the more Echoes it holds.

Behaviour and Temperament

They are tireless, single-minded, and unconcerned with the living unless the living interfere. A traveller who tries to free an Echo, or simply pulls against one that has grabbed them, draws them. They mend the tether and turn on whoever loosened it.

Abilities

They can see and handle the invisible tethers of the Anchored, tighten, mend, and shorten them, and fasten a newly dead Echo to the ground where it fell.

Life Cycle

Whether they are constructs or remnant beings is not settled, and the scholars who think them made disagree about who made them. They do not age.

Uses and Dangers

They give nothing. To those who come to free a loved one's Echo, they are the first obstacle.

Lore and Belief

Gravediggers say the clinking sometimes heard in old burial grounds at night is a Chain-Binder at work, and nail iron to coffin lids to keep it off. The sound is usually something else.

Where It Appears

• The Soul Anchor