Species

A broad kind of people sharing an inheritable continuity, whether biological, metaphysical, or constructed; in ordinary speech the word is people.

Main entry: Species

• Humans PeopleThe young, fast people of the cradle-web's basins and headwaters, of the balanced adaptive field, who emerged c. 300,000-c. 220,000 BR; what marks them is pace, and they form regional peoples rather…
• Elves PeopleOne of the oldest peoples of Caeldon, stabilized in the Elderweald from an inheritance marked by the Verdant Expanse that shows in presence more than in anatomy; their branches are the Wood, Thorn…

  Branches and lifeways: Dark Elves, High Elves, Thorn Elves, Wood Elves

• Dwarves PeopleOne of the oldest peoples of Caeldon, a dense and durable people stabilized under the Ironspine from an inheritance marked by the Iron Backbone; their branches are the Ironspine and Stonewake Dwarves.

  Branches and lifeways: Gatehold Dwarves, Highhold Dwarves, Ironspine Dwarves, Stonewake Dwarves

• Reedfolk PeopleA secondary species of the wet threshold, at home where land and water never settle which is which, and no branch of Humans, Elves, or Dwarves; their strongest country is the lower Confluence Basins…

  Branches and lifeways: Estuary Reedfolk, Floodplain Reedfolk, Marsh-Reed Reedfolk, Shoalway Reedfolk

• Salvage Peoples PeopleA people defined less by descent than by practice, risen from survivor lines who walked the abandoned colossal roads: travelling, reading structures, recovering material, and keeping broken works…
• Orcs PeopleThe far-side people of harsh-land endurance, escorted roads, and sworn passage, neither twisted Humans nor mere raiders; their homeland is the Windscar Expanse and their civilization the Windscar…
• Gnomes PeopleThe far-side people of fine craft and exact measure, who read an unstable coast truly and make others keep to the reading; their country is the Tidelace Coasts and their civilization the Gaugeward…
• Halflings PeopleThe far-side people of sheltered measure, who live where plenty has to be kept rather than taken; their first homeland is the Leeward Folds and their civilization the Foldward Commons.

  Branches and lifeways: Dryfold Halflings, Roadfold Halflings

• Thaluren PeopleAn ancient oceanic people of the Tidebound Reaches, no branch of the Elves despite the misnomer "sea-elves"; they live at sea but are born upriver, and the return to spawn shapes all their custom and…

  Branches and lifeways: Tidebound Thaluren

• Kavari PeopleA resident freshwater people of the far side's tributary braids, gravel runs, and deep pools, neither Thaluren nor a river branch of the Reedfolk; their civilization is the Bankright Circles.

  Branches and lifeways: Bankright Kavari, Coldrun Kavari, Gravelbraid Kavari, Pool-Kin Kavari

• Trolls PeopleA people of wounded frontiers, whose bodies carry Failed Mending, found where land and works refuse to heal and holding the crossings no one else will keep; their civilization is the Crossing-Oath…
• Ogres PeopleA load-bearing people, living where settled worlds need heavy work but will not let the workers belong; their custom is hearth-weight and their civilization the Hearth-Weight Compacts.
• Kobolds PeopleA small, careful, underwork-adapted people who live wherever surface and underworld meet imperfectly, in mine-edges, drains, vents, and ruin underlevels; their civilization is the Underhouse Compacts.
• Goblins PeopleA ruin-adapted people, not a malicious one, who live well in abandoned works, failed towns, and road shadows and know every gap and culvert in them; their strongest country is the Broken Marches and…

  Branches and lifeways: Market-Shadow Goblins, Road-Margin Goblins, Ruin-Warren Goblins, Underwall Goblins

• Giants PeopleRare, withdrawn, and real: the living remainder of the Upland Colossal world, who keep to the storm shelves and hidden basins and keep the Mountain-Father's sleep.
• The Wrought PeopleThe made people, youngest of Caeldon, who began when Dwarven predecessor-frames stopped being tools; their continuity passes through design and repair, and their civilization is the Mending Orders.

  Branches and lifeways: Alchemic, Civicframe, Fieldframe, Forgeframe, Mineframe, Warframe

• Veil-Walkers PeopleThe people native to the Veil, humanoid, with skin that shimmers like oil on water and features that shift with the fog, so that nobody can say afterwards quite what a Veil-Walker's face was like.
• Sihri PeopleAn insect-like forest people of the Dawnreach, the height of a child, found nowhere else, whose click-song is their speech, memory, warning, and prayer.
• Sollun PeopleThe river people of the Green Deep, small and six-limbed, found nowhere else; each hive is one mind in hundreds or thousands of bodies.
• Luminari PeopleBright-touched mortal lineages.
• Ashmarked PeopleDark-touched mortal lineages.
• Vaelwyn PeopleFae-like people tied to rule-bound metamorphosis, masking, or threshold life.
• Thalari PeopleAquatic people.
• Syrath PeopleDraconic material-world people.
• Ssarathi PeopleReptilian people.
• Oathsworn PeopleOath-forged divine servitor people distinct from Angels and Stewards.