Overview
The Ashen-Reach Human is the short, loud shape of The Ashen Reach — quick in the hand, restless in the eye, and the whole of it reading as a line that will not sit down, a line that has already started the next wall. It stands 1.75 m at the crown and carries 75 kg, and it lives forty years, maybe fifty, and it spends the forty the way a fire spends the night, fast and bright and all the way through. It is the builder of empires, guilds, and churches, and the building is the whole of the behaviour, because the wanting is the engine and the wanting does not rest. Of all the races of the world it is the one every other race measures itself against, and the measuring is the whole of its claim.
Habitat
The reach is a wide, open country of old fields and new towns, and the new towns are the habitat, because the old fields are the work and the work is the home. The human keeps the reach the way a beaver keeps a river, by changing it, and the changing is the keeping, and the keeping is the civilisation. The towns are new because the humans are short, and the fields are old because the fields outlive the towns, and the outliving is the joke the reach keeps on itself. The ash in the soil is the old fire's own, and the fire is the reach's own, and the reach is the fire's, and the three of them are the address.
Appearance
It has the body of a field-worker and the eyes of a builder, and the whole of it reads as the reach's own: ruddy skin with the sun, a face dusted grey with the ash, and hands that will not stop. It stands 1.75 m at the crown and carries 75 kg, the man a head broader in the chest, and the woman the quicker hand, and the two of them read as one pair of hands on one wall. The hair is of every colour the field can hold, brown and red and the pale of the winter wheat, and the one mark of the reach is the ash-dust in the hair, taken the way a miner takes the coal, a mark of the country and of the wanting. The clothes are the guild's own, a coat of the reach's grey wool with the guild's mark on the shoulder, and the mark is the family, because the guild is the family.
Behaviour
It is short-lived and it knows it, and the knowing is the behaviour: the human does not spend a life, it spends a wanting, and the wanting is the fuel and the fuel is the work. It is loud, because the forty years are too few to be quiet, and it is ambitious, because the empire is too large for the single life, and the too-large is the engine. It keeps its many oaths the way the reach keeps its fields, one season at a time, and the keeping is the virtue, and the virtue is the civilisation. It will not rest, because the rest is the end, and the end is the one thing the forty years cannot afford.
Natural Weapons & Defenses
Its weapon is the hand and the hand is the tool and the tool is the wall, and the wall is the defence. Alone the human is small, a 1.75 m shape of ruddy skin and quick hands, but the oath is large, and the oaths are many, and the many oaths are the army, and the army is the defence. The hard road is the moat, the town is the wall, and the guild is the garrison, and the three of them are the reach's own armour. Against the long-lived races it has no strength and no patience, but it has the wanting, and the wanting is the one weapon the long-lived have never once needed, and not needing it is the one thing they cannot take.
Magic Alignment
It answers to Solathis, the Dawnfather, the god of the morning, and the alignment is the wanting itself: the human wakes to the dawn the way the fire wakes to the night, and the waking is the faith. The church is the rite, the guild is the liturgy, and the oath is the prayer, and the three of them are the whole of the religion. When the dawn comes over the reach the towns do not pray, they start work, and the starting is the prayer, and the prayer is complete. The dead are not given to the water or the earth, they are given to the wall, their names in the stone, and the naming is the burial.
Society
The society is the guild and the town and the oath, and the three of them are one: the guild keeps the work, the town keeps the guild, and the oath keeps the town. The human family is the guild, because the guild outlives the family, and the guild is the only thing the forty years can build that the forty years can also be proud of. The town has a council of the oaths, and the council is the count, and the count is the only office the reach has ever needed. The new town and the old field keep each other's count, and the keeping is the only treaty the reach knows, and the treaty is the wanting.
Culture & Lore
The lore of the reach is that the first human was the fire's own wanting, given a body by the ash, and the first town is the first wall, and the wall is the culture, because the human builds everything it loves: the towns, the churches, the guilds, and the oaths, which are carved into the town-gate the day a stranger swears them. The Ash-Crow that nests in the town-tower is the reach's own herald, and the crow does not build, it watches, and the watching is the reach's own scripture. The reach keeps its many oaths and its short, sharp, and very loud lives, and the keeping is the culture, and the culture is the wanting, and the wanting is the point.
Home
Its home is The Ashen Reach, the wide, open country of old fields and new towns, where the humans keep their many oaths and their short, sharp, and very loud lives. The reach is not a country so much as a count, the count of the fields, the count of the towns, and the count of the oaths, and the count belongs to the humans. The old fields and the new towns are the reach's own floor, and the floor is the village, and the village is the wanting.
Relations
It is of the Human of the reach, and the Human are the short-lived builders of empires, guilds, and churches, and the building is the whole of the kin. The Ash-Crow is the herald, and the long-lived races beyond the reach are the ones it measures itself against, and the measuring is the relation. To Solathis, the Dawnfather it is the god's own fire, and to the fire it is the want that keeps the fire going, and the keeping is the only law the reach knows.
In the Story
The story of the six reached the reach before it reached anywhere else, because the reach is where the roads meet, and the roads are the reach's own. One of the six stopped in the new town and swore an oath at the town-gate, and the swearing was the hearing, and the hearing was the answer. What the reach keeps of the story is the wall that was started the day they arrived, and the wall that is still being started, because the wall is the wanting, and the wanting does not rest.