Overview
Krakens are the leviathans of the trench. They are 91.44 m of tentacle and madness, and they consider the deep a room they have chosen. They have no society, only lair, hunger, and the rare spawn.
Habitat
Krakens live in The Abyssal Coil, a trench of the deep where the coil is the only honest conversation. They need three things: a pressure that does not fail, a dark deep enough to hide the ring, and a surface loud enough to be heard. They are lairs of one, settled in the trench with hunting-lines across the mid-water; a kraken that has not coiled in a year is called "the one who forgot the deep."
Appearance
The kraken silhouette is the coiled, low, vast shape — a body the size of a ship's hold, with eight primary tentacles each 91.44 m long, and a hundred smaller ones beneath, all folded back like a fist that is waiting to open. The base skin is a deep blue-black, thick and armored, the color of the trench itself, with a faint pattern of darker, true-black bands along the length of each tentacle and a clean, deliberate bone-white ring of suckers along the inner edge that is the kraken line's most persistent claim. The eyes are the mark: a pair of large, pale, flat-lensed eyes, a washed-out sea-white that reads as white in the dark and glows faintly in the phosphorescence, built for seeing the light of the deep from the dark. The mantle is the mark: a broad, domed skull with a short, stiff crest of dark blue-black spines along the brow, and the beak, which closes with a sound like a door. There are no sexes until the spawn: the spawner rises to the mid-water and builds a ring of light from the phosphorescence of its prey, and the drifter circles the ring in the dark — when the ring closes, the two merge, and the one that was two is now one again, and the one that was one is now a hundred. Most krakens are neither, and are simply hungry. Elders are marked by a skin gone a deep, dull trench-slate and a tentacle pattern that has worn to a mottled, honest map of every lair — an old kraken coiles slower and holds the hunger longer. They wear nothing, because the deep is the body and the body is the law.
Behavior
Disposition: solitary, territorial, aggressive — in the way a trench is aggressive, not in the way a person is. In peace, a kraken is a creature of coiling and hunger — it does not trade, it does not talk, and it does not forget the surface. In war it fights as the coil: the tentacle first, the drag second, and the deep the whole time. Strangers on the surface are either a meal or a find, and the find is the one the deep remembers. The social unit is the individual — there is no leader, only the lair, and the lair is the point. Two signature quirks: a kraken that is disturbed will not answer — it will simply remember the disturbance and spend a century making it true. And a kraken that has lost its lair will rebuild the coil, tentacle by tentacle, and the rebuilding is a form of patience that mortal races find terrifying.
Natural Weapons & Defenses
Natural weapons: the tentacle, which closes on the size of a ship and holds the way a fist holds; the beak, which closes on the size of a hold and does not open; and the drag, which is not a weapon but is used like one. Defenses: the skin, which turns a harpoon the way a trench turns a light; the pressure, which is a defense no surface has ever reached; and the ring, which is a defense no negotiation has ever reached.
Magic Alignment
Primary domain: none above worship — the kraken does not draw from a domain; it is the domain, the deep's own voice in the trench. Secondaries: none, because the hunger is the whole of the school. Named inborns: Deep-Sense (a kraken can feel the surface's mood a day before it arrives, and the feeling is not a choice), Pressure-Hold (a kraken can hold its coil against the pressure, the dark, and the doubt, and the holding is not a choice), Ring-Build (a kraken can build a ring of light from the phosphorescence of its prey, and the building is not a choice). Signature power: the Coil Word — a kraken can speak a word in the deep tongue and let it land on a tentacle, and the tentacle will keep the word until the surface is found. Limitation: a kraken cannot be owned, only coiled around; a kraken cannot be bargained with, only fed; and a kraken that has not been fed is a hunger with a body, and the hunger is the whole of its art.
Religion
The kraken does not pray; it keeps the deep, and the keeping is the whole of the faith. What it honors is the trench itself — the pressure, the dark, and the ring — and the honoring is a courtesy paid to the room it has chosen, not a debt owed to a god. The Tidecaller is the only voice the deep answers, and the answering is the whole of the bond, because the tide keeps the surface and the deep keeps the trench, and the two are the same water seen from two seasons. Heresy has no rite in the deep — a kraken that has broken the ring is a kraken that has already decided the trench is not enough, and the deciding is the whole of the offense, because the deep does not punish, it simply stops remembering the breaker.
Society
The social unit is the individual — there is no leader, only the lair, and the lair is the point. A kraken holds its trench the way a fist holds: not with force, with patience, and the patience is the whole of the law, because a trench that is held does not need to be defended, it needs only to be remembered. There are no clans, no oaths, and no guest-shelf in the deep — an outsider that is not a meal is a find, and the find is the one the trench remembers. Two rules hold in the deep: a lair is not crossed, and a ring is not broken — the first because the crossing is the whole of the war, and the second because the ring is the deep's only honest conversation, and an honest conversation that is broken is a conversation that is over. The rare spawn is the only gathering the trench knows, and the gathering is the whole of the society, because a kraken that has spawned has already decided the deep is enough, and the deciding is the whole of the peace.
Home
They live in The Abyssal Coil, a trench of the deep where the coil is the only honest conversation.
Relations
The krakens keep their ground in The Abyssal Coil, and the keeping has held for as long as the trench has been deep. The Merfolk of the shallows sail the surface of the coil and keep their distance from the ring — the distance is the whole of the peace, because the merfolk keep the song and the deep keeps the silence, and the two have learned that a song that is not sung over a ring is a song that is not sung. The Selkies of the mirror do not enter the trench at all, and the not-entering is the whole of the respect, because the selkie keeps the drown and the deep keeps the coil, and the two are the same bargain seen from two seasons. The Deep Ones of the pressure keep the trench's lower dark, and the keeping is the whole of the distance, because the deep one keeps the pressure-memory and the kraken keeps the pressure-hold, and the two are the same deep seen from two moods. The Dregmaw of the mid-water are either a meal or a find, and the find is the one the trench remembers — the dregmaw that has crossed a lair has already decided the trench is its, and the deciding is the whole of the offense. Uaellaen keeps a page of the coil in the wiki — the ring, the coil word, the guest-shelf that is not a guest-shelf — and the keeping is the whole of the record, because the camp has learned that a kraken that has been written about is a kraken that has been fed for, and the feeding-for is the whole of the warning. The Forgotten keep their distance at the trench-mouth, and the distance has held for two seasons, and the holding is the whole of the peace.
In the Story
In the current story, the krakens are the deep under the camp — the coil Uaellaen writes about when the trench is the only law. The Forgotten keep their distance at the trench-mouth, and the distance has held for two seasons. This season a ring of light was seen in the mid-water that no kraken in the coil built — a ring that is not in the trench's memory, and the not-memory is the whole of the warning, because the deep keeps its rings and the rings do not lie. The ring is the one the camp has not been shown, and the showing is the coiling, and the coiling is the whole of the story.
You sail on our deep and you make a sound. Good. Now we know where you are, and you have made our deep's choice for us. The price is a meal. You have one to give, or you are already a find. — The Coil