The Place
The Fanghold is a hold of black stone and iron in the high fangs, and the iron is the whole of the place, because a hold that is iron is a hold that has been sworn, and the swearing is the law. The hold sits on the tallest of the fangs, forty kilometers of bare ridge below it, and the height is the measure the orcs trust, because a hold that has been raised is a hold that has been kept, and the keeping is the war. The stone of the hold is black, a black that is more iron than color, and the black is the color of the oath, which is to say it is a color you can see in the hall and not in the field. The iron of the gates is a dark red, a red that is more heat than metal, and the red is the color of the word, and the word is the calendar, and the calendar is the war. The sky over the fangs is a hard blue, the color of the ridge when the storm is far, and the light on the black stone is sharp and mean, the kind of light that shows every scar in the gate and every seam in the iron. It smells of hot iron and old blood, a smell that is the hold and is also the war, and the one sound under the stone is the crack, a short loud iron-on-stone from the center of the hold that is the war being read as a word, and the word is the oath, and the oath is the short. There is no landmark the way a fang has a landmark, but there is one: the First Gate, a black iron gate at the mouth of the hold, the oldest gate and the first oath, and the gate is the door, and the door is the crack. What makes the Fanghold itself is the war: the hold keeps its oaths the way the oaths keep the word, and the keeping is the war, and the war is the word, and the word is the end.
How They Live
The Orc keep their hold in the fangs, living in chambers of black stone and iron, their halls under the gate and their entrances at the fang's edge, and a gate is raised one iron bar at a time, because a bar is the season and a bar is the calendar. The halls are low and deep, a black stone over a hotter floor, and the black is the wall and the hotter is the law, and the law is the war. Light comes from the hold — the dark red of the iron, which holds the heat of the season and gives it back, and the giving back is the daylight, and the daylight is the kept. Food is the hold: the small game of the ridge, the fang-salt, the root-cellar of the lower halls, and the iron that keeps the word honest, and the game is the staple, because the game is the war, and the war is the kept. Water is drawn from the hold's springs, which the war-keepers tend like a garden, and the tending is the craft and the craft is the rank, and the springs are the cold threads under the stone, and the threads are the kept. Heat is the forge in the season of the cold, and the season is the year, and the orcs have stopped asking the fangs for more. Their oaths are short and sharp and very loud, and the loud is the law, because an oath that is loud is an oath that has been kept, and the keeping is the word. The defense is the hold itself — a visitor who steps onto the stone is already in the word's path, and the word is the alarm and the welcome and the sentence, because the hold has a gate, and the gate has a war, and the war has an end. The day is measured by the war, which is also the calendar, because the fang is the only clock the oath needs, and the clock does not lie about what is owed. Every orc that is named must stand at the First Gate through one full crack before the hold will call it one of its own, and the standing is the naming, and the naming is the only thing the iron ever gives back.
People
Home of the Orc, whose holds are counted by war. One hold at the last count, and the count is kept by the war-keepers, which is to say the count is as reliable as the crack, which is to say it is reliable until the oath breaks. The war-keepers lead, and rank is decided by the keeping, because a keeper who keeps an oath the hold has forgotten is the keeper the gate trusts. Nothing that cannot stand at the First Gate is welcome, and the not-standing is not an insult, because the hold has a word, and the word has a war, and the war has an end. A trader who once stood at the foot of the fang called it a country that keeps its wars the way other countries keep their fields, and the calling was the truest thing he said and the thing the hold paid the least attention to.
In Stories
The place where the war is the only honest thing, and the thing is the word, and the word is the oath, and the oath is the end. The Forgotten have not climbed the fang, and the not-climbing is the decision, and the decision is the longest one the guild has made. Uaellaen heard the crack once, from the foot of the fang, at the hour of the thin sun, and the hearing was the war, and the war was the only thing that lasted.