The Place
The Gullet Pits are a cluster of nine pits sunk in the marsh, and each open pit is 40 m wide and 30 m deep, and the pits drink and hold. The surface of each pit is a constant pale shimmer, and the shimmer is the blood that the Leech Folk keep warm in the pit's floor. The blood is red at the rim of the pit, and the red is the pits' only fire, and the fire is what the pits keep in the floor. The air above the pits drips, and the drip falls in the dark where the pits meet the marsh, and the falling is the pits' way of talking to the marsh.
Three pits stand open in the middle of the marsh, and the other six are closed under the hides that are stretched over the rims, and the hides are the pits' way of sleeping. The walls of the pits are lined with rust-black stone that the marsh has given, and the stone sweats when the pits drink, and the sweat is white where it runs down the walls, and the white is the pits' way of keeping the blood from going thin. The pits smell of iron and wet hide and the sweet rot of the marsh's edge. The largest pit, the Deep Gullet, runs 60 m deep, and the light that comes from it is green at the bottom, and the green is the color of the debt, and the debt is what the pits keep in the dark. The pits are never silent, because the blood moves in the floor, and the moving is the pits' way of talking. This is the place where the debt is kept, and the debt is the pits' only harvest.
How They Live
The Leech Folk build their pits in the marsh, and the pits are dug by the leeches' teeth, which cut the rust-black stone as easily as wet hide. The Folk dig in the summer, when the marsh gives its water, and the digging in the summer is the pits' way of keeping the year. The floor of each pit is a living skin of leeches, and the skin drinks and re-forms as the pits need it, and the re-forming is the pits' way of keeping the floor. Light comes from the blood, which glows faintly in the dark, and the glow is the only fire the pits have, and the glow is the pits' way of keeping the dark. Food is the pit itself: the blood that is kept, the fish that the leeches lift from the marsh, and the debt that is paid in the pit's mouth. The fish are taken from the shallows of the marsh, and the taking is the pits' way of keeping the hunger.
Water is the marsh, and the marsh is the water, and the leeches drink without ever leaving the floor. The defense is the pit, and a visitor who stands at the rim is already inside the debt, and the debt is the alarm, the welcome, and the sentence. The day is measured by the ledger, and the ledger is kept on the hide that is stretched over the rim of the Deep Gullet, and the ledger is the pits' way of keeping the word. The rite of the pits is the dipping: when a young leech is lowered to the floor for the first time, the pit names him, and the name is the first debt he will ever pay, and the paying is the pits' way of keeping the name.
People
Home of the Leech Folk, whose pits are counted by ledger, and the Folk number in the thousands of heads that keep the nine pits. The keepers of the ledger hold the rim of the Deep Gullet, and rank in the Folk is decided by how much debt one has kept honest, and the keeping is the Folk's only rank. No bird is welcome in the pits, because the birds drink the blood, and the blood is the pits' word, and the drinking is the Folk's way of turning the birds off. A fen-trader who has sold at the rim calls it the honest debt, and he says the pits never forget and the pits never lie, and he says the drip there is the sound of the pits keeping the word.
In Stories
The place where the ledger is the only honest conversation, and the conversation is the debt, and the debt is the find, and the find is the end. Uaellaen came to the rim once, in the marsh's dark year, and paid a debt he had not known he owed. The ledger kept it, and the pit did not ask him back.