The Place
The Vigil Gate is a gate of pale stone that stands where the old road of the dead crosses the river of names, and the road runs 100 km from the last grave to the first silence. The gate stands 30 m high and the 30 m is where the stone keeps the sky out, and the sky is kept out because the dead do not need it. The surface of the gate is a constant grey shimmer, the shimmer running down the stone in a blue so thin it is the only light the gate has, and the blue is where the vigil keeps its one lamp. The air at the gate smells of cold stone and of the ash of the burned names, and the ash is where the gate keeps the names it has not yet spoken. The ground before the gate is a plain of black earth, 3 km wide, and the 3 km is the distance the dead walk in a night. This is the place where the promise is kept, and the keeping is the gate's only work, and the work is the silence the stone does.
How They Live
The Revenants do not build, because the gate was cut in the stone before the first name, and the cutting is the gate's only building, and the building is what the stone keeps. Light is the gate itself: the grey shimmer of the pale stone, which glows faintly in the dark, and the oath-light, which is cold and is kept in the word. Food is the gate itself: the soul that is kept, the name that is rung, the oath that is kept, and the vigil that keeps the promise honest, for the revenant does not eat and the not-eating is the gate's only law. Water is the gate, because the stone keeps the cold and the cold is where the vigil drinks, stands, and remembers in the same grey shimmer. The defense is the gate itself, because a visitor who stands at the gate is already in the path of the soul, and the soul is the alarm and the welcome and the sentence. The day is not measured, because there is no day: the vigil stands, and the vigil rests, and the gate is the only clock the oath has. The rite of the gate is the first name: the dead who arrive at the black plain are given their names back in the order they were lost, and the giving-back is the only key the gate has, and the key is the name the stone speaks.
People
Home of the Revenants, whose gates are counted by oath, and the oaths keep a thousand watchmen in the pale stone, the thousand being the most the shimmer can hold at once. The watch of the first name is the eldest and the eldest is where the oath-keepers are chosen from, and the choosing is the only rank the revenants have, for the revenants do not have kings and the not-having is their only law. The oath-keepers keep the shimmer, the count of the names, and the order of the giving-back, and the keeping is the only work the gate values. No living thing that has not stood the night at the black plain is welcome at the gate, and the not-being-welcome is the gate's way of keeping the promise honest. A traveler who has come to the end of the old road calls the Vigil Gate the door that does not open but does not close either, and the calling is his only word, because the gate does neither and the watching is all it does.
In Stories
The place where the oath is the only honest promise, and the promise is the vigil, and the vigil is the soul, and the soul is the end. It was at the black plain that the Forgotten learned the weight of a name that is lost, and the learning cost them the night and gave them the order of the giving-back. The vigil has not rested since, and the keeping is the gate's way of holding the promise.