Places
Places in the Mörk Borg universe
Map
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Galgenbeck
Galgenbeck in the land of Tveland is the greatest city there ever was. No King or Queen rules in Galgenbeck but an arch-priestess: Josilfa Migo. Deep beneath the Cathedral of the Two-Headed Basilisks, in a cool black chamber crosseed by shards of light, lies her thrown. Josilfa, old but still young. Commoners gosip that she colludes with the god Nechrubel, who gave her eteernal life. Nechrubel: the shadow that covers all. Nechrubel is melancholy, crop failure, conflict, and war. It is said he whispered the apocalyptic prophecies in Verhu’s ear.
The Two-Headed Basilisks' reaction to the end of the world
As time grows ever shorter, the Two-Headed Basilisks become ever more desperate in their recruitment. To take one’s own life is considered sinful cowardice. The road to salvation lies through mortification of the flesh; the apocalypse is to be met with eyes wide open. Only then can the soul be allowed passage to the Shimmering Fields. Heretics and apostates are hunted down and corrected, in public and at length, by the Inquisition.
Sarkash
In Tveland also lies Sarkash. The forest seems, lately, to spread unnaturally fast. Paths tangle and wind in the overgrown gloom, leading wanderers astray.
Graven-Tosk
Far in the depths of Sarkash, always where one least expects to find it, in a halo of dying trees, is Graven-Tosk. A truly ancient cemetery filled with mausoleums, blank-eyed cherubs, stagnant fountains, plague pits, and ordinary graves.
But hasn’t it grown warmer in this usually cold place? Do you hear the frantic scratching? The air feels heavy, stale, and hard to breathe.
Palace of the Shadow King
Rising over Graven-Tosk like rage rising over pain is the Palace of the Shadow King. A gothic black castle, like a mirror to the Cathedral of the Two-Headed Basilisk in Galgenbeck. Most of the palace lies in crumbling ruins, home to unfortunate souls sheltering beneath its broken halls. None dare dream what might lie under the rubble-covered catacombs and cellars. Tunnels sprawl beneath like writhing roots, digging deeper into the cold earth like cancerous veins. The inner wing still stands, acting as the home of the Shadow King, a being obscured by ritual. The slaves of the servants of the courtiers of the King come forth and do his will.
The title is hereditary: sons are always born to the Shadow King. It’s whispered Princes of that line disguise themselves as ordinary men wandering the ruins engaging games and tricking travelers, multiplying the miseries of their people.
Grift
From ages past, Grift grew upon an eastern peninsula of the Endless Sea. Cut from the world by the bottomless Múr, the thriving city state can be reached only by three bridges of such might and cyclopean size it is said that only enslaved giants could have raised them. Grift was once a place of harmony and the light of reason, a shelter from the plaguewracked, war-torn world beyond.
But the world turns and even the Múr cannot protect Grift from its inevitable fall.
King Sigfúm the Kind is mocked in the street. Much of Grift has fallen into disrepair as vile creatures begin crawling from the dried, cracked earth. Each night the bridges scream and roar like great ships grinding upon rocks. Sigfúm is defeated. He knows the end is near, believes the prophecies of Verhu and so, kindly and calmly, prepares his people for death. Huge parchments dot the streets, calendars of despair marking each correct preparation and its time. Each day a leaf is turned and when the last page comes, Sigfúm will march his people to the cliff Terion to fulfill what was written. Terion, a thousand meters of vertical rock with the raging sea biting at its base.
The inquisition of the Two-Headed Basilisks is not too keen on the heretical suicide scheme of Sigfúm the Kind.
Kergüs
Desolation rolls over Kergüs like a frostbarren wind. The lawless and forlorn trek across its ice-wracked expanse, crawling over the plains or cowering in the cracked earth to flee Blood-Countess ANTHELIA. North, where the wind is born, lies Alliáns, a storm-piercing spire-city of black glass. Within stands a castle like a waterfall of white stone: the throne of Anthelia.
She as pale as her castle’s walls, as youthful as a drop of melting ice. Some say she is eternally young. The gulls cry the names of Knights who sought her hand, a reminder that suitors and signs of Anthelia’s age disappear in conjunction. But who listens to a gull? And in Kergüs, even gulls freeze in the cold that rolls from the dreams of the Countess. Dreams of her unending youth.
Alliáns
Anthelia’s ambivalence
Anthelia is well aware time is short. Neuroses burden her. “Why is everything so pale? So cold?” She cries out for colour or warmth. She drains the world of both with every glance, touch and breath. Those who bring her vibrant life are promised great rewards. All fear to do so. Excuses are made, explanations found. The feelings of the Countess are fragile, her powers absolute. Court life entails grey opulence, excitement and fear.
Wästland
The Western Kingdom
The Western Kingdom, called Wästland in the songs fo the simple and rhymes of the poor, once home to peace and wealth when Lake Onda gifted fish and the river-trade thrived.
Now, terror and despotism stalk.
Schleswig
In the secret citadel of the sad-but-gaudy city of Schleswig, King Fathmu IX schemes. Paranoid, fat, and increasingly mad, he is consumed with psychosis and invisible fears.
Obsessed with the prophecies of Verhu, the King raids and invades houses and villages, barns and temples. Nowhere and no one is safe, especially the poor. Taxed into starvation, the contents of their larders and storehouses are carted off by Fathmu’s men.
Valley of the Unfortunate Dead
A place few wish to speak of is the Valley of the Unfortunate Dead. Rumors whisper the Basilisk HE is coiled within its crypts, a sight infrequently survived. Lies and legends enshroud the valley, obscuring any truth. Peddlers’ tales say the soil, the very air, is lethal, bringing a sleepless, stumbling death. This is no clean fate but a slow-growing, fathomless despair, weighing down the traveler with poisoned memories and dark thoughts until the spark of life is mutated into a mournful, hopeless undeath.
Others claim lost wanderers can fall and find themselves in the Realm of the Dead when the black soil hungrily drags them under the earth.
Those without hope travel here seeking an end to the pain, a golden afterlife be5yond this dark and ruined world. They gather in suicide cults and the valley’s few twisted trees begin to droop strange fruit from hempen rope. Others plumb the crypts seeking Verhu, believing they can persuade him of other fates. Some simply and stupidly leave gifts and sacrifices to a power they cannot comprehend. Gloom grows, obscuring the worl dlike an oil-stained image.
Bergen Chrypt
When the world was but water, dust, and clouds thick with plague-fat flies came SHE, first of the basilisks. From the cracks of Bergen Chrypt SHE crawled. SHE bears the head of Denial, Lusi, who looks up and down. Yet all shall be well. Her twin Arkh, Head of Deception, claims to be the first prophet of truths now prostituted by Verhu. Few have ever seen her, the oldest, but many walk her twin paths.
SHE spawned many since the dawn of time, their conceptions not without agony. All were cast down the cliffs of Bergen Chrypt. Only HE survived. Down in the Valley of the Unfortunate Dead his eyes locked upon the mountain’s peak, HE spits out curses upon his evil mother. The head Gorgh is bitter, rank with envy that only his twin Verhu knows the damned truth. Time and time again, his prophecies are brought to be. The piles of gold-gift riches from his faithful teeter and slide, so tall are they.