[center][color=red]Sapharan, High City, capital of Lanostre[/color][/center][hr]



It was true what was often uttered from the lips of Lanostrans. To stand upon the walls of Sapharan was to gaze upon the entire world. 

It had been more than a decade, yet for the three inquisitors who stood at the edge of the High City's walls the view had not lost its awe, nor the grasp it had held upon their hearts when they were young. You could, quite literally, glimpse thousands of feet into the clouded abyss of the world below, into the white void of the eastern horizon, where the storms never ceased, and west, where far in the distance, an unnatural darkness tinted the snow, ever resonating. For Tatiana, Astraea and Galahad, these heart-stopping sights were all memories from childhood made manifest again. These twin mountains, where the sun shone above the clouds and reflected off their ancient crystalline rock, making it shimmer like starlight, where the trees still grew strong and tall and evergreen, were home, and yet-- it was not the same home they had left.

In those days before the Red Seminary, they remembered the streets of the High City teeming with life, warriors returning from the Glacier, dragging the corpses of their prey on sleighs, children mustering in the gardens and the screetching of their high-pitched warcries resonating in the air, the percussion of steel against steel as blacksmith forges opened for the morning hunts-- this was Sapharan. 

Not this.

 The streets on which they walked on the way to their homes were silent and almost bereft of life. It seemed most of the High City was empty, save for congregations of Varyan soldiers marching down the avenues, their faces shivering from the cold and grim with fear. What were they so afraid of?

The wind was raging, they could always hear it after all, and in this elevation the cold was biting enough to freeze you dead on some nights, but the emerald aegis of Lanostre still protected the city from the cruelty of the elements. In comparison to the Varyan garrison, the three inquisitors felt almost warm within the aegis' light. Whether this was because of their training, or because they were Lanostrans under the protection of their goddess' aegis, was unclear. Still, one thing was for certain, despite the Lady's supposed death, even now, the twin mountains of Lanostre still gleamed emerald with the glow of her aegis.

Leaving the plaza of the High City, the trio proceeded down The Deadway, the massive earthen stairwell cut from the face of the rock which led further down to Bridgetown. True to its namesake, Bridgetown acted as an aerial bridge connecting the Elder Mountain to the Younger Mountain. These twin peaks where the dual cities of Sapharan stood were the highest points of land in all the known world, taller than even Magnagrad. Through the eons they had endured, surviving the cataclysmic flood that had swallowed the earth after the Ice Titan and His Great Enemy's divine battle sent the world into ruin, and thus, along with Iddin-Mar in Omestris, these two peaks were the only known remnants of the Old World. 

Bridgetown itself was a marvel of engineering, a district of craftsmen and freethinkers built decades ago by T'saraen engineers to connect the twin mountains and make travel between the two cities standing at their peaks safer. Its construction was said to have been a debt of gratitude to the land that had adopted them, and these days, it was a conclave where a small but thriving population of half and full-blooded T'saraens made their home. It was a place of wonder and amazement, where silver clockwork churned gracefully amidst the azure mountain rock, and in the night, schools of tiny clockwork ethermoths were let out to light up all of Lanostre. This beautiful and wondrous sight was still rooted in many a Lanostran's memory.

By the time the three inquisitors had reached Bridgetown, the pale sun was creeping down beneath the western horizon, its rays reflecting off the glossy  surface of the monstrous Black Glacier a distance away. Even from this height, the red pulsing of the Glacier's ethereal veins could be seen in the twilight. Saying their goodbyes, they each left to visit their homes. Tomorrow morning, they planned to meet back there in Bridgetown to prepare for the journey back.