Whither

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Template:Whither Location"Behind the great arch over the Bay, the Pale Wastes stretch, white and silent as the face of the moon. From here, you might almost imagine they were snow. North of the city, the salt-pools fizz with unlikely colour."

"The citizens of Whither enjoy questions: so much so that they always answer a question with another question. This can make intelligence-gathering frustrating."

Whither is a city located to the far north of the Unterzee near the salty Pale Wastes and the Isle of Codex - or is it?

No Answers?

"Why are there so many questions in Whither?"

"Are you asking for any particular reason? At what time of day? Is that your hat? Might it be six?"

Is Whither is a melancholy city of chilly evenings and muted tones? Is Whither a place where questions are asked? Does everyone communicate by answering questions? Can the answers be anything other than questions, and will a citizen get exiled from Whither to Codex if their answer is not a question? Does a strange wind blow through Whither, speaking of the Avid Horizon?

Are the people of Whither quiet and reserved? Do their diets mainly consist of cave-fish, beasts from the Pale Wastes, and passable beer? Do the constables of Whither give unclear sentence lengths, and does Whither have a mayor? Are there vendors in Whither who sell various forms of zee-food, like tyrant's treat or shredded jillyfish? Do these salesmen also have meats to accommodate... other hungers?

Are the people of Whither obsessed with riddles, holding the high-stakes Contest of Riddles to wager on guessing the correct answer? Do these Contests include Drownies as participants, who stake the Riddles of Pearls from the court of the Fathomking, as well as players from Irem, staking the legendary Great Riddles of Irem? Do Whithern and Iremi engage in rivalries of rhetoric at Frostfound to determine the difference between a question and a riddle, calling it the Game of Truths? Is the winner of this game allowed to enter Frostfound without risk?

The House of the Question

"North-west of Whither town, the House of the Question stands alone. Here the initiates of the House make offerings to the three gods of the deep zee, and perhaps a fourth who is not a god. It's the one place in Whither where you can sometimes get a straight answer... for a price."

The House of the Question

Is there a temple northwest of Whither proper, and is it the only place where one can find an answer on this island? Yes, yes it is.

The House of the Question is a temple dedicated to the Gods of the Unterzee, with richly decorated shrines maintained for each mysterious power. The House is managed by several initiates who conduct the various rituals there, and they're capable of drawing a god's attention, or lifting their infamous curses, through certain strange rituals.

The altar of Storm is rich and red with blood and wines, and the initiates perform violent rites for the choleric god, often involving live sacrifices. Stone's shrine is lit with an eternal flame, and the rites to gain her favor involve donating fuel for the fire and reciting incantations in the language of the Elder Continent. Gaining her forgiveness has a similar rite, but at a heftier cost: a devotee must light a pyre of treasure to win Stone's mercy. The shrine of Salt is covered in written stories; to win its favor, a devotee must provide a story for the initiates to add to the walls. No one can quite articulate how to lift Salt's curse, but the rite involves strange bells, a white petal symbolizing the curse's end, and the phrase "All shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well."

There is no fourth shrine dedicated to that which is not a god, and besides, what are gods, anyway?