SILVERWAKEThe abbey and its bells
Every sector was once a working part of a city built to serve the dead. Without a dawn, each one kept doing its job and went wrong doing it. That is why the creatures attack you: they are the Wake's servants, still serving.
The ten Wake Bells
Ten bells, each tuned to hold a share of moonlight and rung together to hold the night in place. Each is kept by a Guardian. When a Guardian falls its bell cracks, and small lights rise and drift toward the sea.
| Sector | Once | Now | Bell | Keeper | Holding back |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The burial garden, where bodies rested | Graves dug and never filled, roots climbing shrouded biers | The Root Bell | The Thorn Reliquary | the bodies in the garden, never buried |
| 2 | Where every name was written in the Book of the Dead beside a lamp | Lamps floating on black water, one per name, and desks with half-written names | The Lamp Bell | The Last Lamplighter | the names, never closed |
| 3 | The tower that tolled the hours | Cut toll ropes, rook feathers everywhere, clock faces at 11:59 | The Hour Bell | The Bronze Watchman | the twelfth stroke, never struck |
| 4 | The funeral trains | Trains frozen at the platforms, coffins under snow, departure boards reading SUSPENDED | The Platform Bell | The Corrupted Robo | the funeral trains, never departed |
| 5 | The foundry that cast the bells | Ten bell moulds with nine empty, racks of votive candles | The Votive Bell | The Candle Parliament | the prayers, never answered |
| 6 | The observatory that read the moon's road | Every lens pointed at one place in the sky, star charts with the moon drawn across the sun | The Orbit Bell | The Griefwell | the moon, never released |
| 7 | Glasshouses that grew funeral lilies | Lilies choking the glass, heaps of dry wreaths, a tomb with its effigy gone | The Crown Bell | The Sepulchre King | the court of the unburied |
| 8 | The bearers' road to the sea | Fallen bearers along the causeway, dark beacons, a glimpse of a silver horizon | The Wing Bell | The Pale Interceptor | the road to the sea |
| 9 | The quarry that cut headstones | Endless stacks of identical blank stones, tunnels breaking into older vaults | The Pilgrim Bell | The Iron Pilgrim | the mourners, brought in and never sent home |
| 10 | The basilica where the Requiem was played | Pews of hollow mourners, the eclipse in the rose window | The Requiem Bell | The Last Organ | the service, never dismissed |
Look around: everything in the "Now" column is drawn into the rooms and never mentioned. Finding it is the point.
The Guardians are not villains
Each one is a mourner that cannot stop mourning, under one last order: "Let no light leave." Most of their last words thank you. Silencing them is mercy as well as duty.
The Wakeful
The hunter that comes when a bearer lingers too long in a sector is the Wake's patience given a shape. It has no lines.