Oriana's Shadow, Isbrann

"Well, if you can't tell from the pictures - it's icy, snowy, and cold. All year round, in fact, except for a few months during the summer. The ocean freezes out a mile or so out from shore some time in the early fall, and the thaws start in late spring. Summertime means green, and it means mud. All that snow has to go somewhere."

Natural harbors are fairly common; however, because of all the ice, they are only used during the summer. A few ridges of mountains cross the continent and approach the sea boldly, only to dead-end at the icy plain that would otherwise be ocean. The non-mountain landscape tends towards either completely flat or gently sloping hills.

To the south are other, warmer lands, including the Sunlands, an area notorious for gangsters and criminals.

Anything hardy; plants and animals in this Shadow tend to have natural resistance (and in some cases, apparent immunity) to cold. Coldweather flowers bloom regularly; they range in any color from the startling to the camoflaging, from brilliant reds and blues to whites and semi-transparents. Animals, too, run the gamut. One of the most stunning is the eilid, a dappled silvery-white deer with hooves and horns the color of burnished steel.

No gunpowder (and thus no guns), but industry is highly advanced technologically. Smiths - weaponsmiths, blacksmiths, and other metalworkers - are common, and excellent at their craft.

"Yeah, we've got a parliament. They're elected - and then they elect one of their number to be the offical spokesman. Whoever it is is supposedly in charge - but all they ever do is make speeches. Not that Parliament itself gets much done; picketing tends to stop the unpopular bills before they make it to a committee, and bickering among the members usually stops all but the most popular bills."

The police force is about on par with Victorian London, which is to say, not as efficient as they could be but still trying hard. Personal ability has the most effect on the speed and correctness of investigations.

Isbrann trade tends to take place over the ocean. During the summer, natural harbours are used; the rest of the year, docks and wharfs are set up on the edge of the ice, with associated camps providing semi-permanent (if on the edge of primitive) housing for the workers. Goods are hauled on sleds or carried on animal-back to the permanent buildings of the summer harbours for proccessing, distribution, and storage.

Given the lack of thawed, arable land during nine months of the year, it should come as no surprise that agriculture is not a major cash venue. There is some export of horses - local breeds tend to be more hardy than their warmer-climated cousins - but very little other agriculture takes place. Metalworkers export their work, but the most common source of income is industrial export and import.

The entertainment industry has not yet been invented; there are no professional actors, artists, musicians, or sports figures. Theater, music, and the other arts are all run on a patronage system akin to Elizabethan times; troupes and bands have regular circuits and repertoires. Almost all of these thespians and musicians have daytime jobs.

Then there's the sports. Anything that can be played on ice or in snow is an accepted sport, with one exception: speed skating is not a sport; people who just like skating fast usually get jobs as messengers between ocean-edge camps and the towns, or between camps, since phone lines are not run across the ice. The most common ice and snow sports, however, are hockey and figure skating - hockey especially. Hockey players don't generally do figure skating, and vice versa; there's no antagonism, just a perceived lack of common ground.

Hockey, if this hasn't been stated clearly, is what Oriana plays; consequently, there is a bit more detail on the structure of Isbranni hockey. Hockey participants have been known, during the summer thaw, to storm the few indoor ice rinks in the country (usually used for testing equipment for the ice docks) to demand time on the ice. During the rest of the year, semi-permanent rinks are constructed from ice and snow out on the oceanic ice; these are built and put into use after the first good freeze and taken out of use after the spring thaws start. Teams are formed and reorganized on the basis of friendships and sometimes relationships; it's not uncommon for a group of friends to reach majority age and form their own team almost before the candles on the last cake are blown out, or for a guy to get his steady girl on the team (or vice versa, as the case may be). Matches are made by word-of-mouth; more organized areas might have a community bulletin board, but cafes, restaurants, and bars are more common venues for arranging matches. Group rivalries and grudge matches are not uncommon, given this setup; play at these games can be rougher than normal, but assuming no major injuries or deaths, most local authorites will look the other way when two teams come off the ice looking like they've been in a war.

More coming soon...

The word Isbrann, according to this site, means "ice fire, damage to grass that has been covered by snow and burned by the sun." And eilid is Gaelic for female deer.