Your human is sick. Very sick. This happens sometimes. As the village wise-woman, she sometimes ends up getting cursed, and since she’s the wise-woman, there’s nobody else to fix the problem. Usually you wait until a travelling magician comes through, to dissipate the curse in running water and make everything better. But this time is different. Worse. Much worse. She hasn’t opened her eyes in days, and you can hear her heartbeat getting weaker. She might not have time to wait for a magician. And now, everyone else is busy with the harvest. And even if they weren’t, none of them know anything about cursework. Not the way you do. She trained you to help her, after all. So now, it’s all up to you... The Wise-Woman’s Dog A Bronze Age Adventure by Daniel M. Stelzer. Release 1.03, serial number 250928. Dialog compiler version 1a/01-dev. Library version 1.0.0-dev (modified). Footnotes version 0.6 by Daniel Stelzer. Automap version 1.0 by Daniel Stelzer. Puzzle prompts version 0.1 by Daniel Stelzer. Plists version 1 by Ben Kirwin. Chapter I: Home Bedroom This is where you and your human sleep, in a little nook off the front room. The bed is big and soft, and one of your human’s favorite comforts. Usually. Your human lies here, unconscious, every breath taking all her strength. Highlighted words indicate places you can go and things you can interact with. Click on a place to go there, or the name of an object to see more details. By default, these words are highlighted in a different color. If this doesn’t stand out, or just looks ugly on your interpreter, you can change it in the OPTIONS menu, or click “Game Options” in the menu at the top right of the page. > undo There are no more turns to undo! > undo There are no more turns to undo! > Your human is sick. Very sick. This happens sometimes. As the village wise-woman, she sometimes ends up getting cursed, and since she’s the wise-woman, there’s nobody else to fix the problem. Usually you wait until a travelling magician comes through, to dissipate the curse in running water and make everything better. But this time is different. Worse. Much worse. She hasn’t opened her eyes in days, and you can hear her heartbeat getting weaker. She might not have time to wait for a magician. And now, everyone else is busy with the harvest. And even if they weren’t, none of them know anything about cursework. Not the way you do. She trained you to help her, after all. So now, it’s all up to you...credits This game was written and programmed by Daniel M. Stelzer. Mahori’s dialogue was written by Ada Stelzer, including the argument with Zuwa. The background of the cover art (photo of dog in field) is by Anastasiia Andrianova on Unsplash. The hieroglyphic text is entirely my own work, and I’m to blame for the inaccuracies; I claim artistic license for all of them. The drawings of the two dog hats were done by Becky Mead and Daniel Stelzer. Round 1 testers: Tabitha, Lance Cirone Round 2 testers: Max Fog, Adam Biltcliffe, Mike Russo, rh Round 3 testers: Adam Biltcliffe, Mike Russo, Max Fog, Lance Cirone Round 4 testers: Tabitha Round 5 testers: Adam Biltcliffe Round 6 testers: Ada and Sarah Stelzer, Becky Mead, Tabitha, Adam Biltcliffe Round 7 testers: Ada and Sarah Stelzer, Becky Mead Round 8 testers: Adam Biltcliffe Round 9 testers: Adam Biltcliffe, improvmonster Round 10 testers: aschultz Plus so, so much valuable feedback from everyone who played and reviewed it during IFComp—special thanks to Emery Joyce and Lucian Smith for their bug reports! Music by Michael Levy: Bandcamp, Spotify. The Wise-Woman’s Dog A Bronze Age Adventure by Daniel M. Stelzer. Release 1.03, serial number 250928. Dialog compiler version 1a/01-dev. Library version 1.0.0-dev (modified). Footnotes version 0.6 by Daniel Stelzer. Automap version 1.0 by Daniel Stelzer. Puzzle prompts version 0.1 by Daniel Stelzer. Plists version 1 by Ben Kirwin. Chapter I: Home Bedroom This is where you and your human sleep, in a little nook off the front room. The bed is big and soft, and one of your human’s favorite comforts. Usually. Your human lies here, unconscious, every breath taking all her strength. Highlighted words indicate places you can go and things you can interact with. Click on a place to go there, or the name of an object to see more details. By default, these words are highlighted in a different color. If this doesn’t stand out, or just looks ugly on your interpreter, you can change it in the OPTIONS menu, or click “Game Options” in the menu at the top right of the page. > Your human is sick. Very sick. This happens sometimes. As the village wise-woman, she sometimes ends up getting cursed, and since she’s the wise-woman, there’s nobody else to fix the problem. Usually you wait until a travelling magician comes through, to dissipate the curse in running water and make everything better. But this time is different. Worse. Much worse. She hasn’t opened her eyes in days, and you can hear her heartbeat getting weaker. She might not have time to wait for a magician. And now, everyone else is busy with the harvest. And even if they weren’t, none of them know anything about cursework. Not the way you do. She trained you to help her, after all. So now, it’s all up to you... The Wise-Woman’s Dog A Bronze Age Adventure by Daniel M. Stelzer. Release 1.03, serial number 250928. Dialog compiler version 1a/01-dev. Library version 1.0.0-dev (modified). Footnotes version 0.6 by Daniel Stelzer. Automap version 1.0 by Daniel Stelzer. Puzzle prompts version 0.1 by Daniel Stelzer. Plists version 1 by Ben Kirwin. Chapter I: Home Bedroom This is where you and your human sleep, in a little nook off the front room. The bed is big and soft, and one of your human’s favorite comforts. Usually. Your human lies here, unconscious, every breath taking all her strength. Highlighted words indicate places you can go and things you can interact with. Click on a place to go there, or the name of an object to see more details. By default, these words are highlighted in a different color. If this doesn’t stand out, or just looks ugly on your interpreter, you can change it in the OPTIONS menu, or click “Game Options” in the menu at the top right of the page. > options Links and footnotes are currently marked with different colors. To switch to explicit brackets, use BRACKETS ON: [links], {footnotes}. Your interpreter supports hyperlinks, so you can click on these words when you see them. Footnotes are currently visible. Use FOOTNOTES OFF to remove them completely. The automap is currently enabled, and will be drawn at the top of the screen. Use MAP OFF to disable it. (This is especially recommended if you’re using a screen reader.) Map pointers are currently enabled: puzzles you have the ability to solve will be marked with a ? on the map. Use POINTERS OFF to disable them. You can also use the THINK command to see which puzzles are solvable at any time. The suggestion bar, showing possible actions you can take every turn, is currently enabled, and will appear right above the command prompt. Use SUGGESTIONS OFF to disable it. The exits bar, showing possible exits from your current location, is currently disabled. This is fine, since the suggestions bar includes the same information and more. Use EXITS ON to enable it. Background music is currently enabled. Use MUSIC OFF to disable it. Tutorial messages will be shown when appropriate. Use TUTORIAL OFF to hide them. > note footnotes Just like this. If the highlighting gets distracting, you can turn it off in the OPTIONS. This game makes no particular claims to historical accuracy—it’s first and foremost meant to be an entertaining game and fantasy story, not a history lecture—but it is based as much as possible on the beliefs and practices of the Hittite Empire around 1280 BCE, during the reign of Muwatalli II. If you’re interested in that, the footnotes will go into more detail on the actual history and culture of its inspirations. If not, these notes are entirely optional; you can play through from beginning to end without ever touching them. But if you ever find yourself wondering about the difference between a wise-woman and a magician, or what a bride-price is, the NOTES command will show you all the footnote topics you’ve come across, and which of them you’ve already read. > look Bedroom This is where you and your human sleep, in a little nook off the front room. The bed is big and soft, and one of your human’s favorite comforts. Usually. Your human lies here, unconscious, every breath taking all her strength. Words in green have footnotes, which provide some extra historical or cultural context. Click them to read the note, if you’re interested. If not, they can be entirely ignored. > bed Big and soft and very comfy. After you examine something, the suggestions bar at the bottom of the screen will suggest things you might do with it: TAKE something small enough to carry, DROP something you’re holding, EAT something edible, or KISS a person, among others. > jump on the bed With a mighty leap, you launch yourself up onto the bed. You’re currently playing the web version of this game, which has better styling and accessibility, but can’t be played on all devices. If the web page is giving you trouble, you can also download a Z-machine version from the menu at the top right of the page, and play it in your favorite Z-machine interpreter. > push the bed You apply a bit of force to the bed, but it doesn’t budge. > my human Her face is so pale, and her breath is so raspy...it’s all wrong. She’s supposed to be so energetic and full of life. You can smell an unidentified curse lingering on her. > unidentified curse You have no idea what sort of curse this is, but it’s an awful one. It tastes like a thick, sludgy black, and smells like fingernails on slate, and it’s left your human asleep for days with her heart barely beating. Normally, fixing something like this would be a job for the village wise-woman. But what do you do when the wise-woman herself is cursed? The Hittites believed that magic stuck to people like a physical substance. To cure a curse, a wise-woman would extract it from its intended victim and put it somewhere else. > note wise-woman The Hittite term is hasawa, written with signs that literally mean “old woman” (MUNUS.ŠU.GI), so that’s the more common translation. But a wise-woman wasn’t necessarily old; it was a profession, rather than a general description. They were specialists in apotropaic (“white”) magic, dispelling and countering curses, performing divinations, and handling whatever rituals the community needed. In particular, wise-women were experts in deflecting and redirecting harmful sorcery, removing it from the victim and either turning it back on the caster or channelling it harmlessly out into the environment. That’s the practice that forms the core of this game. > note sorcery Using magic to hurt another person—making them sick, for example, or blighting their crops—was a serious offense in Hittite society. While wise-women regularly cured people of curses, physical and mental illness, and various other types of impurity, article 44b of the Hittite Laws warns: “If anyone performs a purification ritual on a person, they shall dispose of the residue in the incinerators. If they transport it to someone else’s house or land, that is sorcery, and a matter for the royal court” (where the king himself would pass judgement on capital offenses). There’s no real evidence for a concept of “blessings” (as in positive enchantments, the opposite of curses) in real Hittite society, but they exist in the setting of this game, so the definition of sorcery here is more specific. Wise-women (and their dogs!) are allowed to redirect spells into other people’s houses all they want, but if a spell placed on a person hurts or endangers them, that’s illegal sorcery punishable by death. Other articles of the Laws forbid making clay figurines of specific people for use in magic, and killing a snake while speaking someone’s name, so presumably those are also sorcerous ways to curse a person. But judging from texts like the “Ritual for Depression” (CTH 432), sometimes curses just came from an angry god or spirit with no human intervention at all: a skilled wise-woman had to be able to handle all types, no matter the source. > take the unidentified curse You sniff at your human, making sure you’ve found exactly where the spell is—then pounce at her in a frenzy of licking. Darkness clouds your eyes, your heart struggling to beat and your lungs struggling to draw breath as the spell transfers from your human into you! You gasp for breath, struggling to get air into your lungs. Your body is so much smaller than your human’s—you won’t be able to take this for long! Uh oh—this particular curse might be too much for your body to handle. You’ll need to put it somewhere fast! > put the unidentified curse on On what? > my collar You try to apply the unidentified curse to your collar, but it drips off like water, pooling on your paws until it’s eventually infecting you again. This is a nasty sort of curse that only works on living things—the kind that only comes from an evil sorcerer or an offended god. Each breath is more difficult than the last, until suddenly you just can’t get any air in! Darkness sets in at the corners of your eyes, and... *** You have been poisoned *** Would you like to: UNDO the last move, RESTORE a saved position, see your current SCORE, or RESTART from the beginning? > undo Undoing the last turn (my collar). Bedroom, on the bed > me Your human was very, very clear about this part: you must never put a spell on a living being without proper supervision. Magicians and wise-women are allowed to alter spells, dispelling or redirecting them onto other things, but only licensed temple sanctifiers can put new spells on people. If anyone else does it, even if it’s not meant as a curse, it’s considered sorcery—and the punishment for sorcery is death. Each breath is more difficult than the last, until suddenly you just can’t get any air in! Darkness sets in at the corners of your eyes, and... *** You have been poisoned *** Would you like to: UNDO the last move, RESTORE a saved position, see your current SCORE, or RESTART from the beginning? > undo Undoing the last turn (me). Bedroom, on the bed > the bed You try to apply the unidentified curse to the bed, but it drips off like water, pooling on your paws until it’s eventually infecting you again. This is a nasty sort of curse that only works on living things—the kind that only comes from an evil sorcerer or an offended god. Each breath is more difficult than the last, until suddenly you just can’t get any air in! Darkness sets in at the corners of your eyes, and... *** You have been poisoned *** Would you like to: UNDO the last move, RESTORE a saved position, see your current SCORE, or RESTART from the beginning? > undo Undoing the last turn (the bed). Bedroom, on the bed > my human You carefully return the curse before it can destroy you. She seems to be able to deal with it better than you, for now...and if it killed you, who would be there to help her after? You have a good memory for things that fit in your mouth. ITEMS and SPELLS will remind you of everything you’ve picked up so far today, and you can FETCH any of them to your location. > my collar You can’t really see it yourself, because it’s been fastened on tight to make sure it never comes off. But there’s a blessing on it, a really powerful one, that lets you think and logic better than most dogs. That’s how you can be so helpful in your human’s work! > push my collar You bat at your collar a bit, but it can’t move very much while it is still on you. > items You’re used to carrying things around for your human sometimes, but you haven’t found anything like that yet. > spells So far today, you’ve messed with one spell: • The unidentified curse on your human, which is doing something horrible (fetch it) > look Bedroom, on the bed This is where you and your human sleep, in a little nook off the front room. The bed is big and soft, and one of your human’s favorite comforts. Usually. Your human lies here, unconscious, every breath taking all her strength. > front room (first attempting to get off the bed) You leap off the bed. You lope north. Front room Your house is one of the fancier ones in the village, with a front room to talk and meet people in, a kitchen in the back, and a bedroom nook tucked away to one side. But there’s nobody visiting today; the front room feels very quiet, and very empty. The front door leads out to the rest of the village. A counterweight hangs by the door, keeping the ladder mechanism safely folded up. Navigating by name works well enough in your house, but you can also use compass directions, especially once you’re out in the wider world. The map at the top of the screen shows where you are, and the suggestions bar at the bottom of the screen shows which directions you can move in: north, south, east, west, up, and down. Once you’ve visited a location and added it to the map, you can click on it at any point to navigate back there. > counterweight It’s a big hunk of stone, with a tether tying it to the ladder outside. When your human wants to go out, she lifts it up and does something with the rope, and the ladder goes down; when she wants to stay in, she pulls it back down, and the ladder comes up. > tether Thick and strong, to support the heavy counterweight. > push the tether It sways a bit, but you don’t have the strength to actually lock it into place. > counterweight It’s a big hunk of stone, with a tether tying it to the ladder outside. When your human wants to go out, she lifts it up and does something with the rope, and the ladder goes down; when she wants to stay in, she pulls it back down, and the ladder comes up. > push the counterweight It sways a bit, but you don’t have the strength to actually lock it into place. > east You scamper east. Kitchen This is where all the food-making happens, as well as the milling, the weaving, the crafting, the magic-working...everything a wise-woman has to do, except entertaining guests or sleeping. It’s kind of a mess, but your human was always good at finding whatever she needed, no matter how cluttered it got. A sealed chest has been half-extricated from the miscellaneous clutter. > sealed chest This is where your human stores the tools she needs for her job. There’s no latch or seal on it—she keeps it shut in a way only a wise-woman can open. Or maybe an especially clever dog. You can smell a security blessing lingering on it. > security blessing It tastes like deep, solid bronze-brown and smells like a slow but intricate fugue, the harmonies interlocking with each steady, regular change. It provides the best possible security: anything enchanted with this blessing can’t possibly be opened unless the spell is removed. Which also means it’s not very useful unless you can move spells around. Fortunately, your human has you, her magic sponge, to absorb any stray magic and put it wherever it needs to go. > take the security blessing You sniff around the chest, finding right where the security blessing is most concentrated, then gather it up in one definitive lick. Your mouth snaps painfully shut and your joints go stiff as the spell transfers from the chest into you! As a dog, you have the unique ability to lick up spells and move them to other places. But each spell will only stick to the appropriate sort of target. > sealed chest (I’m sorry, I didn’t understand what you wanted to do.) > sealed chest (I’m sorry, I didn’t understand what you wanted to do.) > the security blessing This one tastes of deep, solid bronze-brown, with a scent of a slow but intricate fugue, the harmonies interlocking with each steady, regular change. It provides the best possible security: anything enchanted with this blessing can’t possibly be opened unless the spell is removed. Which also means it’s not very useful unless you can move spells around. Fortunately, your human has you, her magic sponge, to absorb any stray magic and put it wherever it needs to go. The suggestions bar at the bottom of the screen will also show anything you’re carrying or wearing, and any spells currently affecting you, for easy access. The “Kitchen” link will repeat the description of your surroundings, while the “You” link will suggest general commands, like JUMP or WAIT. > note magic sponge Dogs were believed to absorb any magic they touched, which meant they had to be kept far away from temples: they might track impurity all over the sanctum! This was sometimes used in cleansing rituals (like the “Ritual of Zuwi”, CTH 412, where a newborn puppy would lick curses off someone), but these rituals seldom ended well for the curse-bearing puppy. In the world of this game, where magic demonstrably exists and they can manipulate blessings as well as curses, the dogs are treated somewhat better than in the real Hittite Empire. > put the security blessing on On what? > the miscellaneous clutter You try to apply the security blessing to the miscellaneous clutter, but you can’t find any sort of hinge or openable part to stick it to. It remains resolutely clamped in your jaws. > put the security blessing on On what? > my collar You try to apply the security blessing to your collar, but you can’t find any sort of hinge or openable part to stick it to. It remains resolutely clamped in your jaws. > put the security blessing on On what? > the security blessing Apparently in some foreign places, magicians can combine spells or enchant one spell with another to alter how it works. But you’ve never learned to do that; you can only put spells on physical objects. > west You hurry west. Front room Your house is one of the fancier ones in the village, with a front room to talk and meet people in, a kitchen in the back, and a bedroom nook tucked away to one side. But there’s nobody visiting today; the front room feels very quiet, and very empty. The front door leads out to the rest of the village. A counterweight hangs by the door, keeping the ladder mechanism safely folded up. > east You scurry east. Kitchen This is where all the food-making happens, as well as the milling, the weaving, the crafting, the magic-working...everything a wise-woman has to do, except entertaining guests or sleeping. It’s kind of a mess, but your human was always good at finding whatever she needed, no matter how cluttered it got. A chest has been half-extricated from the miscellaneous clutter. > miscellaneous clutter Everything a wise-woman could need for her job: flour for drawing ritual bounds, colored wool for making torches, clay models for substitutions, hawthorn branches for severings, preserved fish for wavings, expensive imported palm fronds for chirality inversions, a snake-basin for divinations, and so much more besides. If your human were awake, she could figure out exactly how this curse worked, and then she’d know exactly the right kind of ritual to ground it out. But she isn’t, and you don’t. > chest This is where your human stores the tools she needs for her job. There’s no latch or seal on it—she keeps it shut in a way only a wise-woman can open. Well, kept. > push the chest open You push the chest open, to see a weightless folding jack inside. > weightless folding jack A clever little contraption that folds and unfolds, and when it unfolds, it lifts things up and supports them. Kasilti designed it for your human after she saved him from a purging curse, and now she uses it to get at just the right angle of things when she’s working. It’s currently folded shut. You can smell a blessing of the wind lingering on it. If you’re ever not sure what to do, THINK will point you toward puzzles you’re currently equipped to solve, and SCORE will show you what you’ve already accomplished. > blessing of the wind Your mouth is full of the taste of pale lavender, your nose full of the scent of a looping melody that spirals higher and higher without end. It weakens gravity, making anything it’s placed on nearly weightless—good for carrying things all around the village without throwing out your back, your human always says. > the security blessing The taste of deep, solid bronze-brown. The smell of a slow but intricate fugue, the harmonies interlocking with each steady, regular change. It provides the best possible security: anything enchanted with this blessing can’t possibly be opened unless the spell is removed. Which also means it’s not very useful unless you can move spells around. Fortunately, your human has you, her magic sponge, to absorb any stray magic and put it wherever it needs to go. > put the security blessing on On what? > the chest You transfer the security blessing to the chest, and it seals tightly shut. > west You pad west. Front room Your house is one of the fancier ones in the village, with a front room to talk and meet people in, a kitchen in the back, and a bedroom nook tucked away to one side. But there’s nobody visiting today; the front room feels very quiet, and very empty. The front door leads out to the rest of the village. A counterweight hangs by the door, keeping the ladder mechanism safely folded up. > west (first attempting to open the front door to the west) You push the front door open. The door is open now, but the ladder is still pulled up. And your weight isn’t enough to push it down. > ladder Like most of the houses in the village, yours has two levels: the aboveground part where you live, and the belowground part where you store things. Except the aboveground part is actually a few cubits above the ground, so that the belowground part doesn’t get flooded. This ladder lets you get down safely. Or at least it would if you could lower it. The counterweight is keeping it raised off the ground. > note houses Our knowledge of Hittite architecture is very limited, especially when it comes to the homes of common people rather than palaces and temples. Naumann compares ancient foundations with more recent architecture in the region and speculates that Hittite farmhouses consisted of a basic storage area set into the ground, plus a more elaborate living space built on top of it, with external ladders or staircases leading up to the second level. The elaborate ladder-and-counterweight mechanisms in this game are included for the sake of the puzzles and are based on absolutely no evidence whatsoever. More likely the stairs or ladders would have been fixed in place for strength and stability, avoiding all the problems that plague them in this game. My justification is that Kasilti has a fondness for intricate mechanical designs that comes at the expense of practicality. Pictured: A sketch of how Hittite farmhouses might have looked, based on more recent architecture in the region, reproduced from Naumann’s Architektur Kleinasiens, page 380, figure 515. > note cubits A cubit was originally defined as the distance from a man’s elbow to the tips of his fingers, but eventually standardized at about 18 inches or 45 centimeters. > push my ladder You apply a bit of force to your ladder, but it doesn’t budge. > east You hurry east. Kitchen This is where all the food-making happens, as well as the milling, the weaving, the crafting, the magic-working...everything a wise-woman has to do, except entertaining guests or sleeping. It’s kind of a mess, but your human was always good at finding whatever she needed, no matter how cluttered it got. A sealed chest has been half-extricated from the miscellaneous clutter. > miscellaneous clutter Everything a wise-woman could need for her job: flour for drawing ritual bounds, colored wool for making torches, clay models for substitutions, hawthorn branches for severings, preserved fish for wavings, expensive imported palm fronds for chirality inversions, a snake-basin for divinations, and so much more besides. If your human were awake, she could figure out exactly how this curse worked, and then she’d know exactly the right kind of ritual to ground it out. But she isn’t, and you don’t. > sealed chest This is where your human stores the tools she needs for her job. There’s no latch or seal on it—she keeps it shut in a way only a wise-woman can open. Or maybe an especially clever dog. You can smell a security blessing lingering on it. > security blessing Deep, solid bronze-brown in your mouth; in your nose, a slow but intricate fugue, the harmonies interlocking with each steady, regular change. It provides the best possible security: anything enchanted with this blessing can’t possibly be opened unless the spell is removed. Which also means it’s not very useful unless you can move spells around. Fortunately, your human has you, her magic sponge, to absorb any stray magic and put it wherever it needs to go. > take the security blessing You pick out the security blessing, and carefully lick it off the chest. Your mouth snaps painfully shut and your joints go stiff as the spell transfers from the chest into you! > sealed chest (I’m sorry, I didn’t understand what you wanted to do.) > sealed chest (I’m sorry, I didn’t understand what you wanted to do.) > look Kitchen This is where all the food-making happens, as well as the milling, the weaving, the crafting, the magic-working...everything a wise-woman has to do, except entertaining guests or sleeping. It’s kind of a mess, but your human was always good at finding whatever she needed, no matter how cluttered it got. A chest has been half-extricated from the miscellaneous clutter. > chest This is where your human stores the tools she needs for her job. There’s no latch or seal on it—she keeps it shut in a way only a wise-woman can open. Well, kept. > push the chest open You push the chest open, to see a weightless folding jack inside. > weightless folding jack A clever little contraption that folds and unfolds, and when it unfolds, it lifts things up and supports them. Kasilti designed it for your human after she saved him from a purging curse, and now she uses it to get at just the right angle of things when she’s working. It’s currently folded shut. Of course, your human also has thumbs to open and close this and get it positioned just right. It’s useless to you. You can smell a blessing of the wind lingering on it. > take the weightless folding jack Your human warned you very firmly about this. If you pick up the weightless folding jack, the blessing of the wind will start affecting you, while you still have the security blessing. And that could lead to weird, unpredictable reactions. Safer to stash the security blessing somewhere else first, and leave mixing spells for the humans. > west You pad west. Front room Your house is one of the fancier ones in the village, with a front room to talk and meet people in, a kitchen in the back, and a bedroom nook tucked away to one side. But there’s nobody visiting today; the front room feels very quiet, and very empty. The front door leads out to the rest of the village. A counterweight hangs by the door, keeping the ladder mechanism safely folded up. > south You hurry south. Bedroom This is where you and your human sleep, in a little nook off the front room. The bed is big and soft, and one of your human’s favorite comforts. Usually. Your human lies here, unconscious, every breath taking all her strength. > the security blessing Now it tastes of deep, solid bronze-brown and smells of a slow but intricate fugue, the harmonies interlocking with each steady, regular change. It provides the best possible security: anything enchanted with this blessing can’t possibly be opened unless the spell is removed. Which also means it’s not very useful unless you can move spells around. Fortunately, your human has you, her magic sponge, to absorb any stray magic and put it wherever it needs to go. > put the security blessing on On what? > my human Your human was very, very clear about this part: you must never put a spell on a living being without proper supervision. Magicians and wise-women are allowed to alter spells, dispelling or redirecting them onto other things, but only licensed temple sanctifiers can put new spells on people. If anyone else does it, even if it’s not meant as a curse, it’s considered sorcery—and the punishment for sorcery is death. > put the security blessing on On what? > the bed You try to apply the security blessing to the bed, but you can’t find any sort of hinge or openable part to stick it to. It remains resolutely clamped in your jaws. > north You lope north. Front room Your house is one of the fancier ones in the village, with a front room to talk and meet people in, a kitchen in the back, and a bedroom nook tucked away to one side. But there’s nobody visiting today; the front room feels very quiet, and very empty. The front door leads out to the rest of the village. A counterweight hangs by the door, keeping the ladder mechanism safely folded up. > out The door is open now, but the ladder is still pulled up. And your weight isn’t enough to push it down. > put the security blessing on On what? > my ladder You try to apply the security blessing to your ladder, but you can’t find any sort of hinge or openable part to stick it to. It remains resolutely clamped in your jaws. > put the security blessing on On what? > the counterweight You try to apply the security blessing to the counterweight, but you can’t find any sort of hinge or openable part to stick it to. It remains resolutely clamped in your jaws. > put the security blessing on On what? > the front door You transfer the security blessing to the front door, and it seals tightly shut. > east You hurry east. Kitchen This is where all the food-making happens, as well as the milling, the weaving, the crafting, the magic-working...everything a wise-woman has to do, except entertaining guests or sleeping. It’s kind of a mess, but your human was always good at finding whatever she needed, no matter how cluttered it got. A chest has been half-extricated from the miscellaneous clutter. > chest This is where your human stores the tools she needs for her job. There’s no latch or seal on it—she keeps it shut in a way only a wise-woman can open. Well, kept. A folding jack is nestled inside. > folding jack A clever little contraption that folds and unfolds, and when it unfolds, it lifts things up and supports them. Kasilti designed it for your human after she saved him from a purging curse, and now she uses it to get at just the right angle of things when she’s working. It’s currently folded shut. Of course, your human also has thumbs to open and close this and get it positioned just right. It’s useless to you. You can smell a blessing of the wind lingering on it. > take the weightless folding jack It takes some effort, but you manage to scoop up the weightless folding jack. Still large and unwieldy, but only about half as heavy as you might expect. You feel a bit of the blessing of the wind bleeding into you as you carry the folding jack: not enough to really stick to you, but enough to affect you while you’re holding it. > west You scamper west. Front room Your house is one of the fancier ones in the village, with a front room to talk and meet people in, a kitchen in the back, and a bedroom nook tucked away to one side. But there’s nobody visiting today; the front room feels very quiet, and very empty. The sealed front door leads out to the rest of the village. A counterweight hangs by the door, keeping the ladder mechanism safely folded up. > counterweight It’s a big hunk of stone, with a tether tying it to the ladder outside. When your human wants to go out, she lifts it up and does something with the rope, and the ladder goes down; when she wants to stay in, she pulls it back down, and the ladder comes up. > push the counterweight It sways a bit, but you don’t have the strength to actually lock it into place. > tether Thick and strong, to support the heavy counterweight. > push the tether It sways a bit, but you don’t have the strength to actually lock it into place. > counterweight It’s a big hunk of stone, with a tether tying it to the ladder outside. When your human wants to go out, she lifts it up and does something with the rope, and the ladder goes down; when she wants to stay in, she pulls it back down, and the ladder comes up. > put the blessing of the wind on the counterweight You sniff and sniff around the counterweight, trying to find the perfect place for the blessing of the wind. It wouldn’t do to get it only halfway on, after all... There! That’s the spot! You rub your nose back and forth against it until all the magic has transferred. The folding jack becomes too heavy to hold, and tumbles to the ground! The suddenly-less-weighty weight swings and sways, no longer heavy enough to balance out the ladder. With a slow, steady grace, the weight rises to the ceiling, and the ladder outside the front door falls into place! > the sealed front door More for keeping bugs out than people and animals. For people and animals, hoisting up the ladder is much more effective. It’s currently magically sealed shut. You can smell a security blessing lingering on it. > security blessing Your mouth is full of the taste of deep, solid bronze-brown, your nose full of the scent of a slow but intricate fugue, the harmonies interlocking with each steady, regular change. It provides the best possible security: anything enchanted with this blessing can’t possibly be opened unless the spell is removed. Which also means it’s not very useful unless you can move spells around. Fortunately, your human has you, her magic sponge, to absorb any stray magic and put it wherever it needs to go. > take the security blessing You pick out the security blessing, and carefully lick it off the front door. Your mouth snaps painfully shut and your joints go stiff as the spell transfers from the front door into you! > east You pace east. Kitchen This is where all the food-making happens, as well as the milling, the weaving, the crafting, the magic-working...everything a wise-woman has to do, except entertaining guests or sleeping. It’s kind of a mess, but your human was always good at finding whatever she needed, no matter how cluttered it got. A chest has been half-extricated from the miscellaneous clutter. > chest This is where your human stores the tools she needs for her job. There’s no latch or seal on it—she keeps it shut in a way only a wise-woman can open. Well, kept. > put the security blessing on the chest You transfer the security blessing to the chest, and it seals tightly shut. > west You pad west. Front room Your house is one of the fancier ones in the village, with a front room to talk and meet people in, a kitchen in the back, and a bedroom nook tucked away to one side. But there’s nobody visiting today; the front room feels very quiet, and very empty. The front door leads out to the rest of the village. There is a folding jack here. A counterweight hangs limply by the door, not looking particularly weighty at all right now. > save Game state saved successfully. > west (first attempting to open the front door to the west) You push the front door open. You race down the ladder, blinking at the sudden sunlight and sudden noise. It’s the last day of the harvest, and everyone’s working their hands to the bone. But you can’t save your human all by yourself. Maybe one of them will have the key. Chapter II: The Village By your house Your house is situated at the very edge of the village, with lovely views of the barge launch to the north and the busy fields to the south. A ladder leads up to your front door, with the ground underneath it sloping down to the cellar underneath. The links at the top give you some ways to control the game itself: UNDO your last move, SAVE your progress, RESTORE to an earlier save. ABOUT will tell you some information about this program, while THINK will remind you what you’re currently working on, and link a few other commands for more specific help. A few more of these are available in the menu at the top right of the page. Good luck, brave dog! Your human is counting on you! > about Anatolia, 1280 BCE: the last swan song of the Hittite Empire. The Great King abandons the capital in the face of barbarian raids; moving south, he declares that his new city will be even greater than the last, building it into a place of splendor. Paris of Troy swears fealty in exchange for military support as Greek ships converge on his city. Pharaoh Ramesses II saber-rattles down in Egypt, eyeing his former territories in Canaan that have fallen under Hittite control. The King’s younger brother forces the barbarians back and secures the former capital, and his soldiers start to consider if he might make a better heir than his young and inexperienced nephew. Artisans across Anatolia forge royal weapons out of rare, precious iron, and wonder if one day it will be possible to extract it directly from the rock. The technology seems only a generation away...if only the Empire will last long enough to see it. And in the small farming village of Nahhanta, one very clever dog tries its best to save its human from a life-threatening curse. This is a piece of historical fantasy set in the late Bronze Age, featuring canine antics, footnotes on the actual culture and history involved, and reconstructed Bronze Age music performed by Michael Levy. Can the hunter find his runaway puppy? Can the village’s taxes get paid before Imperial soldiers get involved? Can the copper merchant get his comeuppance for lying about the quality of his goods? And when the village wise-woman is laid low by sorcery, can her familiar find a way to save her? It will take luck, ingenuity, and more than a bit of magic...but it just might work. This game was written and programmed by Daniel M. Stelzer. Mahori’s dialogue was written by Ada Stelzer, including the argument with Zuwa. The background of the cover art (photo of dog in field) is by Anastasiia Andrianova on Unsplash. The hieroglyphic text is entirely my own work, and I’m to blame for the inaccuracies; I claim artistic license for all of them. The drawings of the two dog hats were done by Becky Mead and Daniel Stelzer. Round 1 testers: Tabitha, Lance Cirone Round 2 testers: Max Fog, Adam Biltcliffe, Mike Russo, rh Round 3 testers: Adam Biltcliffe, Mike Russo, Max Fog, Lance Cirone Round 4 testers: Tabitha Round 5 testers: Adam Biltcliffe Round 6 testers: Ada and Sarah Stelzer, Becky Mead, Tabitha, Adam Biltcliffe Round 7 testers: Ada and Sarah Stelzer, Becky Mead Round 8 testers: Adam Biltcliffe Round 9 testers: Adam Biltcliffe, improvmonster Round 10 testers: aschultz Plus so, so much valuable feedback from everyone who played and reviewed it during IFComp—special thanks to Emery Joyce and Lucian Smith for their bug reports! Music by Michael Levy: Bandcamp, Spotify. > look By your house Your house is situated at the very edge of the village, with lovely views of the barge launch to the north and the busy fields to the south. A ladder leads up to your front door, with the ground underneath it sloping down to the cellar underneath. > down You climb down. Cellar The space under your house is cool and dark—good for storing things that you don’t want to spoil during the summer. A square of light shines down from above, illuminating the rows of pithoi along the walls. One of them has been set aside for this year’s taxes. > note taxes All subjects of the Hittite Empire had to pay taxes, either in goods or in labor on government-owned land (or both). Since coinage wouldn’t be invented until the Iron Age, the medium of taxation was raw grain or similar produce, collected and stored in enormous silos across Anatolia for later redistribution. Some scholars have argued that all taxes were paid in labor during this time period, but archaeological evidence from those silos shows that some farmers left large amounts of weeds in their tax grain to increase the weight. This suggests that they were responsible for delivering a certain quantity of grain rather than just a certain time period of work. > rows of pithoi Dozens and dozens of pithoi, holding grain, fruit, cheese...anything that needs to be stored without spoiling. > note pithoi A pithos (PIH-thoss, plural “pithoi”) is a large ceramic jar, about as tall as an adult human. They were the standard way of storing everything from grain to wine to human remains: while the royals had their fancy tombs, everyday people would be buried in one of these. While the size could vary a lot, the ones in this game hold about 200 liters or 50 gallons, weighing somewhere around 450 pounds or 200 kilograms when full—quite a lot for a dog to carry! The largest ones could hold up to a ton (900 kg), and were sunk halfway into the ground for stability. > pithos of grain The pithos is about twice as tall as you are, and just as heavy. The villagers gave your human this grain in exchange for her help, and now she has to give it to the capital, or else the tax collectors will be here before you know it. > push the pithos of grain You’re able to shift the pithos of grain, but only a little. It is definitely too heavy to carry. > take the pithos of grain You try your hardest to move the pithos of grain, but it’s no use. It probably weighs more than you do! > up You climb up. By your house Your house is situated at the very edge of the village, with lovely views of the barge launch to the north and the busy fields to the south. A ladder leads up to your front door, with the ground underneath it sloping down to the cellar underneath. > save Game state saved successfully. > spells So far today, you’ve messed with three spells: • The security blessing on the chest, in the kitchen, which holds something closed (fetch it) • The blessing of the wind on the counterweight, in the front room, which makes something weigh less (fetch it) • The unidentified curse on your human, in the bedroom, which is doing something horrible (fetch it) > items So far today, you’ve picked up one thing: • The folding jack, in the front room (fetch it) > north You scurry north. Barge launch Makeshift docks have been cobbled together at the edge of the river, planks and boards all lashed together to load the village’s taxes onto the barge. Tax season is even busier than market day, and Piseni wants to get everything moved in as few trips as possible. Your house is back to the south, and a well-trampled path leads upriver. Piseni, the village elder, is pacing nervously around the docks, while his son tries to avoid notice. > makeshift docks The river has been too rough lately to have a permanent dock, so right now, the villagers just make do with this. It works okay for the occasional trip to the market, even if it won’t stand up to much more than that. > river The whole village of Nahhanta—and probably a bunch of other villages too, even if you’ve never had a chance to see them—is built around the Holaya River. It gives the villagers a way to irrigate the fields, and a way to bring their crops down to Tarhuntassa for market days. > note holaya river The Holaya River (more often transcribed “Hulaya”) is mentioned many times in Hittite documents, but archaeologists disagree on its exact location. One theory is the Calycadnus (modern Göksu), so that’s where it’s been placed on the map for this game. Rivers that could be used for both farming and transportation were rare in Anatolia, so the village here is a fortunate one. > note tarhuntassa Somewhere around 1290 BCE, the capital of the Hittite Empire was moved from Hattusa to a new city called Tarhuntassa (“the city of Tarhunt”), closer to the sea routes in the south and farther from the Kaska raiders in the north. A few decades later, the new Great King moved it back to Hattusa, and made Tarhuntassa the capital of a new vassal state instead. Tarhuntassa itself has never been found, and its exact location is unknown. At the time of this game, Tarhuntassa is properly established as the capital, but many people still remember the days of Hattusa and the suddenness of the change. > note tarhunt Tarhunt (alternately Tarhunz or Tarhunna) was the chief god of the Hittite pantheon, also known as the “Weather-God of Hatti”. Probably descended from the same Indo-European source as Zeus, Jupiter, Thor, Indra, and Perun, other storm gods who are famous for their strength. The name literally means “He Who Overpowers”. Pictured: A drawing of one of the Hittite rock reliefs: the İvriz inscription, reproduced from Hawkins’s Corpus, vol 1, part 3, plate 295. It’s good to see you’re enjoying the footnotes! But you shouldn’t feel obligated to read them all at once. If they’re starting to feel tedious, remember that you can always use the NOTES command later to see all the footnotes you’ve come across—you never have to worry about missing them permanently. > note great king The ruler of the Hittite Empire was literally called the “Great King” (LUGAL.GAL), as in the king who ruled over the kings of his various vassal states, and it’s become conventional to translate it that way instead of something like “Emperor”. In 1280 BCE, the current Great King is Muwatalli II, who would eventually be remembered as a cunning strategist in war and diplomacy alike. > note hattusa The original capital of the Hittite Empire, right in the middle of Anatolia, before the government was relocated to Tarhuntassa. At the time of this game, the Great King has put his brother Hattusili in charge of it, while he himself reigns in Tarhuntassa. > note hattusili The Great King’s youngest brother and a very successful general, currently reigning in Hattusa. Significantly more popular among the soldiers than the crown prince Urhi-Tessop. I’ll stop reminding you about the NOTES command now. I’m glad they are being appreciated! Once you complete the game, it’ll list all the footnotes, including ones that haven’t been revealed in play, so you can be sure you haven’t missed any. But if you want to reveal them all now, you can also type NOTES ALL. > note urhi-tessop Urhi-Tessop (literally, “Tessop is true”) is the Great King’s oldest surviving son, next in line for the throne. But he’s widely perceived as young and weak; the army respects his father’s authority, but doesn’t respect Urhi-Tessop himself. > note tessop Tessop, more commonly transcribed as “Tessub” or “Teshub”, was a weather god from the Hurrian region (modern Syria), adopted into the Hittite pantheon at a point when Hurrian culture was especially fashionable. He was also known as “the Weather-God of Halpa” and his purview included royalty and governance as well as storms, since he was the king of the Hurrian pantheon. Unlike most Hittite gods, we actually have quite a bit of mythology about him, thanks to the collection of epic poems known as the Kumarbi Cycle. He was also the patron god of the crown prince Urhi-Tessop. > note halpa Modern Aleppo, Syria, and in fact cognate to the modern name of that city. The personal name “Halpaziti” literally means “man of Halpa”. > note kumarbi cycle While relatively few Hittite myths survive, we do have Hittite translations of the Hurrian epics known as the Kumarbi Cycle, which provide insight into the Hurrian gods who were adopted into the Hittite pantheon. In the Epic of Kumarbi, the god Kumarbi launches a coup against the previous king of the gods, the personified sky. He castrates the sky and in the process becomes pregnant with Tessop, who is born when the Fates split open Kumarbi’s skull to let him out. Kumarbi demands that the Fates let him eat Tessop, but they give him a stone instead, and Tessop grows up to overthrow Kumarbi and take his place as king. The parallels to the (much later) Greek myth of Ouranos, Kronos, and Zeus are striking. In the Epic of Hedammu, Kumarbi creates an enormous sea monster called Hedammu to defeat Tessop. Tessop’s sister Savoska discovers the plot, and Tessop attempts to fight Hedammu, but the resulting conflict almost destroys humanity altogether; the other gods insist on a nonviolent solution. Savoska seduces Hedammu to get close enough to magically poison him, but what happens after that is unknown; presumably the poison weakens him enough for Savoska and Tessop to kill him. In the Epic of Ullikummi, Kumarbi now creates a stone giant (Ullikummi) that grows one cubit every day and one iku every month, anchored to the shoulders of the titan who holds up the sky. Tessop tries to fight it like he did with Kumarbi himself, but it’s too strong; Savoska tries to seduce it like she did with Hedammu, but it is devoid of emotion. When Ullikummi seals Tessop’s wife in her temple, the siblings venture to the Underworld to retrieve a primordial artifact: the only thing that can separate Ullikummi from the titan is the knife that was once used to split the sky from the earth. The end of this one is also lost, but it probably ends with Tessop victorious. There are several other poems in the cycle, but most are only known from short fragments. Translations of the surviving parts can be found in Hoffner’s Hittite Myths. > note the fates The Hittites drew a distinction between “heavenly gods”, summoned down from the sky at aboveground altars, and “earthly gods” or “primordial gods”, summoned up from the Underworld through ritual pits and the Ways Below. Among these “earthly gods” were the two Fates who determined the lifespans of mortals. Indigenous Anatolian rituals name them Isdustaya and Papaya and describe them spinning out a person’s lifespan on distaff and spindle like a thread; later Hittite rituals refer to them as the Golses (or Gulses or possibly Kuwasses, depending how a particular sign is read), literally “Engravers”, who carve individual fates into the material of destiny. As far as I know, no Hittite source ever mentions three Fates—either exactly two, or an unspecified number—but they are sometimes joined by other gods, like the Auspicious Day (the day of a person’s death) representing the end of a mortal’s life. For far more detail, see Archi’s The Anatolian Fate-Goddesses and their Different Traditions. > note distaff and spindle A distaff and spindle were the traditional way of spinning raw fibers (like hemp and wool) into yarn for weaving. The distaff holds the fibers and keeps them from getting tangled; the spindle does the actual spinning and twists it into yarn. Along with weaving, spinning was a fundamental part of “women’s work” and a full-time job for most women from adolescence onwards—cloth was always in demand and took a huge amount of labor to produce. > note iku The basic unit of area was the “field”, written with the Sumerian word iku. Scholars disagree on the exact size of a Hittite iku, but one theory is a square sixty meters on a side: about a third of a hectare, or a bit less than an acre, or half the size of an international soccer field. > note savoska Savoska of Nineveh, more commonly transcribed as “Sauska” or “Shaushka”, was another of the Hurrian (Syrian) gods imported to the Hittite Empire. She’s often associated with the Mesopotamian goddess Ishtar due to the cuneiform signs used to write her name, but Leonard’s Ištar in Ḫatti claims that, unlike Ishtar, Savoska is specifically associated with love, sexuality, and magic, rather than violence and war. (Leonard also argues for the pronunciations “Savoska” and “Tessop” rather than the more usual “Sauska” and “Teshub”.) Like her brother Tessop, she appears in the collection of epic poems known as the Kumarbi Cycle. She was also the patron goddess of the king’s brother Hattusili, who she saved from a childhood plague in exchange for his eternal devotion. > look Barge launch Makeshift docks have been cobbled together at the edge of the river, planks and boards all lashed together to load the village’s taxes onto the barge. Tax season is even busier than market day, and Piseni wants to get everything moved in as few trips as possible. Your house is back to the south, and a well-trampled path leads upriver. Piseni, the village elder, is pacing nervously around the docks, while his son tries to avoid notice. > barge The river is the best way to transport anything, so the village has a few of these huge barges for carrying people and cargo down to the big city and back. Even with all the taxes loaded on, there’s plenty of space for people too. > jump on the barge With everyone bustling around, you’d probably just get stepped on. No use getting on there until it’s ready to launch. The Elder glares out at the village. “Hmph...our poor wise-woman, Zuwa, Kasilti, Anzi, Iyali, Lamu, Mahori...seven haven’t paid yet...” > piseni Gray-haired and sour-faced, Piseni has the final say on any village matters, which means he’s the first one the soldiers come for when taxes aren’t paid. If the village ever gets in trouble with the law, it’s his neck on the line. So he makes sure everything gets handled before the Empire has to care about the taxes. > kiss piseni “Grah! Back, dog! Can’t you see I’m busy?!” He forces you away and wipes your spit off his face. > his son Hahua is a strong young man, but he never has much to say. Or maybe his father just never lets him speak. After another harvest or two, it’ll probably be time for him to go find a wife of his own. And maybe a voice, too. The Elder glares out at the village. “Hmph...our poor wise-woman, Zuwa, Kasilti, Anzi, Iyali, Lamu, Mahori...seven haven’t paid yet...” > kiss piseni’s son You give him a big lick, and he smiles and pats your head. > look Barge launch Makeshift docks have been cobbled together at the edge of the river, planks and boards all lashed together to load the village’s taxes onto the barge. Tax season is even busier than market day, and Piseni wants to get everything moved in as few trips as possible. Your house is back to the south, and a well-trampled path leads upriver. Piseni, the village elder, is pacing nervously around the docks, while his son tries to avoid notice. The Elder glares out at the village. “Hmph...our poor wise-woman, Zuwa, Kasilti, Anzi, Iyali, Lamu, Mahori...seven haven’t paid yet...” > west You hurry west. Stela channel A single huge stone rises out of the river here: your human’s greatest work, the village stela. Deep channels cut into the riverbank keep it immersed in water on every side, making sure the river is always flowing across it. Several of the village children are gathered here, playing around in the river. One of the village children comes hurtling downstream, and kicks back over to the shore. Unlike some other works of interactive fiction, this game doesn’t always list the possible exits when it describes a location. You can see the possible exits in the suggestion bar at the bottom of the screen, or in the map. For example, you can currently go east or west. > stela It’s about as tall and wide as a full-grown human, shaped roughly into a rectangle, and every surface is covered in a labyrinth of fine, delicate carvings. Your human spent a whole winter working with a travelling magician to make it, and now it keeps the whole village safe: no matter how many spells she redirects into the stela, they’ll never harm it, and the flowing water will eventually wear them away to nothing. You can smell a fiery curse lingering on it. The child hurries back upstream to join the others. Since you can only hold one spell at a time, a stela is a good place to store the ones you’re not using. You can STASH a spell at any point to run it over to the nearest stela, leave it there, then return to where you were. > note magician This is a Babylonian term (ashipu, borrowed into Hittite as apisi) rather than a Hittite one, more commonly translated as “exorcist”. They performed a similar role to the Hittite wise-woman, breaking curses, banishing spirits, and generally doing all sorts of state-sanctioned magic for their clients, but with more focus on countering and dispelling sorcery than redirecting it. Babylonian magic was famous all across the Near East, even if it was still considered strange and foreign by the Hittites. In this time period, the Great King had just hired an illustrious Babylonian healer named Rabia-sha-Marduk for his royal court. When the next Babylonian monarch complained about his best experts being held hostage in foreign lands, the Great King countered that this man was free to leave whenever he wanted—but he’d been offered a grand estate and a princess’s hand in marriage if he stayed in Anatolia, which was a better deal than he could get in Babylon! For some discussion of the ashipu’s role, and also the healer Rabia-sha-Marduk, see Heeßel’s The Babylonian Physician Rabâ-ša-Marduk: Another Look at Physicians and Exorcists in the Ancient Near East. > note stela A stela (STEE-luh, plural stelae STEE-lee) is a large upright stone carved with inscriptions. Historically, they were generally used to memorialize the dead or commemorate great deeds rather than for magic, though certain special ones (called huwasi in Hittite) were treated as physical bodies for the gods. Pictured: the bottom half of a hieroglyph-covered stela from Aksaray, photographed by Ingeborg Simon, CC-BY-SA. Original from . > push the stela It’s solid and steady as a rock. Well, it is a rock. But that’s the whole point. Another child comes splashing down the river. > look Stela channel A single huge stone rises out of the river here: your human’s greatest work, the village stela. Deep channels cut into the riverbank keep it immersed in water on every side, making sure the river is always flowing across it. Several of the village children are gathered here, playing around in the river. The child splashes back upstream against the current. > children With all the adults too busy to tell them no, the children have run off to play in the river. A child comes careening downstream, the current tumbling them around. > kiss the village children The children giggle and crowd around you, taking the chance to pet your fur and play with your face. The child goes running back to his friends. > the village children With all the adults too busy to tell them no, the children have run off to play in the river. One of the village children comes hurtling downstream, and kicks back over to the shore. > stela It’s about as tall and wide as a full-grown human, shaped roughly into a rectangle, and every surface is covered in a labyrinth of fine, delicate carvings. Your human spent a whole winter working with a travelling magician to make it, and now it keeps the whole village safe: no matter how many spells she redirects into the stela, they’ll never harm it, and the flowing water will eventually wear them away to nothing. You can smell a fiery curse lingering on it. The child hurries back upstream to join the others. > fiery curse Now it tastes of fiery orange-red and smells of a dizzying-fast cascade of arpeggios. When Lamu had an awful fever a month ago, you and your human redirected it onto the stela. Now the water’s mostly worn it away, and what’s left can’t hurt anyone any more: it would just make things uncomfortably warm. Another child comes splashing down the river. > take the fiery curse You press your nose against the stela, sniffing and tasting and trying to isolate the magic you’re looking for. Until finally you’ve got it. An unpleasant heat spreads through your body as you lick up the fiery curse! The child splashes back upstream against the current. > stash the fiery curse (putting the fiery curse on the stela) You touch your nose delicately to the stela, and the magic starts to flow—pulled out of your body like beer through a straw, drawn into the labyrinth of channels carved into the stone. Soon it’s entirely gone from you, but you can feel it in the carvings: bound there until someone needs it again, or until the running water eventually wears it away to nothing. A child comes careening downstream, the current tumbling them around. > west You lope west. River path A muddy, well-trodden path runs along the bank of the river: upstream to the dam, downstream to the stela. Several of the village children are gathered here, playing around in the river. One of the children shoves another off the bank, sending her splashing into the river. An @ symbol on the map shows your current location, while other symbols indicate various things you may want to come back for later. The # symbol, for example, marks a stela where you can keep your spells. In particular, the ? symbol marks a puzzle that you’re currently able to solve. If you find this too obtrusive, you can disable it in the OPTIONS. > children With all the adults too busy to tell them no, the children have run off to play in the river. With great effort, the child comes swimming back against the current. > river The whole village of Nahhanta—and probably a bunch of other villages too, even if you’ve never had a chance to see them—is built around the Holaya River. It gives the villagers a way to irrigate the fields, and a way to bring their crops down to Tarhuntassa for market days. A girl sprints toward the edge, leaping off into the water. > drink from the river You bury your face in the river and take a few hearty slurps. Very refreshing! The child comes running back up the riverbank. > jump into the river With a mighty leap, you hurl yourself into the river. The river sweeps you downstream... Stela channel, in the river A single huge stone rises out of the river here: your human’s greatest work, the village stela. Deep channels cut into the riverbank keep it immersed in water on every side, making sure the river is always flowing across it. Several of the village children are gathered here, playing around in the river. The child goes running back to his friends. > me You are a very good dog; your human makes sure to tell you this often. You’re wearing your collar, and holding nothing in your mouth. The river sweeps you downstream... Barge launch, in the river Makeshift docks have been cobbled together at the edge of the river, planks and boards all lashed together to load the village’s taxes onto the barge. Tax season is even busier than market day, and Piseni wants to get everything moved in as few trips as possible. Your house is back to the south, and a well-trampled path leads upriver. Piseni, the village elder, is pacing nervously around the docks, while his son tries to avoid notice. > south (first attempting to get out of the river) You leap out of the river. The Elder glares out at the village. “Hmph...our poor wise-woman, Zuwa, Kasilti, Anzi, Iyali, Lamu, Mahori...seven haven’t paid yet...” You scurry south. By your house Your house is situated at the very edge of the village, with lovely views of the barge launch to the north and the busy fields to the south. A ladder leads up to your front door, with the ground underneath it sloping down to the cellar underneath. > go to the river path (north) Barge launch (west) Stela channel Your fur seems to have dried. One of the village children comes hurtling downstream, and kicks back over to the shore. (west) River path A muddy, well-trodden path runs along the bank of the river: upstream to the dam, downstream to the stela. Several of the village children are gathered here, playing around in the river. “Watch this!” A boy leaps off the bank, landing in the water with an enormous splash. > jump You leap around a bit and revel in the late summer air. The child splashes their way back upstream to join the others. > bark You let out one exuberant bark. A girl sprints toward the edge, leaping off into the water. > shake You give yourself a vigorous shake, for good measure. With great effort, the child comes swimming back against the current. > sit You sit. You’re very good at sitting. One of the children shoves another off the bank, sending her splashing into the river. > go to the stela channel (east) Stela channel A single huge stone rises out of the river here: your human’s greatest work, the village stela. Deep channels cut into the riverbank keep it immersed in water on every side, making sure the river is always flowing across it. Several of the village children are gathered here, playing around in the river. The child hurries back upstream to join the others. > river The whole village of Nahhanta—and probably a bunch of other villages too, even if you’ve never had a chance to see them—is built around the Holaya River. It gives the villagers a way to irrigate the fields, and a way to bring their crops down to Tarhuntassa for market days. Another child comes splashing down the river. > jump into the river With a mighty leap, you hurl yourself into the river. The river sweeps you downstream... Barge launch, in the river Makeshift docks have been cobbled together at the edge of the river, planks and boards all lashed together to load the village’s taxes onto the barge. Tax season is even busier than market day, and Piseni wants to get everything moved in as few trips as possible. Your house is back to the south, and a well-trampled path leads upriver. Piseni, the village elder, is pacing nervously around the docks, while his son tries to avoid notice. The Elder glares out at the village. “Hmph...our poor wise-woman, Zuwa, Kasilti, Anzi, Iyali, Lamu, Mahori...seven haven’t paid yet...” > out You leap out of the river. > me You are a very good dog; your human makes sure to tell you this often. You’re wearing your collar, and holding nothing in your mouth. The Elder glares out at the village. “Hmph...our poor wise-woman, Zuwa, Kasilti, Anzi, Iyali, Lamu, Mahori...seven haven’t paid yet...” > shake You give yourself a vigorous shake, getting water everywhere. You’re now properly dry again. > go to the river path (west) Stela channel The child goes running back to his friends. (west) River path A muddy, well-trodden path runs along the bank of the river: upstream to the dam, downstream to the stela. Several of the village children are gathered here, playing around in the river. The child comes running back up the riverbank. > children With all the adults too busy to tell them no, the children have run off to play in the river. “Watch this!” A boy leaps off the bank, landing in the water with an enormous splash. > west You pad west. By the dam The whole village depends on the river, and this is the heart of it all: the dam that redirects a manageable bit of the water into the irrigation canals, keeping the fields healthy and moist. Or at least it should be. The dam is a splintered mess right now, with Kasilti hard at work trying to fix it. The canal should be flowing south, but now there’s nothing in it but sticky mud. > dam The current has reduced it to a mess of splintery boards with a wide-open gap in the middle, and every time Kasilti tries to secure a piece, it falls apart in his hands. You can smell a fragility curse lingering on it. > fragility curse It tastes like translucent green that’s as spiky as broken pottery and smells like a dissonance that sets your teeth on edge. You’ve seen a curse like this before—it makes anything as fragile as thin-baked clay, so it’ll shatter at the slightest impact. > save Game state saved successfully. > take the fragility curse You pick out the fragility curse, and carefully lick it off the dam. Your bones suddenly feel like dry straw, and you’re becoming very, very aware of every single one of them as the spell transfers from the dam into you! > east You drag yourself slowly east, trying to work through the pain. River path A muddy, well-trodden path runs along the bank of the river: upstream to the dam, downstream to the stela. Several of the village children are gathered here, playing around in the river. With great effort, the child comes swimming back against the current. You try to move carefully, keeping your body as still as possible, but even breathing hurts. It’s like trying to walk on eggshells, except instead of eggshells, it’s your own bones that might be cracking soon! > east You drag yourself slowly east, trying to work through the pain. Stela channel A single huge stone rises out of the river here: your human’s greatest work, the village stela. Deep channels cut into the riverbank keep it immersed in water on every side, making sure the river is always flowing across it. Several of the village children are gathered here, playing around in the river. One of the village children comes hurtling downstream, and kicks back over to the shore. Every little movement of your body makes your joints flare up with pain, and you feel a sort of groaning and creaking deep in your bones, like old, dry wood. How long before something cracks that you really don’t want cracked? > stela It’s about as tall and wide as a full-grown human, shaped roughly into a rectangle, and every surface is covered in a labyrinth of fine, delicate carvings. Your human spent a whole winter working with a travelling magician to make it, and now it keeps the whole village safe: no matter how many spells she redirects into the stela, they’ll never harm it, and the flowing water will eventually wear them away to nothing. You can smell a fiery curse lingering on it. The child hurries back upstream to join the others. > put the fragility curse on the stela You touch your nose delicately to the stela, and the magic starts to flow—pulled out of your body like beer through a straw, drawn into the labyrinth of channels carved into the stone. Soon it’s entirely gone from you, but you can feel it in the carvings: bound there until someone needs it again, or until the running water eventually wears it away to nothing. You give your bones a couple minutes to recover before trying to move them again, but soon they feel as good as new. A child comes careening downstream, the current tumbling them around. > go to the area near the dam (west) River path One of the children shoves another off the bank, sending her splashing into the river. (west) By the dam The whole village depends on the river, and this is the heart of it all: the dam that redirects a manageable bit of the water into the irrigation canals, keeping the fields healthy and moist. Or at least it should be. The dam is a splintered mess right now, with Kasilti hard at work trying to fix it. The canal should be flowing south, but now there’s nothing in it but sticky mud. > dam Kasilti is doing his best to secure the pieces back together, but with only two hands he’s not making much progress, and the water is rushing right through the wide-open gap in the middle > irrigation canals Without water flowing through them, the canals are just a mess of slowly-drying mud. Sticky and smelly and very good! > sticky mud Without water flowing through them, the canals are just a mess of slowly-drying mud. Sticky and smelly and very good! > jump into the dry canal You launch yourself into the sticky mud of the canal, getting it all over your fur. > dam Kasilti is doing his best to secure the pieces back together, but with only two hands he’s not making much progress, and the water is rushing right through the wide-open gap in the middle > me You are a very good dog; your human makes sure to tell you this often. You’re wearing your collar, and holding nothing in your mouth. > shake You give yourself a vigorous shake, getting mud everywhere. You’re now properly clean again—by your own standards, at least. > bark You let out one exuberant bark. > kasilti One of the Northern captives assigned to the village, Kasilti was taken in by Zuwa and Iyali a few years ago, and got a reputation for being good with machinery. Now most of the irrigation canals here are his work, and they flow better than ever before. Everyone knows he has his eye on the Elder’s daughter, but it would take him ages to afford her bride-price: the Elder wants six goats, and he doesn’t even have one. Right now he’s trying his best to fix the dam, but with only two hands he’s not making much progress. You can smell a captivity blessing lingering on him. > kiss kasilti “Please, not now! I need to concentrate.” He takes a hand off the dam just long enough to shoo you away, then grabs at the boards as they start to come apart again. > note captives A large part of the Hittite workforce was made up of thousands of people (combatants and civilians alike) captured in war, brought back to the heartland, and integrated into the population. These captives were a step above slaves in social class: they weren’t bought or sold, and some of them eventually became citizens. But they were still bound to a particular village and did not have the right to travel freely. The Hittite word arnuwala literally means “movable”, and is written with signs (LÚ.NAM.RA) that literally mean “human plunder”, so the word is sometimes translated “transportee”, “deportee”, or simply “NAM.RA person”. I went with “captive” to be understandable in English without the footnotes, but it’s not entirely accurate; in particular, Hittite prisoners were an entirely separate thing. For a good overview of the primary sources, see Hoffner’s The Treatment and Long-Term Use of Persons Captured in Battle according to the Maşat Texts. > note slaves Slavery in the Hittite world was more of a social class than a circumstance. No matter how wealthy a slave became—and some apparently became very wealthy indeed—they could never buy their own freedom. The best they could hope for was to pay a citizen’s bride-price, ensuring citizenship for their children. > note bride-price There were two types of marriage in the Hittite world. A man and a woman who lived together for long enough were considered effectively married, what we would now call a “common-law” marriage. But a proper marriage required a “bride-price” (Hittite kusata): a large gift from the husband to the bride’s parents. In exchange for this “price”, the bride (and her dowry) would officially be separated from her parents’ family and become part of her husband’s. But this could also go the other way: a wealthy woman could instead give a kusata to her husband’s parents, separating him (and his dowry) officially from their family and bringing him into hers. The bride-price was especially important when a slave or captive married a citizen. According to the Hittite Laws, if no bride-price was paid, the citizen would be reduced to their spouse’s social class. If it was paid, the ancient sources are less clear on what would happen. For this game, I’m taking the (perhaps overly optimistic) reading that a slave would remain a slave, but a captive could be raised to citizenship. (Article 112 of the Laws mentions that captives, unlike slaves, could improve their social standing, but doesn’t provide any detail on how.) > note six goats Unfortunately, I’ve been unable to find any sources on how expensive a Hittite bride-price would be, so Piseni’s demand of six goats (equivalent to four shekels of silver in the Laws) is a complete guess on my part. Mesopotamian bride-prices ranged from 1 to 40 shekels of silver in the time of Hammurabi (see Nakata’s The Woman in Marriage as Reflected in the Code of Hammurabi for examples), so on the assumption that prices in a small farming village would be far lower than in a big city, I chose something that fit the scale of money in the game. > note shekels A shekel was a unit of weight, approximately 10 grams (the weight of a pencil). Actual currency wasn’t invented until a few centuries later, so weights of silver were used as a government standard for value: if someone’s taxes were set at one shekel of silver, they might pay in actual silver, but it was also legally equivalent to one sheep, two wheels of cheese (or pithoi of barley), three bronze axes, or four minas of high-quality copper. The exact weight of a shekel varied from place to place, which is why some merchants in the game specify “Imperial shekels” for barter. > note minas A unit of weight; one mina equals forty shekels, or about 400 grams or 14 ounces (the weight of a football). A four-mina metal ingot (the amount of copper you could buy for one shekel of silver) would weigh about three and a half pounds, or one and a half kilograms. > note shekels A shekel was a unit of weight, approximately 10 grams (the weight of a pencil). Actual currency wasn’t invented until a few centuries later, so weights of silver were used as a government standard for value: if someone’s taxes were set at one shekel of silver, they might pay in actual silver, but it was also legally equivalent to one sheep, two wheels of cheese (or pithoi of barley), three bronze axes, or four minas of high-quality copper. The exact weight of a shekel varied from place to place, which is why some merchants in the game specify “Imperial shekels” for barter. > kasilti One of the Northern captives assigned to the village, Kasilti was taken in by Zuwa and Iyali a few years ago, and got a reputation for being good with machinery. Now most of the irrigation canals here are his work, and they flow better than ever before. Everyone knows he has his eye on the Elder’s daughter, but it would take him ages to afford her bride-price: the Elder wants six goats, and he doesn’t even have one. Right now he’s trying his best to fix the dam, but with only two hands he’s not making much progress. You can smell a captivity blessing lingering on him. > captivity blessing It tastes and smells like a pounding drum, a rush of spilled blood, a racing heartbeat—a strange spell, from a strange god, not one you’ve ever heard of. They call it a spell of mercy; as long as he has this blessing on him, Kasilti can do whatever he wants, with his eyes and legs intact. It’ll only blind and hobble him if he tries to leave the village. > save Game state saved successfully. > take the captivity blessing Better not. You don’t really know how these sorts of spells work, and trying to remove it from Kasilti might set it off. And any tampering with it might get your human in trouble too! > spells So far today, you’ve messed with five spells: • The security blessing on the chest, in the kitchen, which holds something closed (fetch it) • The blessing of the wind on the counterweight, in the front room, which makes something weigh less (fetch it) • The unidentified curse on your human, in the bedroom, which is doing something horrible (fetch it) • The fiery curse on the stela, in the stela channel, which makes something uncomfortably warm (fetch it) • The fragility curse on the stela, in the stela channel, which makes something break at the slightest touch (fetch it) > fetch the security blessing (going to the kitchen) (east) (first attempting to get out of the dry canal) You leap out of the dry canal. River path A muddy, well-trodden path runs along the bank of the river: upstream to the dam, downstream to the stela. Several of the village children are gathered here, playing around in the river. The child comes running back up the riverbank. (east) Stela channel The child splashes back upstream against the current. (east) Barge launch The mud on your fur seems to have dried. (south) By your house (east) You climb back into the darkness of the house. Front room (east) Kitchen This is where all the food-making happens, as well as the milling, the weaving, the crafting, the magic-working...everything a wise-woman has to do, except entertaining guests or sleeping. It’s kind of a mess, but your human was always good at finding whatever she needed, no matter how cluttered it got. A sealed chest has been half-extricated from the miscellaneous clutter. (taking the security blessing from the sealed chest) You pick out the security blessing, and carefully lick it off the chest. Your mouth snaps painfully shut and your joints go stiff as the spell transfers from the chest into you! (going back to the area near the dam) (west) Front room (west) You race down the ladder, back into the sunlight. By your house (north) Barge launch (west) Stela channel One of the village children comes hurtling downstream, and kicks back over to the shore. (west) River path A girl sprints toward the edge, leaping off into the water. (west) By the dam The whole village depends on the river, and this is the heart of it all: the dam that redirects a manageable bit of the water into the irrigation canals, keeping the fields healthy and moist. Or at least it should be. The dam is a splintered mess right now, with Kasilti hard at work trying to fix it. The canal should be flowing south, but now there’s nothing in it but sticky mud. > dam Kasilti is doing his best to secure the pieces back together, but with only two hands he’s not making much progress, and the water is rushing right through the wide-open gap in the middle > put the security blessing on the dam You transfer the security blessing to the dam, and it seals tightly shut. Kasilti stares in amazement as the boards snap back into place, joining together as best they can around the holes and gaps. He looks at the dam, then at you, then back at the dam, and decides not to question it: finally, everything is held together well enough for him to fix it properly. In a few minutes he’s secured new wood over the splintered bits, and water starts to flow back into the canals again. He sits back to survey his work in satisfaction. > push the sealed dam It seems solid and secure now. Hopefully it stays that way! Elsewhere... As water floods through the canals, Iyali’s sledge rises up out of the mud, and has suddenly become much easier to move. She’d been trying to drag it through the dry canals down by the threshing house, and now it’s finally working. > look By the dam The whole village depends on the river, and this is the heart of it all: the dam that redirects a manageable bit of the water into the irrigation canals, keeping the fields healthy and moist. Kasilti is watching the dam carefully, to make sure it doesn’t break again. Water rushes south through the canals, bringing moisture back to the fields. Elsewhere... Iyali drags her sledge through the canals, hauling it against the current up toward her destination. > kasilti One of the Northern captives assigned to the village, Kasilti was taken in by Zuwa and Iyali a few years ago, and got a reputation for being good with machinery. Now most of the irrigation canals here are his work, and they flow better than ever before. Everyone knows he has his eye on the Elder’s daughter, but it would take him ages to afford her bride-price: the Elder wants six goats, and he doesn’t even have one. Now that the sealed dam is fixed, he’s watching it carefully for any sign of leakage. You can smell a captivity blessing lingering on him. Elsewhere... Iyali finally reaches the barge and unloads her cargo. > sealed dam After the emergency repairs, it’s...maybe not quite good as new, but definitely good enough to hold on its own. You can smell a security blessing lingering on it. Elsewhere... With her husband’s taxes complete, Iyali moves to her next task: corralling the children playing in the river. > east You pace east. River path A muddy, well-trodden path runs along the bank of the river: upstream to the dam, downstream to the stela. With her husband’s taxes safely delivered to the barge, Iyali has moved to her next task: corralling the village children. “Now! Who wants to hear a story?” Iyali raises her voice over the sound of the river, and the children come running. > look River path A muddy, well-trodden path runs along the bank of the river: upstream to the dam, downstream to the stela. With her husband’s taxes safely delivered to the barge, Iyali has moved to her next task: corralling the village children. “This is a story about Tarhunt, the god of thunder. Mightiest of all the gods! When he fights, the earth itself shakes with the echoes of his thunderbolts.” > note tarhunt Tarhunt (alternately Tarhunz or Tarhunna) was the chief god of the Hittite pantheon, also known as the “Weather-God of Hatti”. Probably descended from the same Indo-European source as Zeus, Jupiter, Thor, Indra, and Perun, other storm gods who are famous for their strength. The name literally means “He Who Overpowers”. Pictured: A drawing of one of the Hittite rock reliefs: the İvriz inscription, reproduced from Hawkins’s Corpus, vol 1, part 3, plate 295. > iyali Zuwa’s wife is a soft-faced, middle-aged woman with a motherly sort of look and a gentle voice. Only a few of the village children are hers, but she ends up raising all of them just the same. “But Tarhunt was so strong, he started to get too confident in his strength. He thought nobody could ever defeat him. He got lazy in his fighting, because he thought he could destroy anything that got in his way.” > me You are a very good dog; your human makes sure to tell you this often. You’re wearing your collar, and holding nothing in your mouth. “And someone saw this, saw this laziness. The great dragon, Illuyanka. And Illuyanka made a plan.” > note illuyanka The name “Illuyanka” literally means “Snake”, from a combination of two separate earlier words that each meant “snake”, and was written in Hittite with an extra sign for “snake” for good measure. Just like Tarhunt is related to Thor, Indra, Perun, and others, Illuyanka might be related to a common Indo-European myth of the storm god battling a serpent or dragon. The story of Illuyanka survives in two very different versions, both incomplete, which were performed (theatrically?) during a springtime festival called the “Purulli”. The story Iyali tells the children here is a combination of the two, plus some newly-invented parts to tie them together. For the originals, see Beckman’s The Anatolian Myth of Illuyanka; for a more literary translation, see Hoffner’s Hittite Myths. > wait You try your best to be patient. “The dragon challenged him to a fight, knowing that Tarhunt could never resist a challenge. So Tarhunt came to the appointed place, ready to smite Illuyanka with a thunderbolt and blast him to pieces.” > sit You sit. You’re very good at sitting. “But Illuyanka was clever! He knew what Tarhunt was planning, and he had laid a trap for the god. Tarhunt was so confident, he hadn’t bothered to look around him. And as he got ready to throw the thunderbolt, a snare caught around his legs!” > wait You fidget with your paws. “Soon Tarhunt was all tied up in Illuyanka’s trap, his legs tied up so he couldn’t run, his arms tied up so he couldn’t reach his thunderbolts. And once he was totally defenseless, Illuyanka tore out his heart and his eyes, so he could never be a threat again.” > wait You swish your tail back and forth for a moment. “Illuyanka took the stolen heart and eyes and kept them in a jar, sealed up tight so that Tarhunt could never take them back. And Tarhunt had to limp back home, eyeless and heartless. Without his eyes he couldn’t see, and without his heart he couldn’t fight. Entirely defenseless.” > wait You scratch vigorously at your ears. “But when Tarhunt was hiding in his home, his daughter came and found him: Inara the Huntress, goddess of wild animals. And she tended his wounds, and she told him not to lose hope. The dragon Illuyanka was cunning and clever, she said; but she was more cunning and more clever. And she would help Tarhunt lay a trap.” > wait You scrutinize a nearby bit of dirt. “So just as Inara told him, Tarhunt travelled down to the world of humans, and he found a wife. And this wife was a pauper, with no money to her name. So he paid the bride-price to her father, and he took her back to the world of the gods.” > wait You scratch vigorously at your ears. “And the two of them had a son. This son’s name is lost to time. Nobody knows what he was called, not even the gods. But because he was the son of Tarhunt, he was strong and handsome, more than any other human has ever been. Even more than Gilgamesh the King. Everyone knew that he would be a great ruler someday, the greatest of all time.” > wait You swish your tail back and forth for a moment. “Now, by this time, the dragon had a daughter of his own, as devious and as cruel as her father. And Illuyanka knew that, if his daughter married the son of Tarhunt, she would be a great queen. She could trick Tarhunt’s son just as Illuyanka had tricked Tarhunt himself, and control him through trickery, making her the true ruler of all the world.” > wait You scrutinize a nearby bit of dirt. “So Illuyanka went to Tarhunt and proposed a marriage. But there was a problem. For a marriage to be proper, a bride-price has to be paid. But Tarhunt’s family had nothing! Nothing that could equal the value of the dragon’s only daughter.” > wait You try your best to be patient. “Instead, Illuyanka saw that the price had to be paid the other way. Instead of Tarhunt paying the bride-price, and the dragon’s daughter joining Tarhunt’s family, Illuyanka would pay the bride-price, and Tarhunt’s son would join Illuyanka’s family.” > wait You fidget with your paws. “But what price could equal the value of the strongest, most handsome man in the world, a man who would be king of everything? Inara negotiated the contract, and she said only one bride-price would be appropriate: the jar with Tarhunt’s heart and eyes sealed inside.” > wait You scratch vigorously at your ears. “Illuyanka was nervous about this. If Tarhunt had his heart and eyes, what would stop him from taking his revenge on Illuyanka? But in the end, his greed won out. He signed the contract, and handed over the heart and eyes to Tarhunt. And he kept his new son-in-law close at all times, just in case.” > wait You swish your tail back and forth for a moment. “And the moment Inara replaced her father’s heart and eyes, what do you think he did? With all his courage back in his chest, he took up his thunderbolts again and chased after the dragon! Chased him all the way across the land, down the rivers, and out into the middle of the ocean.” > wait You scrutinize a nearby bit of dirt. “When the dragon saw he had nowhere left to run, what do you think that coward did? He hid behind his own son-in-law, Tarhunt’s son. He asked Tarhunt, will you kill your own son to get to me? Will you become a kinslayer for the sake of your revenge?” > wait You try your best to be patient. “But Tarhunt’s son knew what had to be done. The bride-price had been paid; he was no longer Tarhunt’s family, he was Illuyanka’s. So he told Tarhunt this—that the ties of family no longer protected him.” > wait You swish your tail back and forth for a moment. “Tarhunt heard this, and he readied his thunderbolt—and—BOOM!” Iyali claps her hands together, making the children jump. “And the dragon, and the dragon’s son-in-law, were no more.” > wait You scratch vigorously at your ears. “Now, who wants to hear that story again?” The children cheer and clamor for more! They always love the stories that end in bloody vengeance the best. > go to the area near the dam (west) By the dam The whole village depends on the river, and this is the heart of it all: the dam that redirects a manageable bit of the water into the irrigation canals, keeping the fields healthy and moist. Kasilti is watching the dam carefully, to make sure it doesn’t break again. Water rushes south through the canals, bringing moisture back to the fields. > south You scurry south. By Piseni’s house The Elder’s house might not be the biggest one in the village, but it’s definitely the fanciest. No ladders or cellars here: everyone walking down the canal gets a full view of the front wall, with all its intricate carvings. They’ll definitely impress any outsider! Water rushes south through the canals, bringing moisture back to the fields. > carvings The whole front wall is covered with reliefs, showing what are probably the biggest events in village history. The hieroglyphs around the figures probably explain those events, too, but your human never taught you how to read those. But Mahori spent a whole winter on them, so they must be important. > note hieroglyphs Two writing systems were in use in Bronze Age Anatolia: cuneiform (for writing primarily Hittite) and hieroglyphs (for writing Luwian). These “Anatolian hieroglyphs” or “Luwian hieroglyphs” were entirely unrelated to the more famous Egyptian ones, but had a similarly elaborate look to them. While cuneiform was only used by professional scribes, hieroglyphs may have been more widespread: people continued to use hieroglyphs after the collapse of the Empire, carving messages into thin sheets of metal, while cuneiform died out completely. Pictured: the bottom half of a hieroglyph-covered stela from Aksaray, photographed by Ingeborg Simon, CC-BY-SA. Original from . > push the intricate carvings You apply a bit of force to the intricate carvings, but they don’t budge. > west You hurry west. Village hall Or at least, it’s the “village hall” when an outsider comes to meet with the Elder, or needs to stay for a few nights. The rest of the time it’s just a big living space for Piseni and his family, the carvings buried behind all the mess of domestic life. Anzi is hard at work, darting between her many tasks. With careful precision, Anzi puts the finishing touches on a bread pudding and sets it on the table. > carvings There are more carvings in here, but when there’s nobody around to impress, they’re buried behind all the beer vats and flour mills. Anzi twists the bread dough into an interesting shape, then shoves it in the hearth. > beer vats and flour mills Vats for brewing beer, mills for grinding flour, looms for weaving fabric, a big hearth for cooking—everything a woman needs to keep the house running while the men are out working in the fields. Anzi sighs and glares out the door. “Where could he be...” > mess Vats for brewing beer, mills for grinding flour, looms for weaving fabric, a big hearth for cooking—everything a woman needs to keep the house running while the men are out working in the fields. Anzi pulls the bread out of the hearth and sets it aside to cool. > bread pudding A bit of bread shaped like a little cup, filled with Kasilti’s favorite cream-and-honey porridge. It’s nice and warm now, but it won’t stay that way if it’s not eaten soon. Anzi scowls. “He promised he’d help me with the taxes today...” > anzi Ever since the Elder’s wife passed, his daughter Anzi has been the lady of the house, and she’s good at it. Everyone knows her beer is the best in the whole village, and her cooking is why everyone hopes to be invited over for dinner. She’ll make a very good wife, whenever someone finally manages to pay her father’s bride-price—but six whole goats is a lot to ask! Anzi moves over to the loom and passes the shuttle through a few times. > kiss anzi “Sorry, dog, but I need you to keep your nose and paws out of this. All right?” She firmly pushes you away. Anzi sighs and glares out the door. “Where could he be...” > look Village hall Or at least, it’s the “village hall” when an outsider comes to meet with the Elder, or needs to stay for a few nights. The rest of the time it’s just a big living space for Piseni and his family, the carvings buried behind all the mess of domestic life. A pudding is staying warm on the hearth. Anzi is hard at work, darting between her many tasks. Anzi gives the door a disappointed look. “What’s taking him so long...” > pudding A bit of bread shaped like a little cup, filled with Kasilti’s favorite cream-and-honey porridge. It’s nice and warm now, but it won’t stay that way if it’s not eaten soon. Anzi works some flour and water together into a dough. > take the warm pudding You snatch up the warm pudding in your mouth. Anzi sighs and glares out the door. “Where could he be...” > show the warm pudding to anzi “Dog...” She sighs heavily. “Fine, take it. I’ll make another.” Anzi pokes some bits of cheese into the bread dough, making a pattern on the surface. > east You scurry east. By Piseni’s house The Elder’s house might not be the biggest one in the village, but it’s definitely the fanciest. No ladders or cellars here: everyone walking down the canal gets a full view of the front wall, with all its intricate carvings. They’ll definitely impress any outsider! Water rushes south through the canals, bringing moisture back to the fields. Away from the heat of Anzi’s hearth, the pudding congeals into a gummy mess. > north You hurry north. By the dam The whole village depends on the river, and this is the heart of it all: the dam that redirects a manageable bit of the water into the irrigation canals, keeping the fields healthy and moist. Kasilti is watching the dam carefully, to make sure it doesn’t break again. Water rushes south through the canals, bringing moisture back to the fields. > show the congealed pudding to kasilti Kasilti looks up as you nudge at his leg. “Hello, dog. What is it that you have?” He puts his tool down and holds out a hand, and you push the pudding into it. “Is this one of Anzi’s?” A beat, and then horror spreads across his face. “I promised Anzi that I would help her with the taxes! I hope I am not too late.” Half a second later he’s hurrying back toward the Elder’s house, tools awkwardly cupped under one arm and the pudding held carefully in the other. It’s hard to tell who will be more pleased: Anzi when Kasilti shows up, or the Elder when the taxes are done. > undo Undoing the last turn (show the congealed pudding to kasilti). By the dam > spells So far today, you’ve messed with five spells: • The security blessing on the dam, which holds something closed (fetch it) • The blessing of the wind on the counterweight, in the front room, which makes something weigh less (fetch it) • The unidentified curse on your human, in the bedroom, which is doing something horrible (fetch it) • The fiery curse on the stela, in the stela channel, which makes something uncomfortably warm (fetch it) • The fragility curse on the stela, in the stela channel, which makes something break at the slightest touch (fetch it) > show the congealed pudding to kasilti Kasilti looks up as you nudge at his leg. “Hello, dog. What is it that you have?” He puts his tool down and holds out a hand, and you push the pudding into it. “Is this one of Anzi’s?” A beat, and then horror spreads across his face. “I promised Anzi that I would help her with the taxes! I hope I am not too late.” Half a second later he’s hurrying back toward the Elder’s house, tools awkwardly cupped under one arm and the pudding held carefully in the other. It’s hard to tell who will be more pleased: Anzi when Kasilti shows up, or the Elder when the taxes are done. > spells So far today, you’ve messed with five spells: • The security blessing on the dam, which holds something closed (fetch it) • The blessing of the wind on the counterweight, in the front room, which makes something weigh less (fetch it) • The unidentified curse on your human, in the bedroom, which is doing something horrible (fetch it) • The fiery curse, which makes something uncomfortably warm (fetch it) • The fragility curse on the stela, in the stela channel, which makes something break at the slightest touch (fetch it) > undo Undoing the last turn (spells). By the dam > undo Undoing the last turn (show the congealed pudding to kasilti). By the dam > save Game state saved successfully. > show the congealed pudding to kasilti Kasilti looks up as you nudge at his leg. “Hello, dog. What is it that you have?” He puts his tool down and holds out a hand, and you push the pudding into it. “Is this one of Anzi’s?” A beat, and then horror spreads across his face. “I promised Anzi that I would help her with the taxes! I hope I am not too late.” Half a second later he’s hurrying back toward the Elder’s house, tools awkwardly cupped under one arm and the pudding held carefully in the other. It’s hard to tell who will be more pleased: Anzi when Kasilti shows up, or the Elder when the taxes are done. > east You pace east. River path A muddy, well-trodden path runs along the bank of the river: upstream to the dam, downstream to the stela. With her husband’s taxes safely delivered to the barge, Iyali has moved to her next task: corralling the village children. “This is a story about Tarhunt, the god of thunder. Mightiest of all the gods! When he fights, the earth itself shakes with the echoes of his thunderbolts.” > the fiery curse Your mouth is full of the taste of fiery orange-red, your nose full of the scent of a dizzying-fast cascade of arpeggios. When Lamu had an awful fever a month ago, you and your human redirected it onto the stela. Now the water’s mostly worn it away, and what’s left can’t hurt anyone any more: it just makes things uncomfortably warm. “But Tarhunt was so strong, he started to get too confident in his strength. He thought nobody could ever defeat him. He got lazy in his fighting, because he thought he could destroy anything that got in his way.” > stash the fiery curse (going to the village stela) (east) Stela channel A single huge stone rises out of the river here: your human’s greatest work, the village stela. Deep channels cut into the riverbank keep it immersed in water on every side, making sure the river is always flowing across it. (putting the fiery curse on the stela) You touch your nose delicately to the stela, and the magic starts to flow—pulled out of your body like beer through a straw, drawn into the labyrinth of channels carved into the stone. Soon it’s entirely gone from you, but you can feel it in the carvings: bound there until someone needs it again, or until the running water eventually wears it away to nothing. (going back to the river path) (west) River path A muddy, well-trodden path runs along the bank of the river: upstream to the dam, downstream to the stela. With her husband’s taxes safely delivered to the barge, Iyali has moved to her next task: corralling the village children. “And someone saw this, saw this laziness. The great dragon, Illuyanka. And Illuyanka made a plan.” > east You lope east. Stela channel A single huge stone rises out of the river here: your human’s greatest work, the village stela. Deep channels cut into the riverbank keep it immersed in water on every side, making sure the river is always flowing across it. > stela It’s about as tall and wide as a full-grown human, shaped roughly into a rectangle, and every surface is covered in a labyrinth of fine, delicate carvings. Your human spent a whole winter working with a travelling magician to make it, and now it keeps the whole village safe: no matter how many spells she redirects into the stela, they’ll never harm it, and the flowing water will eventually wear them away to nothing. You can smell a fiery curse and a fragility curse lingering on it. > go to the village hall (west) River path “The dragon challenged him to a fight, knowing that Tarhunt could never resist a challenge. So Tarhunt came to the appointed place, ready to smite Illuyanka with a thunderbolt and blast him to pieces.” (west) By the dam (south) By Piseni’s house (west) Village hall Or at least, it’s the “village hall” when an outsider comes to meet with the Elder, or needs to stay for a few nights. The rest of the time it’s just a big living space for Piseni and his family, the carvings buried behind all the mess of domestic life. Kasilti is relating some convoluted story to Anzi, while she goes about her tasks with a new spring in her step. Anzi grinds the mill back and forth, crushing the grain into flour. > kasilti One of the Northern captives assigned to the village, Kasilti was taken in by Zuwa and Iyali a few years ago, and got a reputation for being good with machinery. Now most of the irrigation canals here are his work, and they flow better than ever before. Everyone knows he has his eye on the Elder’s daughter, but it would take him ages to afford her bride-price: the Elder wants six goats, and he doesn’t even have one. He looks much happier talking to Anzi now than he did out by the dam. You can smell a captivity blessing lingering on him. Anzi grinds some spices in her mortar. > anzi Ever since the Elder’s wife passed, his daughter Anzi has been the lady of the house, and she’s good at it. Everyone knows her beer is the best in the whole village, and her cooking is why everyone hopes to be invited over for dinner. She’ll make a very good wife, whenever someone finally manages to pay her father’s bride-price—but six whole goats is a lot to ask! Anzi tests a pinch of flour from the mill, then gives it a few more grinds, just to be sure. > look Village hall Or at least, it’s the “village hall” when an outsider comes to meet with the Elder, or needs to stay for a few nights. The rest of the time it’s just a big living space for Piseni and his family, the carvings buried behind all the mess of domestic life. Kasilti is relating some convoluted story to Anzi, while she goes about her tasks with a new spring in her step. Anzi grinds some spices in her mortar. > go to piseni’s house (east) By Piseni’s house The Elder’s house might not be the biggest one in the village, but it’s definitely the fanciest. No ladders or cellars here: everyone walking down the canal gets a full view of the front wall, with all its intricate carvings. They’ll definitely impress any outsider! Water rushes south through the canals, bringing moisture back to the fields. > south You scamper south. Canal junction A wooden structure stands in the middle of a wide clearing, linking three paths together. The irrigation canal comes in from the north and flows into the structure, which divides it into smaller channels east and west. They were harvesting the west fields today, so right now all the water is flowing east. Lamu is searching around for something, wringing his hands with worry. Lamu’s eyes scan back and forth across the field, searching for something. > lamu Most people stay close to the village except during markets and festivals, but Lamu is always the one who leads hunting expeditions off into the places beyond. He also cares a lot about his dogs, so he always has the tastiest treats of all. He should be handling his taxes now, but something else seems to be more urgent first. Lamu cups his hands around his mouth. “Puppy, where are you? Come!” > kiss lamu He seems too distraught to even react to dog kisses. > me You are a very good dog; your human makes sure to tell you this often. You’re wearing your collar, and holding nothing in your mouth. Lamu’s eyes scan back and forth across the field, searching for something. > bark You let out one exuberant bark. > look Canal junction A wooden structure stands in the middle of a wide clearing, linking three paths together. The irrigation canal comes in from the north and flows into the structure, which divides it into smaller channels east and west. They were harvesting the west fields today, so right now all the water is flowing east. Lamu is searching around for something, wringing his hands with worry. > wooden structure It’s supposed to divide the water equally between both sets of fields, without the canals getting gunked up the way they used to. Now it still gets gunked up sometimes, but at least it’s easier to adjust; they finished up harvesting the west fields today, so right now all the water is flowing to the east. Lamu’s eyes scan back and forth across the field, searching for something. > push the wooden structure You’ve seen how to adjust the water, in theory, but you’re not really sure how to do it in practice. Better leave that for the humans. > canals With the dam fixed, water now rushes through the canals, keeping the fields appropriately damp. Lamu cups his hands around his mouth. “Puppy, where are you? Come!” > drink from the irrigation canal You bury your face in the irrigation canal and take a few hearty slurps. Very refreshing! > look Canal junction A wooden structure stands in the middle of a wide clearing, linking three paths together. The irrigation canal comes in from the north and flows into the structure, which divides it into smaller channels east and west. They were harvesting the west fields today, so right now all the water is flowing east. Lamu is searching around for something, wringing his hands with worry. Lamu sighs. “Where have you gone, puppy...” > lamu Most people stay close to the village except during markets and festivals, but Lamu is always the one who leads hunting expeditions off into the places beyond. He also cares a lot about his dogs, so he always has the tastiest treats of all. He should be handling his taxes now, but something else seems to be more urgent first. “Puppy! Puppy!” Lamu snaps his fingers a few times. “Come!” > east You lope east. Threshing house Once the plants are cut down, they’re packed into bundles and carted over here for the threshing. Soon this building will be full of people and animals stomping the grain out of them. But right now, everyone has to focus on cutting the crops down first, and getting their taxes in; everything else can wait. Or at least, everything else should wait. Nobody except the Elder seems especially worried about it right now. Water rushes east through the canals, bringing moisture back to the fields. > bundles Thousands of cut-down stalks, packed into hundreds of bundles, piled into dozens of stacks, surrounding the threshing-house completely. The harvest was pretty late this year, but at least it was a good one! > note threshing The process of turning wheat and barley into flour was a long and painstaking one. First, the stalks would be cut down by hand (reaping); then, the grain would be piled on a stone floor and trampled to split open the hulls (threshing); then, the resulting mess would be tossed in the air with long forks, to let the straw and empty hulls blow away in the wind (winnowing); and finally, the grain would be cleaned, stored until needed, and then ground down into flour (milling). Ideally, the threshing and winnowing would have been finished well before tax collection, but this year in Nahhanta the harvest was very late and the farmers are scrambling desperately to get their grain in on time. Section 9 of the Instructions for Temple Personnel says explicitly that a late harvest is no excuse to delay religious ceremonies, which include the annual tax collection, so the people of Nahhanta will just have to cope! > eat the bundled crops (first attempting to take the bundled crops) Right now they’ll just taste like grass. They have to be threshed first to get the good parts out. > push the bundled crops Right now they’ll just taste like grass. They have to be threshed first to get the good parts out. > the bundled crops Thousands of cut-down stalks, packed into hundreds of bundles, piled into dozens of stacks, surrounding the threshing-house completely. The harvest was pretty late this year, but at least it was a good one! > east You scamper east. By Zuwa’s house Not quite as fancy and decorated as the Elder’s house, but it’s a big building for a big family, right in the middle of everything. The storeroom underneath is the biggest in the village, with a ladder mechanism leading up to the living space on top. Or at least, it should be leading up to the living space. It looks like it’s jammed, with the end of the ladder stuck several cubits off the ground. Water rushes east through the canals, bringing moisture back to the fields. > ladder mechanism It’s the same sort of mechanism Kasilti designed for your house, letting the ladder be lowered during the day so people can use it, but pulled up at night to keep the animals out. Right now, though, it’s stuck, just a little bit too high for you to reach, even by jumping. > ladder It’s the same sort of mechanism Kasilti designed for your house, letting the ladder be lowered during the day so people can use it, but pulled up at night to keep the animals out. Right now, though, it’s stuck, just a little bit too high for you to reach, even by jumping. > jump on zuwa’s ladder The end of the ladder is too far off the ground for you to even try it. What if you sprained your leg or something? > items So far today, you’ve picked up one thing: • The folding jack, in the front room (fetch it) (Plus the congealed pudding, which is now gone.) > spells So far today, you’ve messed with five spells: • The security blessing on the dam, in the area near the dam, which holds something closed (fetch it) • The blessing of the wind on the counterweight, in the front room, which makes something weigh less (fetch it) • The unidentified curse on your human, in the bedroom, which is doing something horrible (fetch it) • The fiery curse on the stela, in the stela channel, which makes something uncomfortably warm (fetch it) • The fragility curse on the stela, in the stela channel, which makes something break at the slightest touch (fetch it) > up The end of the ladder is too far off the ground for you to even try it. What if you sprained your leg or something? > north You lope north. Cold storeroom Just like how Zuwa’s family has the biggest house in the village, they have the biggest storeroom too: set deep underground, with an expensive preservation blessing on it to keep things from spoiling. It’s cold enough that your breath comes in little puffs of mist, and your paws stick to the floor every time you put them down. The storage bins are buried under a thick layer of ice, their contents sealed away until needed. A large cheese has been set carefully to one side, kept cold until Kasilti can use it for this year’s taxes. You can smell a preservation blessing permeating the room. The chill is setting into your bones, and you’re already shaking from the cold. You won’t last long like this! > south You pace south. By Zuwa’s house Not quite as fancy and decorated as the Elder’s house, but it’s a big building for a big family, right in the middle of everything. The storeroom underneath is the biggest in the village, with a ladder mechanism leading up to the living space on top. Or at least, it should be leading up to the living space. It looks like it’s jammed, with the end of the ladder stuck several cubits off the ground. Water rushes east through the canals, bringing moisture back to the fields. > east You scurry east. Busy fields These fields are the last to be harvested, and everyone is working hard to finish the job before the grain starts to spoil. They’re racing the clock now, and nobody can afford a delay! In another week, the crops will be going bad, and then the whole season of work will be wasted. Two of the farmers, Zuwa and Mahori, have thrown down their tools and gotten into another of their endless arguments. “...you know what you’ve done, Zuwa? You’ve stolen the very moon out from my sky! Oh, my moon, my crescent moon, my beautiful harvest moon! How I used to wax and wane her through the fields—a whirlwind of bronze, a tempest! Barley, emmer, flax, wheat—no seed-head could withstand the golden glimmer of moonlight singing out from my hand.” > zuwa As big as a bear, as strong as a bear, and as eloquent as a bear, too. He always lends a hand in the fields when needed, and he can do twice the work of anyone else; but he trips over his words so much, his wife Iyali always has to do the talking for him. Without her here, he’s cowering in the face of Mahori’s verbal barrage. “But now she’s gone, gone, and all because of your foolishness! I remember it like it was yesterday—for indeed, yesterday it was—you, the great Zuwa, deigning to visit me at my lowly residence, your great head bowed low to fit beneath my meager roof.” > mahori A sharp man with a sharp face and a sharper tongue. He’s not especially small as a person, but next to Zuwa he looks tiny—and from the look on his face, he knows that, and hates it. It’s not a secret that he’s got his eye on the Elder’s daughter: for the last few months his wit’s been alternating between praising her and her family and eviscerating his neighbors. But if he wants to marry her, he’ll need a proper bride-price to go with the poetry, and the Elder wants six whole goats for her hand. “‘Please, M-m-mahori,’ you said, or tried to say, warring as ever with your uncooperative lips and foolish tongue, ‘L-let me borrow your n-new bronze sickle, j-just for the d-d-day’. And I, paragon of loyalty that I am, agreed.” > kiss mahori They both seem too intent on their argument to notice. “An unusual failure of judgement on my part! What do I have to show for it? A moonless harvest, a perpetual eclipse! Truly, the greatest part of you is the great emptiness inside your enormous skull!” Mahori finally pauses to breathe, fixing Zuwa with his most intimidating glare. > zuwa As big as a bear, as strong as a bear, and as eloquent as a bear, too. He always lends a hand in the fields when needed, and he can do twice the work of anyone else; but he trips over his words so much, his wife Iyali always has to do the talking for him. Without her here, he’s cowering in the face of Mahori’s verbal barrage. Zuwa protests into the momentary silence. “Mahori, you know I didn’t mean to lose your s-sickle. If you ever stopped t-t-talking maybe I could remember...” > kiss zuwa They both seem too intent on their argument to notice. “Hark, hark and listen, all you passers-by!” Mahori turns toward the canal. “The great bumble-bear steals honey from the humble bumble-bee, then blames it on his buzzing! Do rolling thunderheads criticize nightingales for singing into the storm? What right do you have, Great Zuwa the Bear, to evade my stinger after wasting the golden ichor of my labors? A meager moon-price, I should think! Honestly, you should thank me for my song—you could learn much from a proper demonstration of my elocution.” > me You are a very good dog; your human makes sure to tell you this often. You’re wearing your collar, and holding nothing in your mouth. “Thank you? That’s t-too much, Mahori, you know I always share with you when you n-need it, too...” > bark You let out one exuberant bark. “Ohhh, and thank you so much for your generosity!” Mahori raises his arms in a mocking salute. “I bow before you, I celebrate, I rejoice at your presence! Shall I throw a festival to honor you and your enormous family? A shining new pantheon of deities, the Pantheon of the Bear, eager for my worship! Your grand temple of a home at the top of the hill still isn’t enough for you?” > wait You try your best to be patient. “That’s enough!” Zuwa shouts over him for a moment. “Say what you will about me, Mahori, but leave my family out of it...” > wait You scratch vigorously at your ears. “Or what?” Mahori shouts back. “Does the Pantheon of the Bear demand sacrifice to prevent further catastrophe? You’ve already taken my harvest moon—will you take my sun as well? You have enough sons already! Will you take the very earth from underneath my feet? Gods aplenty are depended upon at harvest-time, but I’ll not add you to my religion.” > wait You swish your tail back and forth for a moment. Zuwa cuts through Mahori’s tirade again. “I’m no god, Mahori, but you do d-depend on me at harvest-time. Everyone does! Maybe I can’t t-t-talk like you, but remember what you lent me that sickle for...” > wait You scratch vigorously at your ears. “Yes, yes, I lend you my moon and you lend me your strength—I haven’t forgotten the arrangement! But how can you repay me now? What good are the arms of a clawless bear, swinging uselessly through the moonless night? Strong you may be, but without tools you might as well be a great boulder, filling the fields with your pointless solidity.” > wait You scrutinize a nearby bit of dirt. “Come on, Mahori, I’ll find it s-soon...” Mahori scoffs. “You’d better! And until then, I’ll just have to repeat my performance to make sure its subtleties get through your thick skull!” > wait You fidget with your paws. “You know what you’ve done, Zuwa? You’ve stolen the very moon out from my sky! Oh, my moon, my crescent moon, my beautiful harvest moon! How I used to wax and wane her through the fields—a whirlwind of bronze, a tempest! Barley, emmer, flax, wheat—no seed-head could withstand the golden glimmer of moonlight singing out from my hand.” > north You hurry north. By your house Your house is situated at the very edge of the village, with lovely views of the barge launch to the north and the busy fields to the south. A ladder leads up to your front door, with the ground underneath it sloping down to the cellar underneath. > spells So far today, you’ve messed with five spells: • The security blessing on the dam, in the area near the dam, which holds something closed (fetch it) • The blessing of the wind on the counterweight, in the front room, which makes something weigh less (fetch it) • The unidentified curse on your human, in the bedroom, which is doing something horrible (fetch it) • The fiery curse on the stela, in the stela channel, which makes something uncomfortably warm (fetch it) • The fragility curse on the stela, in the stela channel, which makes something break at the slightest touch (fetch it) > fetch the fiery curse (going to the stela channel) (north) Barge launch The Elder glares out at the village. “Hmph...our poor wise-woman, Kasilti, Iyali, Lamu, Mahori...five haven’t paid yet...” (west) Stela channel A single huge stone rises out of the river here: your human’s greatest work, the village stela. Deep channels cut into the riverbank keep it immersed in water on every side, making sure the river is always flowing across it. (taking the fiery curse from the stela) You sniff around the stela until you pick out the right bits. An unpleasant heat spreads through your body as you lick up the fiery curse! (going back to your house) (east) Barge launch (south) By your house Your house is situated at the very edge of the village, with lovely views of the barge launch to the north and the busy fields to the south. A ladder leads up to your front door, with the ground underneath it sloping down to the cellar underneath. > go to zuwa’s house (south) Busy fields “But now she’s gone, gone, and all because of your foolishness! I remember it like it was yesterday—for indeed, yesterday it was—you, the great Zuwa, deigning to visit me at my lowly residence, your great head bowed low to fit beneath my meager roof.” (west) By Zuwa’s house Not quite as fancy and decorated as the Elder’s house, but it’s a big building for a big family, right in the middle of everything. The storeroom underneath is the biggest in the village, with a ladder mechanism leading up to the living space on top. Or at least, it should be leading up to the living space. It looks like it’s jammed, with the end of the ladder stuck several cubits off the ground. Water rushes east through the canals, bringing moisture back to the fields. > north You pad north. Cold storeroom Just like how Zuwa’s family has the biggest house in the village, they have the biggest storeroom too: set deep underground, with an expensive preservation blessing on it to keep things from spoiling. It’s cold enough that your breath comes in little puffs of mist, and your paws stick to the floor every time you put them down. But the fire curse offers a little respite, just enough that you’re not about to freeze. The storage bins are buried under a thick layer of ice, their contents sealed away until needed. A large cheese has been set carefully to one side, kept cold until Kasilti can use it for this year’s taxes. You can smell a preservation blessing permeating the room. > preservation blessing It’s so cold it makes your teeth ache even getting near it—if you tasted it, you might not be able to get your tongue unstuck again! The village pooled their resources and got a travelling sanctifier to bless this storeroom a few years back, and now it stays cold and dry all year round to protect the food inside. > storage bins There must be tons of grain, meat, and vegetables buried under the ice, but you can’t see any of it from here. > large cheese Large and firm and well-preserved in wax. Kasilti got it as payment for fixing up the canals, and has been keeping it in Zuwa’s storeroom until tax season. Which is now. > storage bins There must be tons of grain, meat, and vegetables buried under the ice, but you can’t see any of it from here. > uncover the storage bins You poke and prod and gnaw at the ice a bit, but it’s too thick to make any real headway. > put the fiery curse on the storage bins You nose the fire curse delicately onto the storage bins, and a comfortable warmth starts to emanate from them. With enough time, it would probably melt through the ice—but that’ll take hours, maybe days. The village’s produce is safe for now. > uncover the heated storage bins You poke and prod and gnaw at the ice a bit, but it’s too thick to make any real headway. > the heated storage bins There must be tons of grain, meat, and vegetables buried under the ice, but you can’t see any of it from here. You can smell a fiery curse lingering on them. > look Cold storeroom Just like how Zuwa’s family has the biggest house in the village, they have the biggest storeroom too: set deep underground, with an expensive preservation blessing on it to keep things from spoiling. It’s cold enough that your breath comes in little puffs of mist, and your paws stick to the floor every time you put them down. But the fire curse on the heated storage bins offers a little respite, just enough that you’re not about to freeze. The heated storage bins are buried under a thick layer of ice, their contents sealed away until needed. A large cheese has been set carefully to one side, kept cold until Kasilti can use it for this year’s taxes. You can smell a preservation blessing permeating the room. > south The heated storage bins are starting to sizzle where the fire curse comes in contact with the preservation blessing. Probably not a good idea to leave those two unattended together. > the heated storage bins There must be tons of grain, meat, and vegetables buried under the ice, but you can’t see any of it from here. You can smell a fiery curse lingering on them. > fiery curse Fiery orange-red in your mouth; in your nose, a dizzying-fast cascade of arpeggios. When Lamu had an awful fever a month ago, you and your human redirected it onto the stela. Now the water’s mostly worn it away, and what’s left can’t hurt anyone any more: it just makes things uncomfortably warm. > take the fiery curse You pick out the fiery curse, and carefully lick it off the storage bins. An unpleasant heat spreads through your body as the spell transfers from the storage bins into you! > south You scurry south. By Zuwa’s house Not quite as fancy and decorated as the Elder’s house, but it’s a big building for a big family, right in the middle of everything. The storeroom underneath is the biggest in the village, with a ladder mechanism leading up to the living space on top. Or at least, it should be leading up to the living space. It looks like it’s jammed, with the end of the ladder stuck several cubits off the ground. Water rushes east through the canals, bringing moisture back to the fields. > spells So far today, you’ve messed with five spells: • The security blessing on the dam, in the area near the dam, which holds something closed (fetch it) • The blessing of the wind on the counterweight, in the front room, which makes something weigh less (fetch it) • The unidentified curse on your human, in the bedroom, which is doing something horrible (fetch it) • The fiery curse, which makes something uncomfortably warm (fetch it) • The fragility curse on the stela, in the stela channel, which makes something break at the slightest touch (fetch it) > zuwa’s ladder It’s the same sort of mechanism Kasilti designed for your house, letting the ladder be lowered during the day so people can use it, but pulled up at night to keep the animals out. Right now, though, it’s stuck, just a little bit too high for you to reach, even by jumping. > put the fiery curse on zuwa’s ladder You sniff at Zuwa’s ladder until you find the perfect place to deposit the fiery curse, then rub it on firmly. That should do it. > spells So far today, you’ve messed with five spells: • The security blessing on the dam, in the area near the dam, which holds something closed (fetch it) • The blessing of the wind on the counterweight, in the front room, which makes something weigh less (fetch it) • The unidentified curse on your human, in the bedroom, which is doing something horrible (fetch it) • The fiery curse on the Zuwa’s ladder, which makes something uncomfortably warm (fetch it) • The fragility curse on the stela, in the stela channel, which makes something break at the slightest touch (fetch it) > fetch the fragility curse (going to the stela channel) (east) Busy fields “‘Please, M-m-mahori,’ you said, or tried to say, warring as ever with your uncooperative lips and foolish tongue, ‘L-let me borrow your n-new bronze sickle, j-just for the d-d-day’. And I, paragon of loyalty that I am, agreed.” (north) By your house (north) Barge launch Piseni takes inventory of the barge. “Two in, still missing five...once we have four total, we’ll launch.” (west) Stela channel A single huge stone rises out of the river here: your human’s greatest work, the village stela. Deep channels cut into the riverbank keep it immersed in water on every side, making sure the river is always flowing across it. (taking the fragility curse from the stela) You sniff out the right magic and press your tongue to the stela. Your bones suddenly feel like dry straw, and you’re becoming very, very aware of every single one of them as you lick up the fragility curse! (going back to Zuwa’s house) (east) You drag yourself slowly east, trying to work through the pain. Barge launch Piseni counts out the packages on the barge. “Let’s see...Zuwa, Anzi...that’s two in now.” You try to move carefully, keeping your body as still as possible, but even breathing hurts. It’s like trying to walk on eggshells, except instead of eggshells, it’s your own bones that might be cracking soon! Since something dramatic has happened, your command was cut short. You can continue to go to Zuwa’s house now, or switch to something else. > south You drag yourself slowly south, trying to work through the pain. By your house Your house is situated at the very edge of the village, with lovely views of the barge launch to the north and the busy fields to the south. A ladder leads up to your front door, with the ground underneath it sloping down to the cellar underneath. Every little movement of your body makes your joints flare up with pain, and you feel a sort of groaning and creaking deep in your bones, like old, dry wood. How long before something cracks that you really don’t want cracked? > go to the busy fields (south) You drag yourself slowly south, trying to work through the pain. Busy fields These fields are the last to be harvested, and everyone is working hard to finish the job before the grain starts to spoil. They’re racing the clock now, and nobody can afford a delay! In another week, the crops will be going bad, and then the whole season of work will be wasted. Two of the farmers, Zuwa and Mahori, have thrown down their tools and gotten into another of their endless arguments. “An unusual failure of judgement on my part! What do I have to show for it? A moonless harvest, a perpetual eclipse! Truly, the greatest part of you is the great emptiness inside your enormous skull!” Mahori finally pauses to breathe, fixing Zuwa with his most intimidating glare. Every shiver, every breath, every heartbeat is agony as your body starts to come apart under its own weight. You need to get this curse off you, now! > go to zuwa’s house (west) You drag yourself slowly west, trying to work through the pain. By Zuwa’s house Not quite as fancy and decorated as the Elder’s house, but it’s a big building for a big family, right in the middle of everything. The storeroom underneath is the biggest in the village, with a ladder mechanism leading up to the living space on top. Or at least, it should be leading up to the living space. It looks like it’s jammed, with the end of the ladder stuck several cubits off the ground. Water rushes east through the canals, bringing moisture back to the fields. You try to move as little as possible, keeping your bones exactly as they are, but it’s no use—your weight shifts just a little bit too much, and suddenly you’re on the ground, howling in agony as something inside you gives out! You can hear someone running to help...but it doesn’t matter. By the time you’re healed, it’ll be too late for your human. *** You have shattered *** Would you like to: UNDO the last move, RESTORE a saved position, see your current SCORE, or RESTART from the beginning? > undo Undoing the last turn (go to zuwa’s house). Busy fields > undo Undoing the last turn (go to the busy fields). By your house > undo Undoing the last turn (south). Barge launch > undo Undoing the last turn (fetch the fragility curse). By Zuwa’s house > items So far today, you’ve picked up one thing: • The folding jack, in the front room (fetch it) (Plus the congealed pudding, which is now gone.) > fetch the folding jack (going to the front room) (east) Busy fields “‘Please, M-m-mahori,’ you said, or tried to say, warring as ever with your uncooperative lips and foolish tongue, ‘L-let me borrow your n-new bronze sickle, j-just for the d-d-day’. And I, paragon of loyalty that I am, agreed.” (north) By your house (east) You climb back into the darkness of the house. Front room Your house is one of the fancier ones in the village, with a front room to talk and meet people in, a kitchen in the back, and a bedroom nook tucked away to one side. But there’s nobody visiting today; the front room feels very quiet, and very empty. The front door leads out to the rest of the village. There is a folding jack here. A counterweight hangs limply by the door, not looking particularly weighty at all right now. (taking the folding jack) You try your hardest to move the folding jack, but it’s no use. It probably weighs more than you do! > counterweight It’s a big hunk of stone, with a tether tying it to the ladder outside. When your human wants to go out, she lifts it up and does something with the rope, and the ladder goes down; when she wants to stay in, she pulls it back down, and the ladder comes up. You can smell a blessing of the wind lingering on it. > blessing of the wind The taste of pale lavender. The smell of a looping melody that spirals higher and higher without end. It weakens gravity, making anything it’s placed on nearly weightless—good for carrying things all around the village without throwing out your back, your human always says. > take the blessing of the wind You pick out the blessing of the wind, and carefully lick it off the counterweight. Gravity seems to lose its hold on you and every step becomes a leap as the spell transfers from the counterweight into you! The counterweight sinks back down, and the ladder rises back up. > put the blessing of the wind on On what? > the counterweight You sniff at the counterweight until you find the perfect place to deposit the blessing of the wind, then rub it on firmly. That should do it. The suddenly-less-weighty weight swings and sways, no longer heavy enough to balance out the ladder. With a slow, steady grace, the weight rises to the ceiling, and the ladder outside the front door falls into place! > go to my house (west) You race down the ladder, back into the sunlight. By your house Your house is situated at the very edge of the village, with lovely views of the barge launch to the north and the busy fields to the south. A ladder leads up to your front door, with the ground underneath it sloping down to the cellar underneath. > go to the cold storeroom (south) Busy fields “An unusual failure of judgement on my part! What do I have to show for it? A moonless harvest, a perpetual eclipse! Truly, the greatest part of you is the great emptiness inside your enormous skull!” Mahori finally pauses to breathe, fixing Zuwa with his most intimidating glare. (west) By Zuwa’s house (north) Cold storeroom Just like how Zuwa’s family has the biggest house in the village, they have the biggest storeroom too: set deep underground, with an expensive preservation blessing on it to keep things from spoiling. It’s cold enough that your breath comes in little puffs of mist, and your paws stick to the floor every time you put them down. The storage bins are buried under a thick layer of ice, their contents sealed away until needed. A large cheese has been set carefully to one side, kept cold until Kasilti can use it for this year’s taxes. You can smell a preservation blessing permeating the room. The chill is setting into your bones, and you’re already shaking from the cold. You won’t last long like this! > storage bins There must be tons of grain, meat, and vegetables buried under the ice, but you can’t see any of it from here. Your vision swims, and suddenly your legs give out underneath you. The last thing you see is frost creeping across your fur, and then everything goes black. Someone will probably come rescue you soon—but by then, it might be too late. *** You froze up *** Would you like to: UNDO the last move, RESTORE a saved position, see your current SCORE, or RESTART from the beginning? > undo Undoing the last turn (storage bins). Cold storeroom > go to zuwa’s house (south) By Zuwa’s house Not quite as fancy and decorated as the Elder’s house, but it’s a big building for a big family, right in the middle of everything. The storeroom underneath is the biggest in the village, with a ladder mechanism leading up to the living space on top. Or at least, it should be leading up to the living space. It looks like it’s jammed, with the end of the ladder stuck several cubits off the ground. Water rushes east through the canals, bringing moisture back to the fields. > ladder It’s the same sort of mechanism Kasilti designed for your house, letting the ladder be lowered during the day so people can use it, but pulled up at night to keep the animals out. Right now, though, it’s stuck, just a little bit too high for you to reach, even by jumping. You can smell a fiery curse lingering on it. > save Game state saved successfully. > fiery curse Your mouth is full of the taste of fiery orange-red, your nose full of the scent of a dizzying-fast cascade of arpeggios. When Lamu had an awful fever a month ago, you and your human redirected it onto the stela. Now the water’s mostly worn it away, and what’s left can’t hurt anyone any more: it just makes things uncomfortably warm. > take the fiery curse You pick out the fiery curse, and carefully lick it off the Zuwa’s ladder. An unpleasant heat spreads through your body as the spell transfers from the Zuwa’s ladder into you! > north You lope north. Cold storeroom Just like how Zuwa’s family has the biggest house in the village, they have the biggest storeroom too: set deep underground, with an expensive preservation blessing on it to keep things from spoiling. It’s cold enough that your breath comes in little puffs of mist, and your paws stick to the floor every time you put them down. But the fire curse offers a little respite, just enough that you’re not about to freeze. The storage bins are buried under a thick layer of ice, their contents sealed away until needed. A large cheese has been set carefully to one side, kept cold until Kasilti can use it for this year’s taxes. You can smell a preservation blessing permeating the room. > large cheese Large and firm and well-preserved in wax. Kasilti got it as payment for fixing up the canals, and has been keeping it in Zuwa’s storeroom until tax season. Which is now. > put the fiery curse on the large cheese You sniff at the large cheese until you find the perfect place to deposit the fiery curse, then rub it on firmly. That should do it. > south The heated cheese is starting to sizzle where the fire curse comes in contact with the preservation blessing. Probably not a good idea to leave those two unattended together. > preservation blessing It’s so cold it makes your teeth ache even getting near it—if you tasted it, you might not be able to get your tongue unstuck again! The village pooled their resources and got a travelling sanctifier to bless this storeroom a few years back, and now it stays cold and dry all year round to protect the food inside. > take the preservation blessing You can feel ice crystals forming on your tongue before you even touch the threshold, and back away quickly. You could probably bring yourself to touch it if you tried hard enough, but it might not end well... > look Cold storeroom Just like how Zuwa’s family has the biggest house in the village, they have the biggest storeroom too: set deep underground, with an expensive preservation blessing on it to keep things from spoiling. It’s cold enough that your breath comes in little puffs of mist, and your paws stick to the floor every time you put them down. But the fire curse on the heated cheese offers a little respite, just enough that you’re not about to freeze. The storage bins are buried under a thick layer of ice, their contents sealed away until needed. A heated cheese has been set carefully to one side, kept cold until Kasilti can use it for this year’s taxes. You can smell a preservation blessing permeating the room. > south The heated cheese is starting to sizzle where the fire curse comes in contact with the preservation blessing. Probably not a good idea to leave those two unattended together. > heated cheese Large and firm and well-preserved in wax. Kasilti got it as payment for fixing up the canals, and has been keeping it in Zuwa’s storeroom until tax season. Which is now. You can smell a fiery curse lingering on it. > eat the heated cheese (first attempting to take the heated cheese) You snatch up the heated cheese in your mouth. The fiery curse bleeds into you just a little as you pick up the cheese. It’s very, very tempting. But the last time you ate a whole cheese, the whole village got mad at your human. > drop the heated cheese You set the heated cheese carefully on the ground. Most of the fiery curse leaves with the heated cheese, and you shake off any lingering traces until you’re completely clean of it. > the heated cheese Large and firm and well-preserved in wax. Kasilti got it as payment for fixing up the canals, and has been keeping it in Zuwa’s storeroom until tax season. Which is now. You can smell a fiery curse lingering on it. > take the heated cheese You snatch up the heated cheese in your mouth. > south You pace south. By Zuwa’s house Not quite as fancy and decorated as the Elder’s house, but it’s a big building for a big family, right in the middle of everything. The storeroom underneath is the biggest in the village, with a ladder mechanism leading up to the living space on top. Or at least, it should be leading up to the living space. It looks like it’s jammed, with the end of the ladder stuck several cubits off the ground. Water rushes east through the canals, bringing moisture back to the fields. > go to the barge launch (east) Busy fields Zuwa protests into the momentary silence. “Mahori, you know I didn’t mean to lose your s-sickle. If you ever stopped t-t-talking maybe I could remember...” (north) By your house (north) Barge launch Makeshift docks have been cobbled together at the edge of the river, planks and boards all lashed together to load the village’s taxes onto the barge. Tax season is even busier than market day, and Piseni wants to get everything moved in as few trips as possible. Your house is back to the south, and a well-trampled path leads upriver. Piseni, the village elder, is pacing nervously around the docks, while his son tries to avoid notice. The waxed cheese bumps along the ground with a thud-thud-thud as you haul it in, and after a moment the Elder’s son points it out to his father. You quickly snatch the fiery curse off it as Piseni stumps over and grabs it up. “This one’s Kasilti’s? Good, good. Hopefully means he’s finally finished with those blasted canals.” With a grunt of effort he swings it onto the barge. The Elder glares out at the village. “Hmph...our poor wise-woman, Iyali, Lamu, Mahori...four haven’t paid yet...” > go to the stela channel (west) Stela channel A single huge stone rises out of the river here: your human’s greatest work, the village stela. Deep channels cut into the riverbank keep it immersed in water on every side, making sure the river is always flowing across it. > the fiery curse It tastes like fiery orange-red and smells like a dizzying-fast cascade of arpeggios. When Lamu had an awful fever a month ago, you and your human redirected it onto the stela. Now the water’s mostly worn it away, and what’s left can’t hurt anyone any more: it just makes things uncomfortably warm. > stash the fiery curse (putting the fiery curse on the stela) You touch your nose delicately to the stela, and the magic starts to flow—pulled out of your body like beer through a straw, drawn into the labyrinth of channels carved into the stone. Soon it’s entirely gone from you, but you can feel it in the carvings: bound there until someone needs it again, or until the running water eventually wears it away to nothing. > go to the canal junction (west) River path “But Illuyanka was clever! He knew what Tarhunt was planning, and he had laid a trap for the god. Tarhunt was so confident, he hadn’t bothered to look around him. And as he got ready to throw the thunderbolt, a snare caught around his legs!” (west) By the dam (south) By Piseni’s house (south) Canal junction A wooden structure stands in the middle of a wide clearing, linking three paths together. The irrigation canal comes in from the north and flows into the structure, which divides it into smaller channels east and west. They were harvesting the west fields today, so right now all the water is flowing east. Lamu is searching around for something, wringing his hands with worry. > save Game state saved successfully. > go to piseni’s emmer field (west) Piseni’s emmer field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > note emmer A species of wheat that’s more resilient (and less valuable) than bread wheat, but less resilient (and more valuable) than barley. It seems that most Hittite landowners would have many small parcels of land instead of one large one. The reasons for this are never made explicit in Hittite sources, but judging by later eras, farmers likely divided up land by person and by crop to hedge their bets against disaster: if a lot of rainfall one year floods the low-lying fields, now everyone’s lost a bit of their harvest instead of one person losing it all; or if a drought kills all the wheat, at least you still have the barley. For more on Hittite farming, including a deep analysis of the different grains involved and how each was used in food production, see Hoffner’s Alimenta Hethaeorum. (Despite the name, the book itself is in English.) > stalks and stubble All the prickly bits of plants left over after the harvest. Soon they’ll get tilled down into the dirt for the next season. > push the plant stubble You crush a stalk under your paw. > north You scurry north. Piseni’s wheat field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > the plant stubble All the prickly bits of plants left over after the harvest. Soon they’ll get tilled down into the dirt for the next season. > west You pad west. Mahori’s wheat field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > stalks and stubble All the prickly bits of plants left over after the harvest. Soon they’ll get tilled down into the dirt for the next season. > west You pace west. Zuwa’s wheat field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. You can smell a puppy somewhere nearby. > west You scamper west. Kasilti’s wheat field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. You can smell a puppy somewhere, but it’s hard to tell where. > stalks and stubble All the prickly bits of plants left over after the harvest. Soon they’ll get tilled down into the dirt for the next season. > west You pace west. Lamu’s wheat field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > stalks and stubble All the prickly bits of plants left over after the harvest. Soon they’ll get tilled down into the dirt for the next season. > south You scurry south. Lamu’s emmer field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > stalks and stubble All the prickly bits of plants left over after the harvest. Soon they’ll get tilled down into the dirt for the next season. > south You lope south. Lamu’s barley field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. You can smell a puppy somewhere, but it’s hard to tell where. > stalks and stubble All the prickly bits of plants left over after the harvest. Soon they’ll get tilled down into the dirt for the next season. > south You pad south. Lamu’s flax field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. You can smell a puppy very close at hand—even if you can’t see it anywhere. > push the plant stubble You crush a stalk under your paw. > puppy You can’t see any puppy, but you can definitely smell it, and hear it, and taste it. It’s very odd. You can smell an invisibility curse lingering on it. > invisibility curse Your mouth is full of the taste of dappled forest-green, your nose full of the scent of a quiet, insidious hum you can’t quite place. This one is subtle. You can’t see any trace of it—which is probably the point—but you can smell and taste it just fine. > take the invisibility curse You pick out the invisibility curse, and carefully lick it off the puppy. Your paws are suddenly nowhere to be seen as the spell transfers from the puppy into you! For just a moment, a small brown puppy stands in front of you, wagging and panting happily. Then a shout comes from across the field, and Lamu is sprinting over, waving a hand above his head. “There you are! Where have you been?! I’ve been looking all over for you! Don’t scare me like that again—I thought something had got you!” He scoops up the puppy in his arms, but walks right past you without a word. And he hurries away to finally handle his taxes, a series of yip yip yips trailing behind him. It’s as if you don’t exist at all. > the invisibility curse Now it tastes of dappled forest-green and smells of a quiet, insidious hum you can’t quite place. This one is subtle. You can’t see any trace of it—which is probably the point—but you can smell and taste it just fine. Elsewhere... Off at the barge launch, Piseni lashes the last jar into place. “That’s not everyone, but it’s enough for now, and we need to launch before sunset. Anyone who’s coming along to Tarhuntassa, come get on the barge!” This is it—nobody in the village has been able to help your human, but maybe someone in the city can. And even if they don’t, Piseni will be making a bunch of trips to deliver all the tax goods; you’ll have plenty of chances to come back. > save Game state saved successfully. > put the invisibility curse on On what? > my collar You sniff at your collar until you find the perfect place to deposit the invisibility curse, then rub it on firmly. That should do it. > my invisible collar Your collar is definitely here. You can feel it, smell it, even taste it. But you can’t see it at all. To humans with their weak ears and noses, it might as well not exist. You can smell an invisibility curse lingering on it. > east You lope east. Kasilti’s flax field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > stalks and stubble All the prickly bits of plants left over after the harvest. Soon they’ll get tilled down into the dirt for the next season. > west You pace west. Lamu’s flax field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > east You hurry east. Kasilti’s flax field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > east You scamper east. Zuwa’s flax field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > east You pad east. Mahori’s flax field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > east You lope east. Piseni’s flax field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > north You pad north. Piseni’s barley field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > west You hurry west. Mahori’s barley field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > east You pace east. Piseni’s barley field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > west You lope west. Mahori’s barley field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > west You hurry west. Zuwa’s barley field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > west You pace west. Kasilti’s barley field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > north You scurry north. Kasilti’s emmer field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > east You pad east. Zuwa’s emmer field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > east You hurry east. Mahori’s emmer field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > east You scamper east. Piseni’s emmer field The fields are normally divided up into little sections, by family and by crop. But the harvest is finished here, so only stalks and stubble are left. > east Canal junction A wooden structure stands in the middle of a wide clearing, linking three paths together. The irrigation canal comes in from the north and flows into the structure, which divides it into smaller channels east and west. They were harvesting the west fields today, so right now all the water is flowing east. Lamu is playing with his puppy now, making sure it knows just how much he appreciates it coming home. The puppy sniffs at the canals until Lamu calls it away. > puppy Small and bouncy and full of energy, darting around and around. > lamu Most people stay close to the village except during markets and festivals, but Lamu is always the one who leads hunting expeditions off into the places beyond. He also cares a lot about his dogs, so he always has the tastiest treats of all. It seems he finally got around to his taxes, so now he’s free to play with the puppy. The puppy sniffs at the canals until Lamu calls it away. > puppy Small and bouncy and full of energy, darting around and around. The puppy leaps up on Lamu, tail wagging excitedly. > kiss the puppy The puppy is suddenly bowled over and sent staggering by an invisible but enthusiastically wet force. You scurry a few cubits away before you get accidentally slapped or kicked in the confusion. Lamu gives the puppy another treat. > me You are a very good dog; your human makes sure to tell you this often. You are also currently invisible. You’re wearing your collar, and holding nothing in your mouth. An invisibility curse is bleeding into you from your invisible collar. The puppy sniffs at the canals until Lamu calls it away. > go to the barge launch (east) Threshing house (east) By Zuwa’s house (east) Busy fields “Hark, hark and listen, all you passers-by!” Mahori turns toward the canal. “The great bumble-bear steals honey from the humble bumble-bee, then blames it on his buzzing! Do rolling thunderheads criticize nightingales for singing into the storm? What right do you have, Great Zuwa the Bear, to evade my stinger after wasting the golden ichor of my labors? A meager moon-price, I should think! Honestly, you should thank me for my song—you could learn much from a proper demonstration of my elocution.” (north) By your house (north) Barge launch Makeshift docks have been cobbled together at the edge of the river, planks and boards all lashed together to load the village’s taxes onto the barge. Tax season is even busier than market day, and Piseni wants to get everything moved in as few trips as possible. Your house is back to the south, and a well-trampled path leads upriver. Piseni stands on the barge with his son, waiting for the stragglers to get their tax payments in. > save Game state saved successfully. > piseni Gray-haired and sour-faced, Piseni has the final say on any village matters, which means he’s the first one the soldiers come for when taxes aren’t paid. If the village ever gets in trouble with the law, it’s his neck on the line. So he makes sure everything gets handled before the Empire has to care about the taxes. Piseni counts out the packages on the barge. “Let’s see...Zuwa, Kasilti, Anzi, Lamu...that’s four in now.” > put the invisibility curse on piseni Your human was very, very clear about this part: you must never put a spell on a living being without proper supervision. Magicians and wise-women are allowed to alter spells, dispelling or redirecting them onto other things, but only licensed temple sanctifiers can put new spells on people. If anyone else does it, even if it’s not meant as a curse, it’s considered sorcery—and the punishment for sorcery is death. The Elder glares out at the village. “Hmph...our poor wise-woman, Iyali, Mahori...three haven’t paid yet...” > barge The river is the best way to transport anything, so the village has a few of these huge barges for carrying people and cargo down to the big city and back. Even with all the taxes loaded on, there’s plenty of space for people too. > jump on the barge Piseni casts off the last rope just as you leap onto the barge, and soon the current is pulling it away. Away from the village, away from your human and her curse. You’ve never seen the city, and don’t know quite what it’ll be like. But they say there are more people there than in the whole village, and wonders from across the entire world. Maybe one of them will have the cure. Chapter III: The City You hear the city before you see it: all the sounds of people working and talking and arguing. Then the houses clustered around both sides of the river. And then it turns out that wasn’t even the city yet! More and more buildings, and then the walls, and the gates, and the soldiers, and then it just keeps coming. Boats are clustering around the docks by the gate, and people are shouting in all sorts of languages, and someone bumps against you and you almost fall into the water, and it’s all so much all at once! But after a minute the barge stops with a thud, and Piseni is tying it off to unload everything. Your legs almost give out under you as you hop out onto dry land. In front of you are the walls of Tarhuntassa City, the heart of the whole Empire. If everyone and everything here can’t save your human, then nothing can. City docks The river runs wide and slow here, between the city watchtower on the north bank and the city gates to the south, and it’s choked with barges crowding around the sprawling spiderweb of piers. The banks are swarming with people pushing and crowding and arguing, and there might be more people waiting at the gates than you’ve got in the whole village. Your ears hurt from the cacophony, and every movement risks getting stepped on by some inattentive human. A second opening, to the east of the gate, holds a channel to draw water from the river. Your barge is docked a ways to the west. A foreign lady is shrieking orders as her servants try to anchor her boat to the piers, her voice cutting through the chaos. It doesn’t seem to be making any difference. > save Game state saved successfully. > note tarhuntassa city Somewhere around 1290 BCE, the capital of the Hittite Empire was moved from Hattusa to a new city called Tarhuntassa (“the city of Tarhunt”), closer to the sea routes in the south and farther from the Kaska raiders in the north. A few decades later, the new Great King moved it back to Hattusa, and made Tarhuntassa the capital of a new vassal state instead. Tarhuntassa itself has never been found, and its exact location is unknown. At the time of this game, Tarhuntassa is properly established as the capital, but many people still remember the days of Hattusa and the suddenness of the change. > city watchtower Big and imposing, it looms over the north bank in case any enemies try to get across the river. That’s the sort of thing city people have to worry about. > city gates Stone walls that tower over you, an arch big enough for at least three people to move through at once, and a gate studded with weird black bolts that’s probably strong enough to keep enemies out, even if they have spears. The whole thing would be terrifying enough even if there weren’t soldiers standing guard. The foreign lady’s voice rises above the babble. “What are you doing?! Move! I said MOVE!” > soldiers They’re eyeing everyone who passes through the gates, but it’s busy enough that they can’t look too closely. They don’t even seem to notice you. “Do you understand what this cargo is worth?! Do you understand where it’s going?!” > piers There are so many piers you can’t even look at them all at the same time, with all sorts of different boats and barges loading and unloading, and all sorts of people hurrying back and forth. It’s dizzying trying to take it all in. “I am here to treat with the Great King himself! I am to marry his own son!” > channel It’s a small opening, only about a cubit across, and the segmented channel looks like it would collapse if someone tried to climb it. Logically, it seems like the water should be flowing out of the city, since the opening is about four cubits off the ground. But no, it’s moving steadily up the channel and in through the wall. “I represent the whole of Alasiya! This copper is worth more than all of your useless lives, all together!” > note cubit A cubit was originally defined as the distance from a man’s elbow to the tips of his fingers, but eventually standardized at about 18 inches or 45 centimeters. > note alasiya The island of Cyprus, off the southern coast of Anatolia. At this point it was the primary source of copper in the region, and the Hittite Empire very much wanted it as a vassal, but it maintained its independence and trade dominance for several decades more before it finally succumbed. In a diplomatic letter to Mizri (EA 38), the King of Alasiya is described as the Pharaoh’s brother, suggesting that Alasiya had become a very wealthy kingdom indeed! > note mizri Egypt, currently ruled by Ramesses II (known to the Hittites as Wasmuaria and the Greeks as Ozymandias). Tensions between Egypt and the Hittite Empire had been rising for some time, and were about to come to a head in the Battle of Kadesh. > foreign lady Even in a crowd this big, she stands out—she’s definitely rich, and definitely not from around here. Her clothes are all sorts of gaudy colors and look like they’re sewn to fit her body instead of just folded and pinned: a dress cut in a big V that leaves her whole chest bare, a swooshy apron, and a kilt separated into a bunch of layered tiers. “Tie the ropes! TIE them. I said TIE them! NO! NO!” > note clothes Unfortunately, there’s not much evidence of how Hittite clothing worked. Texts show that wool was the most common material, red and blue dyes were popular (madder and woad?), and many different types of garments were used for different purposes, but they’re rather vague on what exactly those garments were. The best analysis I’ve seen, based on artistic depictions and evidence from the surrounding regions, suggests that they probably favored simple rectangles of cloth, draped, pleated, and minimally sewn into tunics and skirts. The Alasiyan lady at the docks, meanwhile, is wearing a tailored dress and skirt based on Bernice Jones’s reconstructions of Minoan clothing: the close-fitting chiton and bare chest are distinctly Minoan features. It’s not clear if an Alasiyan would actually have worn this, but we know the Minoans traded extensively with Alasiya, and we have better surviving depictions of their clothing (in color!) than most of the other cultures of the era. See Jones’s article Revealing Minoan Fashions for illustrations of the ancient depictions, alongside models wearing her modern reconstructions! > servants A couple of them are better-dressed and sticking close to the foreign lady’s side like escorts; the rest of them are all dressed the same and are trying their best to secure her barge to the posts. It’s not going well: the ropes are too slippery and just won’t stay tied. The way she yells at them, they might all be slaves—or maybe they’re not, and she’s just rich enough to yell at anyone she wants. The barge shifts, and one of the servants is pulled into the river with a splash. The foreign lady shrieks in rage. > her barge There’s probably a word for this kind of boat, but it’s not one you’ve ever seen before, so you don’t know what the word might be. It was probably brought upriver from the seaport at Ura, but now it’s about to get swept right back down there if the ropes won’t stay tied. “All of you are worthless! Worthless! I should have you all abandoned in the river for this!” > note ura The most important seaport of Anatolia in this era. Its exact location is uncertain, but for this game it’s placed at the mouth of the Holaya River, so goods can be transported to Tarhuntassa by barge. > note holaya river The Holaya River (more often transcribed “Hulaya”) is mentioned many times in Hittite documents, but archaeologists disagree on its exact location. One theory is the Calycadnus (modern Göksu), so that’s where it’s been placed on the map for this game. Rivers that could be used for both farming and transportation were rare in Anatolia, so the village here is a fortunate one. > push the foreign lady’s boat You apply a bit of force to the foreign lady’s boat, but it doesn’t budge. The barge shifts against the dock with a horrible grinding sound that’s audible even over the foreign lady’s wail of dismay. > jump on the foreign lady’s boat You’re able to get pretty close without being noticed, but you’d definitely get thrown overboard if you actually got on the boat itself. One of the servants bows in front of the woman. “Please, Lady Eritha, we need—” But he doesn’t get any further before she cuts him off. “What I need is the cargo secured! NOW!” > look City docks The river runs wide and slow here, between the city watchtower on the north bank and the city gates to the south, and it’s choked with barges crowding around the sprawling spiderweb of piers. The banks are swarming with people pushing and crowding and arguing, and there might be more people waiting at the gates than you’ve got in the whole village. Your ears hurt from the cacophony, and every movement risks getting stepped on by some inattentive human. A second opening, to the east of the gate, holds a channel to draw water from the river. Your barge is docked a ways to the west. Lady Eritha is shrieking orders as her servants try to anchor her boat to the piers, her voice cutting through the chaos. It doesn’t seem to be making any difference. A rope rips itself out of someone’s hands and the barge rocks alarmingly. Lady Eritha howls her displeasure to the sky. > my barge The barge is now thoroughly unloaded and ready to head back to the village when you’re ready. Surely the humans won’t mind ferrying you back and forth as much as you need. You’ve been very helpful, after all! “Useless! Useless! Worthless trash! I’ll have you all replaced by sunset!” > save Game state saved successfully. > head back to the village You leap back onto the barge as Piseni pushes away from the dock, and soon leave the chaos of the city behind. Barge launch Makeshift docks have been cobbled together at the edge of the river, planks and boards all lashed together to load the village’s taxes onto the barge. Tax season is even busier than market day, and Piseni wants to get everything moved in as few trips as possible. Your house is back to the south, and a well-trampled path leads upriver. Piseni stands on the barge with his son, waiting for the stragglers to get their tax payments in. The Elder glares out at the village. “Hmph...our poor wise-woman, Iyali, Mahori...three haven’t paid yet...” > east You hop back on the barge, and head back toward the city. City docks The river runs wide and slow here, between the city watchtower on the north bank and the city gates to the south, and it’s choked with barges crowding around the sprawling spiderweb of piers. The banks are swarming with people pushing and crowding and arguing, and there might be more people waiting at the gates than you’ve got in the whole village. Your ears hurt from the cacophony, and every movement risks getting stepped on by some inattentive human. A second opening, to the east of the gate, holds a channel to draw water from the river. Your barge is docked a ways to the west. Lady Eritha is shrieking orders as her servants try to anchor her boat to the piers, her voice cutting through the chaos. It doesn’t seem to be making any difference. The barge shifts against the dock with a horrible grinding sound that’s audible even over Lady Eritha’s wail of dismay. > south You lope south through the city gates. Tarhuntassa City So many sights, so many sounds, so many smells! This single main throughway seems like it could swallow up the entire village, and still have room for more. People crowd around on all sides, from the main city gates to the north, the soaring temples to the east, the tangle of streets to the west, or the quieter roads to the south. Legs and tunics of every sort buffet against you, and every moment you spend here you’re in danger of getting trampled by feet or wheels or worse. A massive stela stands in the center of it all, a bastion of calm in the middle of all the chaos. Some important noble forces his way through the crowd, flanked by guards with golden spears. > note golden spears There were two groups of elite guards responsible for protecting the royal family: the “men of the golden spear” and the “men of the meshedi”. (Meshedi seems to be an Akkadian word, but its meaning is unclear. One theory is that it means a particular weapon they held; another theory is that it just means “bodyguard”.) The Great King was generally protected by twelve of each, but presumably there were many more than twelve so they could work in shifts and protect other important royals as well. > stela This stela is the same sort of shape as the one back in the village, but taller and with sharper edges. This one has to be at least six cubits high, probably more, and every inch of it is covered with nail-thin carvings that hurt your eyes when you try to follow them. There’s no sign of water anywhere around here, but the stone is set deep in the ground. Maybe it reaches all the way down to the Ways Below? Either way, it’s good to find another of these! You’ve found a lot of spells so far today, and somehow you have a feeling you’ll be needing them again. Now, you have somewhere to store them when you bring them from the village. A priestess sweeps past, clutching something large and golden-shiny against her chest. > note ways below Connections between the mortal world and the Underworld, where the primordial Underworld gods could be invoked and sacrificed to. We don’t know the pronunciation of the Hittite term, but it was written with signs literally meaning “divine pathways of the earth” or “divine pathways of the underworld” (DIŊIR.KASKAL.KUR): signs that were never used in this sense in Mesopotamia. As a result, scholars disagree on what these “Ways” actually were: whether they were natural features, manmade shrines, or something else. My favorite interpretation is that they were underground springs and watercourses. Context shows that they were physical places you could go, they were sometimes connected to aboveground rivers, and fresh water (especially flowing water) was a holy thing in Hittite religion. Aquifers were also revered in Mesopotamia, where they were considered fragments of abzu, the primordial ocean that envelops the world on all sides. > put the invisibility curse on the city stela You touch your nose delicately to the city stela, and the magic starts to flow—pulled out of your body like beer through a straw, drawn into the labyrinth of channels carved into the stone. Soon it’s entirely gone from you, but you can feel it in the carvings: bound there until someone needs it again, or until the running water eventually wears it away to nothing. A merchant blocks traffic for a moment as his servants lug heavy pithoi toward the market. > look Tarhuntassa City So many sights, so many sounds, so many smells! This single main throughway seems like it could swallow up the entire village, and still have room for more. People crowd around on all sides, from the main city gates to the north, the soaring temples to the east, the tangle of streets to the west, or the quieter roads to the south. Legs and tunics of every sort buffet against you, and every moment you spend here you’re in danger of getting trampled by feet or wheels or worse. A massive stela stands in the center of it all, a bastion of calm in the middle of all the chaos. A weary farmer in simple clothes pauses to rest next to the stela. > people There are so many, it’s hard to keep track of any given person for more than a second or two. A teenager tries to push against the flow of traffic, without much success. > spells So far today, you’ve messed with six spells: • The security blessing on the dam, in the area near the dam, which holds something closed (fetch it) • The blessing of the wind on the counterweight, in the front room, which makes something weigh less (fetch it) • The unidentified curse on your human, in the bedroom, which is doing something horrible (fetch it) • The fiery curse on the village stela, in the stela channel, which makes something uncomfortably warm (fetch it) • The fragility curse on the village stela, in the stela channel, which makes something break at the slightest touch (fetch it) • The invisibility curse on the city stela, which makes something impossible to see (but not impossible to smell or hear) (fetch it) > north You pad north through the city gates. City docks The river runs wide and slow here, between the city watchtower on the north bank and the city gates to the south, and it’s choked with barges crowding around the sprawling spiderweb of piers. The banks are swarming with people pushing and crowding and arguing, and there might be more people waiting at the gates than you’ve got in the whole village. Your ears hurt from the cacophony, and every movement risks getting stepped on by some inattentive human. A second opening, to the east of the gate, holds a channel to draw water from the river. Your barge is docked a ways to the west. Lady Eritha is shrieking orders as her servants try to anchor her boat to the piers, her voice cutting through the chaos. It doesn’t seem to be making any difference. “Tie the ropes! TIE them. I said TIE them! NO! NO!” > her boat There’s probably a word for this kind of boat, but it’s not one you’ve ever seen before, so you don’t know what the word might be. It was probably brought upriver from the seaport at Ura, but now it’s about to get swept right back down there if the ropes won’t stay tied. “I represent the whole of Alasiya! This copper is worth more than all of your useless lives, all together!” > go to the barge launch (west) You leap back onto the barge as Piseni pushes away from the dock, and soon leave the chaos of the city behind. Barge launch Makeshift docks have been cobbled together at the edge of the river, planks and boards all lashed together to load the village’s taxes onto the barge. Tax season is even busier than market day, and Piseni wants to get everything moved in as few trips as possible. Your house is back to the south, and a well-trampled path leads upriver. Piseni stands on the barge with his son, waiting for the stragglers to get their tax payments in. Piseni counts out the packages on the barge. “Let’s see...Zuwa, Kasilti, Anzi, Lamu...that’s four in now.” > go to the area near the dam (west) Stela channel (west) River path “Soon Tarhunt was all tied up in Illuyanka’s trap, his legs tied up so he couldn’t run, his arms tied up so he couldn’t reach his thunderbolts. And once he was totally defenseless, Illuyanka tore out his heart and his eyes, so he could never be a threat again.” (west) By the dam The whole village depends on the river, and this is the heart of it all: the dam that redirects a manageable bit of the water into the irrigation canals, keeping the fields healthy and moist. Water rushes south through the canals, bringing moisture back to the fields. > dam After the emergency repairs, it’s...maybe not quite good as new, but definitely good enough to hold on its own. You can smell a security blessing lingering on it. > security blessing This one tastes of deep, solid bronze-brown, with a scent of a slow but intricate fugue, the harmonies interlocking with each steady, regular change. It provides the best possible security: anything enchanted with this blessing can’t possibly be opened unless the spell is removed. Which also means it’s not very useful unless you can move spells around. Fortunately, your human has you, her magic sponge, to absorb any stray magic and put it wherever it needs to go. > note magic sponge Dogs were believed to absorb any magic they touched, which meant they had to be kept far away from temples: they might track impurity all over the sanctum! This was sometimes used in cleansing rituals (like the “Ritual of Zuwi”, CTH 412, where a newborn puppy would lick curses off someone), but these rituals seldom ended well for the curse-bearing puppy. In the world of this game, where magic demonstrably exists and they can manipulate blessings as well as curses, the dogs are treated somewhat better than in the real Hittite Empire. > take the security blessing You pick out the security blessing, and carefully lick it off the dam. Your mouth snaps painfully shut and your joints go stiff as the spell transfers from the dam into you! > go to the city docks (east) River path “Illuyanka took the stolen heart and eyes and kept them in a jar, sealed up tight so that Tarhunt could never take them back. And Tarhunt had to limp back home, eyeless and heartless. Without his eyes he couldn’t see, and without his heart he couldn’t fight. Entirely defenseless.” (east) Stela channel (east) Barge launch (east) You hop back on the barge, and head back toward the city. City docks The river runs wide and slow here, between the city watchtower on the north bank and the city gates to the south, and it’s choked with barges crowding around the sprawling spiderweb of piers. The banks are swarming with people pushing and crowding and arguing, and there might be more people waiting at the gates than you’ve got in the whole village. Your ears hurt from the cacophony, and every movement risks getting stepped on by some inattentive human. A second opening, to the east of the gate, holds a channel to draw water from the river. Your barge is docked a ways to the west. Lady Eritha is shrieking orders as her servants try to anchor her boat to the piers, her voice cutting through the chaos. It doesn’t seem to be making any difference. “Useless! Useless! Worthless trash! I’ll have you all replaced by sunset!” > put the security blessing on On what? > eritha’s boat You transfer the security blessing to the lady’s barge ropes, and they lash themselves into tight knots. The servants take a step back in astonishment as the slick ropes wrap themselves around the cleats, anchoring the barge in place! The magic accomplished in seconds what they’d been trying to do all morning, and now they’re looking at this strange sorcerous dog with no small hint of fear. Only Lady Eritha herself seems unfazed, and she looms over you imperiously. “Clever dog. Your service is commendable, and it will not go unappreciated.” She gestures to one of the escorts, who offers her a long, shiny coil of metal that looks like it could spiral all the way up her arm. With careful precision she separates off one ring of the coil and presents it to you. “For your master. A token of the gratitude of Alasiya.” Then she snaps her fingers, the servants fall in line, and she strides away toward the city gates. > one ring It’s like a thin ribbon of bright silver with a ridge all down its length, twisted into a spiral to be carried around. > take the silver coil You snatch up the silver coil in your mouth. > show the silver coil to the gate guards They don’t seem to be paying any attention to you, and it’s probably a good idea to keep it that way. > note coil While actual currency hadn’t been invented yet, and rural people tended to stick to barter, pure silver (measured by weight) had become a de facto standard for urban commerce. Especially wealthy people sometimes had silver divided into the quantities they expected to use, rolled out into a thin wire, and coiled up for easy transport; this “ring money” (Sumerian har) never really caught on in Anatolia, but silver was silver all the same. > note spiral While actual currency hadn’t been invented yet, and rural people tended to stick to barter, pure silver (measured by weight) had become a de facto standard for urban commerce. Especially wealthy people sometimes had silver divided into the quantities they expected to use, rolled out into a thin wire, and coiled up for easy transport; this “ring money” (Sumerian har) never really caught on in Anatolia, but silver was silver all the same. > note barter In the years before standardized currency, most transactions involved whatever goods people were willing to part with. The insistence on silver in this game is more a gameplay convenience than historically accurate; Halpaziti should probably accept any valuable item in exchange for his copper, for example. My justification is that a dog can’t haggle, and silver with Tesmu’s stamp on it is a known and trusted quantity. > save Game state saved successfully. > stash the silver coil You find a place to tuck the silver coil away, somewhere people won’t notice or mess with it. > go to the city center (south) Tarhuntassa City So many sights, so many sounds, so many smells! This single main throughway seems like it could swallow up the entire village, and still have room for more. People crowd around on all sides, from the main city gates to the north, the soaring temples to the east, the tangle of streets to the west, or the quieter roads to the south. Legs and tunics of every sort buffet against you, and every moment you spend here you’re in danger of getting trampled by feet or wheels or worse. A massive stela stands in the center of it all, a bastion of calm in the middle of all the chaos. A slave is pushed roughly aside, and has to work his way back into the flow of traffic. > west You pace west. City streets The streets are a maze of sharp turns and dead ends, with buildings everywhere blocking sight lines to take away any hope of orienting yourself. But most of the people seem to come through here, heading west to some kind of canopied fairway or east to the city center. As long as you stick with them, you should be all right. Two soldiers are supposedly standing guard and watching everyone who enters or leaves. In reality, they’ve set up a game board and are just listening for big problems in between rolling the dice. The bigger one rolls the dice, and punches the air in triumph. “Safe.” He drops his piece on the little rosette, taking a bit of metal from the pot. > people There are so many, it’s hard to keep track of any given person for more than a second or two. The bigger one huffs in frustration. “I wish Mizri would attack outright. All this waiting around is agony.” “Be careful what you wish for. Are you sure all-out war would end well for us?” “Of course! They’re still using bronze weapons, and the Great King is working with iron now! It’ll cut straight through their magic and leave them defenseless!” “Yes, sure, and let me know when this ‘iron’ gets down to the rank and file like us. It’s a bluff. One His Majesty is hoping Mizri is gonna buy.” > note iron In this period, the Hittites had developed ironworking into a science, but still didn’t have furnaces capable of separating it reliably from ores and other metals. Pure iron was no longer worth eight times its weight in gold, like it had been 500 years earlier, but it wasn’t cheap either; it was mostly used for ceremonial and religious objects, like royal scepters and cult statues, rather than everyday tools and weapons. Large-scale iron smelting would only come into play after the Empire disintegrated somewhere around 1200 BCE, bringing about the Iron Age. > soldiers One is big and broad-shouldered, the other skinny with a neatly-trimmed little beard. Both of them have spears, but they seem more interested in their game than in actually using them. The bigger one huffs louder. “Well, why do you think His Majesty moved the capital down here to Tarhuntassa? There’s iron all over these mountains, and now that he knows how to refine it, we’ll be unstoppable!” “Yes. The iron.” The smaller one gives him a withering look. “It’s definitely the iron down here, and not the raiders up north, who all this mythical ‘iron’ can’t do a damn thing about.” > game The soldiers have propped up a game board on a couple of crates, and now they’re rolling pointy-looking four-sided dice and moving tokens around a grid of squares. A bowl full of little metal bits sits on the side of the board, its contents changing hands as they gamble. The bigger one’s huffing reaches a worrying pitch. “How do you think we crushed the rebellion in Arzawa if it wasn’t iron?” “I’ll tell you exactly how. When they tried to make an alliance with Mizri, who do you think was writing all those diplomatic communiques? Scribes. Scribes trained right here in the capitol, who report back to His Majesty’s spymaster. And now that trick isn’t going to work a second time. Anyone who wants to rebel is gonna get captive scribes from out east instead of trusting ours.” > note game board The original name of this game is lost to time. It’s now known as the Game of Ur, after the city where it was first discovered, but it seems to have been popular all across the ancient Near East: we’ve found game boards etched into monuments with the tip of a dagger, buried in the tomb of Tutankhamun, and carefully drawn in tablets divining your fortune from which squares you land on. These tablets actually give us enough information to reconstruct the game, so you can find modern versions of the board and rules online! It’s a bit like backgammon: your goal is to maneuver several pieces to a particular goal, and four-sided dice determine how far you’ll move a piece on each turn. > little metal bits They smell like all different kinds of metal: reddish, grayish, yellowish, whitish, and kind of a mix. All different shapes and sizes, too; they look like leftover scraps from something else that were small enough to trade around. The smaller one gathers up the dice and tosses them down. Then he puts his head in his hands. “Just barely...” He moves one space past the rosette, and tosses a bit of metal into the pot. > take the bowl of metal bits The soldiers are paying more attention to the game than their actual job at the moment. They’d definitely notice if you messed with their pot...and those spears look very real. > push the bowl of metal bits The soldiers are paying more attention to the game than their actual job at the moment. They’d definitely notice if you messed with their pot...and those spears look very real. > look City streets The streets are a maze of sharp turns and dead ends, with buildings everywhere blocking sight lines to take away any hope of orienting yourself. But most of the people seem to come through here, heading west to some kind of canopied fairway or east to the city center. As long as you stick with them, you should be all right. Two soldiers are supposedly standing guard and watching everyone who enters or leaves. In reality, they’ve set up a game board and are just listening for big problems in between rolling the dice. The smaller one sighs, stroking his beard. “Even if it was all the spies’ doing, though, it’s good we took down Arzawa. We needed more captives to work the fields. Now we have plenty.” “More laborers, but foreign ones who hate us. How loyal are they going to be to the people who brought them here in chains?” The bigger one spits. “They’re a liability.” > me You are a very good dog; your human makes sure to tell you this often. You’re wearing your collar, and holding nothing in your mouth. The smaller one leans in with a dangerous smile. “Tell me, Kassu. Do you know how we keep the captives loyal?” Kassu shrugs. “Threatening to kill them if they step out of line?” “Oh, no. It’s much, much better than that. We used to take out their eyes, but now we have the blessing of captivity. Have you ever seen it performed?” > wait You swish your tail back and forth for a moment. The smaller one’s eyes have a wicked gleam to them. “When the army takes captives, they make an example of the first one to resist. They cut him right in half, head to toe, and tie the halves to a gate, and march the other captives through. And then if any of them try to fight back in the future...” He makes a horrible ripping sound. “Oh, come off it Sayanu!” Kassu’s face has gone pale. “I’m not scared of campfire stories. The gods hate human sacrifice. It’s an abomination.” “The city gods, maybe. But this blessing? It comes from the gods of the battlefield. They’re much less discerning in their tastes.” > note human sacrifice Hittite rituals used all sorts of animal sacrifices, but almost never human. The one exception I know of is the “Ritual for a Routed Army” (CTH 426), which is what Sayanu is describing. Curiously enough, the Greek historian Herodotus (VII.39) records a similar ritual performed in Anatolia several centuries later. In real life, it was used to purify an army after defeat, rather than to make captives obedient. Either way, it seems the gods of the battlefield appreciate the spilling of human blood much more than the gods of the city do! > wait You scratch vigorously at your ears. Kassu blows on the dice for luck, tossing them across the table. He grimaces. “Can’t quite go out...” He adds another piece to the board. > wait You fidget with your paws. Kassu grumbles something under his breath. “Speaking of city gods...I don’t like these new temples to Pihassassi. What’s wrong with Tarhunt? Good, solid, traditional god. Why did the Great King have to bring in a new one?” Sayanu shrugs. “More gods make the pantheon stronger. Besides, if the Lord of Lightning is guiding His Majesty, maybe it’ll make him strike like a thunderbolt. That can only be good for us.” > note pihassassi The Hittites worshipped an enormous variety of gods—they called themselves the “People of a Thousand Gods” for a reason!—and that included several different storm and weather deities from different places. Pihassassi is a more obscure one; his name literally means “The Lightning”, and he’s basically unknown outside of being the patron deity of Great King Muwatalli II. It’s not even known if Pihassassi was his actual name or just a title: “The Weather-God Pihassassi”, or “The Weather-God of Lightning”? After Muwatalli’s death, Pihassassi practically disappears from the record, but in this time period the Great King made sure he was properly venerated. > wait You swish your tail back and forth for a moment. Kassu’s grumbles intensify. “And what about Tarhunt? What if he gets offended about all these new temples to someone else? What’s the point of offending thunder to satisfy lightning?” “Oh, come off it. Tarhunt’s temples are doing better than ever now that they’re getting some royal attention. This whole new capital is named Tarhuntassa. Thunder and lightning go together and all that. Nobody’s abandoning Tarhunt over this.” > wait You fidget with your paws. Sayanu rolls the dice, and taps the table with a smile. “Safe.” He moves a piece back to his own side of the board. > wait You scratch vigorously at your ears. “On the topic of foreign weather-gods...” Sayanu smirks. “What do you think of Tessop? Our dear Crown Prince’s patron?” Kassu snorts. “A strong god. But a Hurrian one. Not my concern.” “I imagine you might like to see a different god’s chosen...someone like the Crown Prince’s uncle, perhaps, chosen of Savoska?” “Watch your words!” Kassu glances around to see if anyone was listening to that. > note uncle The Great King’s youngest brother and a very successful general, currently reigning in Hattusa. Significantly more popular among the soldiers than the crown prince Urhi-Tessop. > wait You swish your tail back and forth for a moment. Sayanu drops his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “We need a strong king to hold back Mizri. The Crown Prince isn’t that, even with Tessop’s blessings backing him. But Hattusili...the Great King has him running the army already. The soldiers trust him.” Kassu reluctantly lowers his voice as well. “And you think civil war is better than a weak king? It would destroy everything! The Empire would crumble and our enemies would charge in from all sides!” > wait You scratch vigorously at your ears. Sayanu lets his voice get a bit louder again. “Besides. I know you pray to Savoska all the time, hm? Goddess of love and seduction? She chose Hattusili as a child, saved him when he was dying of plague. Now he carries her blessing everywhere he goes. How can it be wrong to have a goddess’s chosen in charge?” “You forget, Sayanu,” Kassu’s voice is a low growl, “that the Great King has to keep all the gods happy, not just one. Offending the whole pantheon for the sake of one goddess will bring disaster.” > wait You fidget with your paws. Kassu gathers up the dice and tosses them down. Then he grins at the result. “Four!” He taps his piece down to the other end of the board. > wait You swish your tail back and forth for a moment. Kassu slams the butt of his spear into the ground, glaring vaguely out toward the harbor. “And now the Ahhiyawa are getting bolder. Their raids are getting more common. How long’s it been since they burned down a half dozen cities on the coast?” Sayanu shrugs. “Bolder, maybe. Not any more successful. Wilusa controls the shoreline, and it would take a miracle to get through those walls.” “You don’t think it’s a sign of something? That rebel leader Piyama-Aradu disappeared right around the time the raids picked up.” “The day the Ahhiyawa figure out tactics and strategy is the day the Great King will finally start paying attention. Until then? They’re a nuisance. Nothing more.” > note ahhiyawa The Achaeans—that is, the Greeks of Homer’s epics. Archaeologically speaking, these are the Mycenaeans, a Bronze Age civilization that collapsed centuries before the Classical Greece of Pericles and Plato. > note wilusa The Troy of the Homeric epics: a walled city in northwest Anatolia. In this time period, it was a vassal state of the Hittite Empire, controlling much of the northwestern coast; it was ruled by a man named Alaksandu, possibly the same as the “Alexandros” mentioned by Homer (as another name for Prince Paris of Troy). There’s no evidence of an actual Trojan War to match the one in the Iliad, but there is evidence of repeated conflict between the Hittites and Ahhiyawa around this time (including one of the first trade embargos in history), which ended abruptly with the Hittites suddenly addressing the Ahhiyawa leaders as equals instead of inferiors. My favorite theory is that an earthquake destroyed Wilusa’s famous walls, leaving it defenseless against Ahhiyawa raids. > note piyama-aradu Piyama-Aradu or Piyamaradu was a former king of Arzawa, overthrown by the Hittites in favor of a more pliable vassal. He dedicated the rest of his life to being a thorn in the Empire’s side and may have been the inspiration for the character of Achilles in the Homeric epics, though evidence for this is scant to nonexistent. > note arzawa A Hittite vassal state on the southwest coast of Anatolia, which made several unsuccessful attempts at rebellion. > wait You fidget with your paws. Sayanu twists his beard between his fingers, leaning against the table. “You know they don’t even have cities of their own? Just a bunch of barren rocks in the ocean. They can’t even farm on their own, that’s why they keep raiding the coastal cities for slave labor. They don’t know how to build anything, only to burn it.” “They’re pretty good at building ships,” Kassu points out. “Ships to burn cities with. Those black hulls aren’t good for anything else. You know what they call their king? Ptoli-Porthos. The City-Sacker. That’s the only thing they value out there. Anything good in their lives they stole from someone else, so all that matters is how well you can pillage and burn.” > note ptoli-porthos An epithet of Odysseus in the Homeric epics. Sayanu’s translation is correct, though his description is distinctly uncharitable to the point of outright misrepresentation (the Mycenaeans very much did have cities and culture of their own); there was very little love lost between the Hittites and Ahhiyawa during this period. > wait You swish your tail back and forth for a moment. Sayanu rolls the dice, and scowls at the result. “Just barely...” He moves one space past the rosette, and tosses a bit of metal into the pot. > wait You scratch vigorously at your ears. Kassu huffs in frustration. “I wish Mizri would attack outright. All this waiting around is agony.” “Be careful what you wish for. Are you sure all-out war would end well for us?” “Of course! They’re still using bronze weapons, and the Great King is working with iron now! It’ll cut straight through their magic and leave them defenseless!” “Yes, sure, and let me know when this ‘iron’ gets down to the rank and file like us. It’s a bluff. One His Majesty is hoping Mizri is gonna buy.” > west You scamper west. Bazaar The street opens out into a wide plaza, shaded by canopies stretched between the buildings and surrounded by carts and market stalls on all sides. It’s no quieter than the city center was, but all the sounds and smells feel more spread out now, like there’s enough space between them for you to wander and explore. A strange creature watches you from off to the west, eyes shining with an unexpected intelligence. A kid in a flamboyant tunic has arranged some clay cups on a little stage, and is gesticulating majestically at the people around him. > strange creature It’s smaller than a dog, with sleek fur, long legs, pointy ears, and unsettling eyes. And something in its expression seems smarter than other animals. Does it have a blessing like the one on your collar? The creature blinks once, turns, and slinks away to the west. “Men and women of Tarhuntassa!” The boy in the gaudy tunic raises his voice above the clamor. “Who among you has faith in the sharpness of your eyes and the quickness of your mind?” The sound of a man wailing in despair echoes from the south. > boy in the gaudy tunic He can’t be older than 15, but he’s grandstanding with all the confidence of a prince, in a bizarre tunic covered in bits of metal that keep reflecting the sun. When he sees you looking at him, he flashes a smile and quickly makes some sort of hand gesture out to the side, flicking his hand horizontally with all the fingers out. A crowd has started to gather in front of the boy as he gesticulates. “I’m willing to bet silver—genuine, high-quality silver—that not one of you can best me in a game of skill!” > kiss the flamboyant kid The boy deftly slips around to the other side, making it all look like part of the act. “Observe these three cups. Perfectly solid, perfectly ordinary cups. And observe this one perfect pebble.” The boy places the pebble under one of the cups, then switches them around for a moment. You hear anguished wails coming from the south. > cups Three little clay cups, all the same shape and size, and a shiny white pebble under one of them. It doesn’t seem too hard to follow it, even when the kid shuffles them around really fast—it should be under the left one now. “If any one of you—any one!—can follow the pebble as I move it around, I will match your bet in silver.” He tips up the middle cup to reveal the pebble underneath. “Do I have a bet? Anyone, a bet?” > pebble Three little clay cups, all the same shape and size, and a shiny white pebble under one of them. It doesn’t seem too hard to follow it, even when the kid shuffles them around really fast—it should be under the left one now. The people start clamoring to get their bets in. “A pithos of barley!” “No, I’ll give you wheat!” “I’ll do one better: a whole cheese!” Sobs of misery come echoing from the south. > push the cups on the table The boy deftly maneuvers the cups away from your mouth. Once everyone’s made their wagers, the boy waves his hands, demonstrating that they’re completely empty. “Ready? Begin!” Then he starts to shuffle the cups around at lightning speed. > cups Three little clay cups, all the same shape and size, and a shiny white pebble under one of them. It doesn’t seem too hard to follow it, even when the kid shuffles them around really fast—it should be under the right one now. The cups twirl back and forth in the boy’s hands, almost too fast to follow! The sound of a man wailing in despair echoes from the south. > look Bazaar The street opens out into a wide plaza, shaded by canopies stretched between the buildings and surrounded by carts and market stalls on all sides. It’s no quieter than the city center was, but all the sounds and smells feel more spread out now, like there’s enough space between them for you to wander and explore. A kid in a flamboyant tunic has arranged some clay cups on a little stage, and is gesticulating majestically at the people around him. Finally the boy stops, setting each cup carefully in its place. “Now, in which of these cups will it be found? Wagers on the left one? The middle one? The right one?” He’s briefly drowned out by the crowd. > save Game state saved successfully. > score You’ve found five out of six useful spells and enchantments. You’ve helped four out of seven villagers pay their taxes. You have not yet saved your human from her curse. > west You pace west. Depths of the bazaar Little alleys and side streets surround the main bazaar on every side, snaking off into the quieter parts of the city. This one ends in a messy tangle of canvas, where the canopies have half-collapsed, blocking the street completely. The strange creature stares at you from an alley to the north, one paw raised. An old woman watches the alley from her own market stall, eyes fixing on you as you approach. The woman watches you with a dispassionate scowl. > strange creature It’s smaller than a dog, with sleek fur, long legs, pointy ears, and unsettling eyes. And something in its expression seems smarter than other animals. Does it have a blessing like the one on your collar? The creature blinks once, turns, and slinks away to the north. > tangle of canvas A couple of the ropes have come undone, turning what was supposed to be a canopy into a solid wall. > old woman Piercing eyes, a flat nose, and a pinched, pointy sort of look, like she always wants to be scowling even when she isn’t. She smells kind of pointy too, like bronze, and other metals you can’t identify. > market stall It looks more permanent than the other stalls you’ve seen. Not quite a full building, but also not the sort of thing you’d set up and take down within a day. The carvings on top might be hieroglyphs saying what sort of place this is, or might just be decorations—it’s really hard to tell when you can’t read them yourself. The woman watches you with a dispassionate scowl. > push the storefront You apply a bit of force to the storefront, but it doesn’t budge. > old woman Piercing eyes, a flat nose, and a pinched, pointy sort of look, like she always wants to be scowling even when she isn’t. She smells kind of pointy too, like bronze, and other metals you can’t identify. > kiss the old woman “Agh, back! Back! Get off! I’m too old to be jumped on!” She shoos you away with a lot of grumbling but no real malice. The woman’s eyes track your movement, without particular care. > look Depths of the bazaar Little alleys and side streets surround the main bazaar on every side, snaking off into the quieter parts of the city. This one ends in a messy tangle of canvas, where the canopies have half-collapsed, blocking the street completely. An old woman watches the alley from her own market stall, eyes fixing on you as you approach. > north You scurry north. Exotic alley This little street doesn’t look any different from the others, but you can smell it right away: coriander and cumin and lots of other spices you can’t even identify. A brightly-colored stand has been set up at the end of it, and that seems to be the source of all the scents; fragrant smoke is wafting out toward the sky. A tall man with an oddly-shaped beard is manning the stall, surrounded by all sorts of strange bottles and devices. The strange creature is now perched on the man’s shoulders, never taking its eyes off you. He’s moved his more interesting wares front and center for you: a silver amulet and a gold amulet. The man looks up as you pad in. “Ah, hello, my canine friend! I had the sense someone interesting would be here coming. And from the look of that collar, your master is one with an appreciation for the magician’s arts, hm? And perhaps you are yourself!” > we're outta time! byeee (I’m sorry, I didn’t understand what you wanted to do.) > save Game state saved successfully. >