gods

There are only four pieces worth focussing on . Two gods and two avatars. Aleph and Iax. Tehlu and Encanis. Aleph has a problem. He has captured Encanis and going to, in layman's terms, break his long name apart and rename him into the cthaeh. A name fit for the faen realm. He has a prison for him to rot out his infinite life far away from mortal, yet not quite as far as the outer void that is the home of it's kind. Circular problem.  To rid the world of a god, a God must die, but gods cannot die 4 doors problem. It takes a god to kill a god and all they can really do is cancel each other out, and that would destroy the world in the process. But Lanre has a piece of Encanis , Lanre is now a tiny god. So if god takes Encanis away, that leaves lanre in charge of the world. Where is away? It's in the Fae. God has to divide himself into angels, giving up his own power. Tehlu is the new light god, the equal of Lanre's dark 

Gods cannot sleep, but Tehlu slept. Dreaming. 

What makes a god? 4 doors of the mind test. 

Gods cannot sleep, cannot forget, cannot go mad, and cannot die. 

Aleph is all of these things, and so is his twin brother you call the Cthaeh. 

In the beginning there was the nameless void. In those days the void was all there was. 

Now imagine that to look a bit like static. Lots of little bits of black and white all jumbled up together. 

That's where Aleph makes his entrance. He took all the white bits out of the void and breathed their long names turning them into 'stuff'

As a consequence of his actions, all of the black pieces of 'stuff' were also separated out. These were the undesirable parts to Alephs desire And this chance/choice was created. So now There were two piles of stuff. And therefore by dividing the void Aleph also created his own opposite. Aleph is the Lord of light and plays with white stuff. His opponent is the Lord of Shadows plays with the black stuff. They are like two sides of the same coin. Two halves of the same thing. Two players in the same game

Aleph and Iax, the Aleu.

As different as hats and shoes.

In the current game, black has only got one piece left on the white side of the board (of any importance) and it has currently been captured by white who is now deciding exactly what to do with it. 

He could, with enough power, break it's name apart and cast it back to whence it came, but he cannot kill it for good, only temporarily, that much inate power this black piece retains, and eternal imprisonment is impractical in white domain and so banishment is the next best answer. 

But that opens the door for a return and so white has a plan to build his eternal prison in the dark half of the board. Eight white pieces were sent ahead to form a circle of white pieces to guard the black from it's fellow black counters. 

Black could still commit suicide tho and thus escape it's forlorn encisement through and so removing that piece of it's name is also essential. God can imprison the spirit shadow of darkness but 

What to do with the corpse?

Tear a pocket off his cloak. Stitch it back on inside out.

It's like the difference between Imagination and memory. 

Between speaking and singing.

An 8fold board demands the pieces have a 4fold name. 7 fold board is unlucky.  A 6 fold board demands a 3 part name. 

Has Kvothe spoken to god's yet?

Yes. Cthaeh (iax) and Haliax. 

Aleph created the world. Names of all things , light and dark. Two gods

Gods need avatar in flesh and blood. Enter Encanis and Tehlu.

Angels don't sleep. Does Selitos? Selitos is fourth 

Aleph gave up part of himself to make Tehlu. Iax gave up part of himself to make Haliax who wears a piece of his torn shadow cloak, the hole in the darkness of the Mael where light now sits. Don't return the cloak! Or bad things will happen

Aleph and Iax are equal twins

Black and white board

If I am doing things right so far you should have some mental images in your heads, but words and numbers are just how you assign names pieces. And pieces should be placed on a board. a diagram or 8 should help focus the puzzle. 

I've thought about this and have decided to simulate the groups I have identified into counters on a plane of existence. Shaped counters. In opposition colours.  That can be placed in formation to create an endgame to help us understand better the fall of Encanis. 

Tak

Working backwards in time should be easier to understand as there is less things to take in in one hit, but it's not. Imagine first being shown the final position in a game of tak, then second having it explained to you why it is a winning formation

, then third being told how all the pieces got where they did. and then fourth being told the basic rules of play. before finally having the players introduced. Backwards is not always better. 

I've put a few pieces on the board now. Chandrian, singers and Sithe.

The Amyr you probably have some ideas about already and Lanre is waiting in the wings. But a queen is more powerful than a pawn but no matter how powerful the pieces are they pale into insignificance next to the Players, two beings of ultimate power, sitting on chairs opposite each other whose strategy actually moves these pieces about. 

But  starting off with the players has it's own complications since they are the Aleu and their own paths to the game table are complicated. 

And it's rather difficult knowing exactly where to start. 

Now simple board games are played on game boards, and these are usually in two colours of black and white. That's a good place to start since black and white are the two sides at play in our scenario. Each side needs a side so this is a double sided board.

Let's have one side for Temerant and the other side for Fae.  The most common board style is checkered and if you know the game checkers you will know that the whole game is played by moving pieces diagonally on the black squares only. The white squares are not used, making half the squares redundant but if they were to be incorporated into the rule book... Than that would Effectively create two boards in one place, which would allow for two different games to be played simultaneously. You follow? It's all a question of which colour piece can go on which colour square. Both boards are of a size 8x8 and that seems a pretty nice manageable number to run with today since it is small enough to count on fingers and is mathematically adaptable to the rules I am inventing here.

Once upon a time, both sides of the board were chequered. Then along came gods father, who put all of the white bits on one side and all of the black bits on the other. 

The result created two opposites and between them was a path to the lethani. 

LP lethani path

How to build a prison.

Lighthouses?

So imagine you have caught this invasive species that cannot die. Bracken?

Like a phoenix it will rise from it's own ashes and try to invade once again. 

Since killing it only sends it back to the other side. It has a link here. A link as powerful as Tehlu. Equally so. They are two fingers of the gods. Arm wrestling. Turn the tables. Next game will begin on the other board. God carried Encanis throght the hole and grew a tree begind it . A being of light spotlighting the prince of darkness. There is now one white piece on the black board and so obviously we will have one black piece on the white board in reciprocation.

And that's how the game finished.

And stands today.

Map the Fae now.

Once there was a road eight white squares long. 

Blacks move attempted to turn all of these eight white squares to dark, but the seventh square remained white. Victory denied.

In the current position. White capstone Tehlu has captured the black general encanis and put him in chains. He is about to break him apart in his hands and send him back through the fire onto to the other side of the board where his faen cage awaits.

Now in these days, the Fae was a dark place. There was only starlight to work by, daylight was a mortal thing. But if you know the Name of your fae star, you have mastery over it, it's light will be tied to you always and will keep the creatures of darkness away from you. Lots of stars, lots of spotlights. But no big shiny sunny beacon. This is the day that god flicked the switch and  turned on the faerielight.

Now our endgame history tells us of eight cities (7+1 'special city') which would fit nicely across the board if placed in a winning line. Furthermore , Aleph now had in his hand 8 angels (including two half angels plus the 'special piece,' called Tehlu!) in his white arsenal. Somewhere in opposition we have the seven Chandrian (6+1 'special piece' Haliax) who , in a black game-over scenario would actually have been (7+1) Chandrian who were tasked to capture all (7+1) cities, but they famously missed their chances at winning that move outright when one of their number defaulted. That's why we are all still playing today.  We don't know how many Amyr were formed but given that they are tasked with confounding the plans of the Chandrian, Eight Amyr (seven plus 'Special piece' Selitos) would seem the likely answer since that fits nicely onto our board as well 

The natural number suggestion for how many Sithe are involved should then also be eight (and in a beautiful game would also confirm to (7+1) with the one being Felurian!)

Now all of Alephs pieces were created out of Ruach. Now there is no way of knowing now many of them there once were but 64 is a pretty good square number to play on a mortal level which also gives us some cubic number possibilities, and they might prove useful if we are thinking about incorporating a second realm into this double sided board. Are you still with me? Good.

In the current game, the black 'special piece' Encanis has been captured by the white 'special piece' Tehlu. A black piece is now safely pinned down under fire in the white half of the board and Aleph is pondering his next move....

But not all things are square. The moon is round. Pegs pegs pegs. Holes in the map.

Fortunately I've already done a little groundwork here during the Perial chapters

Now If Aleph wanted a chat with Perial, Why didn't he just turn up at her door ? Because God's are noncorporeal beings who can only interact with the world of flesh and blood , that's why.

Aleph put a piece of himself onto the game table. This was Tehlu.

His opponent was another god called Iax, and he had already made a similar move when he took possession of Lanre a white knight , painted him a different colour, and put him back on the board as a black knight. He then moved 'like a worm in fruit' to subvert several other pieces to his side to gain a powerful position in the middle game. 

Aleph

Death quote. Even gods die. Mortal word, immortal . Other plains. The land of the dead is god land. Touch of god grants immortality, angels etc plus Perial. Gold touch. Touch of god also takes it away. Sliding scale of titans. Tiny gods. 

Gods don't sleep, Tehlu slept. Non corporeal . Chandrian death denied them.

"In the beginning... The world was spun out of the nameless void by Aleph, who gave everything a name..."

Now without going into too much theology, this makes Aleph a God. 

Now the first rule of the universe is that For every action there is a equal and opposite reaction. And that law dictates that God must always have a twin, usually called the Devil. Because God is light and you cannot have a light without making a shadow, shadow and darkness are the colours of the devils house. And between them these two gods combine to form everything* except the moon she is a third party. Alephs counterpart has had a few names but You know him best as Iax before and the cthaeh after. They are the same being , Alephs other side and are like the two ends or the same piece of string. Think of them as light and dark, One and zero. Alpha and omega ...It's all the same thing really. Two gods. Perfectly balanced. But only One moon. 

Aleph is the god who appeared in Perial's dream as a being 'made entirely of fire or sunshine:. Agents of darkness usually appear suitably clad in the colours of the opposition.

 It's a bit like god is a programmer who works through... software. And so if he wanted to get physically interactive in the world he had spun then he would need to develop some hardware, and that why he needed Tehlu to act as his avatar in Temerant. And thats why he needed to use Perial as his link.

He had to change her a bit to make her body fit for purpose but she said she was willing so it was an act born of love. Whereas folk like Poor rob the rhintA got raped. 'a man shouldn't lie with a woman save in love' she said . And already had the right bits to give birth and gods dream touch (with his great glowing penis) allowed her body to conceive speed up the process and between them they Produced a special child with a link to Aleph on his astral plane AND a link to the earth on which he would walk to being everyone in it gods justice. Barefoot. Thus Tehlu could join in physical battle with the avatars of darkness who were already looses upon the land. 

Encanis had no such link being a possession this the earth blackened beneath his feet.