**
Connects to: 09.22, 27.18, 29.14.36 and the City of Shuttered Windows.
The Doge claims that he rules the City of
Shuttered Windows, but it is truly ruled by its belly.
If the city does not eat, how long can even the
mightiest live before the mobs haul their palaces
down? Therefore the Electors of the city do all
they can to keep the mob well fed and, while
the cattle and ostrich drives down from the
Freeholds are certainly important the true bread
basket of the City are the Gardens of the Sea.
Most farmers bring water to their fields either by praying for rain or digging ditches, but the practical people of the City bring their fields to the water. In the shallow waters of the coast of the freshwater Keening Sea they mound cartloads of dirt to make artificial islands (surrounded by posts driven into the mud to slow erosion) in which corn and other crops grow in well-watered abundance. These artificial islands are connected by a thousand wooden bridges, as it would not be wise to wade in these waters and risk losing a foot to the giant snapping turtles.
The great fear that grips the gardeners of the sea is that a storm will come and wash away their crops. Thankfully, a great breakwater rises from the sea (roughly from where 28.16, 29.15 and 29.16 meet and extending to the northeast past the Wedding Band (30.15)). The gardeners say that the breakwater was there even before the City and it certainly looks old enough. It is a massive belt of statues that the waves of centuries have washed smoothed but strangely entwined inhuman forms can still be made out.
Other gardens exist up and down the coast but
they are at the mercy of the storms that blow in
off the Keening Sea so they are few fewer than
those behind the breakwater.
Connections:
- During their mating season, the winds carry storms of flying snakes (27.18) from the west.
- Two great flying fish (09.22) are currently stabled in the gardens of the sea.
- The Gardens are flooded during the annual rain (29.14.36).
Hooks:
- Where else does the City get its food?
- Why so many snapping turtles?
- Who built the great breakwater and what do the ancient worn-down statues depict?
