Of The Zetac [from The Codex]

[Introduction to The Codex]

Of the Zetac, we must begin with what we must understand: that many of their quotidian practices have been banned in Pyth. That is on occasion of those practices’ abominable nature: cannibalism, hominid sacrifice, blood feuds and grotesqueries of violence, arbitrary religious diktats and social commands contravening the very organic laws of Pyth, and, not in any manner least, the keeping of the most vicious and savage animals.

The Zetac remain in Pyth due to the hoary promises made to their ancestors, the Kokokol. They, the people of the Zetac, so long ago saved the Gens Electae from the ravages of the Kromena and were promised within Pyth a permanent home. That promise is honored yet this day. But the Zetec also by promise must abide within Pythian law and custom, and, indeed, their priests, of due course, did this agree.

Hence, to wit, we must herein discuss both the practices of the Zetac duly permitted in Pyth, and, then, their execrable practices, banned as they are. For those practices are yet followed by the Zetac in their distal Northmen homelands and elsewhere the Kokokol are found, and, moreover, such practices seemingly form the scaffolds of Zetac religion and culture, permitted and unpermitted alike. And, moreover and more troubling, many Zetas, it is keenly suspected, continue these self-same practices in secret and with subterfuge within the confines of Pyth, illegal though that is.

Mayhap we should begin, then, with the most banal observation about the Zetac, and that is that they are highly ceremonial in all things. Even the most minor meal is accompanied by prayer. They have incantations on awakening, and different ones on retiring, as well as, to be certain, incense, certain postures and salutes, and private prayers. Birth, death, coming of age, planting and reaping of crops, beginning and completion of crafts and works of all kind, exchanges of goods, marriage (of course), hunting, combat and fighting, exercise, game-playing, salutations and gatherings among family, friends, or strangers: all of these are invested in ceremony. Every season calls for forms of dress and headwear and adornments, and every change of season (merely four by their count, per annum) is a ceremonial event par excellence.

All of this to be sure is not banned in Pyth, not banned, that is, as long as it is not disruptive.

The priests of the Zetac are, perhaps inscrutably to cultured society, also their secular leaders, officials, and nobility, albeit, at least nominally, for they in this are subservient to the secular laws and officials of Pyth. Priests bless (or reject from blessing as unworthy or degenerate) food, clothing, households, roadways, people, eating utensils and ceremonial vessels, incense and weapons, armor and fortifications and decorative objects, playthings and crops and fields and children. Priests will bless other priests, and they will bless the temples where the blessings occur. Their high priest in Pyth, the Grand Zeta, is considered blessed by the gods themselves, as well as other priests, and the highest of the high priests (the “Grandest Grand Zeta,” we do suppose), far away in the frigid hinterlands of the Kokokol, is considered verily to be one among the very gods themselves.

The ceremonies and prayers and blessings and devotions of the Zetac are all done but to one end: to appease the gods. For the gods, the Zetac believe, control all and everything. If it should pass that the gods (or even one of them) are unhappy, then events will transpire poorly, mayhap horribly. But if the gods are happy and content, then good things should follow, and then the people are happy and content, indeed as they should be.

And who is it who should determine whether things have gone well or poorly? And who is it who should determine what gods are happy? And if the gods (but even one) are unhappy, and who is it then who should determine why it is and (most importantly) who is culpable? The priests: the priests determine cause and consequence. And here trouble brews.

Blame, to be sure, usually redounds upon the follower, the believer, the hapless layperson, who is duly accused of apostacy, of failure in rite, ritual, and belief. The penalty in minor instances may be penitential (self or public abasement and due restitution to the priests), yet in those matters of significance it will be expulsion. Priests, natch, do not themselves blame.

This much is lawful by Pythian laws, yea, not banned as long as the abasements are not so extreme as to violate the law. These are religious acts and no more.

Yet what if the follower is blameless and angry at the blame laid on? And what if he or she or they are indeed known as devout and pious and reverent? (A glimpse into the cause of Zetac ceremonial piousness here emerges.) And what if the priest himself has failed visibly or repeatedly? And what if whomever expects blame finds another priest to lay blame, first, at another door? And what if the priests have animosities amongst themselves and would risk internecine conflict for resolution?

We come, then, at long last, yet inexorably, to the heretofore referenced crisis: the forbidden practices of the Zetac.

For, firstly, by tradition and even by modern practice ayont Pyth, the penalties of the Zetac in all but minor matters are abasements brutal in nature or, oft, death. In Pyth this is by law forbidden, but many the Zeta has, indeed, gone lost within the City.

Moreover, secondly, the Kokokol and, hence, the Zetac, are long known among the Northmen and their enemies for eating of the hearts and brains of their vanquished to steal their souls and thwart revenge in their afterworld. This is but one desecration made of the bodies of their enemies. Those who have displeased the gods (even one) are subject to no less. Such is, to be certain, unlawful and banned in Pyth.

Yet, moreover, thirdly, the Kokokol and Zetac partake in blood sacrifices in the gelid wastes they call their motherland. These offerings to the gods (or a god, more oft) are not just of the vanquished and impure (low dignity sacrifices, to be sure), or of valuables (of middling value), but of skilled soldiers, and beautiful maidens, and of the Zetac's very children. This they do to show how they honor a god (or gods) or beg for favor. In Pyth such horrific conduct is grossly illegal and condemned. Nonetheless blood altars have been found within the Zetac's very ghetto.

Fourthly, priestly accusations of impiety or impurity cultivate volatile violent reactions from those accused and their kith and kin. The stakes can be mortal, and oft it is that accusation and response devolve, in and out of Pyth, into orgies of bloodletting, murder, and destruction: priest and followers against accused, followers against priests, priest against priest. "The Zetac do not forget," it is said, and indeed readily they hold grudges. Violence deferred is not violence averted. Zetas have gathered clansmen from afar more than once, and, following some period of quiescence post an incendiary accusation, savagery and brutality have anon erupted. Difficult it is to describe the horror: the Zetac, particularly those suckled in the degenerate frozen desolation of their motherland's teats, revel seemingly in barbaric acts, in going berserk and slashing, maiming, desecrating, and violating their foes. Thus, the careful ceremoniousness of the Zetac yields by paroxysms of insanity.

Then, fifthly, in coming into Pyth the same said kith and kin of Zetas have many times brought extraordinarily dangerous wild animals and monsters to assist in their forays of vengeance, as alluded to, above. Long have the Zetac been banned from keeping their pet bears in Pyth. In like style the law does prohibit their keeping "rabid dogs, feral wolves, or any hunting falcon as large as a hobbit." The Zetas' klatch, nonetheless, have brought into Pyth their massive "atalbyorn," to wit, ferocious, vicious, unspeakably enormous bears, uncontrollable but by their masters, and even then tenuously. Other times they have brought creatures called by them "bagaski" or "killer clouds," being thick violet plasmatic miasmas that, when touched, quickly absorbed the heat of those so touched, killing them nigh the instant. These were "husbanded" by the Zetac's weird cult of ineffectual magicians commonly known as the "Yeti Knights," themselves, we note, also banned in Pyth. Nonetheless, these "bagaski" proved impervious to basal magics and even to the stabs of steely knives of the mages of the Office of Magic. Only eventually after heroic effort by the City did all such "bagaski" succumb via the most esoteric means. These are but a few examples.

We turn, then, lastly and sixth, to that situation anent when, the transpiration of ordinary events ends in such a dire way for an entire Zetac community that verily its entire population is threatened or dying. Then, and but nearly then only, excepting ordinary ceremonies and blessings, does the Grand Zeta materialize, gracing Zetac society with his august presence. For, then, it would seem, the Zetac are certain they have been bedeviled, bewitched, cursed. And who wouldst lay such a curse? To them obviously another city or hamlet, an age old community of rivals, mayhap, perhaps ones already considered by those accursed to be the enemy. Here, then, it is to be revenge and war. Thus the Grand Zeta;s presence becomes warranted, and war and revenge he duly declares and sanctifies, cloaking and blessing the action in ceremony and prayer. Yet, too often the supposed evil rival in point of fact rests placidly unaware of these developments, then to be caught blind when the brutal atrocity materializes, an attack by its very design meant to fully obliterate the community and its citizen. This the City of Pyth, however, being the more supreme authority, truly cannot countenance. Laying aside, if but slightly, the immoral depravity of such acts, such acts nonetheless threaten the very tranquility and, indeed, the very security of Pyth. For Pyth cannot be the victim of such attacks, nor the source of them. Pyth cannot as well tolerate such conflicts within its very walls, such as they are extraordinary breaches of the peace, indeed. Hence, Pythian law bans the Zetac from accursing others or responding to curses. One cannot say this has been entirely effective. Yet, within the bounds of Pyth's laws and walls it is forbidden, and beyond the City's jurisdiction we can take no measure.

Certainly, then, our discussion of the Zetac's forbidden customs ends with an observation transcendent of our banal beginning: the "eccentricities" of the Zetac are, in fact, existential threats to the City. Such, we are told, if dubiously, is "more than compensated" by the martial benefits the Zetac bring to the City's defense. For Grey Elves, alas, have more notoriety as magicians than warriors.

We must conclude, then, with what we must accept: that the Zetac, uncouth, immoral, and disgusting as they may be, a people as barbaric as the Rublemanae but more disgusting, are nonetheless within the City to remain. Their presence is more than the prize of a promise, as might be supposed, but as protectors of the population.

Prepared by C.L. Strauss, D.M.A.

Office of Religious and Cultural Affairs

Note: It has come to the attention of the Office of Redaction and Correction (hereinafter "ORC"), via a communique from Grinderstal, King and Primary Prelate of the Zetechians, that certain statements in Dr. Strauss's analysis, supra, may be inappropriate. Mr. Ginderstal refers to these as "death libel." In response, Dr. Strauss apologizes that anyone would misunderstand his analysis in an offensive manner. He also states that he "did not think Barbarians could read." Dr. Strauss apparently fully relies on assistants for field work, but he assures us his analysis is accurate. On behalf of the City, ORC reaffirms Pyth's warm relationship with the Zetechians and the important role Zetechians play in Pyth's community. We regret any suggestion otherwise.