The Foundling's Tale: Factotum Part 41

Sunt Veil, the ~ low sea wall that runs before Fishguarde, Little Beachey and Hard Mile. It continues for miles south and north, following every promontory and inlet, gaining different names at different parts, yet is all the same long wall.

Swarty Hobnag, the ~ very old bogle warped by his loathing of everymen to desire to eat their rotting flesh.

sweeten to soak in a dulcifer, to dulcify.

swink(s) city laborer, one who works the mills and foundries of the city magnates.

swordist more common name for a sabrine adept or sabrine magist.

T.

taffies and glairs what we might call lollies or candy or sweets, taffies being the harder sort and glairs the softer. Some of the more common include sugar-purses, triple boilers, syrup-marrows, rose-marrows, clementine glairs and honeyed persimmons-even boschenbread (see Book Two) is considered a taffie.

talbot breed of seekhound, a dog bred to track all manner of living thing but not to fight with them. Similar to our beagles, though perhaps a little sleeker and a little taller.

tandem comfortable seat made to fit two or more bottoms, hence the name, for a tandem is intended to give ease to more than one person. Imported at first from exotic northern lands such as Turkemantium and Dhaghestahn, such original items of furniture are not common even among the middling cla.s.ses, yet more local artisans have made themselves very rich indeed imitating the style. It is fas.h.i.+onable among the fluffs to sleep sitting upon one of these. Exitious or broken-faced leers (those with sthenicons grown into their faces) also prefer such sleeping arrangements, as the permanently attached sthenicon does not allow for lying down comfortably without the requirement of a specially fas.h.i.+oned pillow to keep the head from lolling during the night.

telltale's gaze, beneath a ~ to be subject to the scrutiny of a false-man so as to determine if you are lying or speaking the truth.

Temburly Hall hereditary manor house of the Counts Plume and their ancestors, a grand spreading structure now maintained by a mere skeleton of staff in the grieving absence of their grieving lord, Philemon Plume, elder brother to Gaspard Plume.

testudoe(s) heavy-ended bludgeon, five to seven feet long, k.n.o.bbled with metal studs or wooden knots and giving a powerful and nasty blow. A very old pattern of weapon finding its way into Soutland culture from the Lauslands-who took it from the pa.s.sionate folk of Ing-testudoes are traditionally made of wood and as such provide some protection from the arcs of a fulgar if you should ever choose to take on such a foe.

tetter-faced covered with tetters, that is, acne.

thanatocrith technical name for a sciomane, a controller of gudgeons and rever-men, though jackstraws are held to be the most pliant of all the tribe. Using a variety of puissance called striction-and somewhat similar to a wit's frission-they can achieve control or obligation over a single gudgeon, or two or three or four or even more gudgeons as they increase in skill and experience. Through this control they can obligate the gudgeons, dictating to some extent their actions, their intent, though if left without an obligation a rever will do as it determines according to its nature. This capacity to obligate rever-men is gained through transmogrifying surgery that takes some tiny fraction of the head-matter of the person and swaps it for some of the head-matter of the gudgeon. Combining this with select memes (mimetic organs) from the patibilic system (the pinguis patibila) more typically found in a wit gives the desired control through the employment of the frissionlike striction. The more gudgeons in your fold the more head-matter required, and the farther they get from you, the weaker your obligation.The term "thanatocrith" comes from the Attic root "thanatis" for the moment of transition from life to death, from Phenomena to Tharma. They are rare in the Half-Continent and will usually be found only at rousing-pits or in the hidden employ of some black habilist or dark trading magnate. In places with lesser moral nicety (such as Heilgoland), however, they are common enough and perform with particular distinction as percusors.

thatigated sterilized. Brought in by the transmogrifying surgeons of Sinster nearly two hundred years ago, thatigation is a relative newcomer to more common physical learning; such cleaning of all surgical implements has markedly reduced deaths on the table and, even more so, after surgery.

thaumacra technical term for script "recipes."

thennelever tube, usually of wood, used for safely containing the more dangerous kind of powdered potive. As thick as two fingers and as long as a hand, it has a wax-leather cap fastened to one end and fixed down by a metal ring. Within the tube is an upper segment in which a dose resides, shaken in from the main receptis beneath.You remove the top, fling the opening away from you into the air, releasing the potive several yards in the desired direction, return the top, tip it up, shake in another portion and repeat.

therimoir(s) terrible toxic weapons, mostly of historied manufacture. See Book Two.

thorn-withies species of box-thorn called the sentis magna, lance-leaf or leuce thorn (leuce p.r.i.c.kle), which provides thorns of a foot or more in length with a basal diameter of three inches or even more. These thorns are "harvested" and used along the tops of walls and the upper margins of their face as a scaling deterrent; those on the upper wall-face pointing down at an acute angle to needle a climbing foe make the placing of scaling ladders difficult.

three-bell scoundrels late-night, closing-time troublemakers.

Three Brothers Hob, the ~ nonsense poetica-or performed poem-about three hungry nickers. In its entirety it goes something like this: Frair Clog, Log and Nog

Three hobs in a bog;

One turns to the others to say,

"Brother Clog! Brother Log!

We wallow like hog

While yon tasty morsels do play!"

So these hobs from bog

Step out of the sog

To s.n.a.t.c.h neighbor eekers away.

These eekers did cog

This maraude from fog

And bent o'er in prim fancies to pray.

Yet Clog, Log and Nog

Still came from the sog

And took off those daft eekers as prey.

Three hobs from the bog

Heft meals still agog,

To return on their swamperling way.

Yet back in the bog

Nog turned to hob Clog,

Said,"Already I've eaten today!"

Then frowning to cog

Clog figured for Nog

An answer to his brother's dismay.

Spake he,"Brother Nog,

You'll do like the hog

And sink your food down in the brey."