WORLD BOOK WORLD BOOK WORLD BOOK 0076 0076
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any diplomatic visits or among those seeking to establish trust. Ruchi build up immunity to many poisons over time, though they more easily detect and
recognize the effects of poisons than others. Keeping a client alive is the Ruchi’s code
• Svaramu are hired public speakers that announce
and spin all family matters for public consumption.
They can often be rehired to tell a completely different story the very next day. Some svaramu earn
wonderful secondary incomes secretly reporting on
additional details about their public employers and
the true tales behind the official story.
• Vargam are also poisoners, though they are not as
exhaustively trained as the Rumu, nor do they act
with the acceptance of Prajan leaders. In short, they
are amateurs at poison craft at least in terms of variety and depth of knowledge in creating and using
poisons. They are the outlaws, and perhaps not just
assistants to assassins. These crafty bug and lizard
collectors extract what they need from creatures
and nature, mix it with roots and saps, and dole out
their toxins liberally to those who can afford them.
Their ability and speed at crafting virulent poisons
for assassinations make them highly sought after by
the desperate who cannot wait for a Rumu’s help.
• Takaku are a caste of unclean laborers with no possibility of upward social or economic mobility. Not
quite slaves, most Prajalu shun these indentured
servants or, like shadows, acknowledge them only
as needed or when noticed. Strangely, many private rites demand their blessings for the establishment of homes, new ventures, and new loves.
Child Trading & Child Selling
Prajalu sometimes sell infant or very young family
members to one another, but rarely do they do so after
a child can walk, and only then for matters of continuity (if a family loses many to a plague, for example).
On the surface, this appears to be a form of slavery,
but nothing could be further from the truth. In Prajalu
minds, seeking new blood strengthens the family unit
with new skills or abilities. Newfound brothers and sisters are immediately welcomed into the fold.
Outsiders think the Prajalu practice of child trading and purchase alarmingly odd, and keep their own
children under a watchful eye when among them.
Prajan practices generate many fearful rumors, making
them an easy spook-story for misbehaving children—
“behave or Prajalu will steal you away in the night!”
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Customs & Culture
Given how distrustful the Prajalu are of other humans
and other races, learning about their culture comes more
through the Nyutu or older lore from the times of the
Dragon Kings. Things have changed much since then,
granted, so it is a guess as to how much truth wanderers
know about this tribe without braving them face to face.
Prajalu are generally indifferent to the other human tribes
and races of their world. They recognize that every group
must make practical adaptation to their surroundings in
order to survive and, so long as another group does not
interfere with them, they are content to live side by side.
If others should enter Prajan lands, they find that Prajalu
distrust all non-equatorial humans to a point bordering
on racial hatred. Foreigners garner immediate suspicion
regardless of actions or inactions. It becomes understood
that they prefer the company of other Prajalu. The exception to outsider-loathing is their universal embrace of the
Nyutu, regardless of tribal origin, as harbingers of prosperity. Nyutu recognize this and move through Prajan lands in
greater numbers than elsewhere on Khitus.
At the birth of any Prajan child, a Prajal adult can invoke a combat challenge to claim that child for his or
her family. This practice is often employed by jealous
cuckolds or romantic rivals. Any family member can accept the challenge to fight to keep the child, though it
most often falls to one of the child’s parents. Regardless
of the challenge’s outcome, enormous social pressure
ensures that the child is raised fairly and cherished.
Prajalu are free to marry as many times as they deem
necessary, usually for business or political purposes.
In the process they create large, extended or multiple
family units with concurrent marriages. The Prajalu are
just as jealous or emotional as other humans, so these
multiple marriages are often fraught with strife, either
among the multiple spouses of either gender or simply
in matters of inheritance and the seeming favoring (or
lack thereof) of children.
The dead garner widespread mourning in a family and
community; there are specific rituals for the deceased
and those held dear. None among the departed’s immediate family and closest friends may speak during
the seven-day mourning period after discovery of the
death, lest their voices drown any final messages from
the deceased; they write all communications on wax
tablets that are eventually collected and interred with
the fallen’s other belongings. As soon as possible, a family member and a Rumu make a death mask of the deceased. After a body’s disposal on the second day of a
mourning period, the death mask and any other artistic
effigies or representations of the deceased become the
