A city-state deep in the jungles of southern Ve, ruled by pixies whose perception of reality has fundamentally diverged from that of other races. Outsiders call them insane. The Locquine pixies call everyone else blind.
The Discordant Court
Locquine has no formal government recognizable to outsiders. The pixies organize around what they call "truth-lines"—invisible currents of meaning that they perceive flowing through reality. Those who can read the truth-lines most clearly become guides; those who cannot follow or fall.
To visitors, this appears as chaos. Pixies interrupt conversations to address empty air. They laugh at nothing, weep at sunshine, and occasionally fly in spiraling formations for hours without explanation. Negotiations are impossible in any conventional sense—the pixies respond to questions that weren't asked and ignore questions that were.
Yet Locquine persists. The pixies build elaborate structures from woven vines and river-clay. They maintain gardens of medicinal plants. They wage coordinated defense against jungle predators with uncanny effectiveness, as if they know where threats will emerge before they do.
Relations with Outsiders
Locquine tolerates visitors who follow the unspoken rules—rules that visitors cannot perceive and therefore inevitably break. The pixies have killed traders for stepping on the wrong patch of moss. They've showered gifts on explorers for breathing at the right rhythm. There is no predicting them.
What makes Locquine valuable despite the danger: the pixies create things. Weavings that show glimpses of possible futures. Elixirs that grant temporary truth-sight (and temporary madness). Maps of places that don't exist yet. Those brave or desperate enough to trade with Locquine sometimes emerge with artifacts worth fortunes—if they emerge at all.
The safest approach, according to the few repeat visitors, is to bring gifts of music. The pixies respond well to songs, especially sad ones. They'll gather to listen, swaying in unison, and afterward are more likely to engage in something resembling rational exchange.
The Five Who Speak
Among the thousands of pixies in Locquine, five have learned to translate between their perception and that of outsiders. They call themselves the Five Who Speak, and they serve as the closest thing Locquine has to diplomats. Each speaks in riddles, but the riddles contain real information if properly decoded.
The Five rotate. When one dies or "ascends" (a process the pixies celebrate but don't explain), another learns the art of speaking to the blind. Currently:
- Whispergleam — Speaks through questions, never statements
- Thornlace — Speaks only in metaphors involving water
- Mothquiet — Speaks backward; requires patience to understand
- Sungrief — Speaks normally but lies constantly; the lies encode truth
- Rootsong — Speaks through humming; words emerge from the melody
What Outsiders Miss
The pixies of Locquine are not broken. They function according to a logic that incorporates information others cannot access. When they stare at empty space, they're watching the truth-lines. When they laugh at nothing, they've perceived something genuinely funny in the pattern of reality. When they attack without provocation, they've seen a threat that hasn't manifested yet.
Whether this makes them prophets or psychotics is an ongoing debate among scholars. The pixies themselves find the question meaningless.