The Sylthik are a ruling caste of Kyagos humans, not a separate lineage — their distinction is scar-rank, not blood. They rule the four city-states of Kyagos, and they measure a person's worth in scars. A line cut into the cheek marks distinction: one for a minor honor, five for the highest lords of Vassum or Tekos. The scars are read at a glance, so a Sylthik's standing walks into a room on their face before they say a word. Outsiders carry the opposite mark. A handkerchief knotted at the throat identifies a visitor as rightless, someone the law does not protect, and most Sylthik treat anyone wearing one accordingly.
Their wealth comes out of the mountains, and it is dug by people who are not Sylthik. For roughly four centuries the city-states have run on slave-worked mines, and for three of those they sold the gems and worked metal to Drasnian dwarf traders out of Gorath's Slaver's Coast, who supplied fresh slaves in return. A Sylthik lord never had to break ore. He had to own the shaft and read the ledger. That bred a ruling caste fluent in cruelty at one remove, counting profit while the dying happened underground and out of earshot.
A man with no scars is a child or a foreigner, and the law has a use for each. — a saying of the Vassum scar-courts
The arrangement cracked when Syvlius burned. The largest city-state fell to its own slaves and to the Dead Moon Tribe that came down to finish the work, and the surviving Sylthik now govern an island that has watched them bleed. The three intact city-states have closed ranks, doubled their guards, and started quietly doubting whether the others will hold. None of them has ever governed without slaves, and none of them knows how.
Aspects
- My rank is cut into my cheek
- Someone else breaks the ore