The Fray - endlessm/threadbare GitHub Wiki

Overview

The collective name for the creatures that haunt The Fraying and follow its frayed roads inward. Enemies of the StoryWeaver. Also called the Children of Null.

For a long time the Fray were believed to be born of the Void, or of the Fraying itself, bursting out of the dark to fall upon Threadbare. They are not. Nothing comes out of the Void: it is not sentient, it makes nothing, and anything that passes into it is unravelled forever. The Fray were woven by Null, on the three Denial Looms, built from the elements torn out of the Eternal Loom and hidden in fortresses across Threadbare. Null weaves them from the last loose fibres that drift at the Fraying's edge, and sets them loose there, which is why they seemed to be born at the edge. They gather in the Fraying still, because it is where the Void is pushing at the boundaries of the world, and where they can speed its growth the most, and they are boldest and hungriest the closer they are to it. But they do not feed on the Void. Over time they have followed the frayed roads inward, and are now found far from the Fraying, anywhere there are stories, memories and songs to devour, and anywhere a place has started to forget itself.

Every one of them was made for the same purpose: to hasten the Void's otherwise natural work. The Void spreads by neglect. The Fray make the neglect come faster.

A Hunger for Each Gift

Scholars at the Observatory of the Unseen once noted that each kind of Fray seemed to favour one thing the world has made. The Elders now know why. Each Denial Loom is built around one stolen element and weaves one great kind of Fray: the Not Loom spins InkDrinkers with If's Spindle, the None Loom weaves MemoryMoths with Once's Warp Stones, and the Never Loom weaves Storyvores with Ever's Shuttle. The InkDrinkers hunger most for Imagination. The MemoryMoths hunger most for Memory. The Storyvores hunger most for Spirit. The truth is that all of them will eat all three, but each has a hunger it prefers above all others, and none of them ever has enough.

This is why the Fray are never far behind the Void. Where a community stops tending one of the things that holds it together, the Fray that eats that thing is soon to follow. A town that has stopped reading will hear InkDrinkers whining at the windows. A village that has stopped telling its old tales will hear Storyvores chattering on the road. The Fray do not cause the forgetting, but they finish it.

Three Gifts, Three Enemies

Of all the Fray, three were woven with a purpose beyond hunger. Null made an enemy for each of the gifts the FirstSpun gave the world, and each carries one of Null's Three Denials:

FirstSpun Gift Null's Denial Null's Child What it takes
[Once]] ](/endlessm/threadbare/wiki/Memory- -None- -[[MemoryMoths) Memories themselves, so that nothing remains
[If]] ](/endlessm/threadbare/wiki/Imagination- -Not- -[[InkDrinkers) The ink, and the Inklings in it, so that no new idea ever reaches the page
[Ever]] ](/endlessm/threadbare/wiki/Spirit- -Never- -[[Storyvores) The stories that already exist, so that no one can read them and be inspired to a better life and a better future

The Void is drawn to absence: wherever Memory, Imagination or Spirit go missing, wherever culture, stories, connection, community and care are no longer passed on. These three were woven to make that absence faster.

For contributors, this explains why Null made them. It does not change where, why or how they are met in the game.

Nature and Behaviour

The Fray range from mischievous to savage, and which one a traveller meets depends on how hungry they are and how close to the edge. Near the settled heart of the world they are pests: they snatch, tangle, trip, and tease. Out in the Fraying, where the Void runs thick, they are something far worse.

They share a few habits:

  • They travel the seams. The Fray move along frayed roads and through the places where whole fabric meets worn, rarely striking out across land that is well tended and well remembered.
  • They leave nothing behind. What the Fray eat does not come back on its own. A page drained by InkDrinkers is simply blank. A tale eaten by Storyvores leaves only a vague sense that something used to be there.
  • They fear what is finished. A story told all the way to its end, a book sealed and kept, a song sung through to the last note: the Fray have no way in to things that are whole.

Known Fray

MemoryMoths. Plush, moth-like creatures with wings of faded handwriting, at home in the Memoir Mines, who eat what a memory is made of and what it means. Quiet custodians alone, a plague in swarms. Three kinds are known: Flitters, Dusters and Pinners. Favourite hunger: Memory.

InkDrinkers. Spindly, mosquito-like creatures that swarm in from the Fraying in long, whining clouds. They settle on anything written or printed and drain the ink with needled mouths, leaving pages blank and the Imagination of a place withered. Three kinds are known: Splugs, Sploads and Splats. Favourite hunger: Imagination.

Storyvores. Savage, goblin-like pack hunters, made almost entirely of mouth and belly, who roam the frayed roads in chattering, hungry packs. They devour stories in any form, spoken, sung, painted, half-remembered, briefly imagined. Dangerous in numbers, cowardly alone. Five kinds are known: Gnashers, Nippers, Gulpers, Bloaters and Gobblers. Favourite hunger: Spirit.

Smudgers. Oily, slug-like creatures of the BlotWorks, woven on the Not Loom, that leap at travellers to smudge them out and smear writing past reading. Driven off by water. Favourite hunger: Imagination, in the form of clarity.

Standing Against the Fray

Nobody in Frays End claims the Fray can be ended for good, not while Null's Denial Looms still stand to weave more. They are not beyond the Void, though. Nothing is: not Elders, not Threadlings, not plants or buildings or hills, and not the Children of Null. Anything that passes into the Void is unravelled, the Fray included. They can be driven off, outwitted, outlasted, and starved. Those who travel the frayed roads learn a few things quickly:

  • Keep what matters closed and whole. Those who fight InkDrinkers carry sealed bottles and fresh quills.
  • Finish your stories. Storyvores flee from a tale told all the way to its end, and from a StoryWeaver who refuses to be quiet.
  • Watch the Hushrooms. The soft-capped Hushrooms that grow along frayed seams dim their glow when Fray are near. A cluster going suddenly silent is the surest warning a traveller will get.
  • Tend what the Fray would eat. Every act of reading, telling, singing, and weaving takes away a meal. The best defence against the Fray is a place that remembers itself.

Creating New Fray

Contributors are welcome to add new Fray to Threadbare. A new creature belongs to the Fray if it:

  1. Was woven by Null on one of the Denial Looms, to hasten the Void's work, and is set loose along the Fraying.
  2. Has a favourite hunger: one of the three gifts of the FirstSpun, Imagination, Memory or Spirit, above all, often in a particular form (such as writing, story, dream, song, colour, craft, or names).
  3. Opposes the StoryWeaver, and can be driven off by the thing it eats being kept whole, finished, or tended.

Follow the Naming Conventions: Fray names should be compounds that say plainly what the creature does or eats, like InkDrinkers and Storyvores.

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