The Near Dream of Shining Waters The gates to Caer August, once called Caer Rosewood, are all that really remains of this once proud spire, burning from the heart of the water outside the harbour. Surrounding the holding at Darklingvale are naught but ruin and broken stone.

The Dreaming is a place where no human can physically set foot without assistance, despite the powerful influence human hopes and fears have upon the landscape. Much of the Dreaming changes constantly, a rough sea of turbulent, chaotic transformation without end. Here, chimera are born, often dying within seconds. The fortunate ones escape from these great storms of Glamour which birth them into more stable areas of the Dream. Some even flee into the Autumn World of mortals and Kithain. The Kithain walk with one foot in the Realm of Flesh and one in the Realm of Myth. For changelings, the Dreaming is always available. They dress in clothes made of dreamstuff and are empowered by the Dreaming's essence. Changelings call this dream essence Glamour, and it is what sets them apart, aliens amongst the humans which with they dwell. Yet even this pales before the Dream. While Glamour infuses every part of a changeling's life, helping him to remember his faerie nature, the world seen by changelings is actually the same world that mortals see every day. True, they see the chimerical trappings invisible to human eyes - where mortals see a grey office buildings and congested streets, Kithain may see towering castles and colorful wagons - this is still the Autumn world. It is not until a Kithain opens a Rath - a magical doorway at the heart of a Freehold - or passes the gates to a Trod - a faerie road through the Dreaming - that they once again truly remember the majesty of what they have lost. The Dreaming is truly another World, one sealed off from the Autumn Realms and guarded by the Mists, but one which Changelings are rediscovering. Stepping through that gateway opens a world lost to the Kithain over six centuries ago, and rediscovered only during the Resurgence. It is almost impossible to map the Twilight Realm. Unlike the clay Flesh Realms, areas of dream-reality mutate constantly, as the dreams that shape them change. These geographical changes are referred to as the Firchlis and can be troublesome affairs. There is no guarenteed route through the Dreaming, not even in that area closest to the Mundane World, called the Near Dreaming. Of course, there are always "exceptions." Cities in the Clay Realm tend to have mirror images - though distorted - in the Near Dreaming. Most Freeholds remain constant in their distance from each other (though not in ease of travel) and in the natures of their gateways. Perhaps it is these seats of kithain power that actually hold the dream cities stationary, though none can say for certain. In any case, the entrances to freeholds are the only stable points in the Dreaming. They remain recognizeable from visit to visit, though everything around them may change. Freeholds also generally connect the most important facet of the Dreaming, the Trods. These pathways have often existed for millennia, since the days of the Wars of the Courts, and beyond. The bind together with Silver Paths various parts of the Dreaming, but where Freeholds are a constant and consistent refuge, the Trods often change over time, bending in new directions as the lands beneath them (or above, or around) change. The Firchlis can do more than move a Trod. From time to time, the Firchlis can completely alter the shape of the Dreaming in a matter of seconds. While these events often mean no more than a change of scenery from field to forest, it can also mean a shift from Dream to Nightmare. In the Kingdom of Northern Ice, the Firchlis often takes the form of a fierce snowstorm, blinding to the eye, which only reveals the changes to actual view when the storm abates and snow settles. But there are stable points in the Near Dreaming, places where even the Firchlis doesn't manage to erase every feature of the Dreamscape. These are places of great import to the Kithain, for they are rare markers that can help changelings to find Trods is they're willing to risk the inherent dangers around them. Some are rivers, some are mountains, and others are cities not quite like those found in the Autumn World. Every Kingdom of the changelings is reflected in the Near Dreaming (just as surely as every city of the mortals is reflected in the Penumbra - 'though unlike those other reflections the Kingdoms change constantly, through the power of the Firchlis). Certain elements always remain the same: the Trods and the Freeholds remain intact, though they too undergo constant alteration. In the Kingdoms of the Kithain, each Kingdom reflects the dreams of its citizens and especially the dreams of its rulers. The Dream of the Kingdom of Northern Ice is a vast sweeping landscape of powerful majesty, blanketed beneath a continual snowfall. Great glacial plains and mountains which touch the sky - both are at home here. Beneath the snow, beneath the crust of frost, a heart of fire beats beneath the surface, ever warming holds which dig beneath the surface. Vast forests of trees Ever Green bear the weight of snow and ice, and great frozen rivers, miles deep, flow across the land. More than any other in Concordia, the Kingdom of Northern Ice is vast, and this broad expanse of wilderness can be felt by any who cross the Mists into Dream. [adapted from Dreams and Nightmares, pp. 8-33]