Trods
Trods are one of two means to enter the Near Dreaming. Where every Freehold has a Rath (a magical doorway into the Near Dreaming), not every freehold has a Trod, and not every Trod is at a freehold, although the vast majority are. The difference between a Rath and a Trod is essentially Safety.
Where a Rath is merely a doorway, a gateway, a Trod is a path or road. Trods connect two places and bind them each to the other, giving a route between the two. Trods wind their way through the Dreaming, giving travellers in that uncertain Realm a swift and sure passage to their destination. This is because of the Silver Road.
Trods through the Dreaming vary as vastly as the Dreaming itself does. Most in the Near Dreaming are recognizable as paths of some sort, but are more esoteric in the farther Dreamrealms.
The one thing each Trod holds in common is the Silver Road. The Silver points the way to wherever the Trod leads. When you see it woven into the Trod you're travelling, that means you're on the right track. The presence of the Silver -- whether in the form of an actual silver-brick road, or of silver ribbons woven into the roadside trees, or the silver of moonlight across the water -- indicates that your journey will follow all the rules of Fate and the Story. It will be Glamourously fulfilling, magically right. The Silver indicates that the pointless, the boring, and the gratuitously hurtful will be kept outside the shape of your journey. Perhaps it actively keeps them away, perhaps it only serves as a token or a sign. We've lost so much of the old Trod Lore to the Mists.
The Silver Path protects most Trods known to Changelings, and hostile chimera, Dark-Kin, and others are kept from it by the Ban of Silver. Those Trods that do not have the Silver Path are called Twilight Roads. Like the Paths of Balor, many of the Twilight Roads are one-way. The Paths of Balor predate the Silver Path, and like the Twilight Roads do not have the protection of the Silver Path. The most common are the Green Paths of Balor, though travelers have also reported Gold and Black Paths of Balor. The one-way Green and Black Paths of Balor wind through the Near Dreaming, and elsewhere, and are even rumored to go to the spirit-worlds of the Prodigals and Restless Dead.
Types of Trods
Land
Land trods may be anything from a wide superhighway to a narrow path along a precipice. They may pass through idyllic faerie towns, literally burning deserts or through forests of mists and moaning trees. A changeling may walk, ride or drive along these trods; travel is limited only by terrain.
Water
These trods may be small as a mountain stream or as vast as a thousand oceans. Due of the lack of recognizable landmarks, travelers, travelers on this type of trod must rely on charts and other navigational treasure to travel these watery path safely.
Sun
Sun trods are sky trods that are open during the day. Only those changelings who can fly (even in a balloon) may travel these ethereal highways. Sun trods may appear as shafts of focused sunlight or as paths along sun-lit clouds. A changeling traveling a sun trod must find a moon trod to continue his journey after dark.
Moon
Moon trods are sky trods that are open only at night. Only those changelings who can fly may travel these phantom trails. Moon trods may appear as dust motes dancing in shafts of pale moonlight or as paths along nightsky clouds.
Cursed
Cursed trods have been corrupted by some means. Perhaps a powerful chimera, changeling brigands or a wicked monarch has taken up residence beside it, and kills all who travel it. Banality may block or sever some trods, trapping travelers in gray pitfalls where their Arts are of little use. These areas of the Dreaming are often home to feral chimera and other monstrosities. Any type of trod may become cursed.
Chimerical
Chimerical trods are far too ethereal for material creatures such as the fae to travel, but chimeras have little trouble using these Glamour-rich roads. Some arcane Arts may allow changelings entry to these alien trods. Such paths are extraordinarily dangerous, even to the most potent Kithain. The Silver Path does not extend into these trods.
Nightmares
The Nightmares Realms fester in the Deep Dreaming like an insatiable cancer. Dark and twisted trods spiral from them, touching almost every other part of the Dreaming. Malignant chimera and even darker creatures travel these fearsome roads. Some Unseelie changelings use these trods on secret errands, but these paths are dangerous even to them. The Silver Path exists along some of these trods. Most believe the Tuatha de Danaan built these paths there during their wars in the Nightmare Realms. In recent decades, these trods have disgorged increasing numbers of malign chimera into the Near Dreaming and the Autumn World.