SEALS GUIDE / HELP / LORE / SEALS In play: help seals. Also holy seals, sigils, trigrams. IN THIS TOPIC 8 Lake Wind Thunder Earth Fire Mountain Heaven WaterThe eight Seals: holy shapes of broken and unbroken lines, and what people wear them for.
The Seals are geometric shapes made of broken and unbroken lines, holy symbols woven through the city's culture and faith. Walk through Deshret and you will see them everywhere: tattooed or even carved into skin, stitched into the linings of clothes, sold as cheap peel-and-stick stickers in the markets, and marked above doorframes.
Sepulchre teaches that they are blessings, sacred shapes handed down from Marrow to the people. The Church offers them as a service, and a seal inscribed on your body by the clergy is the posh version. Street copies are the cheap option, and what most people have.
There are eight Seals, each tied to a Saint. Each has a proper name, but most people use the street names: Lake, Wind, Thunder, Earth, Fire, Mountain, Heaven, and Water. Type help seals/<name> to read one, for example help seals/lake.
Lake
Flesh. Health, and recovery from illness and injury. Saint Vael's seal. Very common among surgeons and medics, and the most bodily of the blessings. Heavy-industry workers tattoo it over old scars. Families who can afford the tithe pay a priest to paint a sanctioned Lake seal over the door when someone they love is dying. Mothers hang it above cribs.
Wind
Mind. Clarity, memory, and focus. Saint Lyra's seal. Apprentices cramming for guild exams lean on it, and it hangs on cheap necklaces worn by the elderly. It is scratched into the doorframes of guild libraries. There is a superstition that it lets you speak with the soul of the city, and that some people hear it guiding them to their purpose. Divers love it, and are usually the ones who believe that.
Thunder
Motion. Safe travel and crossing thresholds. Saint Vesper's seal. The Outriders carry it as their patron mark, and so do couriers and smugglers. Merchants hang Thunder charms over their stalls to keep business flowing.
Earth
Matter. Endurance, strength, and perseverance. Saint Ferro's seal. It is carved somewhere on a huge number of buildings, whatever the building is, and on the great blast doors of the surface gate. Guards, gangers, and muscle of every kind wear it, believing it lets the body take one more hit before going down.
Fire
Energy. Transformation and raw power. Saint Cinder's seal. Gangers and guards use it too, carved on weapons and etched on knuckles. Earth keeps you standing; Fire makes sure the other person does not. Newlyweds carry Fire charms on their wedding night.
Mountain
Self. Willpower and identity. Saint Wren's seal, very common among monks, and among anyone fighting an addiction, since people believe it gives the strength to break those bonds. A few famous slum rebels wore only the Mountain seal and nothing else, and it has become a mark of dissidents. Wear the Mountain alone, where people can see it, and expect strange looks.
Heaven
Fate. Luck and good fortune, the brightest of the seals, and Saint Marrow's. It is hugely popular with gamblers, and lottery booths bundle it as a charm with their tickets. People wear it for new ventures and any kind of luck.
Water
Void. Endings and death. It is not canon and borders on heresy, but many link it to Saint Marrow too. You rarely see it inscribed anywhere, and people do not wear it, not openly. Getting it put on you by choice is the kind of thing that makes the neighbours stop inviting you to dinner. It does turn up on people whose work involves death, from corpse-haulers to assassins, and nobody wants to see either. Water charms are sometimes delivered to enemies as a death mark and a threat. Be very careful with this seal: showing it, or using it to threaten someone, can have consequences you did not plan for.
Read next: help saints and help religion.
NEARBY [P] SAINTS [N] SEPULCHRE LORE 36 Abkal Cabiri Coterie Deshret Districts Diving Glossary Great Houses Guilds House Amari House Drepane House Kadesh House Morcant House Qamarat House Rook House Valcora House Varga House Vesalius Kolkhos Languages Law Life In Deshret Materials Mythos Ophirian League Outriders Pegasus Religion Saints Seals Sepulchre Splicers Symphony Technology The Hum Vulcani
For carving a seal in play, see help rune carving. For tattoos, see help body modifications.
On the Agora: https://agora.underspire.net/t/seals/39