The Clade
"It reminds me that we were not always as we are today," the young woman said quietly.
Her pale face was upturned to one of the wondrous tapestries on the wall. Names were laced through heraldic images and symbols meaningful only to the hands that embroidered them.
"There were once many of us."
Her fingers longed to trace the silk threads, but she withdrew her hand, painfully aware of her claws. A smile graced her face as she explained the motif of delicate fuchsia orchids creeping from the top of the tapestry through all the bloodlines depicted.
"But we have always loved flowers and their hues."
She gestured elegantly at the empty space on the tapestry, as if formally introducing an honored guest.
"For the rest of the Orchid web to embroider as the years pass, and when it is full, they will begin another."
Violet eyes grew wide with reverence as she looked to all the other family tapestries. Some had been hemmed, never to be added to again, and others awaited the hands of descendants.
"They carried them, from every broken city to the next, often as their only possession. These tapestries are all that remain from our ancestors. It is our history, woven with messages from the past for the future."
She began her tour of the Clade anew, trying to imagine the world when her people were young.
A place for contemplation, discussion and celebration, the Clade is the official gathering hall of Kalinor and a seat of various records, most of which are embroidered into the vivid tapestries that cover long stretches of the walls.
The Clade was once a smaller tunnel diverging from the primary cavern. Its opening is high above the ground, marked by a short ledge. With patience and precision, the tunnel became a large hall meant for city-wide meetings and events.
Rugs cover the ground in the jewel tones emblematic of Kalinor, annually donated by the Warp and Weft. Chains of cut opalgloams form a twinkling web across the ceiling, the stones faceted like diamonds but bright with inner light. Altering with the seasons, swaths of colored ombre silk loop overhead, washing the space in a perpetual twilight of hues.
