Researching the Daziarn

[Guest 3]

I'm trying to collate all canonical information about the Daziarn. Most of what I need is in The Prisoners of Time, but I haven't read books 16-20, and, sadly, they aren't yet online. So I'm hoping that someone will tell me if the Daziarn features prominently in any of those books so I can seek them out, if I need to.

Yrs,
PSchaefer

[Ghost Bear]

You'll also want to read the third Grey Star book, Beyond the Nightmare gate.

I don't think the Daziarn appears in books 16-20, but Shadow Gates do, so there might be some relevent information there.

-Ss

[Guest 3]

More questions:

I've found the following societies and powers in the Daziarn:
Yoacor & the Beholder
Ookor & Serocca
Meledorians & Ironheart
Acadamicians
Elessin & the Screaming God
Agtah & the Chaos-master

We know that the Ookor and the Meledorians are between the strongholds of Earth and Water. We know that the Realm of Paradox is there as well, but not its extent. Is it reasonable to assume that the Realm of Paradox is contained by those two elemental strongholds - this would provide us with the additional information that the Elessin and the Academicians are also between those Strongholds.

Do we have any info on what/who is between the Stronholds of Fire and Air and Air and Earth?

Thanks,

[The Tagazin Poodle]

I think it's a safe guess that the Elessin would be between Earth and Water, as is the Vale of Peace.

In theory, Paradox and the Academicians' Neverness would also be there, but the nature of those two realms suggest that they could defy mapping.

[Relenoir]

Ghost said:

I don't think the Daziarn appears in books 16-20, but Shadow Gates do, so there might be some relevent information there.
-Ss

I think Ghost Bear is right on target here. It's the Plane of Darkness that appears in 16-20, not the Daziarn.

[deiseach]

Speaking of the Daziarn, how do Magnamunders/Magnamundians/Whateveryoufancy know that a Shadow Gate is a gate to another dimension if no one (pre-LW) ever returned from it...?

[Thomas Wolmer]

deiseach said:

Speaking of the Daziarn, how do Magnamunders/Magnamundians/Whateveryoufancy know that a Shadow Gate is a gate to another dimension if no one (pre-LW) ever returned from it...?

Possibly the Shianti told the Magnamundians (my preferred term about it? They used to travel a lot...

[deiseach]

Thomas said:

Possibly the Shianti told the Magnamundians (my preferred term about it? They used to travel a lot...

Sounds plausible. Still, had the Shianti acquired the status of myth by LW's time? If so, anything they said would have to be taken with a pinch of salt

[outspaced]

deiseach said:

Speaking of the Daziarn, how do Magnamunders/Magnamundians/Whateveryoufancy know that a Shadow Gate is a gate to another dimension if no one (pre-LW) ever returned from it...?

Grey Star was taught by the Shianti themselves, and he actually returned from one first. Additionally, I'm sure the Brotherhood Mages have powerful scrying spells to try to determine exactly what the Shadow Gate is. With their scrying research on the Shadow Gate, perhaps they have sent people through before, hoping for them to return . . . but none had the resilience, language skills, and sheer, all-round thingness of Lone Wolf.

[Ghost Bear]

outspaced said:

perhaps they have sent people through before, hoping for them to return . . . but none had the resilience, language skills, and sheer, all-round thingness of Lone Wolf.

From The Prisoners of Time, Section 245:

Be patient a little longer, Lone Wolf, and I shall show you where, in all this vast region of the Daziarn, you can find the one Shadow Gate that leads to Magnamund.'

And from Section 262:

It is now a forgotten city, yet within its heart there lies a secret that even the Chaos-master failed to discover: the Sandai were the guardians of a Shadow Gate. Long had they kept hidden this portal whilst they searched for a means to enter it, for unlike the Shadow Gates of your world, those of the Daziarn are closed. Only those who possess a key can pass from this realm into the universe of Aon.'

And finally from Section 233

Serocca raises her eyes from the table and smiles. 'Power is the key, and the power is now within your grasp. The two Lorestones of Nyxator are the power--they are the key to your escape from the Daziarn.

So, there is only one Shadow Gate in the Daziarn that leads to Magnamund. This Shadow Gate is locked, and you need power to open it. Since the Lorestones have never entered the Daziarn before, no one has had the power to open it before.

Or maybe there was a source of power, but no one got a chance to use it, since after the Sandai were wiped out, presumably the knowledge of the Shadow Gate was lost to only a few (Serrocca, Vonatar...)

-Ss

[Guest 3]

How did Grey Star get back from the Daziarn? (That book isn't yet up on projectaon.)

[Black Cat]

Ghost said:

So, there is only one Shadow Gate in the Daziarn that leads to Magnamund.

Hum...I didn't read War of the Wizards yet, but how GS is going to come back to Magnamund if there's only one Shadow Gate that brings back to his home land and if he is really far away from it? My guess is that Grey Star will use the power of the Moonstone to create a Shadow Gate for himself... the same way that Naar will use that stone later in the LW series.

Anyway, with what I read about the Shadow Gates in the LW series (I think it was in book 3), the Shadow Gate under the Guildhall of the Crystal Star is believed to be an eternal prison which no one can escape...until Lone Wolf come back from the Daziarn in book 12. In a further book (book 20 if I remember well), it is say that with the trips that LW made thru the numerous Shadow Gates he encountered, the Elder Magi (and probably a lot of other magical guilds) have a better understanding of the way Shadow Gates work.

As for the Shianti, they made the Moonstone from material of the Daziarn, and before they lived on their Isle of Lorn, the lived among humans. So they might have explained to them what was a Shadow Gate and how it worked. But with the passage of time and with the departure of the Shianti, the humans mostly forgot about these Gates. Only parts of that knowledge made their way to the time of GS and LW, and probably only in Southern Magnamund.

[GaryE]

Quote from 1986 Summer Special Newsletter:

If the Shadow Gates are the only entrances to the Daziarn, and they move about, and they can only be seen by the Kundi, then:

1) How come the entrance to the Daziarn below the Magician’s Guildhall stays where it is?

2) How come the magicians knew it was a Shadow Gate and knew it was there if they couldn’t see it and they weren’t of the Kundi Tribe?

3) If the Daziarn is an ‘Eternal Prison’ from which none can escape, how does Grey Star hope to get out of it?

(Jim Clarke, Belfast)

The nature of Shadow Gates differs greatly in northern and southern Magnamund. In the north they are fixed geographical locations where the two planes of existence overlap and connect to form doorways from one to the other. But in the south, following the exodus of the Shianti, Shadow Gates rarely—if ever—appear in the same place for more than one day. Before the Golden Age of the Shianti, all Shadow Gates were like those in the north. But following the return of the Moonstone to the Daziarn, the Goddess Ishir used her power to alter the nature of the Shadow Gates in the south, so that the Shianti would not easily be tempted to enter and retrieve their Moonstone. (One of the fixed southern Shadow Gates was once located in the Darkling Room in the Port of Suhn.)

The magicians of the Crystal Star Guild are not aware of the purpose of the Shadow Gate on which they built their Guildhall. Early members of their order entered the portal and were never seen again (they are still alive somewhere in the Daziarn), after which the guild assumed the portal to be some sort of magical black hole, and have used it ever since as a place of disposal for murderers and traitors. Other fixed sites for northern Shadow Gates include Ikaya (through which the Ice Demons entered Magnamund) and below the Tomb of the Princess in Barrakeesh.

Grey Star will be able to use the power of the Moonstone to effect an escape from the Daziarn. The nature of his escape and the adventure which follows is told in the last of the Grey Star first series, entitled-‘War of the Wizards’.

[North Star]

Ah good! You mentioned the gate beneath the Brotherhood Guildhall. I would have done if you hadn't!

NS.

[The Tagazin Poodle]

Spoilers:
To elaborate, once Grey Star came into contact with the Moonstone, the Shianti were able to "lock on" and activate its Dimension Door ability, which brought Grey Star to the Lissan Plain (after some conversation, that is).