The Tiste Andii, Children of Darkness
Hairlock: ‘The Tiste Andii are Mother Dark’s first children.' (GotM, UK Trade, p.50)
'Tiste Andii hair was either silver-white or midnight black.'(DG, UK MMPB, p.335)
Tiste Andii Eyes
'Such remarkable eyes...One moment a deep hue of amber, cat-like and unnerving, the next grey and banded like a snake’s – a fell rainbow of colours to match any mood. He (Baruk) wondered if they were capable of lying....a slight upward tilt to the large vertical-pupilled eyes...The Tiste
Andii’s eyes shone green as glacial ice.'(GotM, UK Trade, p.155-6)
'The Tiste Andii considered it (The union of Mother Dark with the Light) a degradation of pure Dark, and the source of all their subsequent ills' (DG, UK MMPB, p.336)
Korlat's thoughts: 'despair is the nemesis of the Tiste Andii. How often have I seen my kin fall on the field of battle, and have known – deep in my soul – that my brothers and sisters did not die through an inability to defend themselves? They died, because they had chosen to die. Slain by their own despair.
Our gravest threat.'(MoI, UK Trade, p.748)
The Mhybe's thoughts: 'a people plagued by indifference, an apathy that made even the efforts of civil discourse too much to contemplate. There were secret tragedies in the long, tortured past of the Tiste Andii. Wounds that would never heal. Even suffering...was capable of becoming a way of life. To then extend such an existence from decades into centuries, then into millennia ...those few of them who were killed on such occasions were simply left on the ground. It had fallen to the Rhivi to retrieve those bodies, to treat them in the Rhivi way and to mourn their passing. The Tiste Andii looked upon such efforts without expression, as if bemused by the attention accorded to a mere corpse. '(MoI, UK Trade, p.73-4)
Olar Ethil : "What if I told you that five thousand humans carrying the blood of the Tiste Andii have walked the Road of Gallan? That one with Royal Andiian blood has ridden through the gates of dead Kharkanas? And the Road of Gallan? Why, upon that path of blood hunt the Tiste Liosan. And," her head creaked as she regarded Kilmandaros, "something far worse." (DoD)
Tiste Andii split with Mother Dark
No. Be warned, Anomander, dear son, from Andii blood is born a new world. Understand me. You and your kin are no longer alone, no longer free to play your vicious games. There are now … others.
Anomander spoke. “Mother, did you imagine I would be surprised? Horrified? It could never be enough, to be naught but a mother, to create with hands closed upon no-one. To yield so much of yourself, only to find us your only reward -- us slayers, us betrayers.”
There is new blood within you.
“Yes.”
My son, what have you done?
“Like you, Mother, I have chosen to embrace change. Yes, there are others now. I sense them. There will be wars between us, and so I shall unite the Andii. Resistance is ending. Andarist, Drethdenan, Vanut Degalla. Silchas is fleeing, and so too Hish Tulla and Manalle. Civil strife is now over, Mother.”
You have killed Tiam. My son, do you realize what you have begun? Silchas flees, yes, and where do you think he goes? And the newborn, the others, what scent will draw them now, what taste of chaotic power? Anomander, in murder you seek peace, and now the blood flows and there shall be no peace, not ever again.
I forsake you, Anomander Blood of Tiam, Dragnipurake. I deny my first children all. You shall wander the realms, bereft of purpose. Your deeds shall avail you nothing. Your lives shall spawn death unending. The Dark -- my heart -- is closed to you, to you all. (TtH)
Endest on Black Coral : It is almost as we once knew. Kharkanas, before she embraced Light, before the ones born of ashes lifted themselves up and took swords in hand. Scabandari. Ilgast Rend, Halyd Bahann. Esthala who dreamed of peace. Kagamandra Tulas Shorn, who did not. (TtH)
The Andii civil war in Kurald Galain
"There were factions – a power struggle." She looked away, up the Road. "It went on for generations – yes, that may be hard to believe. Generations among the Tiste Andii. You'd think that after the centuries they'd be entrenched, and maybe they were, for a time. Even a long time. But then everything changed – in my life, I knew nothing but turmoil. Alliances, betrayals, war pacts, treacheries. You cannot imagine how such things twisted our civilization, our culture."(DoD)
Faction Leaders within the Tiste Andi from the Realm of Darkness
Silchas Ruin’s. Andarist’s, and Anomander’s own. Drethdenan’s, Hish Tulla’s, Vanut Degalla’s, Manalle - (TtH)
Hish Tulla and Manalle are female and agreed to a pact with Anomander Rake
Tiste Andii Throne of Darkness
The throne room was still a chamber of ghosts. Black stone and black wood, the crimson and onyx mosaic of the floor dulled with dust and dried leaves that had wandered in from some high window. It seemed to hold nothing of the now brimming power of the Teronderai, the holy sepulchre of Mother Dark, yet for all that Withal felt diminished as he stepped through the side entrance and edged out towards the centre of the room.
The throne was on his right, raised on a knee-high dais that was, he realized, the vast stump of a blackwood tree. Roots snaked down to sink into the surrounding floor. The throne itself had been carved from the tree itself, a simple, almost ascetic chair. Perhaps it had once been plush, padded and bold in rich fabrics, but not even the tacks remained.
"This is the throne of the Tiste Andii, and Kharkanas is the capital of the Hold of Darkness."
The Saelen Gara
The Saelen Gara of the lost Kharkanan forestlands had believed that the moon was Father Light's sweet seduction, innocent maiden gift to Mother Dark. To remind her of his love, there in the sky of night. But then, they had also believed the moon was but the backside of Father Light's baleful eye, and could one rise up and wing the vast distance to that moon, they would discover that it was but a lens, and to look through was to see other worlds for whom the moon was not the moon at all, but the sun. The Saelen Gara talespinner would grin then, and make odd motions with his hands. "Perspective," he'd say. "You see? The world changes by where you stand. So choose, my children, choose and choose again, where you will make your stand…"(Toll)
I remember the Saelen Gara, an offshoot Andii people in my home world. They lived in the forests. Until the forests died. We begged them, then, to come to Kharkanas. To the cities of the realm. They refused. Their hearts were broken, they said. Their world had died, and so they elected to die with it. Andarist begged …(Dust)
Given Names
Anomandaris Anomander Rake
Silchas Ruin
Andarist & Enesdia
Orfantal
Horult
Sandalath
Korlat
Serrat
Orfantal
Jekaral
Boruld
Dashtal
Endest Sillan
Spinnock Durav
Killanthir
Desra
Nimander Golit
Nenanda
Aranatha
Kedeviss
Skintick
Kadaspala
Surnames
Irake (Rake, Purake?)
Drukorlat
Ruin
Golit
Tiste Andii Prayer before Battle (before Mother Dark rejected them)
Let Darkness receive my every breath
With her own.
Let our lives speak in answer unto death
Never alone.