The Fekratt are nomadic cattle herders working the plains south of Chuza, moving camp with an efficiency that makes onlookers feel entirely useless standing by – yurts up, cattle penned behind acacia thorn, a full meal underway inside the hour, and gone again without a trace by the following morning.

FILE NOTES

Everything about the tribe runs on water and trust in equal measure. A stranger approaching camp is stripped and inspected for signs of Bachia – a plague the Fekratt fear enough to turn away warriors rather than risk it – before anyone gets past the cattle line. Greeting customs cut two ways: the chieftain, VoidArr, spits directly at a guest as the highest mark of trust the tribe can offer, water being precious where they come from; everyone else gets the gentler version, a warrior spitting into his own hand before it’s offered to be shaken.

Justice is swift and quiet by Chuzan standards – a captured thief walked to a wagon wheel under nothing louder than a slow drum, bled out for the tribe’s use rather than executed for a crowd’s benefit, the blood worked into a thick, curdled drink shared as a mark of welcome. A newborn child is met with curses rather than praise, on the theory that praising a baby only invites bad luck on it.

The tribe keeps a seer – an old woman, circular tattoos across her face, chained to a spool each night rather than left to wander. Her readings come unprompted and rarely explained further than given.

STATUS: Filed under Locations. No fixed address, by design.