Paraidthése
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Παραίσθηση (in English: Paraidthése, four syllables, with the primary and secondary accents on the second and third syllables, and the "th" a soft, aspirated t as in the French words thé and théatre) was the first capital of the Republic and remains the imperial seat of Istantium.
Contents
Geography
The city's sprawl covers portions of several large islands, innumerable smaller islands, and a significant portion of the Kordivun Peninsula. The wealthy enjoy the unparalleled vistas and inviting sea breezes on the series of smaller islands surrounding the Imperial Estate (collectively known as the Îles des Rêves), while the poor are crowded into dingy slums on the larger Cauchemer Island and the mainland, which squat sullenly in the shadows of the Empire's decaying industrial infrastructure.
Neighborhoods
Paraidthése is an ancient city, and a living one. As such, the past mingles with the present in new and strange ways.
The Old Cities
Paraidthése sprawls across the lands once divided between Istantium's founding cities, Issoul and Antium. The cities remained identifiably separate entities for many years after giving up their independence to form the greater Istantine Republic, but lost their status as separate Compartments with the ascension of the first Imperator, when they were officially merged into a single entity: the Imperial Seat, Παραίσθηση. The citizens were still conscious of the difference between the cities for several more centuries - only the grand buildings in the Imperial District - the great offices of government, the sprawling military barracks, the Imperial palace, the Temples and theaters - inhabited the no-man's-land between the two cities.
Over the last five hundred years, however, the city's sprawl has grown up around the Imperial district and has become so all-encompassing that all such definition has been lost. Except, of course, in the Old Cities.
Old Issoul
Old Issoul is situated on the northern and western slopes of the vast, dormant volcano Mt. Nuxto. The city's history can be read in the rings of development surrounding the original - now crumbling - walls the way woodsman reads the rings of a great oak. The old public square and squat public
Old Antium
The Imperial Quarter
Îles des Rêves
Port District
Theater District
Landmarks
Imperial Palace
Amphitae
The Gates of Heaven
Senate
Mount Nuxto
This dormant volcano covers the southeastern third of Cauchmer. Once rich farmland, the long lower slopes have been completely developed, except for the southernmost reaches on the opposite side of Cauchmer, where several plantations still cling to stubborn life and some of the most extraordinary wine in the world is produced. Steep granite cliffs protect the half-collapsed caldera, which broods over the desireable, pseudo-Bohemian neighborhoods of Old Issoul and is home to the notorious Skotadi.
Skotadi
The
Transportation
Elegant watercraft, known as adreyni, and expensive watertaxies ply the narrow routes among the smaller islands, but these wealthy enclaves are also connected to the city proper by an elaborate - almost fantastical - series of bridges accessible by foot, horseback, and the small, single-horsed carriages popular among the elite. Public ferries ply crossings too wide and deep to be bridged, and although the cost is more than most can afford, the Senatarium and Imperium may cross all public ferries and/or bridges for the price of a single pointille, one one-hundredth of an illaster.
In contrast, the poor must make do with the water-trains, known colloquially as the sardines. These ugly, deep-hulled craft run along rails on land, much like any subway or other light rail car; under water, the sardines are suspended beneath a rail system constructed at such a depth that it would not interfere with the operations of the ferries, adreyni and watertaxies. Above-ground, the water-trains are as safe as any other rail system, which is to say: accidents occur with some frequency, but only as one would expect. Large-scale disasters are hearteningly rare, at least by the standards of the underwater trains. Belowdecks (as most Paraidthesians call the complicated system of underwater rails), however, malfunctions are common and disasters occur with alarming regularity.
Even some of the wealthy, tired of seeing the occasional severed arm or leg wash up onto their otherwise pristine, well-groomed beaches, have commented on the problem - although no one would think about forcing the private constortium responsible for the maintenance and operation of the water-trains to spend much to improve the design. No, in the higher circles, the most bandied-about solution is some sort of metal tunnel or mesh netting around the rails to contain the body parts from major explosions so that they do not otherwise pollute the bay.
Economy
Paraidthése is the seat of imperial government, and a fair portion of the city's economic life is centered around governmental and quasi-governmental functions. Most of the Empire's wealthy and powerful families maintain homes among the Îles des Rêves, which are inhabited at least during the Season at the Imperial Court. The wealthy employ a modest army either directly or indirectly, and the mercantile quarters are always busy when Court is called. The city also does a brisk trade in the "red light" service industries.
Paraidthése is also one of Istantium's two major deep water ports, and both Cauchmer and the mainland bristle with docks. Merchandise from trading partners is offloaded here for delivery by smaller vessel and/or overland to Istantium's interior, while Istantium's exports - shoddy tech and cheap cloth, manufactured cheaply in the sweatshops that mushroom and disappear with extraordinary frequency, mediocre gems from the played out mines in the interior, processed lethe and ridium, grown in the river valleys of the interior, spices such as carrigum, cinabar and spacecia from the far south, and so on and so on - are loaded for distribution throughout the region.
Government
More than anyplace else in the Empire, Paraidthése is a quintessential kleptocracy. The Imperator may award executive governmental positions to anyone he chooses elsewhere in the nation. In Paraidthése, however, such positions are the hereditary right and property of the Imperium, both individually and collectively. The city's charter defines only a limited number of such positions, of course - (such as Commissioner of the Arts and Public Spaces or Inspector of Bordellos, Lethecafés, and Fight Pits) - so the Imperium have found a clever means of circumventing this limitation. Instead of leaving his office to only one heir, a clever Ioulon (literally: little emperor) will leave his office to two or three heirs, who are in turn entitled to a small staff of their own, who must in turn be either Ioulons or recognized bastards of the Imperium, and so on. Generally, a new Imperial Consul will take the time to cull the ranks on first ascending to the office, but there have been as many as 1314 Inspectors of Bordellos, Lethecafés, and Fight Pits in the past when the Imperial Consul did not bother to clean out the bureaucracy.
