Chapter 2 Name

(Links to pages will take you to drunkduck.com.)

Do not read this before reading the chapter completely!

Taint of Exile's second chapter is named "name". That sound like I'm repeating myself!
The reason behind this name for the chapter is simple.
I do not know how many of you might have realized it, but I did not mention the main characters name even ones in the first chapter. In this chapter the name Viator is first mentioned and only on the second last page (page 33).

Louhiatar,
mother spirit
of wolves

Loaus,
father spirit
of mooses

In the first chapter we were learning a bit of the world. We got to see humans and q'etyanas and very little magic. The side of the story shown on the first chapter is easier to understand despite the imaginary race q'etyana.

This second chapter, however, shows us glimpses of the spirit world, the immortals, the deitys.  This chapter introduced three of these immortal beings: Louhiatar (also known as Loviatar and other names), Loaus and Kati.

You got to see a bit of interraction between Viator and Louhiatar. These first pages showing this scene hints on a lot of things which will open to you in time. You got to see a bit of the relationship between Louhiatar and Loaus which is far from simple despite both of them being immortal beings who have known each other for eternity and not to mention them being lovers with children!

Kati, mother spirit of trees

Some people have come to love Kati and I myself personally like her both personality- and designwise. She's tall, firm and strong like an old tree. Best of all is that when she opens her eyes she plants trees just by walking! (Page 21)

The story takes place in autumn which is easy to show now since I switched to coloring during this chapter. Still, it's quite early eutumn, because the woods are only catching color, but has still plenty of green.

In this chapter Viator eats a raw fish. Okay, here in Finland and neighbouring Scandinavia we eat a lot of fish. Pretty much in any shape possible (though I have not investigated this further).
We eat smoked, fried, raw and etc. fish. Some people eat everything in a fish. Including eyes. To some this might seem strange and to some not.

However, I don't think anyone would take a raw fish and just eat it belly-side-up with scales and everything still intact. Viator does eat fish in its most natural form as is shown in this chapter. In the world of this story Viator's eating habits are strange.

Loaus as a moose

Now onward to a detail I want to bring up because I have sometimes noticed people confuse the animal I call moose with something more elk-like and Loaus is the father spirit of mooses. I do not mean that you have confused them (but if you have here is a picture for you). In the years I have dealt with people who know nothing of Finland I have come to notice that they do not really know what kind of animal moose is.


Alces alces
source: luontokuva.org

Moose which is in Finnish hirvi (google that if you like to) does not really look like an elk. It's actually not as beautiful animal in my opinion (though I like mooses anyway). The latin name for moose is alces alces, if someone has need for that.


Moose range map
source: wikipedia

Page 12

CLOTHES

Aamu, the girl in the story, shows us a bit of detail that was taken from the Eura's dress mentioned before. Here in the fullbody picture you also see her shorter set of sleeves. Her dress looked like this only in this and the second page. After that for the entire chapter I forgot the extra sleeves! And I realized it much, much later...

Here's a close up of the wrist jewellery she's wearing. The same kind of wristband is seen in Eura's dress.

She's also wearing the sock-like shoes mentioned before.



Page 6

 One thing I enjoyed showing in this chapter was on page 6. In this page I show how Viator's cape is actually dressed. He's taking it off by taking it over his head after opening a buckle behind his neck. The whole collar part is attached to the cape itself by only the round part on the backside. This can be seen in the panel where the cape is hanging of a branch.

One last thing to be mentioned about clothing for now is the cape Viator as a child is wearing in the very last page of the chapter (page 34). You'll be seing a lot of this kind of capes in future and different ways of wearing them.

Oh, and do give attention to the shoes he's wearing on this page as well!

LINKS

World Setting
Moose (and to see the difference, Red Deer)