Eres, the species

Further Info : The first human sentient species from whom the Imass are descended.  All Eres are Bonecasters

Note : The species are referred to generally in these books as both Eres and Eres'al, singularly and collectively.  Eres'al is generally taken to mean a female version of the species.

Physical Description

Tall, lithely muscled, with a fine umber-hued pelt and long, shaggy hair reaching down past the shoulders. A woman. Her breasts were large and pendulous, her hipswide and full. Prominent, flaring cheekbones, a broad, full-lipped mouth. All this registered in an instant, even as the woman’s dark brown eyes, shadowed beneath a solid brow, scanned across the three T’lan Imass before fixing on Trull Sengar.She took a step towards the Tiste Edur, the movement graceful as a deer’s—

Then the light vanished entirely. - (HoC, UK Trade, p.661)

Onrack:'Before the Imass, there was another people, older, wilder. They dwelt where it was warm, and they were tall, their dark skins covered in fine hair. These we knew as the Eres. Enclaves survived into our time...Trull Sengar:'...And they lived in jungles...?'...Onrack: 'Its verges, occasionally, but more often the surrounding savannas...They worked in stone, but with less skill than us...All Eres were bonecasters, Trull Sengar. For they were the first to carry the spark of awareness, the first so gifted by the spirits.’- (HoC, UK Trade, p.659)

..chattering now in some strange glottal tongue filled with clicks and stops. -(BH)

History

Monok Ochem: 'The Eres did not fashion holy sites of their own...but they understood that there were places where death gathered, where life was naught but memories, drifting lost and bemused. And, to such places, they would often bring their own dead. Power gathers in layers – this is the birthplace of the sacred.’ - (HoC, UK Trade, p.660)

Onrack: 'Eres holy sites burned through the barriers of Tellann. They are too old to be resisted...Hood did not exist when these were fashioned...Nor are they strictly death-aspected. Their power comes... from layers. Stone shaped into tools and weapons. Air shaped by throats. Minds that discovered, faint as flickering fires in the sky, the recognition of oblivion, of an end . . . to life, to love. Eyes that witnessed the struggle to survive, and saw with wonder its inevitable failure. To know and to understand that we must all die, Trull Sengar, is not to worship death. To know and to understand is itself magic, for it made us stand tall.’ - (HoC, UK Trade, p.660)

Bottle: 'the Eres. The Dwellers who lived in the time before the Imass, the first makers of tools, the first shapers of their world.’ - (HoC, UK Trade, p.669)

“Tiste Edur forest,”  Curdle said, scampering ahead.  “They like their forests.”

“All those natural shadows,”  Telorast added.  “Power in permanence.  Blackwood, bloodwood, all sorts of terrible things.  The Eres were right to fear.” - (BH)

‘This place is . . . complicated,’ Bottle sighed. He reached down and picked up a large, disc-shaped rock. ‘Eres’al,’ he said. ‘A hand-axe – th ebasin down there’s littered with them. Smoothed by the lake that once filled it. Took days to make one of these, then they didn’t even use them– they just flung them into the lake. Makes no sense, does it? Why mak ea tool then not use it?’

Strings stared at the mage. ‘What are you talking about, Bottle? Who are the Eres’al?’

‘Were, Sergeant. They’re long gone.’

‘The spirits?’

‘No, those are from all times, from every age this land has known. My grandmother spoke of the Eres. The Dwellers who lived in the time before the Imass, the first makers of tools, the first shapers of their world.’ He shook his head, fought down a shiver. ‘I never expected to meet one – it was there, she was there, in that song within you.’

‘And she told you about these tools?’

‘Not directly. More like I shared it – well, her mind. She was the one who gifted you the silence. It wasn’t me – I don’t have that power – but I asked, and she showed mercy. At least’ – he glanced at Strings – ‘I gather it was a mercy.’

‘Aye, lad, it was. Can you still . . . speak with that Eres?’

‘No. All I wanted to do was get out of there – out of that blood—’

‘My blood.’

‘Well, most of it’s your blood, Sergeant.’

‘And the rest?’

‘Belongs to that song. The, uh, Bridgeburners’ song.’ - (BH UK MMPB, p.)

Eres'al, the Goddess

(The) Eres’al: the spirit goddess of the Nerek  - (MT, Glossary)

represented by Axe in The Fulcra -  (MT, Glossary)

Hull Beddict:'(The Nerek believe)That they were all born of a single mother, countless generations past, who was the thief of fire and walked through time, seeking that which might answer a need that consumed her – although she could never discover the nature of that need. One time, in her journey, she took within her a sacred seed, and so gave birth to a girl-child. To all outward appearances...that child was little different from her mother, for the sacredness was hidden, and so it remains hidden to this day. Within the Nerek, who are the offspring of that child...it is the female line that is taken as purest...she (the single mother) is known by a number of related names, also suggesting variations of a single person. Eres, N’eres, Eres’al.’ ' - (MT, UK Trade, p.193-4)

‘Eres’al. That’s the Nerek goddess.' - (MT, UK Trade, p.426)

Silchas Ruin: 'She wanders time, Kettle, in a manner no-one else can even understand, much less emulate. And this is very much her world. She is the fire that never dies.’ - (MT, UK Trade, p.397)

Onrack:'...I came into contact with sorcery. That which the Eres projected. For lack of any other term, it was a warren, barely formed, on the very edge of oblivion. It was...like the Eres themselves. A glimmer of light behind the eyes.’ - (HoC, UK Trade, p.662)

Eres'al and Shadow

She appeared from the heat haze, moving like an animal -- prey, not predator, in her every careful, watchful motion -- fine-furred, deep brown, a face far more human than ape, filled with expression -- or at least its potential, for the look she fixed upon him now was singular in its curiosity.  As tall as Bottle, lean but heavy-breasted, belly distended.  Skittish, she edged closer

He met her eyes, and was shaken to his very core.  This was no mindless creature.  Eres’al.  The yearning in those dark, stunningly beautiful eyes made him mentally reel.

.... “All right,”  he whispered, and slowly sent his senses questing, into that womb, into the spirit growing within it.  For every abomination, there must emerge its answer.  Its enemy, its counterbalance.  Here, within this Eres’al, is such an answer.  To a distant abomination, the corruption of a once-innocent spirit.  Innocence must be reborn.  Yet … I can see so little … not human, not even of this world, barring what the Eres’al herself brought to the union.  Thus, an intruder.  From another realm, a realm bereft of innocence.  To make of them part of this world, one of their kind must be born … in this way.  Their blood must be drawn into this world’s flow of blood.

But why an Eres’al?  Because … gods below … because she is the last innocent creature, the last innocent ancestor of our line.  After her … the degradation of spirit begins.  The shifting of perspective, the separation from all else, the carving of borders -- in the ground, in the mind’s way of seeing.  After her, there’s only … us.

The realisation -- the recognition -- was devastating.  Bottle pulled his hand away.  But it was too late.  He knew too many things, now.  The father … Tiste Edur.  The child to come … the only pure candidate for a new Throne of Shadow -- a throne commanding a healed realm. - (BH)

Eres'al and the Deragoth

“The Deragoth are far older than Dessimbelackis,”  Paran said.

“Convenient vessels,”  she said.  “Their kind were nearly extinct.  He found the few last survivors and made use of them.”

Paran grunted, then said,  “That was a mistake.  The Deragoth had their own history, their own story and it was not told in isolation.”

“Yes,”  Ganath agreed,  “the Eres’al, who were led unto domestication by the Hounds that adopted them.  The Eres’al, who would one day give rise to the Imass, who would one day give rise to humans.” - (BH)

Eres'al and Bottle

“He was half asleep, Fid.”

The sergeant shrugged.

“No,”  the wizard said,  “you don’t understand.  Half asleep.  Someone’s with him.  Was with him, I mean.  Do you have any idea how far back sympathetic magic like this goes?  To the very beginning.  To that glimmer, that first glimmer, Fid.  The birth of awareness.  Are you understanding me?”

“As clear as the moon lately,”  Fiddler said, scowling.

“The Eres’al, the Tall Ones -- before a single human walked this world.  Before the Imass, before even the K’Chain Che’Malle.  Fiddler, Eres was here.  Now.  Herself.  With him.” - Quick Ben - (BH)

Eres'al and T'amber

“T’amber,”  Grub said.  “Only you and me can see.  So watch, Lostara.  Watch.”

The golden glow was coalescing, rising up from the corpse.  A faint wind flowed past Lostara and Grub, familiar now, heady with the scent of savanna grasses, warm and dry.

“She stayed with us a long time,”  Grub whispered.  “She used T’amber.  A lot.  There wasn’t any choice.  The Fourteenth, it’s going to war, and we’re going with it.  We have to.”

 A slight figure now stood at a half-crouch over the body.  Furred, tall, and female.  No clothing, no ornamentation of any kind.

 Lostara saw the T’lan Imass, thirty or more paces away, slowly turn to regard the apparition.  And then, head bowing, the undead warrior slowly settled onto one knee.  “I thought you said we were the only ones who could see, Grub.”

“I was wrong.  She has that effect.”

“Who -- what is she?”

 “The Eres’al.  Lostara, you must never tell the Adjunct.  Never.” -(BH)