Kurald Galain

Map of Kurald Galain

'Dorssan Ryl' by Corporal Nobbs

Kurald Galain [KER-ahld GAH-lain] was the Warren of Darkness and Elder Night. The Elder Warren was referred to by Tattersail as the 'Breath of Chaos'. Said to be the Warren and ancient realm of Mother Dark, it was the Warren used by the Tiste Andii such as Anomander Rake and other agents of Darkness and Night such as Draconus. 

Kurald Galain gifted the world with darkness and night.

In Memories of Ice

Korlat brought Whiskeyjack through the Warren to quickly travel to Dujek Onearm's command camp. The Bridgeburner described the Warren as lightless, scentless, and still. The ambient temperature was no different than his skin and he felt gritty flagstones under his feet. According to Korlat, even Kurald Galain was not immune to the Crippled God's poisoning of the Warrens as evidenced by a sudden streak of grey that assailed their eyes.

At the Siege of Coral, all the Tiste Andii of Moon's Spawn joined in ritual magic to fully unveil Kurald Galain for the first time since coming to the Malazan world. The act cleansed the Warren of the Crippled God's poison and created a permanent manifestation of the Warren in the city. Now known as Black Coral, the city lay within the Tiste Andii Warren just as much as it did the Malazan world.

In Midnight Tides

At the time of the sundering of Kurald Emurlahn, civil wars plagued Kurald Galain. An initial wave of Andii settlers found their way to the Malazan world, and were later followed by Silchas Ruin and an additional four hundred thousand Andii. The arrival of Ruin's Andii, and their Tiste Edur allies led by Scabandari, was contested by a large army of K'Chain Che'Malle.

After the K'Chain Che'Malle's defeat, the Tiste Edur spoke of the dying race's vengeance against the Tiste. The K'Chain Che'Malle sent their Kaschan sorcery into the warren of Darkness like a plague. Their ritual turned Darkness in upon itself with an all-devouring hunger. The gates between Kurald Galain and every other realm were sealed, and Mother Dark herself was driven into the core of the Abyss. There, she would one day devour all that was around her, resulting in her own murder, the death of the Abyss, and the end of all things.

In modern times, Trate fell to the combined land and naval forces of the Tiste Edur. During the fighting, Crimson Guard mage, Corlo, found he was able to open a passage to Kurald Galain that allowed him, Iron Bars, and the rest of the Second Blade escape the city. They found themselves in a rats' maze of branching black stone passages barely higher than their heads. The stone beneath their feet was greasy and uncertain, and the air was the breath of a crypt, stinking of death and withered flesh. Corlo declared the warren rotted and septic.

As they sought to find an exit, Corlo had to work to hold off a mass of Tiste Andii Shadow wraiths. Acquitor Seren Pedac suggested he allow a single wraith to approach and perhaps bargain for help. The spirit that spoke to them was Sandalath Drukorlat, who died at the hands of the K'Chain Che'Malle during the Tiste invasion of the Malazan world. She showed them the exit in return for their promise to grant her oblivion.

In Reaper's Gale

Clip, the Mortal Sword of the Black-Winged Lord, was the first Bluerose Tiste Andii in thousands of years to be blessed by Mother Dark to walk the Darkness of Kurald Galain. Using his spinning chain, he opened a gate to Kurald Galain for Silchas Ruin, Fear Sengar, Seren Pedac, Udinaas, and Kettle to lead them on their quest for the Finnest of Scabandari Bloodeye. The Elder Warren was nothing like Seren Pedac expected. Instead of impenetrable darkness, they found a pearlescent white sky overlooking a rock-strewn vista of uneven stony ground with the occasional dead tree turned to brittle stone. Distant detail could be made out in unnatural clarity. As it became night, the sky became a strange pink before changing to purple and blue, then to black. In an icy stream, Udinaas found a blind minnow, which was the first suggestion that the Humans were seeing a version of Kurald Galain different from reality.

When questioned, Clip admitted it would have been too tedious to lead them by hand through the dark, so they now walked an illusory road of Kurald Liosan, a long ago gift of Father Light. He called Kurald Galain a realm of the Tiste, a place of elemental forces with the potential for chaos beneath every surface. Silchas Ruin said the Tiste were the first children and built the first civilizations and cities in realms such as Kurald Galain.

Eventually they reached their destination--a colossal stone gate leading to Starvald Demelain that appeared to have been heaved and buckled by an earthquake with some of its cyclopean stones flung for hundreds paces by some kind of impact.

In Forge of Darkness

Kurald Galain was the primary setting of the Kharkanas Trilogy. Several hundred thousand years before the events of Gardens of the Moon, it was the ancestral land of the Tiste and adjacent to the lands of the Jaghut, Azathanai, Forulkan, Thel Akai, Jheleck, and Dog-Runners.

The Tiste capital was Kharkanas from where Mother Dark ruled. The Tiste nobility largely built their great houses and fortresses along the Dorssan Ryl river which crossed the entire realm from north to south.

Many of the realm's native fauna, including Eckalla, Tereth, and Wrashan, had been hunted to extinction.

In Fall of Light

Tiste power structure updated for Fall of Light

(Information needed)

Highborn Families - Holds

Tiste power structure in Forge of Darkness

• Dracons Hold
• Dreth Hold
• Haran Hold
• Hust Hold
• Misharn Hold
• Purake Hold
• Tulla Hold
• Vanut Hold

Greater Houses

• Drukorlas
• Durav
• Enes
• Hellad
• Manaleth
• Sengara

Notable locations

• Abara Delack
• The Forging
• Kharkanas
• Neret Sorr
• Riven Keep
• Sedis Hold
• Yannis Monastery
• Yedan Monastery

Geographic features

• Bareth Solitude
• Dorssan Ryl
• Glimmer Fate
• Old Forest
• Riven West Marches
• Suruth Common Forest
• Vitr
• Youth Forest

Native animals

• Eckalla
• Ginaf
• Heghest
• Rhote
• Tereth
• Tramil
• Wrashan

Author's comments

• In a 2020 interview, author Steven Erikson described the conflict between Chaos and Darkness as "creation versus absence--Darkness being absence. You can't define one without the other."
• Ian C. Esslemont notes that while Tiste Andii are more attuned to Kurald Galain, characters like Heuk show that it is not impossible for non-Tiste Andii outsiders to have the proper mindset, affinity, and opportunity to access elemental Darkness.

Notes and references

List of abbreviations • Paginations • How to reference an article