The city of Tairasante sprawls across its six hills and two rivers like a carelessly thrown blanket, tangled in a net of narrow winding streets. Above it all, an enormous castle sits atop the tallest hill, three thousand years old and beginning to show it; in the midafternoon sun, it casts a shadow that stretches all the way across the consolidated river.

A ring of decorative spires marks the perimeter of the old city walls, which if they were rebuilt today would enclose less than a tenth of the city. Along the southern edge of the ring, several of the spires have been stripped of their decorative gold plating; the affected spires are exactly the ones which are out of sight of the castle.