Story 5787

1 | Start

2 | # The Tithe of the Returning Tide Common Names: *Tideborn*, *The Ebb*, *Drowners* (derogatory) ----- ## Founding Myth The faction traces its origins to Dr. Linnea Salish, a marine ecologist studying transient orca populations from the Orcas Island research station when Outbreak Day struck. Stranded with a small group of researchers, fishermen, and tourists, she watched the mainland burn from across the water while the pod of orcas she’d been tracking circled the island for three days—something she’d never witnessed in her career. In her journals, later canonized as *The Salt Testaments*, Salish began framing the outbreak not as catastrophe but as **Earth’s immune response**—Cordyceps as antibody, humanity as infection. The orcas, she wrote, had come to witness “the Great Returning,” when the stolen breath of the world would flow back into the soil. Over twenty years, her ecological observations calcified into theology. She died in Year 14, but by then, she was no longer “Linnea”—she was simply The First Witness, and her acolytes controlled every nautical mile from Anacortes to the Fraser River. ----- ## Core Beliefs The Debt of Breath The Tideborn believe humanity owes an unpayable debt to the living world—every breath taken for millennia was stolen from the lungs of the earth. The Cordyceps is the Collector. The infected are not monsters but the Forgiven, whose debt has been settled. To kill an infected is a minor sin; to become one is neither heaven nor hell, but *resolution*. The Cycle of Waters All things flow outward and return. The tide is the visible proof of cosmic law. Their calendar is lunar; their rituals tied to tidal extremes. The highest holy days are the King Tides of winter, when the boundary between land and sea blurs and “the drowned world shows its face.” The Sparing Those who survived did so because the earth is not finished with them. Every survivor carries a purpose—most simply haven’t discovered it yet. The Tideborn see themselves as *midwives of meaning*, helping others find their purpose… or finding it for them. ----- ## Practices & Identifying Marks The Tideline Rather than scars, adherents tattoo a continuous wave-pattern line that begins at the left wrist and, over years of devotion, extends up the arm, across the shoulders, and down the right arm. The fully marked—those whose line is complete—are called The Unbroken Circuit and serve as priests and navigators. The ink is made from squid ink harvested from the Salish Sea, mixed with ash from the First Witness’s cremation pyre. Saltings Initiation involves submersion in frigid seawater until the body goes limp—held under by elder members in a ritual drowning that stops just short of death. Those who surface are “salted”—reborn owing their breath to the sea itself. Those who don’t surface… paid their debt early. The Offering of Anchors The dead are not buried. Bodies are weighted with stones and returned to the sea at specific locations called **Anchor Points**—places where the Tideborn believe the barrier between worlds is thin. They have mapped dozens of these sites throughout the San Juan archipelago and Georgia Strait. The Speaking of Hulls Tideborn vessels are considered sacred. Each boat has a name, a carved figurehead, and is “fed” small blood offerings before voyages. To harm a Tideborn vessel is a killing offense. ----- ## Structure & Hierarchy The Current – A council of seven navigators who interpret tidal patterns, weather omens, and orca sightings to guide faction policy. Decisions require consensus, framed as “reading the same water.” Harborkeepers – Regional leaders who control specific ports or island settlements. Vancouver, Victoria, Bellingham, and Anacortes each have one. They hold civil authority but defer to The Current on spiritual matters. Tidecallers – The militant arm. Recognizable by their hooded rain slickers dyed deep blue-black and their preference for maritime weapons: harpoons, gaffs, weighted nets, flensing knives.

3 | Early convert named Eli