The Cullhold

A dry ridge-cave the Cullers use as a kill-house and cache — hides curing, clean arrows in score, and a wall of echo-beast skulls, the freshest still half-crowned with crystal.

The Cullers chose this cave for what it isn't: wet, visible, or near the paths the Sap-Drinkers take. Hides hang on pegged frames. Arrowheads are stacked by grain, not by weight. The skull wall has a gap left — always one gap — because the next skull is always somewhere still moving in the wood. The freshest skull here is half-crowned with crystal; there is more than one Rotcrown's get, and the Cullers are counting.