Elethri is also called the Nation or the Land of the Five Rivers for the five great rivers that cross it, flowing eastward from the Malaitha Mountains to the ocean. Its borders are defined by the Malaitha Mountains to the west, by the northernmost river to the north, and by the southernmost river to the south. Its easternmost border is indeterminate, with the eastern isles generally being considered part of Elethri. The isles themselves are difficult to get to and from and the ocean there is generally avoided by ships as numerous rocks, reefs, and submerged mountain peaks make it incredibly treacherous to navigate, and usually not worthwhile. Most of Elethri is subtropical, with the southern most river lying within the region that can be equated to that defined on Earth by the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn. Towards the north Elethri gets rather cold, but most of Elethri, especially the coastal lowlands, is keep relatively temperate by the currents and the winds coming off the ocean.
Elethrian society makes no differentiation between the male and female for any purpose other than the conception of young. There are no gender norms or expectations. All styles of clothing are appropriate to all sexes, with no associations being made between them. Neither is there any association between biological sex and personality types, or behavior, or roles and activities. There is no concept of masculine or feminine behavior, or masculine or feminines roles or tasks. In short, there is no concept of the masculine and the feminine, but only an understanding of what sorts of acts (and therefore what combination of body parts) are potentially fertile.
Elethrian society is, for the most part, shy, private, and reserved. Friendships that are expected to endure the decades are rare and often slowly built, and many elves are more or less loners, some of them nomadic, some of them living with whatever animal they have built a rapport with. The most important rule of Elethrian culture is to “Keep your branches out of your neighbor’s canopy.” What you think of someone or a lifestyle or a private religion is your business, but making your opinions someone else’s business (particularly if that someone else is a stranger or casual acquaintance) is probably the biggest taboo in Elethrian culture, apart from wanton killing or destruction of the natural world, whether plant or animal life, or killing someone’s pet or companion, which are crimes that might see one hunted by vigilantes or guards.
Possibly related to the saying, “Keep your branches out of your neighbor’s canopy,” is the phrase to “entangle branches.” This phrase is inspired by what can happen when two trees grow very close together and twine their branches through and around each other, so that if one tree falls it takes the other with it, or at least severely damages it, and while one trees stands firm and strong, the other stands also. Entangling branches has no connotations whatsoever as to the gender of the entangled, or even whether sexuality or sexual behavior is a part of the relationship, but refers to a mutual relationship symbolized by the image of the trees that is expected to last the lives of the entangled partners. Naturally, this is something that is between the entangled and those they choose to share it with, and no one else has any business asking, caring, or speculating.
Likewise, marriage in Elethri is a private affair, conducted entirely by the will of the two being married. Generally, marriage refers to a relationship between a male and a female that has the possibility of conceiving young, and is often considered – or at least hoped – to be a form of entangling branches. Celebrations of marriage usually consist of something like a potluck with friends and perhaps acquaintances, when such celebrations occur at all. Except in the case of royalty, marriage is always unrecorded, and even in the case of royalty, no external permission is ever involved.
Technically, Elethri is a rather odd Monarchy. Officially, the succession goes to the oldest child of the previous Monarch (or Monarchs), favoring males (and in the absence of any child, to the closest relative), which is odd because otherwise Elethri makes no distinction between male and female (though it is impossible to determine if the law regarding males is always observed, it is the impression given to such states as the Valor Alliance). However, it is not what it would seem to one unfamiliar with the laws of Elethri, since the Heir’s Spouse is considered Heir, and the Monarch’s Spouse is absolutely equal with the Monarch, with no distinction being made between their powers or roles. Thus, there are as many reigning Queens as reigning Kings. Due to the fact that whoever the Heir or Monarch chooses as Spouse is Heir or Monarch, the choice is usually made with a great deal of care (when it is made at all). Often, the Heir will vanish into the forests for a century or two, without any signs to mark him or her as Heir, to find, if possible, a Spouse.
In practice, Elethri is half anarchy. The King and Queen are usually more a sort of celebrity than an actual King and Queen, and most of Elethri knows that the King and Queen cannot actually force anything on them that they do not consent to. The vast majority of elves are capable of living, fairly comfortably, on their own, and of vanishing quite easily, and they know it. By far the majority of elves are half-way there already, and not insignificant number have very limited contact with anyone outside of (possibly) a small circle of friends and do not even know what goes on in the Capitol, Frèlin. Some of the cities do not even have governors or an official guard, but such things are comprised of volunteers and resemble vigilante teams more than anything else, though such vigilante teams may be more concerned with gardening and keeping tracks of what homes are unoccupied and opened and what stands of trees can accommodate new tree-houses than anything more violent. There may also be a number of undeclared vigilantes. Crime in Elethri is very low due to the elves’ lifestyle and to the generally peaceful and reserved nature of the elves.
To the human nations, Elethri is shrouded in mystery and the – sometimes over-grown – legends of the past. Human empires rise and disintegrate while Elethri remains much the same, and even the names of the Kings and Queen change only a few times. Despite being in many ways what would be considered uncultured and uncivilized, Elethri with its shining cities is also prominent in certain aspects of the culture of Ellenesia. A prime example is that, despite the fact that Elethri does not count the years or keep dates in any official capacity, Elethri keeps the year centered for the rest of Ellenesia, as the elves (some of whom are dedicated sky-watchers with a relatively advanced astronomy due to how long they have to study the stars) celebrate the Winter and Summer Solstices. The Bay of Winter Dawn and the Bay of Summer Dawn are named for the great rings of stone built in long-past ages to watch the skies, specifically for the respective Solstices for which they are named.
Elethri, Nation of Five Rivers, is featured in both novels of the Legend of the Singer Duology, Children of the Dryads and Sorceress of the Dryads, and the forth-coming Kindred of the Sea.
Posts related to Elethri:
Enthralled By Love 
So, this nonbinary society idea sounds great… only issue is that most things in this society are implicitly binary, and so it just looks like there was zero understanding of the terms binary and nonbinary, and also zero regard to actual nonbinary or trans people. I don’t know if the author of this is nonbinary, but it just… doesn’t sound like it, and seems more like they thought “you know what, wouldn’t it be nice if there was a society without gender norms” and that’s where they stopped, because aside from the most superficial of gender norms, everything is and remains so very binary.
I’m just gonna use quotes and a list to show what I mean.
“Elethrian society makes no differentiation between the male and female for any purpose other than the conception of young.” – Sounds plausible, this is good.
“There are no gender norms or expectations.” – Also good.
“All styles of clothing are appropriate” – yes, good so far and then: “to both genders” – …. what? Both genders? Both of the non-existent genders, since that would make the society binary. So, what are the two genders supposed to be? Do you mean both sexes, referring to the biological markers? And even then, there’s also more than two. Intersex people exist in a number of variations.
“Neither is there any association between biological gender and personality types, or behavior, or roles and activities.” – We’ll get to this with the king and queen part.
“There is no concept of masculine or feminine behavior, or masculine or feminine roles or tasks. In short, there is no concept of the masculine and the feminine, but only an understanding of what sorts of acts (and therefore what combination of body parts) are potentially fertile.” – Okay, so… this is gonna be an aside, but a society that doesn’t have any set gender roles and only differentiates by the biological markers of male and female is still binary. Even without specific gender roles. It might attempt to be nonbinary in regards to gender, but in of itself, this is a deeply binary thing to root deep inside your society.
“Elethrian society is, for the most part, shy, private, and reserved. Friendships that are expected to endure the decades are rare and often slowly built, and many elves are more or less loners, some of them nomadic, some of them living with whatever animal they have built a rapport with. The most important rule of Elethrian culture is to “Keep your branches out of your neighbor’s canopy.” What you think of someone or a lifestyle is your business, but making your opinions someone else’s business (particularly if that someone else is a stranger or casual acquaintance) is probably the biggest taboo in Elethrian culture, apart from wanton killing or destruction of the natural world, whether plant or animal life, or killing someone’s pet or companion, which are crimes that might see one hunted by vigilantes or guards.” – This has big ‘your gender expression is only yours and that’s why it’s nonbinary as a society’ and also ‘what’s in your pants is only your business’ vibes which just contradicts the rest of the text that is incredibly focused on how what’s in your pants is NOT only your business.
“Entangling branches has no connotations whatsoever as to the gender of the entangled, or even whether sexuality” – how do sexualities work? There’s only supposed to be one gender, nonbinary. There are reportedly no terms for masculine or feminine traits. How is sexuality defined? – “or sexual behavior is a part of the relationship, but refers to a mutual relationship symbolized by the image of the trees that is expected to last the lives of the entangled partners. Naturally, this is something that is between the entangled and those they choose to share it with, and no one else has any business asking, caring, or speculating.” – Again, this seems very ‘look at my justification of how nonbinary everything is on the surface while underneath everything is actually very binary.’ At this point, it just seems like there’s not been any thought put into it, or that the author has any idea of what binary actually means.
Now we’re getting to my favourite part. This is a fucking kicker, buckle up.
“Likewise, marriage in Elethri is a private affair, conducted entirely by the will of the two being married.” – I wish I could make the next part bold:
“Generally, marriage refers to a relationship between a male and a female” – SUPER FUCKING BINARY. Like… I get what you’re trying to do, but normalizing marriage between opposite sexes is just the definition of binary. You can dress it up as much as you want, no amount of gender expression liberation can make up for the fact that marriage is mainly and primarily meant for people of opposite sex.
“Technically, Elethri is a rather odd Monarchy. The succession goes to the oldest child of the previous Monarch (or Monarchs), favoring males” – WHYYYY??????? Is this a society of nonbinary people or a society of absolute bodily binaries where people just don’t care if you wear a dress???
“(and in the absence of any child, to the closest relative), which is odd because otherwise Elethri makes no distinction between male and female.” – Okay but then why the fuck would you put that in? This is Gender Apocalypse level of nonsense.
“However, it is not what it would seem to one unfamiliar with the laws of Elethri, since the Heir’s Spouse is considered Heir, and the Monarch’s Spouse is absolutely equal with the Monarch, with no distinction being made between their powers or roles. Thus, there are as many reigning Queens as reigning Kings.” – Why are there two gendered terms for a nonbinary ruling class? Only way I could imagine this to make sense is if the monarchy really wanted to signal which person has the gonads, which is just… fucking weird.
“Due to the fact that whoever the Heir or Monarch chooses as Spouse is Heir or Monarch, the choice is usually made with a great deal of care (when it is made at all). Often, the Heir will vanish into the forests for a century or two, without any signs to mark HIM OR HER” – What is this?? What is the in-universe explanation for two gendered pronouns to be used in a nonbinary society? I just… They/Them is a perfectly usable gender-neutral pronoun, and if for some reason you hate it, then use a neo-pronoun.
“In practice, Elethri is half anarchy. The King and Queen” – again, please… you’re gonna need an explanation for the two gendered terms.
So, tl;dr, nonbinary society is actually super binary. There’s binary terms for royalty, there’s binary pronouns (as a default. If somebody chooses He/Him or She/Her as an outlier in the nb society, that makes sense. But why is it treated as the default?), trans and intersex people don’t seem to exist at all, or at least aren’t taken into account, marriage is incredibly binary (nobody gets to know your sex unless you’re married in which case it is one of the primary deciding factors of that marriage).
Overall it just seems like there is no understanding of what an actual nonbinary society would look like, how it would treat marriage, and there seems to be no understanding of what binary and nonbinary are in any context but the broadest most superficial terms from the author. We were actually rather interested in this, being two nonbinary people but… this is just weird. This needs a serious overhaul before anyone nonbinary is going to take a look at it and enjoy it.
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I am nonbinary, since you asked, and perhaps I used my words poorly, and should have used the word ‘sex’ in some places (I may edit that to change some of the wording to make more sense). And for some of your questions: there are reasons but if I answered every one of them in depth, I’d end up writing something really long.
Keep in mind reading this response that I have NO concept of gender or sex or sexuality. My only way to approach it at all is the raw facts of biology: if one wants a certain result, one need both pairs or there will not be any children. This may contribute to the fact that I confuse the word gender/sex. I ONLY UNDERSTAND BREEDING. Some things I say may be insensitive or narrow (and I am willing to try to do better), because I simply have no concept of gender. I would appreciate your help, but I think you can help me better if you understand why I fail at times.
With reference to the ‘both genders’, refer back to what I said: my wording may be clumsy, and I’ll probably edit it sometime.
I am writing this text in the context of a society that is not Elethri. How else do I express that, in general, Elethri doesn’t subscribe to a binary understanding of who people are, but if someone isn’t of that opinion, he’ll still keep his opinion to himself?
About marriage: ‘marriage’ is a word. Technically, Elethrian may not even have a word that would translate to ‘marriage’ in English. But Elethri does have a concept of an arrangement or agreement that assumes the possibility of children coming into being through that arrangement and has some of its elements built around that possibility. After all, having children involves certain responsibilities to people outside of the ones originally making the agreement. This also ties into my experience growing up: when I was told there was such a thing as ‘gay marriage’ I didn’t ever think it was wrong, but I thought marriage was about having children. I never had a problem with a ‘married people relationship’ otherwise; but I always took ‘marriage’ to imply the responsibilities attendant to the choice to have children
The reason for the odd law is unknown; it might date to an ancient custom never reconsidered, or it might be because, in elves far more so than in humans, the female is the greater portion of how the child comes out. By taking most of the biologically female Monarchs from across Elethri, that basically prevent in-breeding and keeps the Monarchs diverse.
The point of the terms isn’t to be gendered, but to make people easily distinguishable. The actual Elethrian translation (I haven’t worked this part of the conlang through completely, never mind Elethri usually have three or four versions of a word) might be Heir-born and Heir-chosen or Monarch-born and Monarch-chosen. I used ‘King’ and ‘Queen’ is this article in part to emphasize that THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE IN EXPECTATION based off the biological sex of the individuals. But it might be better to use ‘Heir-born’ and ‘Hero-Chosen’. I’m welcome to discussion on this.
I used He/Him and She/Her most of the time since I feel like “they/them” are plural; I use “they/them” for those who desire it, but I personally find it awkward so it’s not natural to me. I also find it really weird using gendered pronouns all the time, so this is something I am still figuring out how I want to do myself. However, I don’t feel as weird using gendered pronouns as I could, given that I am comfortable being called either He/Him or She/Her and really don’t give a care which one you call me. It just seems weird. So I’m still deciding what I want to do about that. As for trans/intersex, there are more biologically intersex elves than among humans, but keep in mind: this is written by someone who has NO understanding of sex or gender apart from the biological functions (which are conceivably m/f/m-f/NA). Those functions don’t seem to be very important to me (unless one wants to have children), but I have no other concept of sex or gender).
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