Andan

> "*Petal-sweet, thorn-sharp.*"
> ― Andan watchwords
>
>

The **Andan** are one of the six factions governing the hexarchate in the Machineries of Empire universe.

Notable Andan include Heptarch Andan Shandal Yeng, Agent Andan Tseya, Governor Andan Viendris, Andan Niath, and Andan Irimi.

## Role

The Andan are a high faction; their corresponding low faction is the Vidona. They dominate and dictate hexarchate culture and finance, and are in charge of first contacts, diplomacy, and other interactions with foreign powers. They often intermarry in order to concentrate wealth in carefully chosen families.

They appreciate the blunt utility of the Vidona as a counterpoint to their subtler methods of control, and consider the Nirai easily manipulated, the Rahal too rigid to adapt to necessary circumstances, and the Kel "a hammer in search of a nail" but useful nonetheless. They have an intense hatred for the Shuos due to faction history and overlapping spheres of interest, and attempt to either outmaneuver or outspend them. Meanwhile, the Rahal find them too open and flexible in their regard for other cultures, though a necessary buffer between the hexarchate and heretical regimes; the Nirai are only interested in their ability to fund research endeavors; the Vidona take umbrage at their intolerable and borderline disloyal feud with the Shuos; the Kel despise them as too culturally flexible and friendly with heretical foreign powers; and the Shuos passionately hate them for their wealth, positive perception of the rest of the hexarchate, and overlapping areas of competition.

### Diplomacy

According to Shuos Emio, even the Andan know that there are no shortcuts to a stable regime. The Andan also provide protocol training within and outside their faction, and Andan-trained protocol advisers such as Oya Fiamonor are highly valued.

## Government

The center of Andan government is the City of Inverted Gardens. Their emblem is the kniferose, and their colors are blue and silver.

The most recent Andan hexarch was Andan Shandal Yeng.

## Technology

Individual Andan are able to hypnotize and mentally dominate people of lower social status, binding them to the Andan's will. The ability, known as enthrallment, depends on physical proximity and diminishes with repeated use against a specific target, but uncontrolled enthrallment can destroy the subject's brain; Andan operatives without full control of their abilities are therefore kept isolated from lower-ranked individuals. When activating enthrallment, the Andan's eyes turn dark rose-blue. The effectiveness of enthrallment as a threat causes faction members to go to great lengths to gain greater social status. The Shuos, however, are said to train some of their operatives to resist enthrallment.

The Andan also have a version of the Shuos shouter which operates over a wider range of calendrical values and is kept in the Andan Archives.

## Recruitment

Prospective Andan are expected to possess some combination of beauty, wealth, and culturally significant creativity. Ties to Andan families are also valued; the Kel feeling against nepotism is associated with their antipathy toward the Andan, who frequently practice it.

The Andan academies stress deportment, wealth-building, and the arts. Like the Shuos, they notoriously have an Introduction to Seduction class; Andan-trained courtesans are widely regarded as superior to the Shuos-trained version. Hexarch Nirai Kujen once claimed that either Shuos cadets or Andan cadets before the faction split were once required to speak in code throughout an entire semester.

## History

The Andan and Shuos started out as a single faction which sundered before the birth of Hexarch Nirai Kujen, so long ago that not even he knows which came first. According to Andan records, the younger twin of Andan Estrekor saved the heptarchate from one of Estrekor's treacherous plots and forced her out of the Andan to found the Shuos. The Shuos claim that Estrekor was a Shuos, betrayed by her younger twin who left to found the Andan. Much of the two factions' mutual hatred dates from the time of the split.

A centuries-long campaign to stamp out corpse calligraphy in the hexarchate stemmed partly from the regime's embarrassment after one of the most successful, long-lived Andan hexarchs became a corpse calligrapher.

Petty squabbles with the Andan were partially responsible for weakening the Shuos before the hexarch's seat fell to Shuos Mikodez.

Records of an Andan diplomatic mission among the Hafn two years before the Hafn invaded the hexarchate revealed frustratingly few clues to the heretic regime's motivations.

An archive in the Hall of Stochastic Longings on the Fortress of Scattered Needles houses Andan records going back 500 years.

The Andan in both the Compact and Protectorate retained their positions as brokers of the two realms' culture and wealth after the broadcast of the revised calendar, despite the loss of enthrallment as a weapon in the Compact. One of High General Kel Brezan's first concerns was to obtain Andan help in stabilizing the Compact's markets.

Nine years later, the Andan, along with the Vidona, had the most difficulty with the Protectorate's decision to adopt the Compact's calendar, leading to a great deal of Andan infighting.

## Culture

The Andan pride themselves on dominance of hexarchate’s culture, but disdain the art of paper-folding, which is specific to the Vidona. However, most of the hexarchate's entertainment, including popular dramas, are Andan-made.

The most properly-inclined Andan dress in variations on blue-and-silver. Along with the Rahal, the Andan still use some formality levels in their speech, such as the -zho honorific, which are considered archaic among other factions.

Despite the delicacy of Andan hospitality, there are almost as many jokes about prepackaged Andan meals as there are about Kel ration bars.

### Andan jokes

* The Shuos joked that cadets who failed to hack their commandant's surveillance system during their first year were only fit for the Andan.
* Andan Tseya described Shuos Jedao as "a Shuos, which means he's like an Andan, except with worse public relations."
* Shuos Jedao knew an astounding number of filthy Andan jokes.

## Trivia

* Protector-General Kel Inesser's lineage included some of the great Andan families.
* Planetary governors are usually Andan, and less usually Rahal. Governor Nirai Lozhoi was an exception.
* The heroine of *A Rose in Three Revolutions* was an Andan.
* Andan rose liqueur, a drink known in the heptarchate, may be related to wine-of-roses.

## References

1. ↑ Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 2
2. ↑ The Factions: High Faction Andan
3. ↑ Author's website
4. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 8
5. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 12
6. ↑ The Factions: High Faction Andan
7. ↑ Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 2
8. ↑ The Factions: High Faction Andan
9. ↑ Author's website; The Factions: High Faction Andan
10. ↑ Raven Stratagem, Chapter 18
11. ↑ Raven Stratagem, Chapter 14
12. ↑ The Factions: High Faction Andan
13. ↑ Raven Stratagem, Chapter 3
14. ↑ Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 3
15. ↑ The Factions: High Faction Andan
16. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 5
17. ↑ The Factions: High Faction Andan
18. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 6
19. ↑ Open Thread: Revenant Gun
20. ↑ Author's website; [http://www.solarisbooks.com/post/2005 The Factions: Low Faction Shuos
21. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 8
22. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 2
23. ↑ Raven Stratagem, Chapter 5
24. ↑ Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 17
25. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 2
26. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 12
27. ↑ Raven Stratagem, Chapter 2
28. ↑ The Factions: High Faction Andan
29. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 8
30. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 36
31. ↑ Hexarchate Stories: Glass Cannon
32. ↑ Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 22
33. ↑ Raven Stratagem, Chapter 14
34. ↑ Raven Stratagem, Chapter 2
35. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 5
36. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 5
37. ↑ Revenant Gun, Chapter 3
38. ↑ Ninefox Gambit, Chapter 23