K'Chain Che'Malle

The K'Chain Che'Malle are one of the elder races of the Malazan world, present from Gardens of the Moon, though at first only as relics. Their civilization flourished and fell so long ago that even the world's other ancient peoples speak of them at a remove, and old accounts hold that in their day they ruled much of the world, keeping powers far older than humanity at bay until their own age ended. What survives of them in the early books is plunder and rumor: in Gardens of the Moon, the empire's inner circle of commanders is said to use devices looted from a K'Chain Che'Malle tomb, contrivances of bone and verdigrised copper wire that carry speech across great distances. Their name otherwise attaches to sealed tombs, strange ruins, and the guesses of scholars of the deep past.