Does the "Air Rune" spiral have a direction?

[g33k]

That is to say, does "canon" specify that it spirals outward from the center, or into the center from the outside, or does each have a different meaning within Storm Tribe culture... or is this just silly Gloranthan navel-gazing of a particularly egregious and onerous form?

(YGMV)

[Joerg]

Jeff has stated explicitely that the handedness of the spiral has no sinister or clockwise meaning when used as tattoo or other ornamentation.

IMO going inward is facing your inner wind, or the No Wind, or it is ascending the Holy Mountain. Going outward is to bring the force of Storm into the world. Both are meaningful.

[scott-martin]

Great question. Not a theologian but wind patterns suggest clockwise coriolis, which is only possible if the "normal" Storm Rune starts from the center and spirals out. Sikkanos in Sea Season is the obvious recalcitrant power. When the rune flips you're going in.

[Bill the barbarian]

9 minutes ago, Joerg said:

IMO going inward is facing your inner wind, or the No Wind, or it is ascending the Holy Mountain. Going outward is to bring the force of Storm into the world. Both are meaningful.

as is releasing a violent and volatile wind of any kind (imagination required here, or on second thought maybe it would be better to not) into the world.

[Byll]

If you watch Orlanth's ring from the ground it travels anticlockwise from the lower (outer) sky to the top (centre), that would seem to be a good pattern. But it may just depend on handedness, or how it relates to other graphical or structural elements around it.

[Joerg]

7 hours ago, Byll said:

If you watch Orlanth's ring from the ground it travels anticlockwise from the lower (outer) sky to the top (centre), that would seem to be a good pattern. But it may just depend on handedness, or how it relates to other graphical or structural elements around it.

Orlanth's ring only seems to spiral - effectively it moves up straight from Stormgate to Pole Star, but the stars in the background perform seven full rotations during that rise, which gives a spiral pattern on that background if you map out that journey, and mythic encounters that can be drawn from the approximation of the ring and other constellations.

The magic used by the dancers of the Dragonrise (provided by the Dara Happan star magic used or abused in that rite) was extraordinary in pulling Orlanth's ring into a real spiral on the sky, rising halfway along Umath's path in a single night.

In other words, there is no chance for Orlanth's ring encountering the Red Moon under normal circumstances, and Minaryth planned out the Dragonrise intrusion avoiding the Red Moon. They didn't have to make the full seven spirals, either, ascending only to the Dragon constellation in the River.

[Julian Lord]

Glorantha's weather patterns move clockwise around the centre of the world -- and IIRC that's related to the way that Magasta's Pool spirals inwards, in that the rains from that weather follow the routes of the other waters towards that pool

The Rune itself though can spiral inwards or outwards, clockwise or anti-clockwise -- and so it can emulate all corresponding RW weather conditions, cyclones and anti-cyclones and etc.