The homeland communities of the Ogier, scattered across the Westlands. Stedding have a unique property: the One Power cannot be channelled within their boundaries, and channellers feel cut off from the True Source while inside. Even Shadowspawn are reluctant to enter them. There are forty-one inhabited stedding, each governed by a Council of Elders, with an average population of around twelve thousand. Ogier who remain outside a stedding too long fall prey to the Longing and eventually die.