Avatar of Dinh AaronMk

Status

Recent Statuses

7 mos ago
Current Never spaghetti; Boston strong
9 mos ago
The last post below me is a lie
1 like
9 mos ago
THE SACRIFICE IS COMPLETE. THE BOILERMEN HAVE FRESH SOULS. THEY CAN DO SHIFT CHANGES.
2 likes
10 mos ago
Was that supposed to be an anime reference
10 mos ago
I live in America, but the m, e, r , i, c are silent
2 likes

Bio

Harry Potter is not a world view, read another book or I will piss on the moon with my super laser piss.

Most Recent Posts

Kingdom of Akron

River to Arkronia


“'An on m'right I seek to fight the winter's blight that doth threaten our summer love.” recited Matheias in a muted sing-song as he paced the open deck of the ferry boat, fist clenching tight the pummel of his sword as he recited a poem from memory. He held a small number of attendees in rapt interest, the princes, the gray bearded Akronian captain and the assorted crewmen setting forth to the imperial capital. The humans of the boat, and there were many were largely deep at work of ferrying the boat against the river. Their bare bodies glistening in the spring sun as they sweated into the cold air at the oars. They could not give the luxury of listening to the knight, who wore his helmet visor down to avoid the scorn of the imperial hosts and their servants as a free human in Arkronian lands.

“An' from darkened forest comth the very lowest t'take from me mine love.” the knight continued. The lowered visor had a long beak shape helping to conceal not only his face but his race.

King William stood elsewhere, leaning across the side of the boat smoking his long pipe. He watched the countryside scroll slowly by them. The coming spring had lifted much of the snow from the countryside, revealing it gray and barren under naked trees beginning to bud with new life. However, the lack of any growth had not stifled the turnings of life in the country. As they rowed up the great black river leading to Arkron's cosmopolitan heart he watched the stooped form of peasants and serfs at work in the fields to prepare them for a new season of planting. Fences were being mended and black melt-full soil tilled up and turned over to aerate and lighten it before it settles into hard clay. Beyond the darkened fields rose the marble white columned palaces and estates of Arkronia's towering aristocracy, the very people an Empire's worth of tribute kept alight on the rising updrafts of centuries of unending glory. Many in those distant towering mansions might be said to be richer and more powerful than any other race's nobility across the continent. Presiding over vast teams and townships of humans and elite Arkronian alike. And while the Arkronian could travel more than easily across the entirety of the Empire often travel, even for William was miserly and seemingly rife with its own mundane complications that irritated it. Whether it was being obliged to submit to some toll master's demands on the highway or to have to face down the barely concealed superiority of his own hosts.

Yet, by centuries of history William was bound to these people and obliged to offer thanks to them. For without them, there would be no he. The binds of gratitude bound them both tightly at the hand of dynastic politics. And when all things were said and done, and once the trivialities of obliging Arkronian order and legal procedure were done there were individuals in the Empire that William found pleasant enough for him. Those willing to be interested or play at being interested. In these people he placed considerable trust; though he wondered at loyalty. And for the time being he was thankful that he and his party had such an easy time. But he attributed this to the circumstances at hand. There would be little point in directly offending the travelers to descend on the capital for the coronation, and many of Arkronia's best would be making the trip all the same.

As Matheias continued his poem, William continued to watch over the countryside with glazed meditative impassivity as he slowly smoked through his ration of herb and grass. He watched the passage of peasants and higher born Arkronians pass up and down along the river-side road. All were outpaced by the ferry which made its tiring speed against the current in order to make the time promised to them by the captain. The obsession on order did one thing a Cor Avan could appreciate, or any other raised in the Cor: the punctuality of an Arkronian promise was a gift all of it's own. But watching the shore was to watch what kept this machine all in motion, as it would if one were to watch the oarsmen at their ungrateful work sweating at the bench.

How much longer might they have to the capital? A day or two perhaps? He thought about it. He had once hiked to the capital from port. It had taken him nearly over a week and a half. But that was stoppages for the weather. It was winter then, and the snow that blew in from off the sea was enough to bury a peasant's hovel. The country nobles had been polite enough to offer him a space to shelter, where from high windows he watched the snow blow in from the sea and drift to nearly as high as the ceilings. And those same nobles not wanting to be daunted had their servants open the door and dig themselves out. As they opened the tunnels out into the snow they dug and melted out of the heavy ocean born snow great dining halls and ate in the comfortable mild warmth that could only be found in there. And having been offered the gratitude of a royal visit offered William and his company snow shoes and coats and let them back out. If at the time he felt he was not possessed to arrive to the capital he believed he may have stayed in those palaces until the snow cleared and as armies of servants continually cleared out and expanded the rural palaces until they stretched out for miles under heavy winter snow.

Passing from extensive and endless fields and on into pastures where the long fences marched on over the hills and on more undaunted by distance and terrain. Here and there idled flocks of pearl white sheep and the scattered herd of cattle laying out in the mud and taking in the early warmth of a spring sun. There also were horses with their broad and well build shoulders and flanks, ready for war and to equip the armies and officers of the Arkronian military. They pranced and ran about in sweeping pastures and fields as free as they could be, getting their exercise. Here and there among them stood human serfs who leaned on their staffs with whips wrapped at their sides idling supervising the herds doubtlessly appraised more valuable than they themselves.

And among field and pasture were the well tended forests of their orchards and vineyards were already workers were out with sheers and rakes to clear the earth and trees for a new growing season. The dead were being cleaned from the healthy and tossed aside. A continual regrowth of the Arkronian's own grown luxury.

William took a puff of his pipe and asked himself: how much longer until their voyage ends?
Kingdom of Akron

Port Arkron


To sail in the shadow of the great galleons of the Arkronian navy was a sight to behold. To be in its wake was a terror to sail. The great sails of the mighty sailing ship were as high as a city wall, spanning outwards far beyond the deck railing. Its towering aft and fore castles looming watchfully over the deck and sea, clad in plates of decorative and armoring bronze. The ship's planks were lacquered heavily with black pine tar. In the same way a dragon's wing soars out from its body, the great and immense red banner of the empire flew unfurled and waving in the wind far beyond the reach of the deck and to wrap around the aft castle as the winds drove it to and fro.

Standing at the rail of their schooner, the young prince Edward starred up at the great rising barrel chested hull of the great Arkronian ship. His beak hanging open as his eyes were held high at its immensity. The sailors on deck moved about him. They had seen much, and such a size was not unusual. There was in the Empire many things much bigger. The shadow of the immense ship loomed heavily and engulfed the Waxward. And soon in the distance the great towers that would herald the entrance to Port Akron would rise from the sea, burning.

“Good prince, please have caution. Yer leanin' over t'rail.” said one of the knights attending to the family. With a gentle hand he took him by the shoulder and pulled him back.

With a gulp Edward floundered for a moment, believing in that dizzying moment as he looked up at the immense ship several yards off deck he was indeed about to fall into the sea. He momentarily raised his voice to scream before realizing in that moment he was being pulled back. In his tension and anxiety the feathers on the back of his head rose in alert.

“Sir Mathaies!” he exclaimed blustering with a squeak, “What'r ye doing?”

“Keepin' ye' safe, m'lord.” the knight bowed. He was unlike the crew, a human with a dull and unassuming face. But he looked down at the Avan with sharp and parental eyes. He looked to be in middle age, and he clasped the hilt of his sword with a broken hand, his index finger overlapping his middle.

“A-ah, fair 'nuff then.” Edward intoned with a blushing voice. He turned back to look at the great Arkronian galleon and said with a cheer: “But it's s'big!”

“Ay, all'is large in Arkronia.”

“But why so?” asked Edward.

“They's a people o'large intent.” replied the knight.

“Yea'v been there?” asked the prince.

Mathaies nodded, “Some years ago 'ey was the levee yer gran'father sent t'the capital as part'o 'is obligations. F'er nearly th' twenty years o'my young service as squire t'an ol' knight o'the court I went with a mask. Fer in Arkronia humans are seen as less then. T'was nearly required more o'less t'pretend t'be a'pious Avan t'some ol' god t'not shovel horse shit.”

“'An did ya?” Edward asked.

“Nay, avoided that.” laughed Mathaies, “Now I be servant t'year father I doubt t'be as risk. He knighted me, the'fore I have some privileges. An' I served m'peonage.”

“What did ye do in t'empire?” Edward asked as he wandered along the deck rail watching the great galleon. From the deck of the much larger ship gray faced strangers looked down with disdain. On the Avan vessel they had been obliged to raise their sails to match the speed of the lumbering treasure ship. The threat of the glint of their superior's weapons obliging them to do so or face some unspoken repercussions upon them. The young prince did not understand the meaning behind this, and went about in simple astonishment of the great vessel.

“T'was well after t'last rebellion.” Mathaies explained, “Though m'master was called t'fight in it. The time I was called in f'er duty was 'least a time a'peace. Fer our'part was partook in obligin' the further peace in th' realm an'paradin' about like dandies.”

“Did y'march in the palace?” asked Edward excitedly. Mathaies nodded.

“How was'it?”

“Immense.”

“Ay, I hear so!”

“It strikes many a'terror in some.”

“So I hear.”

They reached the bow of the ship, where king William sat. Idly puffing on a pipe in his beak. He stared ahead out down the bow sprit. There rising out over the distance was the towers of the port of Port Akron. Their white stone rising in a faint glow in the late afternoon sun light. In the middle distance several large ships plied the waters heading toward the port. Edward looked on, amazed at the number of large vessels cutting through the waters.

“Port Order.” William said flatly, referring to the city by their dialect of Corvid. He took a long pull on the pipe.

“What'll we be doing there?” asked Edward.

“We'll stay a'while.” William answered, “Declare ourselves, rest fer awhile. Check t'see if t'Waxward is right enough fer t'river an'if we can take her up it. Or we move things t'a barge.”

Edward cooed interested at the thought of the experience and sat down next to his father to watch. Mathaies hovered behind them like a shadow with a dour expression for the imperial seat ahead. He knew too much about it and in his heart of hearts he believed he should hide himself in some way. He still had in his belongings his hawk beaked helmet, and for a time this may permit him to avoid the hard sight of scornful Arkronians. But wearing his armor may be seen as a threat to the carefully crafted image of public order in the port ahead.

The Waxward sailed smoothly on towards port at the newly slowed speed set by the merchant galleons of the Arkronians. Now lagging behind the great ship they the captain and the helmsman had directed the speedy corvette to sail further to the side, avoiding the waves the larger ship threw up.

They entered into port later in the evening with the crew in full activity. The leaving of and entering of any port was hard dangerous work, made so by competing for space between the known or unknown dangers of rocks and hidden shallow embankments that often ring a shore to the multitude of ships that sailed about with them, and before they entered the shadow of the great white towers they had spent much time vying for and searching for a location in the queue of ocean going vessels seeking an opportunity to dock.

As they waited, prince Edward received a brief impromptu education of the ships at port by the crew and by Henry who emerged from below deck. From the long narrow galleons of the Saa'kaleed Abiat to the cogs of nearby Rhaetia. Even the more distant smaller traders from Skekaria. Arguments broke out and were settled over the styles of rigging and the length and heights of decks and spans. But more impressive to Edward still were the large Arkronian ships at harbor, from the wide breasted ocean goers of the merchant fleet to the meaty and blood soaked hulls of the northern whaling ships returning south from their long excursions in the frigid waters north of Epha, their great scummy pots of whale oil bubbling still as they came to dock, perfuming the air with the aromatic if tepid smell of boiling sperm.

All of this was watched over by the twin towers that guarded the gate to the port. As with the seawall, they stood tall and impressive in their white stone, though long grayed and green by the spray of stormy seas. But as clear as freshly painted the outward facings of the great sea gate stood painted the emblem of the Empire on the coat of arms of the city itself, a red winged shield with the three entwined black triangles of the imperial state. As well, a heavy chain hung from the towers, in time of plight the great chain would be pulled up from the bed of the seat to discourage any hostile raiders from entering port. But for the centuries the Empire had been in Mycoria, the chain had never been raised. It hung merely as a threat, a promise of self defense and powerful opposition to any threat that might challenge the Arkronian's strict law. So it rusted, its immense links became the perches of hundreds of gulls and rockbirds.

By the time they found room and negotiated with a harbor master they were informed that it was late, and today the longshoremen would soon retire to sleep. By the following morning the kegs of gifted liquor would be unloaded and deposited on the next barge to the capital. The captain elected a contingent of the crew to remain behind, and differing from shore Mathieas offered to stay too to help where needed. William permitted this, and with the remainder of the entourage went ashore and quickly found a hotel to abscond in for the night.

Edward, excitable at the new sights wandered about in the lamp-lit streets of the city with his brothers. Their father king felt no danger, he knew the Arkronian obsession with order. Even with their own guard, there would be a watchful presence by their hosts all the same to ensure nothing happened to them. Or they themselves to the city and their hosts. But opting to keep to himself he remained behind in the inn, and sat melancholy at the window.

Despite the cold early spring William sat by an open window. The turbulent air of the port city wafting in, the fire place crackled along a far wall. The room was as opulent as the city was large. The wide paved streets dominated by the tall homes of the great merchant counting houses and the manufacturers and warehouses of the harbor district of Port Akron. Lit by northern whaling, the city was held in a pale green glow in the night, accompanied by the orange and yellow lights of candles in windows as the city's finest went about their evenings before bed. There was a restrained silence in the city, much unlike the chaos of Hemden's evenings when the travelers of the canals and the merchants and the various teamsters and longshoremen met with the tradesmen and other day laborers of the city in a raucous nightly celebration in the numerous taverns and bars of the city. At night under torch and fire light the minstrels that remained hidden at day would play long into the cool summer nights. Where as by comparison in Arkronia, the libertine feelings were suppressed by a harsh conservative demand for order and cleanliness. It was here that William first heard “police” and not “night watch” or “guard” which was so much a fancy of the wealthier houses of his capital home.

“There's always somethin' rotten in Arkronia.” a voice said from the shadows, and William turned to look about. He didn't notice anyone. But the room was so proportioned that all the same someone might be hiding in the unnerving far corners. This was either a fact of control the imperial masters wished to impress or a strange mistake in the order. But for all the work of candles and fireplace, no space felt particularly well lit.

“Ye know this.” the voice added from somewhere and William turned back to the window to notice something out of the corner of his eye on the bed. The definitive black shape turned. “Really should keep t'window closed.”

“It's stuffy.” protested William.

“Ay n' so is the castle but s'what.”

“It's at least open in it.”

“True that be. But what'fer does it amount to if you dream s'much of flying the cope so it were?”

William didn't answer the figure's question and went on trying to ignore him.

“T'is a shame you're alone though. Perhaps y'might've enjoyed goin' out to see the city with the princes. Might allow you t'stretch yer legs. You'll want to walk straight when you get t'the palace. Maybe if the queen were still alive things wouldn't be s'gloomy 'bout'cha.”

William stared out the window unflinchingly. He blinked once, and looked down at a dog crossing the street, disappearing into some alley off to the side.

“T'is a strange sight t'see a city so empty however.” the figure said in a long sighing tone. “But as I said: t'is always something fishy in Arkronia. I believe they're always hiding somethin', an'ye know it.”

“They always do.” William said.

“Mm, yes. But what'about that dog? Why is it alone? They're not ones f'strays like that.”

William turned his head a slight, pulling the figure more into his periphery. The shadowy Avan lay himself across the bed, putting his boots up and folding great heavy arms under his head. “Saw it in your eyes.” it said with a carefree tone.

“Do'ye think they're hiding something?”

“Mmm,” the figure grumbled, “Yea used t'be good at'his.”

“What do'yea mean?” protested William

“Oh Good King William! How've you grown from seeing the patterns'n things and t'this. Is it not hard? There is something fishy goin'an here.”

William turned, and looked down onto the streets, the figure continued, “Do'yea need a hand held? The city is quiet, there'ain't a soul'in sight. Yea see anyone sweepin'? Is there anything t'sweep? They're trying to hide something going about.

“Anyways t'is late m'lord, don't you think? Yea'have a lotta time yet t'travel. Best y'sleep. The boys'll be back soon.”

Kingdom of Cor

Collans


With spring remained the rains. Or less of it than any other time in winter. It fell as snow in a cold snap or when some northern wind managed to break over the mountains. Otherwise it came in humid and warm from the south. While still early in spring and still numbingly cold, at times a spring rain brought with it warm air. For the first time this season someone could, though with a blanket step away from the fire. In the house of Bone Friend this was the case, as the lecturner sat out under the covered awning of his house, holding a cup of nettle tea in his hands. His wife took up a seat by his side.

“Are we going t'do anything about the two families?” his wife, Honor Pleased said. A narrow built woman, she was graced with an awkward and tall disposition. It was whispered she was the product of some strange coupling with a spirit from the Low Forests as a cruel joke against her now deceased mother. It was never a thing she could put down by herself, and the rumor had the misfortune of sticking to her where ever she had went. But for those who saw her long gait - as though a tower were about to fall over - it was not a long leap to make. But appearances were far from the last thing about her, for behind the awkwardness she possessed many qualities that had attracted her husband to her: she was the heiress to a modest burgher's fortune from the city of Stonewall on the northern coast, where the two had met at a winter party they attended at the expense of one of Friend Bone's professional acquaintances. But he was first brought to her by the speckled gray on blue feathers that crowned her head, the way she shone in the face even among the polite silent judgment of the attendees. He had approached her, asked her to dance, and managed to coax grace out of her long limber form even as she stood so tall her silver beak rested at his brow. With slight effort he managed to beguile her father to consider him, where he lived a professional life and could afford to give a place of dignity, thus beginning a year long courtship at a distance trying to prove himself.

And she was here now, in the country, looking out across a field to the creek that split the town. Watching the budding branches bob and nod with the warm early spring rain. The grass had not yet grown entirely, the countryside in brown. But as thunder began to roll over head the two realized that this would change soon. Together here they had raised ten children, two of which survived; one of which they both sent to the same acquaintance as whom inadvertently introduced them to study numbers as well as words.

“One of them's going t'try something on t'other.” she remarked again.

“I know.” Friend Bone said with a low voice, “One of'em warned me of a rumor.”

“So what's your plan?” she asked.

“Wait it out. T'ain't much I'cann do. Try t'stop anything if it t'were. Keep it low under the table.”

“And you sure y'can't make them stop?”

Friend Bone shook his head, “Nay. Bad blood that goes back a'few generations t'ain't easy to put out. And they've been keepin' it hot.”

“So y'er not going t'do anything?”

“Ican't, and the whiskey's been caught up in all this for s'long as both don't budge.”

“T'is a shame. They're both wonderful families.” said Honor with a wistful sigh.

They watched in the near distance as a small gang of young Avan run to the creek in despite of the rain to begin splashing about. From the hovel across a voice rang out as someone tried to call them back. “You remember when ours used to do that?” a nostalgic Honor said, “I miss those days.”

“I don't. I don't like t'get wet.”

“Oh now how come? You seem t'bathe just fine.”

“It's not that.” Friend Bone said with a laugh, “It's how cold the rain gets. It hurts.”

“And how about Stonewall, the ocean spray? You saying it did not hurt you then too?”

He took a moment to gulp down his cup and replied, “It did. I was pretending.” he laughed. Honor rolled her eyes. From the house emerged their youngest, a young Avan girl frail in her adolescence. She looked about nervously, holding a wooden plank with two small fresh loaves of bread. “I think they cooled 'nuff'now.” she said hesitantly with a tittering tension in her voice.

“Oh apple blossom, thanks.” cooed Honoria, tenderly reaching out and scooping her head towards her and with the gentleness of a snowfall rested the side of her beak on her head in a kiss. “I'll take those.” she offered.

“D'you want t'stay out here with us?” Bone Friend asked. The young one smiled and bowed, but hesitated.

“Y-yes.” she stuttered, “Can I, get'a blanket?”

“Go ahead.” Bone Friend said.

Her name was Passivity. Once a light of fire to match the sharp gleam in her eyes, blue like her mother's. But after her brothers succumbed to disease she retreated to a dark place, and becoming a recluse. She was hard to coax out. It even stumped Bone Friend, who spent the long hours before she fell asleep helping her through the initial onslaught of nightmares that plagued her.

“Will we try t'ask her t'come t'Ostrafeast?” whispered Honor, holding one of the small loafs of bread in her hands

Friend shook his head, “If she wants she'll ask t'come.”

“Y'sure? Because t'be honest: I have fear for her alone in t'home. They say t'is not good to be alone with your darker spirits.”

“She just mourns.” Friend said. He intended to add they both knew how well all their children were with one another. But this was fact they both knew all too well, and it would not help to say anything. All the same, the answer did not settle Honoria who looked back at the house with a terrified, saddened expression. She cast her look down at the bread and gingerly twisted and turned it this way and that until it broke. It had nuts in it. She sighed sadly. In her heart she knew that if she was not so low they might have been able to court her off. She was a wonderful girl.

“I'm thinking: perhaps we should send her t'the witch?” Honoria asked.

Friend looked up, astonished, “Why would'ye think o'that?”

“I'm just... Perhaps it'd be t'best idea. She can help, so others have said.”

“She is a mad woman though, cavorts with bad spirits. It'd be a risk!”

“I know but-” Honoria was cut off when they heard the sound of the door of the house being unlatched. Both parties straightened themselves as Passivity stepped out wrapped tight in a blanket. She looked at the two of them with innocent eyes.

“Hello.” she spoke softly.

“Welcome back. Come o'er'here, sit with me. I'll keep y'warm.” Honoria invited.

Smiling pensively, Passivity obliged and sat in her mother's lap. Together the two wrapped themselves in the gray wool blanket she had brought out and they looked out at the creek.

By this time the youths had finally been scolded or bribed back into the house. They ran up through the reeds with their clothes soaking wet. Further out in the distance beyond the hovel a small herd of deer wandered out into the gray rainy mist of the open fields. They watched their dark silhouettes move faintly over the blackened rain impregnated ground. The thunder continued to roll over head, not threatening much. The air had a cold heavy smell to it. Things felt as peace.

“This is a wonderful spring bread.” said Honoria, “D'ya want t'share a piece, my little duck?”

“I'm not hungry.” Passivity said, leaning her head against her mother's shoulders. Honoria looked across her daughter's tired head to Friend who sat leaning forwards, elbows against his knees deep in thought.
At Sea, to Arkronia


Though the Arkronians had long banned the construction of large resplendent ships throughout the realm, so as to maintain a monopoly on large men of war and great treasure galleons the art of designing ships for inter-realm trade and travel was still permitted to travel. But the area of design that was left there was much room for experimentation and design of its own to meet the needs of the mostly autonomous realms. Of such designs and characteristic was the ship Waxward, one of the five royal ships owned by the crown of Cor for its numerous wants and needs.

Built with a low deck and a shallow hull, the low ship lacquered with slick black pine tar was a swift skipper across the icy black waves of the ocean. Filled with the wind, its white and red sails billowed and swelled with the wind. The ropes and yards of its rigging snapping in the wind with every billowing crack of the wind into the sails. The very movement of the ship over the waves was like a rock being smoothly skipped over the water, flying straight across the low white heads of a still and calm northerly sea. Towards pillowing white mountains of late winter clouds to the north west it bounded forth towards Arkronia, with its long spear tipped bow raised up over the sea directing the helmsman on ever more towards the seat of royal power.

With a light crew bustling across the deck, the atmosphere was calm as under a low plank-topped and open cabin the royal passengers and their retinues and attendees sat on dense woolen pillows. The spray of the water and the rush of the wind was cold and bitter and they covered themselves in blankets to guard themselves from the occasional light spray of the cold ocean waves. Likewise, the crew went about their meagre work, now within the middle of their voyage and with only but the tending of the sails to do to keep the ship flying straight they went about with idle work: cleaning the dock and mopping up the sea water to keep it dry, mending torn ropes, or sitting upon the ropes of the rigging and keeping a eye cast out over the boundless waters.

Compared to the heavy vessels of the Arkronian fleet, whose immense decks supported a great number of marines and could sail across the great expanse of the seas to foreign lands kept as stories from many of the common residents of the homeland the Waxward was a small frigate of no notable difference. It had no fighting decks or platforms, or emplacements for even any large engine to do series battle. It would be in naval strategy considered mostly a boarding platform, its small crews hanging out on the periphery waiting to attack on any hostile vessel to board and capture it from its crew as they struggled against the much larger fighting platforms. And even compared to the mighty treasure galleons of the main fleet proper such a ship could not hold much in the way of storage. But it was especially in defiance of this that the Cor's shipyards have had for nearly the passed century been turning these ships out.

So small and rudimentary to be quickly built by a small team of carpenters, Corvig schooners like the Waxward were cheap in all except for whatever luxury materials or fittings demanded of them. Built for speed, what they often lacked in terms of capacity they made up for in speed, capable of completing trips faster than the lumbering and mighty treasure galleons that circulated the immense wealth of the Arkronians. Sent out from port, they could deliver single loads of a single commodity with considerable speed and efficiency, and were slowly plying further up and down the west coast of the realm in the small inter-realm traffic that existed.

Their commercial advantages in this respect also made them well respected passenger transports among the nobles and guild burgers of the coasts who could readily at any moment take one to make a quick and fleeting voyage to some distant or semi-distant area at short notice.

“An' out t'ere abroad t'sea are a race o'people whose women go about bare-chested all te'time in the warm lucid sun of their aft'noons!” the captain of the ship exclaimed, warmly drawing a deep breath from his pipe as he laughed. He, captain Wallace Hair Dog Spitting Into the Sea was an old nobleman, whose family he claimed stretched back millennia. But over the eons they had waned from great kings, onto into barons, before being scattered among the hundred scots lands of the Hemden watershed to manage to the watershed lots of the area, a far cry from grand princley status but he had started young with the meager savings his family had acquired working a small free hold farm and the collection of fees to see to the upkeep of the levees and canals that protected the farming valley around Hemden and the city itself from seasonal spring melts and summer rains to pay his way aboard a ship as an officer, and then into his own ship. A crude cut gentlemen with a head of graying and black feathers that never lay down straight his beak was scarred and mired by many decades at high-sea adventures, from brief stints aboard Arkronian treasure ships to lands far and wide and then into the easy quasy retirement in the Coarsecrane court. His sharp black eyes shone in the sun, black pearls set in white and graying rings around his eye.

His arrayed guests laughed, and in the distance a few lewd comments were made by comfortable crewmen who overheard the story without receiving scorn. For his part, William took the story with an air of impassivity as he sat slouched under his blanket with his own pipe of smoldering herb. Along side him sat his eldest son Henry who laid with his head resting atop his hand on a pillow, a heavy blanket laid over him.

“Bare a day that I miss t'days not.” he said wistfully, “But m'body is worn an' I doubt I can bare the long voyages again. S'long at sea n'the salt gets into yea. Yer joints ache, yer mind throms. Even so long out, n'I feel that me stomach turns an'me. Short voyages'r fine. But t'long slog across th'great sea an' it hollows me out.”

“It sounds like y'miss it.” Henry said.

“Mhm” Wallace intoned, “But 'bou's much as an' old man misses 'es youth. Our lohrd here mayhaps 'as much t'speak there on it in that as much.”

William looked up from looking down in his mug. In the center of the group circle a small brazer had been placed were from a hook hung a kettle of brandy warming over the coals. It was a small offering from the hold full of the southern distillate wine, brandy that was in the ship's hold as a gift to the Arkronian court as soon as they arrived. But looking into his cup he could see it was still half full and a layer of ash puffed out from the pipe was floating on the service.

“Y'tell?” Wallace asked.

“No thank you.” William answered, and the captain shrugged.

Also there were William's other two sons. His second oldest, Coffey Spit In The Lake sat upright gently sipping the warmed liqueur. He resembled his father and eldest brother Henry, except for the broadness of his brow compared to the other two and the tufts of feathers that spiked up from the side of his head like short elf ears. And besides him younger still was the younger thirteen year old young boy with a lost look in his eye, Edward Joined The River At Seventeen To Seek Peace In Time. Joining them too were two knights of the court, who lounged separated from the group but none the less under the cover and holding onto cups of brandy, though they had foregone their armor to the hold, they did not go without swords.

“What's Arkronia like?” Edward asked, his voice tense and feeble. He looked about himself for a moment, and up at Wallace and his father, “Yea two have been there, right?”

“Right I 'ave.” Wallace said, “And s'far as I can attest t': it's a remarkable city. Well orderly, nea possible t' get lost in its streets fer y'can find yerself easily back t'where you found yerself. Much unlike Hemden, whose streets wind 'bout themselves oft', and far better than an dozen others. Would'a'ya say, m'lord?”

William nodded, “It's a very open place.” he remarked.

“T'aint never been up't th' palace 'fore though, only seen it from a'distance.”

“T'is an immense building.” William said for the captain

“Aye?” Edward said.

William nodded, taking a draw from his pipe and then saying, “Some say'yea can fit entire castles in'ta it. I've seen'em do whole parades inside. Nae a man it is said has thrown a royal coin in'ta t' air and hit t'ceiling.”

“Oy've 'eard a lad once tried t'shoot an arrow up into t'cieling and it never struck.” added the captain

William smiled, laughing for once. But it was a dry crackling laugh, “I know not 'bout that. But mayhaps t' great hall. May be why t'emperor sits so high so often.”

“Than how's it we don' have a castle s'large?” Edward asked.

“We don't 'ave the gold t'challenge the gods!” Coffey exclaimed. He had been there once, but had not seen the grandest parts. But William remembered for months after he had terrifying nightmares of being lost within it when they had left. Its size was imposing and existentially defeating to many who say it, so it was said. Though not many had ever laid eyes upon the great palace, with the realm being so broad, William believed that had any soldier of any rebellion ever gone to see such an immense palace they would have to lay down their spears and swords for they knew they would be doing battle with the avatars of some great terrifying race of gods. The thought of such a building struck him with considerable unease, and he had seen it before. Laid eyes upon its disorienting scale and proportions. It was a terror in itself as it was beautiful. By being, it defied any use of the term, “palace”. With the deft strokes of the architects and the engineers who had toiled for centuries to build it, rendered all other nobles mere peasantry in contrast. But mayhaps that too was the reason for the regular rebellion, it inspired by pure existence a jealousy that built in the hearts of lineages of ungrateful lords and set the heights for god-hood that can be achieved.

“Well, I'mit that ay've nae been into t'palace me'self. But: I have heard a story. Mayhaps, m'honor you can confirm if you can: but have thee been t'the library in its halls?”

“I've never been interested.” William said.

“Ay well: Henry, y'like books do yea'not?”

“I fancy t'read now an' then: sure. Why?”

“Oy've heard it tell on good faith that th' library within defies all known scale. That oer'th'eons the great emperors an' great families collected within' it the entirety of t'world's written word. Copies o'originals, originals, copies o'copies. Ascendin' in great columns, set like a beehive t' infinite collection o' words spans all walls, inner and outer. From t' darkness of the corners to th'lights o'f t'windows an' th' lamp. But nae' all books within it are ever in t'same language fer t'span and greatness o't'empire gae far. An' in t'copies o'copies, there may exist a version o'any book with all'o t'error that it may have.”

“Astounding!” Henry exclaimed, “How is it though they 'ave collected so many?”

“Who knows but t'gods!” Wallace said with a loud booming voice, rolling into a laugh as he drew from his pipe, realized he let it go cold, and with a deft painless finger pinched a few smoldering embers into it before puffing it back to life. “Though, some say it only exists fer image.” he added with a wink.

“That is quiet t'collection. How does anyone find a'thing?”

“Well I hea' tell they 'ave a 'hole class o' men an' women whose entire lives are'in that library. From birth thro' life. Eat n' drink n' fuck in its halls. They die there, livin' like a society devoted t'th' Word. They learn ere' catalogue, memorize t'shelves. N' by th' end, they only know parts.”

“All 'o that, 'nd all of that work. Must cost'em a fortune, yay?”

“Ay, t'at do. But when'yea own a continent as does thee, yah learn not t'care.”

“The thought makes m'sick.” Coffey complained.

“I find it hard t'imagine.” Edward said, “How long till we are there?”

Captain Wallace leaned back and thought, and turning out over the deck shot, “Mastah Navigatah! How'fae 'we be!?”

“Tarry naught, a day in the likelihood m'honor!” a voice shot back, coming from a scrawny figure by the bow. Not an Avan, but a human dressed in slack dress and a heavy oiled cloak to protect from the water.

“Y'answeahed might quick. Y' confident!?” Wallace roared back.

“Aye, sah!” he shouted, “Was 'jus 'low deck t'check and calculate. We' holdin' pace steady as she goes. T'wind is strong.”

“T'gods bless spring winds!” Wallace laughed loudly, “Thank ye, ya a w'ight honahble gentlmen.”

“M'pleasure m'loed.” the navigator shouted back.

Kingdom of Cor

Collans


If one were to take the road from Hemden and keep pace somewhere to the south-east, in three to four days time depending on the weather you might make it into the duchy of Camienbrea. Here, at a cross roads that matches the main road with about half a dozen mule paths that trace up and down the border and spiderweb about is the village of Sulley, a border point recognized as being certainly on the Camienbrea side of the border of the duchy and county line, opposite of which is Lassex where Hemden rests. But continuing from here along the main road to the castle of Surrey where the Lord Breth resides over a respectable but small barony of a few hundred farmers you turn firmly west. But a summer travel the sun is often rising right from the middle of the road and travelers towards it often simply stop because the land here is flat and full of thistles and there is little escape from it except to sit slumped in the wheat until it rises enough to be hidden under the brim of hats. The same goes for the opposite direction, and it is that stretch that is considered the worst road in all the realm, or at least those that travel, and those still often only do such in the mid-kingdom so the legends of their terrible road are not spoken of in the north or south.

But all annoyances aside it is simply a day or two's walk or a day's ride along the unpaved road to the village of Sumdale were you leave the direct stare of the sun and turn south. Here along this road you walk into the Stonewood and the land of the old estates of the ancient Craichol family and its cadets who were entirely murdered after the first rebellion for trying to usurp Arkronian rule in the Cor, the then ruling Cashawk family finding their act of chicanery an affront and emblematic of the unworthiness of their rule and as servants. The estates were entirely divided up but so numerous were the divisions that in the generations since the land owners simply abandoned any pretense of rule and through vacancy the land became free making the first of the free peasant realms in the thick of the forest. But here and there throughout the are persisted stalwart barons who continued to rule from castles nestled in deep dark forest and woods. Of which were the Blackbarrow family, who rose to rebellion in the Little Rebellion in the aftermath of the peace of the Third Rebellion.

In the time of the Little Rebellion, then king Paul Blackarm Who Burns Out The Enemies of Justice Coarsecrane, the father of present king William sought out the entire destruction of the family. Those who did not flea were impaled on spikes and burned. Petitioned to house a new royal family in the territory, he refused muttering the line, “I trust a self-interested peasant before a self-interested noble.” With that, the area drifted into what some considered lawlessness, but is considered the largest stretch of largely passive country side owing to the life style of the peasants here who intermittently clear and farm the forest and are left unabated except for the royal tax duties to the king himself. The old castles and estates of the barons largely growing cold and empty in the intervening seasons and three generations now have grown up knowing no direct liege except that of the distant king, who long left the area to its own devices and came to be considered gentle and noble for his patience in their self rule.

And that is why a pickax was being swung against a wall plastered over with hard clay, the burn marks of a large fire scorching the wall around it from the previous season. The rest of the castle looming overhead as a haunting ghost of a time now feeling long distant. Seated on a gray stone in the cold sun of the early spring a studious Avan with a narrow graying face sat chewing idly on a pen in his beak as he clutched a folio to his lap. Sharp academic eyes watched heavily as the work crew in front of him chipped away at the sealed wall.

There were others with him who stood about waiting. There only needed to be so many to swing a pick and a hammer, it was not a herculean labor. But they were needed. But for now they waited for the simple work to finish. A breeze shot down from over the ruined ramparts of the castle into the court yard and the seated gray-topped Avan pulled at his coat, an old and out-of-style caribou coat from the northern Epha.

When the wall did finally fall he shot up in readiness as it came down in pieces, shooting up clouds of dust and dirt as it came down, “Ah, splendid!” he exclaimed.

Walking into the door now made he swept the air with his folio, fanning aside the dust as he searched for a torch. He found one readily in the silver sunlight that arced in and took it, holding it out. “Ol' Creft, can I ask ye fer a strike?” the grey-headed Avan asked, holding out the torch, “I left my light at home.”

“Certain', your honor.” another said, and pulled a flint and steel from his pouch and with a few knocks lit the torch. The gray headed Avan smiled wide as he went off into the heart of the leaning keep with the others following him, along the way reaching out to light more and more torches as they went along, bringing light to the ruined hall.

This was really a side-corridor, the old gate house and great hall that would have been the main point of interest had long since collapsed after several winters. The fire set in it by the old king had greatly threatened the integrity of the building and after many violent southerly storms and heavy northerly snows had finally come down one year without anyone around to see it. This hall was a mere supplementary access, and the hall went down. Winter pooled up in the floor and the cracks between the stones, shining brilliant gold with the torch light.

They stopped their voyage where the air fell still and smelled of mildew and wet. The far-reaching light of the torches just barely reaching out into the darkness to light the corded bulk of a number of casks. The gray headed Avan moved forward, and lit a brazer and began filling the chamber with light.

Shadows were thrown against the wall from rusting iron bars. Iron chains from the ceiling hung limply or haphazardly across the floor, and in the dozen of cells in the old gaol. But now instead of bodies in its cells, there sat a number of large casks with a series of numbers written on them, years. Opening his folio the Avan went to work searching the years.

“Ay, hear lads. This 'ere's the splendid lot!” he exclaimed and tapped the face with his knuckles. It did not sound. It was full. It was twenty years old.

Friend Bone Splinters In The Knee of the old House of Cribknoll, the gray headed Avan who stood back to write in the log in his folio as the others assembled to help haul out the casks was a scribe, or would be described as one in the courts of the Arkronians. With a tradition of the letters he had adopted from his father and his associate who was a noble man of letters in the region's old noble houses and escaped the fires of Paul Blackarm. In the Avan tradition of the Cor, he was what was referred to as a Lecturner; scribe, lawyer, jurist, educator, and mediator. With a tall build he looked as though he could have been a warrior and he joked that when he was a youth his father said he would have rather have named him Reach Them With A Spear for he had a reach as long as he was tall. But even so, with no court to tempt with knightly prowess and often only boar to shoot with arrows there was no particular reason to give to him any martial skill and so he was trained in the letters over the sword, though he still knew how to fight.

But with the whiskey loaded they made their way. The door left unsealed, they would come to get it another time. It was not a long wagon journey, and though the road was rough they had strapped the kegs tight to the rustic wooden wagon as they pulled through dark sleeping trees. The buds at the tips of their branches having hardly broken through to show before the first leaves burst forth. And snow still covered the cool earth. Even the grass yet had yet to unfurl and show its green colors though the sun had begun the melt.

It was clear in the sky and overhead as they rode out from the cover of the forest into the first open fields. A small number of isolated farm houses dotted the area with troublesomely high stone walls built around them. But further yet ahead was the village of Collans.

Collans was a village of at that time thirty wood and wattle and daub hovels, built on the gentle sloping embankment towards a small river that ran black over the dark stones underneath it. The surrounding fields equally as black with upturned sod from the previous year and where over the winter the cuttings of the last harvest still lay intermixed with the ragged rich ash blankness of the earth. Gangs of pigs prowled the barren fields rooting through the thick sopping mud searching for the eggs of beetles and bugs that would hatch in the warmer weather to come. The small village straddled either side of the rocky stream though the water was not deep enough nor ever violent enough to so much as warrant a bridge to cross it and as such a dozen foot paths entered the waters to come out again elsewhere and the daily crossing of the stream meant that often the women of the village never took to wearing skirts or when they did to hike them high up to prevent the lace from getting wet, and thereby defeat the point of modesty. At the center of the village a tall moss covered pillar rose, latched to it a few dozen or so ropes that were being covered now with a wide array of brightly covered ribbons for the moment to soon arrive.

The laborers and Bone Friend entered the town with a muddy splash from a puddle in the road, made from the melting snow and a flock of white and mottled bread-brown geese parted, protesting loudly with their clamorous honks. In the yard of the farm house they passed a small group of children sat playing and singing a spring time song. All the group waved as a tired Avan woman with her back arched over looked up and smiled, hailing the worthy men with the look that paid the graces but was too far gone in its own work to really commit.

The group stopped suddenly at a house whose fence was covered in ivy. An Avan woman, with a head of blue feathers like a jay stepped out and looked at them. “Well iffi' yea weren' gonna take any longe'.” she said with a sarcastic grin in her voice. “You can take'em in an' set them aside.”

“Ay ma'am.” one of the workmen said. Bone Friend stepped over and bowed, taking her hand and placing it to the side of his beak.

“Don' act like a gallant, wordy.” she said laughing, “They's not he'e anymore.”

“Doesn't matte'.” said Friend, “But it's all set an' finished. We'll be 'an back up once some clay is ready to fill up the hole again.”

The Avan shrugged, “T'is a real shame we have t' get yea all involved in t'is affair.” she said, “If it wan't for the Carriers...”

“Don' bring it up. Ah'm dealing with it.”

She huffed, and crossed her arms. She watched the kegs pass into the house. Broodily she said with a sneer, “Really t'is our whiskey. It's pah'ticallily theft.”

“No, it's just a'property dispute.” Bone Friend said with a long sigh.

“More like pride.” the Avan said under her breath, “You hea' what 'ey hea'd?”

“No.”

“ T'aht Cleary means t'kill my son. I'm thinking to have a'knife on me.”

Bone Friend rolled his eyes, shaking his head, “That won' be neccesary. I'll have t'speak with him 'bout this. Before t'holy-day.”

“Y'betteh, or it'd be mo'e'than m'son's blood on t'village square.”
An Avan sat quietly in the garden. The moonlight over head shining down through the reaching boughs of naked, ancient oaks. In the dappled rays of silver blue light the last patches of a winter's snow glow a soft azure. Abutting against the blue shine of snow in a late evening's moonlight was the warm golden light of a small fire as the hooded figure of the bird-man hunched over it. Clutched between his beak was a long pipe, from which he puffed laconically as he stared into the fire.

On the still cool mid-seasonal night the bells of the city of Hemden rang in low tones, chiming the hours. Their slow trembling rings rolling across the low hills and above the smoking roof tops of the city hidden just beyond the walls of the great garden. One, two, three the Avan counting, puffing in time to the rings. Four, five, six, the fire light from the castle keep a few yards off glowed comfortably in the cool night air signaling a place more comfortable than the chilly night air. Seven, eight, he paid a moment's thought at the last ring to credit the clock work skill of the Arkron. He was young still when such time keeping was new and in a distant way it still sounded different and odd. At this time the bells of the city would be silent, ringing out only to signal the beginning of some occasion in the city; a meeting of a guild, a party by a grandee, the arrival of news. Now the code of the bells had long changed.

He took a long draw from the pipe, and removed it from his beak. Taping the tip against his hands he held the smoke in his mouth, not fixing to breath at all as he felt the hot, abrasive, and numbing mixture at the beak of his throat before he finally let go and simply breathed it out in a cloud. His mind drifted off to other matters as he looked into the fire and he sat that way for some time with his cloak hanging heavily off his shoulders. He knew he should not be out at this hour but there was no one to tell him otherwise. After all, he had wandered and soldiered before; he was no stranger to all of this. And when men bowed back at your words, what reason was there to abide by their common sense.

Earlier that afternoon a carrier crow had arrived with a message at its talons. The hefty letter delivered the missive promptly and to the point. The Emperor was dead, his son was soon to inherit, and the forty-nine year old Avan found himself contemplating history. The last rebellion had been his father's affair to manage, he had only watched from the safety of castle chambers or palace dining halls. Not often though not rarely was he taken to the side of battle to watch the ranks close in on each other and battle fought against one another. He had sometimes been taken out in his father's retinue and stood to watch at the edge of wooded lines or atop hills as battles were fought and the opposing forces herald's and civil men met and discussed the battle itself, taking the technical details and doing the mid-fight diplomacy. After all, someone would need to call the victor. The holy men were there too, as were the soldier wives and bed maids and all the non-fighting hangers-on who looked on with something other than terror, but excitement. He recalled the tension of the spectators not as something terrible but as something fun and enjoyable, games were played and bets exchanged. He was young at the time, he could not have known the terror of the actual battle at play below.

“Ye'ea wanderin' again.” a voice said, but the Avan did not take notice. He continued to think to himself as he drew circles with the mouth piece of the pipe on his hand, tracing across the grey downy feathers that grew thin and patchy there like a barren field tilled up and ready to plant but with the weeds crawling back to reclaim it fast before the farmer can assemble his equipment, there had been a hard rain there. The imagination recalled the smell of fresh tilled earth and a recently departed spring rain. Perhaps there was a thunderstorm, it smelled electric. It smelled like sex.

“P'haps if you stayed on track.” the voice said, sounding nearer now. Again, the Avan did not pay attention. Or he pretended not to. He returned to the letter: the Emperor was dead. That was not what concerned him in the least. Monarchs came and went, they died and their sons inherited or someone assembled a small army and blocked their ascent, naming themselves the new king. If the one to-be was not well liked, there would be no fight; it would pass under threat of noble violence. And this was entirely the concern at heart. Though unfounded, he had a keen eye for rumor and stories and the gossip of the day had not stopped: some lords and named have not given up on the dream of the 3rd Rebellion. Though, there had been successions since.

“Now yea'ea in the patch.” said the voice again, clearer and the Avan finally acknowledged him.

“When'll I get rid of you?” he asked in a low tone, his voice cracking as he coughed.

“Don'think you will. The two o' us: we're going to the grave together I thinks.” the voice said and a figured seated itself just out of the fire's light. It took on the appearance of a large Avan, hooded and robed. Its features however silhouetted in the dim moon light. From under the hood though rose what appeared to be protrusions, like horns from the head. But it's long crooked beak lent a profile like a hawk or eagle, lithe and dangerous.

“I thought you hated smoking.” the Avan remarked, his voice cold.

“Ay, th'stench is fucking terrible and it disagree with me somewhat. But you let your pipe go cold, m'friend.”

The Avan looked down. The smoldering embers in his pipe did indeed go cold and looking around he noticed the night had taken on a darker air. How long he had let it go was beyond him. Last he knew it was eight in the evening. He had not heard the chimes again so it must not have gotten later. Looking up he cast his view to the sky. He did not want to look at the shadow seated at the edge of light across from him. He did not want to acknowledge what he credited as his world.

The stars above were sharp and crisp in the night sky. The moon taking on a full glow as it hung high in the night sky. The brilliant band of lights that made up the sky offered a different aural spectacle from that of a small fire.

“Yea by t'way may want to check the fire.” the shaded figure remarked and the Avan looked down and found the fire too was fading unhealthily. He grabbed at a few small twigs and threw them on and the tongues of flame took on renewed health. Raising his hands to the fire he warmed his palms and brought feeling back into them as he wrapped himself closer with the cloak.

“Now, I do be knowing that y'have somethin' on yea mind.” the figure said, reaching up with a hand and scratching the side of his face. The tremble of his voice sounding like a smile, “Y'mind catching me up? Y'be looking perplexed all day I noticed. Chance per something put y'on the spoil?”

The Avan looked down at the pipe in his hands, turning it over, careful not to turn out the mix. With a surrendered sigh he turned it over and tapped it out onto the snow and began drawing it across the back of his hand again. “This be'in the letter then.” the figure said, with a lift of the head, “The one in the pocket.”

The Avan knew he had no business knowing this but was long surrendered to it. “It is.” he said simply.

“Long live the Emperor.” the hooded figure said with a cackle, “Long may he reign.”

“Indeed.”

“So, tell me when t'last emperor died. That was...” the hooded figured trailed off, letting a raised hand wave through the air. The Avan felt his eyes burrowing upon him and it made him feel colder. He tossed a few more sticks on the fire.

“Thirty years ago, just about.” the Avan said.

“Ah, I see it then s'clear's the moon. Ay, yes. That do be well.”

“Why does this matter to you?” The Avan asked aggresively.

“Because I be'feeling you have yea'self some doubts. Like last time?”

“Mhmm.” the Avan grunted.

“Well yea'be-knowing me: better to stick to the friends y'know than you don't. The Arkronians have been good to you. S'far.”

The Avan didn't answer that remark. He tapped the pipe against the back of his hand as he ran it up and down his arm. He felt it catch the small feathers that grew there as it traced along the bare skin. His silence was not indecipherable to the figure seated nearby who laughed.

“Doubt is strong.” he said, “maybe it is mere hubris on their part. Will'ea least 'tend the crowning.”

“I don't have a choice on that part.” the Avan said.

“Nae, 'couse you don't. If'ean you did though?”

“Would not matter. A gesture is a gesture. A friend is a friend. The blood runs, and it runs good.”

“But to whoms't? The Arkronians as a race, or the Imperial House?” a moment of silence passed, made as punctuation and emphasis on the point to be made: “Here'in lies t'true problem.”

The Avan nodded. Slight and solemn. “Then t'is is as'it will be always. Go happily. I am cold.”

Finally the figure rose, after what felt like a long conversation to the Avan. Snow and branches crunched under his footfalls as it disappeared into the woods and the Avan looked down to find the fire had smoldered into embers. He snapped into reality as he heard distantly the bells of the city solemnly ring out ten times. He looked back at his castle and saw many of the lights had died. Some torches and lanterns smoldered, as he believed to be out of courtesy to him by the guards, who knew their lord had eloped somewhere off into the garden somewhere.

It was best that he had not entirely wandered into the country.

Hemden, Kingdom of Cor


A siren's choir of birds erupted with the break of dawn as in the city below the bells were into ringing their short morning songs. The breaking early spring sun, while it brought limited warmth did awaken the lives of the sleeping city below as its rays touched on the windows of the homes below. Looming high over the city atop a steep hill rose the ancient castle of Hem's rock. Its twelve tightly clustered towers crowned with flowing banners as a ringed series of walls did more than just defend the keep itself, but contain within it an entire court society that had evolved and grew up there. Containing a synthesis of the magisterial court politics of Arkron and the stubbornly old ways of the ancient Avan kings. It was at once self-interested in keeping itself contained and to create its own aristocratic high society, as within the walls large townhouses and mansions of prominent if landless nobility settled close nearby, within reach of the king and his court and protected by its walls so they need not suffer commoners. Yet, this attitude closely at odds with an unsettled feeling that saw the oldest and most native of the castles sufferers to wander out into the city and interconnect the popular customs with that of the court, cursing it to never achieve true segregation.

As the city awoke an early traffic begun as servants and the many petty hangers on of the court flirted through the gates. The daily flow of the newest fashions and trinkets began early so as to make as much time with the court's women and men, many of whom would demand time as well as offer generosity to them. This would not entirely be the sole traffic today. For deeper in the keep the nucleus of royal politics was rising to the day. They had in that day, a purpose. Couriers were dispatched to make the necessary orders.

The city of Hemden was situated at the far end of a wide river, where a plethora of fanning smaller rivers and streams from the mountains and further trickled and rolled into the center of the country to meet at the vast lake on whose shores the city straddled, and over which it stepped widely over six streams and rivers that teemed with all manners of canoe and barge. Canals dug centuries ago only spread the access to the water, and entire neighborhoods were built up to access to these canals. The earliest of errand workers strode the waters in flat bottom boats to make daily deliveries of morning bread and eggs to the middling commoners and merchants who stayed in their warm homes during such cold mornings. During this time of year, the heat of the sun broke the chill of the night and waters warm still from the following early spring dead bled off white mist that filled the streets in the morning light. Opposite from the great castle at the banks of the lake docked an ocean going fleet, the river and lake being well deep and wide enough to accept many ships into it. The lake, and the city of Hemden served as, and was recognized readily as being the most peaceable port in the realm from any storm, and the winter gales that barreled north from over Rhaetia did not turn the waters of the lake as much as they did the waters of the open ocean where the winds threw up waves large enough to swallow entire ships before pushing it all northwards to drench and flood the Swiftpaw in great frozen torrents of wave and rain. And it was to the prized docks the castle men went for a boat was needed and there they kept the royal corvettes moored.

“What will'in they expect of us?” a young Avan asked. His face was strained with an unusual uncertainty. It was not his first time of being in the capital. But this was an entirely new experience for him.

The young prince Henry Peace Fear The Gods Coarsecrane was tall and handsome for his species. And speaking to his father the commonalities were not hard to overlook. With a bright red cap of feathers that ran from their face over and across their heads to their backs they resembled woodpeckers with wide expressive orange beaks. Although William Walker Coarscrane bore a dainty snood that lay right to left across his own.

Smoking a pipe, William looked over at his son with an impassive look. Despite having disappeared into the shadows of the gardens the previous night and stayed there until long after much of the watch themselves turned in he had not gotten much sleep. But if he was bothered by it it did not show. Piercing green eyes shone with mirror clarity as he looked through the haze of smoke to Henry Peace. He shrugged.

“How do we know t'new emperor is not an honorable man? Honor before all, that is what'ya used to say. Aye?”

“They be.” William said in a low voice, looking away. They stood at an arcade of windows that looked out from the keep. The red rooftops of the royal village that had come to exist around the castle shone with misty morning dew as the city beyond was enveloped in a rolling white haze.

“By chance: have you met the Emperor to be? Rakon-Da?”

“Ney.”

“You've 'eard of 'im?”

“Aye, son.”

“What about him?”

“I 'ear he's a bright young man.”

“So t'realm is in good hands?”

“I'd assume so.” said William, breathing out a thick cloud of smoke. He looked about himself, searching the corners of the hall and by the ceiling. Some days he felt odd about the castle. This was one of his days. He looked ahead to the boat ride, to escape the keep and its indolent residents. “We should see if t'good cook has made anythin' fer us before we lift and leave. It'll be a timely voyage, but one we shall make. Have you packed yea'things?”

“Yes.” Henry bowed, “You lead.”

“Thanks.” William mumbled. His belly all the same however did not grumble in hunger.
@Milkman

Basically, we should or could assume that whenever we post that we got the letter already, and can start preparing to go there to introduce characters, or en'route. Us closest can spend whatever IC time doing palace intrigue until we're all there.
Name:
Kingdom of Cor

Flag:


Quick description of your nation:
The Kingdom of Cor is a vast landscape comprised of diverse territories. From the Low Wood of the south to the vast plains of Erien of the north. Scattered throughout the kingdom are the scattered fiefdoms and territories of the Cor, presided over by ancient families whose fiefs hold as few as seventy to as much as several thousand or more. And too betwixt those the stalwart free domains of peasant enclaves who have managed to resist the interest of nobles and merchant alike with their even more ancient ways. Along their coasts and through the rivers run a thriving trade from the coastal guild cities to the interior merchant middleman.

The side your nation was on during the 3rd rebellion:
The Throne

Population/races:
The dominant race in the Kingdom of Cor are the Avan, a race of half-man and half-bird, although they were never blessed with the ability of their wild peer's ability to fly. Some would say it was a joke by their ancient gods, or a blessing, or a curse for some past sin that they as a whole have been cast with the burden of having a bird's head and feathers growing where they may else have hair.

But besides them are scattered populations of the other races shifted into the territories since the time of the empire and through the realm's old loyalty to the imperial crown.

Culture/society:
It is said an Avan never forgets. Whether that be a slight or a gift. For that reason powerful rivalries and impenetrable alliances have been formed between communities within the Kingdom of Cor and abroad that has lasted for centuries. It is said the worst of wedding massacres have been carried out because of some long ago minor theft between two peasants or because of some mis-management of a few sacks of grain. Likewise, enduring and unshattering alliances have been formed on the mere presentation of gifts.

In fact, among the Avan and the peoples of the Cor who have long settled there, gifting is an important ritual. It is unspoken of to ever visit anyone without a small token of gratitude or generosity. What is often not obtained by gold, is often obtained by a complex relationship built on gift-fiving or having a debt of a gift or a favor between not just individuals but sometimes entire communities. The behavior has not just been a fluke of Avan behavior, but has enveloped the entire social make up of the Cor holding it in strict relationships of blood feud and blood brotherhood.

If there was any moderation to any of this that keeps the region for slipping into complete chaos until one coalition or the other purges the entire country it is the double institution of The King Who Walks The Low Forest The Falcon Mountains And Wades The River, or the Walking King and the All Council, an annual gathering of all the residents of the Cor – in theory – who issue judicial indictments and to legislate on matters of public policy every autumn before the first snow.

Religion:
The people of the Cor follow an ancient pagan religion, where-in the land itself is held as sacred and the whole of the world as far as they can see is home to any number of spirits as there are people to populate it. Their relationship to the world urges a reverent respect for it, as well as fear and even passion for it. They believe nothing should be at odds with the harmony of that world, least they bring out of the dark holes of the Low Forest the monstrous creatures that lurk there, and devour children in their crib.

In a more metropolitan setting, due to the nature of empire there can be found communities still practicing a number of other religions and often their practices have been grafted into the practices of the traditional belief, often transforming it and distorting the native orthodox and orthoprax. But this has been a long process, as in the Avan's long cultural memory: they know. But in such a way entirely new relationships to their metaphysical world have opened to them and whole communities have adopted to their entirely new and unique worldviews readily through acknowledgment of this “divine weathering and erosion of the world”.

History:
The history of the Avan and of the Cor at large has been as maddening as the history of the continent itself with thousands of independent threads of stories woven between dynasties, villages, town, and castle. The mountains run flush with it and it lurks in the shadows of the ancient trees of the Low Forest. In this confusion, the origins of even the Avan have been obscured by the distortion of location and participation in such events with some saying the Avan sprung from the mountains, or the low forest, or from the ground itself one warm night and stormed across the land.

Writing itself never came to the Avan until the arrival of the Empire who impressed the old kings with their gifts, inadvertently sealing a strong alliance, although the early errors of the empire to not keep facilitating the respectful ritual of gift giving has often strained the relationship and threatened to take it out of the realm of confident friendship and into colder waters, if not straight betrayal.

Many in the Cor believe that with the end of the last rebellion the relationship will remain as it has. However with the death of the king, and the inability for his son to ascend to the throne doubt besets the realm if it will. Some whisper that perhaps the unthinkable must happen: the Avan must be the ones to break off a relationship if court intrigues run afoul. Others insist that they need only wait and see before passing judgment. A third party insists on no matter the change: a friend is a friend, and the Arkron have been a friend.

Government:
Monarchy with an annual general parliament

Economy:
Agrarian

Military:
Many, though not all nobles in the Cor are capable of maintaining at least a small retinue of trained and dedicated professional warriors, like those of knights. Often paid out of their master's pocket for their arms and armor some are sometimes permitted to take work on the side whose revenues they use to arm themselves. These make up a small body of generally well armed and armored men at arms or noble soldiers who follow their leige-lords and high chiefs off into battle as his house guard. The most successful of this corp or those who belong to even wealthier lords can themselves afford men at arms of their own and often head into battle with their own personal guard at their side, as dedicated to the art of war if not as well equipped for it.

For larger engagements or campaigns mass levees are not unheard of in the country side. Many in the Cor are skilled with the bow, particularly in the country side to protect their homes, crops, and livestock from beasts or bandits. Otherwise, the spear and the pike is easy enough to drill with in mass. Though they are not armed much beyond that and the burdens of acquiring armor and protection is on the shoulders of the levees themselves. Long serving veterans of numerous conscriptions or descendants of such may be in the possession of heirloom armor or loot once taken from the corpses of the dead if chance and inheritance allows.

Territory:


Factions:
This feels like something I should hold off for when the RP starts and as I write them in.

Characters:
King William Who Walks The Low Forest, Falcon Mountains, And Wades The Rivers of House Coarsecrane
Age: forty-nine
Male
@Milkman

I've been at work all this time so I haven't been able to cook up anything. But now that I get one day off I have the opportunity to at least cook up a flag, so when I get that finished I'll be moving it all over.
@Kassarock

Go ahead
Name:
Kingdom of Cor

Flag:
tba

Quick description of your nation:
The Kingdom of Cor is a vast landscape comprised of diverse territories. From the Low Wood of the south to the vast plains of Erien of the north. Scattered throughout the kingdom are the scattered fiefdoms and territories of the Cor, presided over by ancient families whose fiefs hold as few as seventy to as much as several thousand or more. And too betwixt those the stalwart free domains of peasant enclaves who have managed to resist the interest of nobles and merchant alike with their even more ancient ways. Along their coasts and through the rivers run a thriving trade from the coastal guild cities to the interior merchant middleman.

The side your nation was on during the 3th rebellion:
The Throne

Population/races:
The dominant race in the Kingdom of Cor are the Avan, a race of half-man and half-bird, although they were never blessed with the ability of their wild peer's ability to fly. Some would say it was a joke by their ancient gods, or a blessing, or a curse for some past sin that they as a whole have been cast with the burden of having a bird's head and feathers growing where they may else have hair.

But besides them are scattered populations of the other races shifted into the territories since the time of the empire and through the realm's old loyalty to the imperial crown.

Culture/society:
It is said an Avan never forgets. Whether that be a slight or a gift. For that reason powerful rivalries and impenetrable alliances have been formed between communities within the Kingdom of Cor and abroad that has lasted for centuries. It is said the worst of wedding massacres have been carried out because of some long ago minor theft between two peasants or because of some mis-management of a few sacks of grain. Likewise, enduring and unshattering alliances have been formed on the mere presentation of gifts.

In fact, among the Avan and the peoples of the Cor who have long settled there, gifting is an important ritual. It is unspoken of to ever visit anyone without a small token of gratitude or generosity. What is often not obtained by gold, is often obtained by a complex relationship built on gift-fiving or having a debt of a gift or a favor between not just individuals but sometimes entire communities. The behavior has not just been a fluke of Avan behavior, but has enveloped the entire social make up of the Cor holding it in strict relationships of blood feud and blood brotherhood.

If there was any moderation to any of this that keeps the region for slipping into complete chaos until one coalition or the other purges the entire country it is the double institution of The King Who Walks The Low Forest The Falcon Mountains And Wades The River, or the Walking King and the All Council, an annual gathering of all the residents of the Cor – in theory – who issue judicial indictments and to legislate on matters of public policy every autumn before the first snow.

Religion:
The people of the Cor follow an ancient pagan religion, where-in the land itself is held as sacred and the whole of the world as far as they can see is home to any number of spirits as there are people to populate it. Their relationship to the world urges a reverent respect for it, as well as fear and even passion for it. They believe nothing should be at odds with the harmony of that world, least they bring out of the dark holes of the Low Forest the monstrous creatures that lurk there, and devour children in their crib.

In a more metropolitan setting, due to the nature of empire there can be found communities still practicing a number of other religions and often their practices have been grafted into the practices of the traditional belief, often transforming it and distorting the native orthodox and orthoprax. But this has been a long process, as in the Avan's long cultural memory: they know. But in such a way entirely new relationships to their metaphysical world have opened to them and whole communities have adopted to their entirely new and unique worldviews readily through acknowledgment of this “divine weathering and erosion of the world”.

History:
The history of the Avan and of the Cor at large has been as maddening as the history of the continent itself with thousands of independent threads of stories woven between dynasties, villages, town, and castle. The mountains run flush with it and it lurks in the shadows of the ancient trees of the Low Forest. In this confusion, the origins of even the Avan have been obscured by the distortion of location and participation in such events with some saying the Avan sprung from the mountains, or the low forest, or from the ground itself one warm night and stormed across the land.

Writing itself never came to the Avan until the arrival of the Empire who impressed the old kings with their gifts, inadvertently sealing a strong alliance, although the early errors of the empire to not keep facilitating the respectful ritual of gift giving has often strained the relationship and threatened to take it out of the realm of confident friendship and into colder waters, if not straight betrayal.

Many in the Cor believe that with the end of the last rebellion the relationship will remain as it has. However with the death of the king, and the inability for his son to ascend to the throne doubt besets the realm if it will. Some whisper that perhaps the unthinkable must happen: the Avan must be the ones to break off a relationship if court intrigues run afoul. Others insist that they need only wait and see before passing judgment. A third party insists on no matter the change: a friend is a friend, and the Arkron have been a friend.

Government:
Monarchy

Economy:
Agrarian

Military:
Many, though not all nobles in the Cor are capable of maintaining at least a small retinue of trained and dedicated professional warriors, like those of knights. Often paid out of their master's pocket for their arms and armor some are sometimes permitted to take work on the side whose revenues they use to arm themselves. These make up a small body of generally well armed and armored men at arms or noble soldiers who follow their leige-lords and high chiefs off into battle as his house guard. The most successful of this corp or those who belong to even wealthier lords can themselves afford men at arms of their own and often head into battle with their own personal guard at their side, as dedicated to the art of war if not as well equipped for it.

For larger engagements or campaigns mass levees are not unheard of in the country side. Many in the Cor are skilled with the bow, particularly in the country side to protect their homes, crops, and livestock from beasts or bandits. Otherwise, the spear and the pike is easy enough to drill with in mass. Though they are not armed much beyond that and the burdens of acquiring armor and protection is on the shoulders of the levees themselves. Long serving veterans of numerous conscriptions or descendants of such may be in the possession of heirloom armor or loot once taken from the corpses of the dead if chance and inheritance allows.

Territory:


Factions:
This feels like something I should hold off for when the RP starts and as I write them in.

Characters:
This feels like something I should hold off for when the RP starts and as I write them in.
© 2007-2024
BBCode Cheatsheet