Shadows of the Past

For a moment, your hand goes for your bow. It's just a single man and he isn't aware you are even here. It would be easy. Just a single arrow would be enough, if you hit well enough and you trained hard to make just such a shot. But then you reconsider. He alone could hardly have attacked a caravan all by himself, and you have no idea how many more might be hiding nearby and rush over when they hear him scream. You are not so arrogant to think that you alone could take on a group of bandits that overwhelmed five warriors. Yet it is still prudent to have your weapon ready when you know foes to be nearby, and so you unsling it anyway as you slowly go back the way you came. Ollin and his llamas are not far away, and you will need to hurry to get there in time.

---

"And you are absolutely sure it is safe to walk here?" While Ollin was rather easy to get along with after getting to know him a bit, his questioning of every little thing was becoming rather aggravating.

"Yes, it is. These leaves just scratch when you brush against them, they aren't poisonous or anything."

"If you say so..." At least he is listening. As clueless as he seems, he wouldn't make it far without a beaten path showing him the way.


To you, the small detour is not any more difficult than the dirt path you had left. Convincing Ollin to ditch the road was surprisingly hard, even when you knew that the bandits were ahead. He had pointed out that his llamas wouldn't really like it here, due to their fear of predators. It was probably even the truth, as long as you counted the trader as one of his lamas. The beasts had taken easily to the brush, and after a short walk away from the road and down a slope you had found the small creek you were walking along now. That the cool water was quite soothing to your tired feet was a nice benefit on the side.

Going ahead was not an option while leading them, and so you stuck with the others who walked in silence. Not that the two guards were much for talk anyway. They were brothers as far as you could tell and kept more to himself and trailed behind the llamas, leaving Ollin and you to walk ahead of them. As he was becoming more comfortable with his surroundings, the questions slowly die off and you seize the opportunity to learn a bit more about your employer. "So... I've noticed that..."

He interrupts you there and you are feel slightly guilty about bringing it up when you see his grimace. "Pretty clueless out here? Don't deny it. I know that it is pretty obvious for someone like you."

"It's just a bit weird. I always thought traders go from place to place and know the land just as well as the hunters of my tribe."

"I'm from Zacatl, born and raised. Never seen much of the jungle before buying myself some animals and becoming a trader. It's just days and days of swamp all around us and the things in there are nothing to be trifled with. So I always stuck to the beaten paths and had someone around to stick a spear into whatever comes out."

You glance back to the two others walking behind the lamas. They might make a decent showing against a wolf or coyotes, but a jaguar would feast on their guts before they knew what even happened. Let alone what might happen if a spirit crossed their path. "I'm sure they do good work for you."

He just snorts at that. "Those two are all I could get for the trip. The river is fickle in Zacatl, so you always end up with everyone looking for a way to get a meal in one month and there not being enough hands to go around the next. It was rather busy again as I've set out and I couldn't get anyone else. Truth be told, had you not joined us, I would have turned back and cut my losses. For all I know my fish goes for a small fortune back home right now. Would have cost me all credibility in Tlamaca though."

"You've mentioned some deal with the Wise Men." More like shouted it at the other merchant, but you didn't hold it against him to get a bit worked up with the trouble those bandits meant for him.

"Yes, I promised them a prompt delivery of twenty barrels of dried fish. Shouldn't have run my mouth back then even when deal looked so good. They know that trading with Zacatl is always a bit of a gamble, so I hope they won't be too mad about it. And you? What does a jungle girl like you want in Tlamaca?"

"I'm also looking for the Wise Men. Heard they know a lot about the past and I'm curious to see more of the world. My tribe..." You pause and give a small shrug. It would be a lie to say that you still felt truly comfortable with them after the years they managed to hold those stupid suspicion about you, and yet that's hardly something to complain about with what is still essentially a stranger. "I just didn't want to spend my entire life walking in a big circle every year." Which is the truth, even if it's not all of it.

"Might be a bit hard to get to talk to them. They are a reclusive bunch and rarely speak to the folk around them, save to give them orders. They are the reason there is a settlement in Tlamaca at all and you can tell that they know that."

"I've been told I can be rather persistent." You give him a small smile though you are a bit worried about that for a while now. Mahuizoh only knew second-hand of the Wise Men himself, and you had not really any idea about who they were and what it would take to learn from them. "Can you tell me some more about the place? You must know it a bit by now."

"Sure. It's an old city from before the Fall, built mostly around the compound of the Wise Men. Sprawling hills, save for the city center, which they've build a wall around with the stones from the houses outside. Some say it looks like a city should, but I think it doesn't look any better then any other place I've been to, just a bit sturdier. They maintain some of the old roads and get a lot of trade from around. We will be heading straight to the marketplace and I would suggest you do the same to get your bearings first. The south is mostly smiths and artisans, while the north has a few farms to keep everyone fed. Thought about where to sleep yet?"

Actually, not really. You had kinda assumed that you could just find an even spot for your bedroll and be done with it. "No, why?"

"Shouldn't stay outside all night, especially as a young woman with such a prize around your neck." With that he gestures to your pendant. "It's not a tribe where everyone knows who everyone else is. People steal and do other things to each other if they think they can get away with it. There are a few guards around to keep order, but they are a crooked bunch and the Wise Men don't really concern themselves with it. Spend a night in the place where we will on my expense. I can pay you the rest of your due in beans if you want to stay longer there and I think you should."

It's a sobering thought to know that just because a place had walls, it didn't mean it was safe. Your tribe had always stuck together, even when you were pretty much an outcast, and nobody ever thought about stealing from each other. Maybe the big cities of old were not so great places to live as you always thought.

---

Walking among the caravan instead of ahead of it is much better. With the bandits behind you, Ollin had relaxed quite a bit and preferred to have you close to chat a bit while your feet ate up the distance. The small village you've made a stop at was hardly remarkable, just farmers and hunters, but the terrain had changed markedly afterwards. True to the description, the landscape was becoming more and more uneven, and you could see the hills rising around you. The only thing straight was the road you traveled on, and that was compensating by being straight as an arrow. To the left and right, you could see either the land falling away when you crossed a valley at nearly tree-top level and then came steep hangs as your ancestors decided to just cut through the hill rather than build above it. The stone-paved path was a bit frayed at the edges, but the center was still pristine and a small grove worn into the very rock spoke of many people walking this route.

As you came closer to your destination, you became more and more excited. Thankfully Ollin didn't tease you about it, but he did smirk a lot when you looked in wonder around you. On the last day of your journey, the road finally levels out among the overgrown remnants of a city, and your excitement grows even more as you spot the stone wall in the distance. A hundred steps away from it, both ruins and trees cut off suddenly, though you can tell from the ragged edges of vegetation creeping into the free space that its man's work that keeps it away. It allows you a good view at the wall, though. Two men high, built from carefully-stacked stones pried from the ruins, and with spiked wooden stakes on top of it. Behind those you can glimpse a few men walking on top of the wall. The gate, though, is made of logs as you know from any palisade, not metal as some of the wilder tales about Tlamaca that you heard in your youth had claimed.

The gate guards don't take any note of you as you walk inside, and at first you are reminded of the ruins near your tribes path, but most of them lacking the covering of plants. Here at the road, the houses are clearly lived in with wooden doors and mismatching stonework or plank roofing showing signs of repair and maintenance, though when you gaze down some of the side paths, you can spot the empty husks you've always known just the same. The other thing that strikes you soon are just how many people are here. At first you pass only a few, and then the trickle grows into a stream as you come closer to the marketplace. So many are there that you can barely take the sights in. Traders are everywhere and hawking their wares from stone benches, the floor, the back of their animals, or even wooden stalls arranged in a great square.

To the east of this great place, you see a towering building rising into the sky. It shows damage, true, but not a sign of rubble is to be found on the upper areas, despite there being clear signs of collapses. Weathered statues adorn the tiered building, of men and woman in strange clothes who hold scrolls and weird instruments in their hands. Faded murals adorn every surface and the whole building, no, palace, is framed in by the rolling hills rising beside and behind it. Instead of a wall, it seems to sit on a little hill whose edges have been worn away and replaced with a wall that divides the upper from the lower area. Three stairways you can spot to lead down into a overgrown thicket that divides the place from the market and an unassuming dirt path leads into it from where you stand.

The Wise Men's Place. You can see why people would name their city after it.

You are almost in a daze as Ollin hands you your payment for your aid and points you to the place he stays, a tavern he calls it, before departing on his business. The march was rather long and exhausting and you could certainly go for a nap, yet you are buzzing like a hummingbird. Everything here is so strange and exciting. Why not explore a bit before resting?

Where do you want to go?
[] Go to the artisan district.
-[] To see how metal is made.
-[] To buy something.
--[] Write-In what to look for.

[] Look around the market.
-[] To buy something.
--[] Write-In what to look for.
-[] Talk with people there.
--[] Write-In about what.

[] Go to the Wise Mens Place

[] On the other hand, well rested you can see much more. Go to the tavern.
-[] Talk with Ollin about something when he comes back.
--[] Write-In

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AN: Welcome to the wider world. Added your money to the front page.

Since you've had a lot of time to talk with Ollin, feel free to ask any other questions about Tlamaca or Zacatl in the thread and I will answer them here.