- Pronouns
- They/Them
Vote closed, tally please, then.
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Behind the Serpent Throne (CK2)
- Thread starter The Laurent
- Start date
- Original Fantasy
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Tally.
lkmcclenahan
That which doesn't kill me, only makes me stranger
- Location
- UK
Vote tally:
##### 3.21
[X] Plan Haste
-[X] Rassit Race
-[X] Yes. News of the Emperor's death is liable to get out immediately rather than a little later. Though it's going to get out eventually.
-[X] Commanding the Wind-Dancers in his absence.
-[X] Don't take this step, just yet. Perhaps later, Kiralo thinks, once he's established in Csirit he can take such an action.
-[X] No, preserve the relationship and ties with the Southlands merchants and banks for the moment that have borrowed Kiralo's money, their goodwill is more important at the moment.
No. of votes: 1
Broken25
[X] Plan Moderation
-[X] Chancellor's Gambit
-[X] Commanding the Wind-Dancers in his absence.
-[X] Don't take this step, just yet. Perhaps later, Kiralo thinks, once he's established in Csirit he can take such an action.
-[X] No, preserve the relationship and ties with the Southlands merchants and banks for the moment that have borrowed Kiralo's money, their goodwill is more important at the moment.
No. of votes: 1
mori
[X] Return of the Mother
[X] Chancellor's Gambit: He follows Fei-Da's own schedule, which is somewhat hasty but not furiously fast. Gathering together a small escort of Csiritan troops for the journey and taking it by stages by river and only sometimes on horseback, they should arrive as winter's grip begins to slip over the land. It will come as expected to Kuojah and he will be prepared to greet and deal with Kiralo, for better and worse, but there might yet be some who didn't expect it who don't know about the matter. Kiralo could bring four or five Rassit with him, passing them off as an honor guard or body-guard, but no more than that. There will be time to prepare and settle some affairs before one leaves, but it does play to Kuojah's own plans. (Arrives between Early and Mid-Winter)
[X] Commanding the Wind-Dancers in his absence.
[X] It can be uninterred, and it's possible that it could be transferred with him for non 'Rassit-Race' options for potential burial in Csirit.
[X] No, preserve the relationship and ties with the Southlands merchants and banks for the moment that have borrowed Kiralo's money, their goodwill is more important at the moment.
No. of votes: 1
veekie
[X] Plan Haste
No. of votes: 13
Tanor, drake_azathoth, Estro, Neptune, Zeitgeist Blue, Ct613hulu, notanautomaton, Fumbles, Ridiculously Average Guy, Tsume817, Terrabrand, WanderingEye, EvilPorygon
[X] Return of the Mother
No. of votes: 3
bookwyrm, Gingganz, Ephemeral_Dreamer
##### 3.21
[X] Plan Haste
-[X] Rassit Race
-[X] Yes. News of the Emperor's death is liable to get out immediately rather than a little later. Though it's going to get out eventually.
-[X] Commanding the Wind-Dancers in his absence.
-[X] Don't take this step, just yet. Perhaps later, Kiralo thinks, once he's established in Csirit he can take such an action.
-[X] No, preserve the relationship and ties with the Southlands merchants and banks for the moment that have borrowed Kiralo's money, their goodwill is more important at the moment.
No. of votes: 1
Broken25
[X] Plan Moderation
-[X] Chancellor's Gambit
-[X] Commanding the Wind-Dancers in his absence.
-[X] Don't take this step, just yet. Perhaps later, Kiralo thinks, once he's established in Csirit he can take such an action.
-[X] No, preserve the relationship and ties with the Southlands merchants and banks for the moment that have borrowed Kiralo's money, their goodwill is more important at the moment.
No. of votes: 1
mori
[X] Return of the Mother
[X] Chancellor's Gambit: He follows Fei-Da's own schedule, which is somewhat hasty but not furiously fast. Gathering together a small escort of Csiritan troops for the journey and taking it by stages by river and only sometimes on horseback, they should arrive as winter's grip begins to slip over the land. It will come as expected to Kuojah and he will be prepared to greet and deal with Kiralo, for better and worse, but there might yet be some who didn't expect it who don't know about the matter. Kiralo could bring four or five Rassit with him, passing them off as an honor guard or body-guard, but no more than that. There will be time to prepare and settle some affairs before one leaves, but it does play to Kuojah's own plans. (Arrives between Early and Mid-Winter)
[X] Commanding the Wind-Dancers in his absence.
[X] It can be uninterred, and it's possible that it could be transferred with him for non 'Rassit-Race' options for potential burial in Csirit.
[X] No, preserve the relationship and ties with the Southlands merchants and banks for the moment that have borrowed Kiralo's money, their goodwill is more important at the moment.
No. of votes: 1
veekie
[X] Plan Haste
No. of votes: 13
Tanor, drake_azathoth, Estro, Neptune, Zeitgeist Blue, Ct613hulu, notanautomaton, Fumbles, Ridiculously Average Guy, Tsume817, Terrabrand, WanderingEye, EvilPorygon
[X] Return of the Mother
No. of votes: 3
bookwyrm, Gingganz, Ephemeral_Dreamer
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Update on Tuesday morning, hopefully. Something of a delay, but hopefully that'll allow me to get stuff in place.
- Pronouns
- They/Them
You know, if this goes well, I might make an original fic in the same setting someday.
Maybe try to get a hipster welfare Patreon going or something.
Maybe try to get a
- Pronouns
- They/Them
I actually had a vague idea for a web-serial set in far-off Anlan. I mean, right now I only have the idea of a spirit-filled knife and the first line of, "Oh Saints and Spirits, he's going to kill me."
Probably third person, so the added bit to that sentence would be 'thought X' or whatever else.
Of course, right now I'm carefully not telling anyone shit about Anlan, so that'll have to wait.
Edit: Also, I have a Patreon now, randomly enough.
Last edited:
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Update tomorrow.
Turn 0--A Race Run
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Turn 0--A Race Run
Kuojah wasn't a man that Kiralo associated with speed, with sudden decisions, and yet this had every hallmark of one. It was swift in a way that brought to mind a phrase that only truly worked in Southlander, at least with the same way it rhymed and danced against itself. 'Like a Rassit.' In Csiritan, the only phrase would be 'In the fashion of the Rassit' which was not nearly so precise.
It was a petty, distracting thought, because he was focusing on the other facts. His father needed his skills but didn't respect them, yet that wasn't all that drove Kiralo forward, walking towards where Fei-Da was sitting.
The man looked at him and Kiralo looked back and asked a simple question, "Is the boy's mother still alive?"
"Who? Oh, the Emperor," Fei-Da said, "The honorable and revered Emperor's mother is indeed deceased."
Kiralo looked at Fei-Da and closed his eyes, thinking on it. The Emperor was seven. Kiralo remembered it, the years alone, the challenges and difficulties, and he was twelve when he'd lost his mother.
His father he'd lost before he was even born. Kuojah hadn't mentioned the details that any person should care about because they didn't matter to him nearly as much as they might. Kiralo had a suspicion, and it was an unnerving one for the Emperor, for anyone in Kuojah's grasp.
"His name?"
"Dai'so," Fei-Da said, absently.
"You cannot think to deny me in this! He would be the smartest, the most just man ever to walk the earth, I would raise him with all of my skill. I would be the perfect father," Kuojah had wildly claimed.
That rattling corpse, Kiralo thought, will drag me down with him if I go and play his game the way he wanted it to be played. It was a harsh thought, but it illuminated his choices, and he stepped forward and said, "You can compliment Kuojah when you see him--"
"Cs-Kuojah," Fei-Da said politely, as he reached down to bring the cup of tea to his lips.
"I can call the man whatever I wish," Kiralo said, "Kuojah can hear that if he were a little braver, perhaps his speed would make him one who lived in the fashion of the Rassit."
"I will be sure to tell him that, Cs-Kiralo," Fei-Da said, his voice chilly and his manner formal, arms stiff as if he was about to bow.
"But he is not a Rassit," Kiralo said carefully, and then he turned, "You are welcome to stay here for a few days."
"Is this a refusal?" Fei-Da asked, and then added, the words piling on top of each other, "There is wealth to be had, trust me, and honor enough, and anything you would like. A good marriage women...Cs-Kuojah has power, and I will do what it takes to…"
"I won't be needing the house," Kiralo said with a smile. "I'll be in Csrae before the month is out. I am a Rassit. I shall outrace his very thoughts."
He knew there was drama to such a declaration, and he felt for a moment like a character in a play, on the edge of portentous events, declaiming poetry with force and a lack of humor, and it seemed ridiculous.
"The buns are ready," Amai said in Southlander, "Would you like one? I can make one or two more for your trip, and when you get back in a day or two, riding on the south winds themselves, you can have more."
She held out the baozi and Kiralo burst out laughing and clapped first Fei-Da and then Amai on the back, and got to packing.
He would ride before the day was over.
******
Beyond the main edges of the city were the barracks and the pastures, where the proud Rassit and few Tarnarnin of Herinzet shared their space with the often prouder and usually more numerous mercenaries that the city relied on as much as their own armies.
It was a fine day, the sun creeping up into the sky as Kiralo and Gale thundered into the barracks.
In the barracks, Kueli looked at him and asked, "Who died?" The man stood, tall and broad, his frame strong and steady, though he was clearly still suffering the effects of last night's drinking, though this did not disturb his carefully groomed mustache.
"The Emperor of Csirit," Kiralo said simply.
"Spirits above and fucking below," Kueli burst out, "This...when?"
"Three weeks ago, or thereabouts. I've recieved a letter from my father…" Kiralo said.
"Ah, and so now you want me to tell you some good Far Southlander curses so you can tell him to go stick his head even further up his own ass?"
"And you doubt I'm inventive enough to insult someone?" Kiralo asked, "No. I'm going to be in Csrae in two weeks, and we'll see just what he does to that."
Kueli looked around the room as if there were spies even here. There were, but they were all people that Kueli had control over, or at least they wouldn't spread this around, especially since they were closeted in a room with a door, the spirits of the room whispering and chattering to hide a little of what was being said.
"Steal a march?" Kueli asked, "But Kiralo...this is still so sudden, and you know what Csirit is. Don't you? It's the serpent throne, a literal viper's nest!"
"Not literal," Kiralo said, primly, as if he wasn't right.
"So, shall I go with you once more into battle?" Kueli asked.
"No, I would like you to stay here."
"Really?" Kueli asked, "Stand here as you leave alone to…"
"I am going to take Arimi and Vedal," Kiralo said.
"You think the kid can keep up?" Kueli asked.
He was talking about Vedal, who was one of the new scout Rassit that Kiralo had been working with. The boy, a mongrel of rather mixed past--an Anlan grandparent, a Bueli cousin, a Csiritan father and Southlander mother--was fierce and loyal, and he had a lot of potential at least in his job, but that wasn't quite the same as being up for the sort of journey that Kiralo was proposing.
In theory. In practice the boy, though only eighteen, was quite the rider.
"He'll be fine," Kiralo said. "I hope that this is not the last straw."
"No, I knew you were insane when you became my Captain," Kueli said, "I wish we could have another night out on the city before you left, but...I assume you're in a hurry."
"I still need to talk to the Prince of Herinzet. Take my leave from him."
Kiralo glanced westward as if he could feel the very weight of the tower that stood above it all. He'd been on a balcony near the top with the Prince once, and the man had talked casually of his son's misdeeds, of politics and his daughter's marriage and in that moment at the age of twenty three he'd thought for a moment that his life was going to change.
What would he have said if an offer was made, if that night had turned out to be anything other than the phantasms of politeness.
A refusal changed the world just as much as acceptance. That was then.
*****
"What is this?" Fei-Da asked, as Kiralo ascended the stairs moments after he had declared his decision and eaten a baozi. "What is your game, what is your plan, Kiralo?"
No longer Cs-Kiralo he thought as he raced into his study and began thinking. He could bring a few books and no more. The shelves hung against the walls, and two dozen books that mattered to him rested there. He opened a few at random, and then decided on two slim volumes, one almost warped by water as he glanced over at his small oaken desk, cluttered and crowded with papers, with poems.
Call it vanity, but he would take his own works, and the play that he still had not completed. The rest was out there, could be bought later, but the city play he was working on, the poems half-formed or half-finished, these were the only copies. He'd have Kueli or someone come in soon enough to pack it all away.
He hurried into the room, and Amai came up behind him.
"So I am to be dismissed?" she asked.
"You shall be paid for the season," Kiralo replied, "I wish you the best of luck."
He turned, and Amai looked slightly put out, "And what of the boy?"
"Narain can learn from anyone," Kiralo said, "I do not have the time to work out every detail, but I shall do what I can."
Amai nodded, her demeaner as brisk as it was usually confiding, and now that she had said her piece, she was going to be as dutiful as was needed.
It took far less time than most men would expect for Kiralo to pack away everything of meaning in his life, everything he couldn't do without. He remembered the difficulty he'd had saying goodbye to anything at all when he was fifteen, when he was leaving the world he'd known all his life behind.
But a Rassit learned what was important and what wasn't quickly, or they were loaded down, Kiralo decided, with a thoughtful frown as he made his last few selections.
******
The city had been spread out before them. It looked small, and the flickering lights and the brief flashes of colors of the spirits only made it seem smaller. The Prince, Namal Virinzen, had stared out into the night and talked about far too many things for it to be a coincidence.
A nervous young man, not even a captain then, had watched the leader of the city as he leaned over the railing. "My son says the weather is fine to go out riding horses, though he prefers to gamble on them."
Kiralo had wondered whether he should say anything, and he had glanced at the guards and said, "It is the season for it, I would think."
"It is always the season for something," Namal had said with a withering contempt, "For something or someone. My youngest daughter prefers the books, and the ciphers of the library, and sometimes the spirits themselves."
His hair was greying, and yet he spoke of her as one might a young girl, when in fact she was twenty. Kiralo had seen her only from afar at a party or two, though the young woman was said to enjoy poetry, or at least enjoy listening to poets.
He spoke for a long time and Kiralo began to see the question that was shaping up in front of him.
He'd wondered whether he was a madman for seeing it, because surely it wouldn't be asked. And if it were asked, then surely it would be no grave insult to demur in such a way that indicated plainly a polite and courtly refusal.
Surely the Prince of Herinzet was not sizing up the possibility that Kiralo might marry his daughter.
"So she says, but my son, well, he sometimes takes to the field itself, and bets on himself and makes some sort of spectacle," Namal continued, "Of himself. I worry sometimes, for it can be dangerous to go out riding."
And if Kiralo couldn't possibly be hearing the overture, the first plucked notes of a song of marriage, then surely he couldn't have heard the final dying notes of a potential assassination.
Yet nothing had come of it, and two years later the young man was going in broad daylight not to the very top of the large stone tower that held the Prince and all of his many adivisors, but likely to its very heart.
******
"A...fall from a horse?" Kueli said, and then laughed, "If this were the Southlands, I'd bet ten to one against it being a natural death."
It was remarkably unsurprising how many unpopular rulers or untoward nobles fell from a racing horse and were unfortunately dashed against the ground and, just as unfortunately, did not recover and were given burials with the full measure of dignity their lofty positions and the accident that had brought them low deserved.
It had not been Kiralo's first thought, but the thought had crept up, and just because Kiralo could remember no incident in the history of Csirit like that--most Emperors simply didn't ride and hunt the way the people of the Southlands did--that didn't mean it had not happened before.
And it didn't mean, Kiralo thought with a dry mouth, that it couldn't happen now.
Suddenly the small, spirit-haunted room was too small and too haunted.
"Perhaps," was all Kiralo could muster as he thought through the implications both of accident and murder.
*****
Talking with the Prince: 1d100+23 (Dip)+3 (Past History)+1 (Attractive)+2 (Warrior of the Peace)=1d100+29=72
The Prince was not in the throne-room, but that was to be expected at this time of day. Instead, Kiralo entered a large room with dozens of couches and pillows strewn everywhere, embroidered and made with skill and care, as spirits hovered and slipped one way and then another. Some of them carried messages, and others warnings or threats, and others tried to listen in on the conversation of their fellows, for there were dozens of courtiers and officials spread out at different couches, talking, laughing, or gesturing for a serving girl to bring more wine or food or a book they had forgotten they wanted to read from…
It was all so familiar that for a moment Kiralo almost fell into the rhythm. He could talk to the musician in the corner, who was tuning his far southlands sitar, and then swing over to where Yinel was no doubt talking about the trade deal and the latest gathering's from his town garden.
This was a place he felt oddly at home in, considering just how much went on that was at the least corrupt and at the most vile. There was beauty and there was ugliness, but instead of slipping into the river he rode straight through it, walking over rugs and around couches as he aimed straight for Prince Namal.
The Prince was a tall man, thin and wiry but slowly slipping towards the indolence of old age, his frame thickened. His skin was a burnt color, and he had a burn to match across his neck, the result of a foolish stunt in his youth that he was surely never to repeat. He was dressed in brilliant scarlet robes, and he was reclining as he ate from a plate of cold cheeses and meats, his greying hair offset by his brilliant emerald eyes.
Kiralo, contrary to the studied and casual way that Namal had encouraged, fell to his knees in greeting.
"Greetings, Prince Namal, third of your name, may this supplicant apologize for any haste in which he acts," Kiralo said, "And any informalities of his dress."
Indeed, he was wearing riding attire, and not merely because he was in a hurry. This was meant to be a message.
"Where are you going?" Namal asked, understanding at once the message, "Should we worry? I had thought that the bandits would be quiet this time of year, with your Wind-Dancers acting as the wolf among the hens with them."
"This is so, Highness. But I have been given a letter, and it calls me in a way I cannot fail to respond to, however it is written."
"Oh? And what does this valued and powerful letter say?" the Prince asked, sounding far more bored than Kiralo knew he was.
Everyone was listening now, and Kiralo knew that what he said next would be repeated a thousand times.
"It was from my father, and we all know what high esteem and respect I hold for the man," Kiralo said, allowing the courtiers to laugh politely and the Prince to grin. There was little to lose in the Southlands insulting Kuojah's name and honor, not like in Csirit.
"We all know," the Prince said, "And it said?"
"The Emperor is dead. A simiple accident while hunting," Kiralo said. The last thing he wanted to note was that the Emperor had fallen from his horse. Assumptions would be made that might not actually be true, and about people whom Kiralo suspected might have nothing to do with it. "But just like that, everything has changed."
"I'll say it has," the Prince said, and the sound of the courtiers murmuring grew louder as they reacted to the news, "And who is the new Emperor?"
"A boy of seven years. My father has asked me to come north...thinks that my skills might be useful."
"And they are not useful here? This is dangerous information you give me, that the empire is weak--"
Kiralo inclined his head even more and said, "I know this, but I also know that you knowing is not dangerous for Csirit to whom I return. I know the Southlands, and there is no head for interference of that sort."
"But what of another sort?" Prince Namal asked, his tone casual, "What if you were the key to reopening trade and reducing the harsh taxation and cruelty which people of Southland stock face in...Hari-Su, was that what your people called it?"
Your people, he'd said.
Kiralo nodded, though. "It might be possible, your Highness. But I came here to ask your leave. In the future, though, I shall remember with gratitude your acceptance and the conversations we had on many diverting topics."
"And I shall miss your own presence. Your mercenary company will be staying for the season though, is that correct?"
"Yes, your highness," Kiralo said, held in place by everything that wasn't being said.
The air was tense for a moment and finally the Prince said, "Then I give you my leave and my blessing. Good luck in that…"
"Viper's pit?" Kiralo asked after a long pause, "I would say that it is more the crushing snake, if one means to be negative."
"Perhaps," Prince Namal conceded, "I leave it to the poets to find the proper phrases."
"I shall think on it then," Kiralo offered, "And if I can think on the right phrase, perhaps I shall send you a letter."
The prince smiled at this, and understood just what was meant.
******
"A seal, please," Kiralo asked. "A seal from your master to guarantee me safe passage?"
Fei-Da frowned, writhed, and then began to write a letter.
*****
The Southlands were beautiful, and the ten horses thundered along the road raising clouds of dust as they moved, almost obscuring a good afternoon as Kiralo and his two chosen riders left Herinzet on the same day the letter had arrived.
The Southlands passed before them as the days rolled by like the hills, the rivers and the valleys. He'd read the Csiritan descriptions of the Southlands, which always talked of the deserts well past the Seventeen Cities, yet they never talked about the bounty and beauty of the streams and pools, or the plains filled with high grass or carefully tended crops, or the way the sky was the sort of blue that seemed almost impossible.
They stopped where they could, making worse time than Kiralo had hoped and better than he might have expected, and it was three days of hard traveling, about eighty miles in the first day and around half-again more afterwards for the next two days until at last they were in Narashi Port, a large and beautiful town that rested at the edge of the old trade lines. The new ones, based on smuggling, though, those took good advantage of the out of the way nature of Narashi Port, and it was surprisingly easy, in fact, to find a smuggling vessel that would take them.
The journey across the seas was as easy as if the Spirits of the ocean itself were pushing them along, and against his every fear and worry, they arrived at a forgotten piece of beachfront without having met the Imperial Navy.
The letter was some protection, but who knows what might be going on, even now. From there it was easily enough to make the journey, stopping at the waystations and hostels along the Imperial Road.
Easy, but not simple. Csirit was just as beautiful in its own way, and every thundering gallop forward, switching from horse to horse so that none of them, especially Gale, was overburdened, was closer to a meeting he was quite nervous about.
Kiralo knew there were stares at the inns he stayed at, and he'd occasionally try to dispel them with a song, but the truth was that he was in far too much of a hurry at the moment to care about the stares and the looks.
A Rassit who has undertaken to make such a journey's mind should be on nothing more than the journey.
Yet he stared out into the night and wondered just when this would feel like home.
They were stopped every so often, and Kiralo endeavored to not be caught in the politics that might be behind such things, showing the letter but remaining quiet on any other matters at all.
*****
The colors, for instance, that was a thing to watch. Official mourning for the Emperor was always a month long. Depending on one's closeness to the Emperor, one wore more and more white and black together, the colors of death itself. Even peasants would have a little of white-and-black they'd wear, Kiralo had been told, if only for their own loved ones repurposed.
Or on the orders of some lord trying to show his piety.
But after the month, only those who were closest to the Emperor, like in the Court or high officials, or those who wished it had to wear white and black, and who still wore it after the month was up probably said a lot about what the individual lords thought.
A people who still wore at least a single white-and-black garment were a people whose lords had made them do so, who had perhaps even sent in soldiers to enforce this religious edict, this mourning for the one who had guided them.
And a people without it were a people who had done the mourning required of them and still had a life.
He'd worn mourning for his mother for an entire year, and stopped only when he'd reached a certain point.
With Jia, even when he'd passed all hope itself and even caring for her had not been as much an act of love as an act of painful endurance, when he'd been burned out of everything except apathy and his care for her seemed to mean nothing for either of them, he had kept on going.
But the white and black, the mourning colors as he was taught, that was different. When it at last wore on him, when he realized one day that it no longer meant anything, that he put on the black and white bandana or the under-shirt, or...any of it no longer because he loved her, though he had and did still, but because he was used to it.
That burden was unlike that of his mother, whom he had never dropped even after he felt dead: that burden he dropped the moment he'd truly felt it, truly realized that it was meaningless and senseless.
And plenty of people here along the roads had their own lives to life, not spent grieving overlong for a man they had never known in a city most of them had never seen.
*****
Everything fell away as the journey consumed him. Other than a slow day mired in a quick stop, the last six days of the journey were done at a speed that would have stunned even some Rassit, so fast that the spirits gathered to watch them as they rode.
Up through Hari-Su, and then Hari-Os, before continuing on through Basnat. There, the whispering on the death of the Emperor was a roar, and on everyone's lips was a name. Prince Jinhai.
Again and again the name was said as if it were the refrain for a song, the key line of a poem, and again and again the muttering and whispers turned towards the man's deeds and all that he had done.
Prince Jinhai was a cousin of the current Emperor, who all knew to be a young boy, and he was young still but not a boy. Twenty and seven, he had won his fame fighting off the Sea-Raiders in Hari-Os and was regarded by the average person as being like a hero out of a story. Brave, wise, handsome, it was clear that the stories were being spread about him already.
Basnat had, some claimed, been neglected by the Emperor in recent years. It had relied on internal trade as well as trade with the Southlands, resting as it did between just about everything else. Those from Hari-Su and Hari-Os wishing to bring their products inland had to go through either Hirand, loop up over Hari-Nat, or through Basnat.
The rich agricultural province of Hirand shipped all of the crops it sent south through Basnat, meanwhile nearby Irit and Csrae traded with them as well.
A vast network of power had managed to rest in one place, and when that withered, there was much poverty at least among those who relied on trade.
That, Kiralo understood quite well. The average peasant might not be worse off, though Kiralo knew enough not to make a judgement yet, but it was clear that there was complaint, and that so long as Prince Jinhai allowed it to fester, there was a good chance it could end in a war.
Kuojah backed the current child Emperor, and Kiralo could guess that the man would never be so improper as to sell out Dai'So. And so thereby stood the challenge, Kiralo assumed as he rode north, so fast that the days blurred. He almost half-missed the rivers and valleys of Irit so fast were they moving on those last days.
The time would come when he'd see the world and Csirit rather than pass through, when he'd register how strange it was to be around people who looked like him, who spoke Csiritan albeit a half-dozen different variants of the language, some of which he had trouble understanding.
There were so many things that should surprise and shock him, but when he rode one-hundred and seventy miles in the final day to a small town twenty miles outside of the capital, it had to be said that there was no energy left for anything else except laying on the dark upstairs next to one of the other riders (the inn not having the room for people not to sleep two to a bed, and neither of them wishing to sleep on the floor not after that ride) and thinking.
Tomorrow. Tomorrow he'd see his father again, and the capital and its famous river, and the vast city-within-a-city, walled off and kept separate, that housed the Imperial Court.
Csrae[1] was a city of over a million souls, and the Court was said to be a marvel.
The question remained, however, just what would Kiralo wear to the meeting with his father?
Clothes makes the man?
[] Southlander Court Garb: Marking him as sophisticated in one sense, but also as a foreigner, whose cut and style of cloth and patterns are all unlike those of someone from Csirit. At the same time, it's at least appropriate for a court setting, even if not the one that Kiralo has found himself in.
[] Old Csiritan Formals: Not quite up for court even when they were in fashion, these clothes will likely make Kiralo look out of fashion and are not the best repaired or kept by any means, but they are the only clothes he has that are Csiritan and have no hints of Southlander to them, which perhaps is enough of an advantage to outweigh the many disadvantages.
[] Rassit Attire: He has raced here as a Rassit, perhaps he should enter the Court as a Rassit, in the leathers and jackets and garb of a Rassit. Let them talk and let them gawk, it'll definitely make a sort of spectacle, and isn't that half of why Kiralo had journeyed so fast and so hard?
*****
[1] The city and province share the same name.
A/N: A little rough. I was going to have it be a travelogue, and then I realized that as fast as he's going, he's not really appreciating the scenery. Because, uh, he's going over a hundred miles every day on horses. And that's sort of possible, by the way. In the sense that people have gone a hundred miles a day on a horse in real life as a fast messenger or the like, in ideal conditions, so a Rassit is able to bust right through that limit when they're hauling ass.
So yeah, not entirely happy, but here we are.
Kuojah wasn't a man that Kiralo associated with speed, with sudden decisions, and yet this had every hallmark of one. It was swift in a way that brought to mind a phrase that only truly worked in Southlander, at least with the same way it rhymed and danced against itself. 'Like a Rassit.' In Csiritan, the only phrase would be 'In the fashion of the Rassit' which was not nearly so precise.
It was a petty, distracting thought, because he was focusing on the other facts. His father needed his skills but didn't respect them, yet that wasn't all that drove Kiralo forward, walking towards where Fei-Da was sitting.
The man looked at him and Kiralo looked back and asked a simple question, "Is the boy's mother still alive?"
"Who? Oh, the Emperor," Fei-Da said, "The honorable and revered Emperor's mother is indeed deceased."
Kiralo looked at Fei-Da and closed his eyes, thinking on it. The Emperor was seven. Kiralo remembered it, the years alone, the challenges and difficulties, and he was twelve when he'd lost his mother.
His father he'd lost before he was even born. Kuojah hadn't mentioned the details that any person should care about because they didn't matter to him nearly as much as they might. Kiralo had a suspicion, and it was an unnerving one for the Emperor, for anyone in Kuojah's grasp.
"His name?"
"Dai'so," Fei-Da said, absently.
"You cannot think to deny me in this! He would be the smartest, the most just man ever to walk the earth, I would raise him with all of my skill. I would be the perfect father," Kuojah had wildly claimed.
That rattling corpse, Kiralo thought, will drag me down with him if I go and play his game the way he wanted it to be played. It was a harsh thought, but it illuminated his choices, and he stepped forward and said, "You can compliment Kuojah when you see him--"
"Cs-Kuojah," Fei-Da said politely, as he reached down to bring the cup of tea to his lips.
"I can call the man whatever I wish," Kiralo said, "Kuojah can hear that if he were a little braver, perhaps his speed would make him one who lived in the fashion of the Rassit."
"I will be sure to tell him that, Cs-Kiralo," Fei-Da said, his voice chilly and his manner formal, arms stiff as if he was about to bow.
"But he is not a Rassit," Kiralo said carefully, and then he turned, "You are welcome to stay here for a few days."
"Is this a refusal?" Fei-Da asked, and then added, the words piling on top of each other, "There is wealth to be had, trust me, and honor enough, and anything you would like. A good marriage women...Cs-Kuojah has power, and I will do what it takes to…"
"I won't be needing the house," Kiralo said with a smile. "I'll be in Csrae before the month is out. I am a Rassit. I shall outrace his very thoughts."
He knew there was drama to such a declaration, and he felt for a moment like a character in a play, on the edge of portentous events, declaiming poetry with force and a lack of humor, and it seemed ridiculous.
"The buns are ready," Amai said in Southlander, "Would you like one? I can make one or two more for your trip, and when you get back in a day or two, riding on the south winds themselves, you can have more."
She held out the baozi and Kiralo burst out laughing and clapped first Fei-Da and then Amai on the back, and got to packing.
He would ride before the day was over.
******
Beyond the main edges of the city were the barracks and the pastures, where the proud Rassit and few Tarnarnin of Herinzet shared their space with the often prouder and usually more numerous mercenaries that the city relied on as much as their own armies.
It was a fine day, the sun creeping up into the sky as Kiralo and Gale thundered into the barracks.
In the barracks, Kueli looked at him and asked, "Who died?" The man stood, tall and broad, his frame strong and steady, though he was clearly still suffering the effects of last night's drinking, though this did not disturb his carefully groomed mustache.
"The Emperor of Csirit," Kiralo said simply.
"Spirits above and fucking below," Kueli burst out, "This...when?"
"Three weeks ago, or thereabouts. I've recieved a letter from my father…" Kiralo said.
"Ah, and so now you want me to tell you some good Far Southlander curses so you can tell him to go stick his head even further up his own ass?"
"And you doubt I'm inventive enough to insult someone?" Kiralo asked, "No. I'm going to be in Csrae in two weeks, and we'll see just what he does to that."
Kueli looked around the room as if there were spies even here. There were, but they were all people that Kueli had control over, or at least they wouldn't spread this around, especially since they were closeted in a room with a door, the spirits of the room whispering and chattering to hide a little of what was being said.
"Steal a march?" Kueli asked, "But Kiralo...this is still so sudden, and you know what Csirit is. Don't you? It's the serpent throne, a literal viper's nest!"
"Not literal," Kiralo said, primly, as if he wasn't right.
"So, shall I go with you once more into battle?" Kueli asked.
"No, I would like you to stay here."
"Really?" Kueli asked, "Stand here as you leave alone to…"
"I am going to take Arimi and Vedal," Kiralo said.
"You think the kid can keep up?" Kueli asked.
He was talking about Vedal, who was one of the new scout Rassit that Kiralo had been working with. The boy, a mongrel of rather mixed past--an Anlan grandparent, a Bueli cousin, a Csiritan father and Southlander mother--was fierce and loyal, and he had a lot of potential at least in his job, but that wasn't quite the same as being up for the sort of journey that Kiralo was proposing.
In theory. In practice the boy, though only eighteen, was quite the rider.
"He'll be fine," Kiralo said. "I hope that this is not the last straw."
"No, I knew you were insane when you became my Captain," Kueli said, "I wish we could have another night out on the city before you left, but...I assume you're in a hurry."
"I still need to talk to the Prince of Herinzet. Take my leave from him."
Kiralo glanced westward as if he could feel the very weight of the tower that stood above it all. He'd been on a balcony near the top with the Prince once, and the man had talked casually of his son's misdeeds, of politics and his daughter's marriage and in that moment at the age of twenty three he'd thought for a moment that his life was going to change.
What would he have said if an offer was made, if that night had turned out to be anything other than the phantasms of politeness.
A refusal changed the world just as much as acceptance. That was then.
*****
"What is this?" Fei-Da asked, as Kiralo ascended the stairs moments after he had declared his decision and eaten a baozi. "What is your game, what is your plan, Kiralo?"
No longer Cs-Kiralo he thought as he raced into his study and began thinking. He could bring a few books and no more. The shelves hung against the walls, and two dozen books that mattered to him rested there. He opened a few at random, and then decided on two slim volumes, one almost warped by water as he glanced over at his small oaken desk, cluttered and crowded with papers, with poems.
Call it vanity, but he would take his own works, and the play that he still had not completed. The rest was out there, could be bought later, but the city play he was working on, the poems half-formed or half-finished, these were the only copies. He'd have Kueli or someone come in soon enough to pack it all away.
He hurried into the room, and Amai came up behind him.
"So I am to be dismissed?" she asked.
"You shall be paid for the season," Kiralo replied, "I wish you the best of luck."
He turned, and Amai looked slightly put out, "And what of the boy?"
"Narain can learn from anyone," Kiralo said, "I do not have the time to work out every detail, but I shall do what I can."
Amai nodded, her demeaner as brisk as it was usually confiding, and now that she had said her piece, she was going to be as dutiful as was needed.
It took far less time than most men would expect for Kiralo to pack away everything of meaning in his life, everything he couldn't do without. He remembered the difficulty he'd had saying goodbye to anything at all when he was fifteen, when he was leaving the world he'd known all his life behind.
But a Rassit learned what was important and what wasn't quickly, or they were loaded down, Kiralo decided, with a thoughtful frown as he made his last few selections.
******
The city had been spread out before them. It looked small, and the flickering lights and the brief flashes of colors of the spirits only made it seem smaller. The Prince, Namal Virinzen, had stared out into the night and talked about far too many things for it to be a coincidence.
A nervous young man, not even a captain then, had watched the leader of the city as he leaned over the railing. "My son says the weather is fine to go out riding horses, though he prefers to gamble on them."
Kiralo had wondered whether he should say anything, and he had glanced at the guards and said, "It is the season for it, I would think."
"It is always the season for something," Namal had said with a withering contempt, "For something or someone. My youngest daughter prefers the books, and the ciphers of the library, and sometimes the spirits themselves."
His hair was greying, and yet he spoke of her as one might a young girl, when in fact she was twenty. Kiralo had seen her only from afar at a party or two, though the young woman was said to enjoy poetry, or at least enjoy listening to poets.
He spoke for a long time and Kiralo began to see the question that was shaping up in front of him.
He'd wondered whether he was a madman for seeing it, because surely it wouldn't be asked. And if it were asked, then surely it would be no grave insult to demur in such a way that indicated plainly a polite and courtly refusal.
Surely the Prince of Herinzet was not sizing up the possibility that Kiralo might marry his daughter.
"So she says, but my son, well, he sometimes takes to the field itself, and bets on himself and makes some sort of spectacle," Namal continued, "Of himself. I worry sometimes, for it can be dangerous to go out riding."
And if Kiralo couldn't possibly be hearing the overture, the first plucked notes of a song of marriage, then surely he couldn't have heard the final dying notes of a potential assassination.
Yet nothing had come of it, and two years later the young man was going in broad daylight not to the very top of the large stone tower that held the Prince and all of his many adivisors, but likely to its very heart.
******
"A...fall from a horse?" Kueli said, and then laughed, "If this were the Southlands, I'd bet ten to one against it being a natural death."
It was remarkably unsurprising how many unpopular rulers or untoward nobles fell from a racing horse and were unfortunately dashed against the ground and, just as unfortunately, did not recover and were given burials with the full measure of dignity their lofty positions and the accident that had brought them low deserved.
It had not been Kiralo's first thought, but the thought had crept up, and just because Kiralo could remember no incident in the history of Csirit like that--most Emperors simply didn't ride and hunt the way the people of the Southlands did--that didn't mean it had not happened before.
And it didn't mean, Kiralo thought with a dry mouth, that it couldn't happen now.
Suddenly the small, spirit-haunted room was too small and too haunted.
"Perhaps," was all Kiralo could muster as he thought through the implications both of accident and murder.
*****
Talking with the Prince: 1d100+23 (Dip)+3 (Past History)+1 (Attractive)+2 (Warrior of the Peace)=1d100+29=72
The Prince was not in the throne-room, but that was to be expected at this time of day. Instead, Kiralo entered a large room with dozens of couches and pillows strewn everywhere, embroidered and made with skill and care, as spirits hovered and slipped one way and then another. Some of them carried messages, and others warnings or threats, and others tried to listen in on the conversation of their fellows, for there were dozens of courtiers and officials spread out at different couches, talking, laughing, or gesturing for a serving girl to bring more wine or food or a book they had forgotten they wanted to read from…
It was all so familiar that for a moment Kiralo almost fell into the rhythm. He could talk to the musician in the corner, who was tuning his far southlands sitar, and then swing over to where Yinel was no doubt talking about the trade deal and the latest gathering's from his town garden.
This was a place he felt oddly at home in, considering just how much went on that was at the least corrupt and at the most vile. There was beauty and there was ugliness, but instead of slipping into the river he rode straight through it, walking over rugs and around couches as he aimed straight for Prince Namal.
The Prince was a tall man, thin and wiry but slowly slipping towards the indolence of old age, his frame thickened. His skin was a burnt color, and he had a burn to match across his neck, the result of a foolish stunt in his youth that he was surely never to repeat. He was dressed in brilliant scarlet robes, and he was reclining as he ate from a plate of cold cheeses and meats, his greying hair offset by his brilliant emerald eyes.
Kiralo, contrary to the studied and casual way that Namal had encouraged, fell to his knees in greeting.
"Greetings, Prince Namal, third of your name, may this supplicant apologize for any haste in which he acts," Kiralo said, "And any informalities of his dress."
Indeed, he was wearing riding attire, and not merely because he was in a hurry. This was meant to be a message.
"Where are you going?" Namal asked, understanding at once the message, "Should we worry? I had thought that the bandits would be quiet this time of year, with your Wind-Dancers acting as the wolf among the hens with them."
"This is so, Highness. But I have been given a letter, and it calls me in a way I cannot fail to respond to, however it is written."
"Oh? And what does this valued and powerful letter say?" the Prince asked, sounding far more bored than Kiralo knew he was.
Everyone was listening now, and Kiralo knew that what he said next would be repeated a thousand times.
"It was from my father, and we all know what high esteem and respect I hold for the man," Kiralo said, allowing the courtiers to laugh politely and the Prince to grin. There was little to lose in the Southlands insulting Kuojah's name and honor, not like in Csirit.
"We all know," the Prince said, "And it said?"
"The Emperor is dead. A simiple accident while hunting," Kiralo said. The last thing he wanted to note was that the Emperor had fallen from his horse. Assumptions would be made that might not actually be true, and about people whom Kiralo suspected might have nothing to do with it. "But just like that, everything has changed."
"I'll say it has," the Prince said, and the sound of the courtiers murmuring grew louder as they reacted to the news, "And who is the new Emperor?"
"A boy of seven years. My father has asked me to come north...thinks that my skills might be useful."
"And they are not useful here? This is dangerous information you give me, that the empire is weak--"
Kiralo inclined his head even more and said, "I know this, but I also know that you knowing is not dangerous for Csirit to whom I return. I know the Southlands, and there is no head for interference of that sort."
"But what of another sort?" Prince Namal asked, his tone casual, "What if you were the key to reopening trade and reducing the harsh taxation and cruelty which people of Southland stock face in...Hari-Su, was that what your people called it?"
Your people, he'd said.
Kiralo nodded, though. "It might be possible, your Highness. But I came here to ask your leave. In the future, though, I shall remember with gratitude your acceptance and the conversations we had on many diverting topics."
"And I shall miss your own presence. Your mercenary company will be staying for the season though, is that correct?"
"Yes, your highness," Kiralo said, held in place by everything that wasn't being said.
The air was tense for a moment and finally the Prince said, "Then I give you my leave and my blessing. Good luck in that…"
"Viper's pit?" Kiralo asked after a long pause, "I would say that it is more the crushing snake, if one means to be negative."
"Perhaps," Prince Namal conceded, "I leave it to the poets to find the proper phrases."
"I shall think on it then," Kiralo offered, "And if I can think on the right phrase, perhaps I shall send you a letter."
The prince smiled at this, and understood just what was meant.
******
"A seal, please," Kiralo asked. "A seal from your master to guarantee me safe passage?"
Fei-Da frowned, writhed, and then began to write a letter.
*****
The Southlands were beautiful, and the ten horses thundered along the road raising clouds of dust as they moved, almost obscuring a good afternoon as Kiralo and his two chosen riders left Herinzet on the same day the letter had arrived.
The Southlands passed before them as the days rolled by like the hills, the rivers and the valleys. He'd read the Csiritan descriptions of the Southlands, which always talked of the deserts well past the Seventeen Cities, yet they never talked about the bounty and beauty of the streams and pools, or the plains filled with high grass or carefully tended crops, or the way the sky was the sort of blue that seemed almost impossible.
They stopped where they could, making worse time than Kiralo had hoped and better than he might have expected, and it was three days of hard traveling, about eighty miles in the first day and around half-again more afterwards for the next two days until at last they were in Narashi Port, a large and beautiful town that rested at the edge of the old trade lines. The new ones, based on smuggling, though, those took good advantage of the out of the way nature of Narashi Port, and it was surprisingly easy, in fact, to find a smuggling vessel that would take them.
The journey across the seas was as easy as if the Spirits of the ocean itself were pushing them along, and against his every fear and worry, they arrived at a forgotten piece of beachfront without having met the Imperial Navy.
The letter was some protection, but who knows what might be going on, even now. From there it was easily enough to make the journey, stopping at the waystations and hostels along the Imperial Road.
Easy, but not simple. Csirit was just as beautiful in its own way, and every thundering gallop forward, switching from horse to horse so that none of them, especially Gale, was overburdened, was closer to a meeting he was quite nervous about.
Kiralo knew there were stares at the inns he stayed at, and he'd occasionally try to dispel them with a song, but the truth was that he was in far too much of a hurry at the moment to care about the stares and the looks.
A Rassit who has undertaken to make such a journey's mind should be on nothing more than the journey.
Yet he stared out into the night and wondered just when this would feel like home.
They were stopped every so often, and Kiralo endeavored to not be caught in the politics that might be behind such things, showing the letter but remaining quiet on any other matters at all.
*****
The colors, for instance, that was a thing to watch. Official mourning for the Emperor was always a month long. Depending on one's closeness to the Emperor, one wore more and more white and black together, the colors of death itself. Even peasants would have a little of white-and-black they'd wear, Kiralo had been told, if only for their own loved ones repurposed.
Or on the orders of some lord trying to show his piety.
But after the month, only those who were closest to the Emperor, like in the Court or high officials, or those who wished it had to wear white and black, and who still wore it after the month was up probably said a lot about what the individual lords thought.
A people who still wore at least a single white-and-black garment were a people whose lords had made them do so, who had perhaps even sent in soldiers to enforce this religious edict, this mourning for the one who had guided them.
And a people without it were a people who had done the mourning required of them and still had a life.
He'd worn mourning for his mother for an entire year, and stopped only when he'd reached a certain point.
With Jia, even when he'd passed all hope itself and even caring for her had not been as much an act of love as an act of painful endurance, when he'd been burned out of everything except apathy and his care for her seemed to mean nothing for either of them, he had kept on going.
But the white and black, the mourning colors as he was taught, that was different. When it at last wore on him, when he realized one day that it no longer meant anything, that he put on the black and white bandana or the under-shirt, or...any of it no longer because he loved her, though he had and did still, but because he was used to it.
That burden was unlike that of his mother, whom he had never dropped even after he felt dead: that burden he dropped the moment he'd truly felt it, truly realized that it was meaningless and senseless.
And plenty of people here along the roads had their own lives to life, not spent grieving overlong for a man they had never known in a city most of them had never seen.
*****
Everything fell away as the journey consumed him. Other than a slow day mired in a quick stop, the last six days of the journey were done at a speed that would have stunned even some Rassit, so fast that the spirits gathered to watch them as they rode.
Up through Hari-Su, and then Hari-Os, before continuing on through Basnat. There, the whispering on the death of the Emperor was a roar, and on everyone's lips was a name. Prince Jinhai.
Again and again the name was said as if it were the refrain for a song, the key line of a poem, and again and again the muttering and whispers turned towards the man's deeds and all that he had done.
Prince Jinhai was a cousin of the current Emperor, who all knew to be a young boy, and he was young still but not a boy. Twenty and seven, he had won his fame fighting off the Sea-Raiders in Hari-Os and was regarded by the average person as being like a hero out of a story. Brave, wise, handsome, it was clear that the stories were being spread about him already.
Basnat had, some claimed, been neglected by the Emperor in recent years. It had relied on internal trade as well as trade with the Southlands, resting as it did between just about everything else. Those from Hari-Su and Hari-Os wishing to bring their products inland had to go through either Hirand, loop up over Hari-Nat, or through Basnat.
The rich agricultural province of Hirand shipped all of the crops it sent south through Basnat, meanwhile nearby Irit and Csrae traded with them as well.
A vast network of power had managed to rest in one place, and when that withered, there was much poverty at least among those who relied on trade.
That, Kiralo understood quite well. The average peasant might not be worse off, though Kiralo knew enough not to make a judgement yet, but it was clear that there was complaint, and that so long as Prince Jinhai allowed it to fester, there was a good chance it could end in a war.
Kuojah backed the current child Emperor, and Kiralo could guess that the man would never be so improper as to sell out Dai'So. And so thereby stood the challenge, Kiralo assumed as he rode north, so fast that the days blurred. He almost half-missed the rivers and valleys of Irit so fast were they moving on those last days.
The time would come when he'd see the world and Csirit rather than pass through, when he'd register how strange it was to be around people who looked like him, who spoke Csiritan albeit a half-dozen different variants of the language, some of which he had trouble understanding.
There were so many things that should surprise and shock him, but when he rode one-hundred and seventy miles in the final day to a small town twenty miles outside of the capital, it had to be said that there was no energy left for anything else except laying on the dark upstairs next to one of the other riders (the inn not having the room for people not to sleep two to a bed, and neither of them wishing to sleep on the floor not after that ride) and thinking.
Tomorrow. Tomorrow he'd see his father again, and the capital and its famous river, and the vast city-within-a-city, walled off and kept separate, that housed the Imperial Court.
Csrae[1] was a city of over a million souls, and the Court was said to be a marvel.
The question remained, however, just what would Kiralo wear to the meeting with his father?
Clothes makes the man?
[] Southlander Court Garb: Marking him as sophisticated in one sense, but also as a foreigner, whose cut and style of cloth and patterns are all unlike those of someone from Csirit. At the same time, it's at least appropriate for a court setting, even if not the one that Kiralo has found himself in.
[] Old Csiritan Formals: Not quite up for court even when they were in fashion, these clothes will likely make Kiralo look out of fashion and are not the best repaired or kept by any means, but they are the only clothes he has that are Csiritan and have no hints of Southlander to them, which perhaps is enough of an advantage to outweigh the many disadvantages.
[] Rassit Attire: He has raced here as a Rassit, perhaps he should enter the Court as a Rassit, in the leathers and jackets and garb of a Rassit. Let them talk and let them gawk, it'll definitely make a sort of spectacle, and isn't that half of why Kiralo had journeyed so fast and so hard?
*****
[1] The city and province share the same name.
Talking in Port: 87, only a half day's delay
Fair Winds?: 1d100=87, fast journey
The Ride Up North (Speed): 1d100+30=54, 99, 43, 82
The Ride Up North (Incidence): 1d100+5 (Speed)=69
The Ride Up North, Part 2: 1d100+30=94, 123
Fair Winds?: 1d100=87, fast journey
The Ride Up North (Speed): 1d100+30=54, 99, 43, 82
The Ride Up North (Incidence): 1d100+5 (Speed)=69
The Ride Up North, Part 2: 1d100+30=94, 123
A/N: A little rough. I was going to have it be a travelogue, and then I realized that as fast as he's going, he's not really appreciating the scenery. Because, uh, he's going over a hundred miles every day on horses. And that's sort of possible, by the way. In the sense that people have gone a hundred miles a day on a horse in real life as a fast messenger or the like, in ideal conditions, so a Rassit is able to bust right through that limit when they're hauling ass.
So yeah, not entirely happy, but here we are.
[X] Rassit Attire: He has raced here as a Rassit, perhaps he should enter the Court as a Rassit, in the leathers and jackets and garb of a Rassit. Let them talk and let them gawk, it'll definitely make a sort of spectacle, and isn't that half of why Kiralo had journeyed so fast and so hard?
- Pronouns
- They/Them
Remember, Reaction Posts and/or Omakes still get bonuses.
[X] Southlander Court Garb: Marking him as sophisticated in one sense, but also as a foreigner, whose cut and style of cloth and patterns are all unlike those of someone from Csirit. At the same time, it's at least appropriate for a court setting, even if not the one that Kiralo has found himself in.
As tempting as it is to go full Rassit, there are some conservatives like Kuojah that are going to pretty much write us off completely if we show up looking like an uncivilized soldier. We'd probably make a big impression with the 'young guns' of the court, but in all honesty they're eventually going to love us anyway just because we're an actual general with stories of an actual war. There's no reason to throw away our chances to talk with the uptight guys before they get a chance to hear our poetry and appreciate our more sophisticated side.
As tempting as it is to go full Rassit, there are some conservatives like Kuojah that are going to pretty much write us off completely if we show up looking like an uncivilized soldier. We'd probably make a big impression with the 'young guns' of the court, but in all honesty they're eventually going to love us anyway just because we're an actual general with stories of an actual war. There's no reason to throw away our chances to talk with the uptight guys before they get a chance to hear our poetry and appreciate our more sophisticated side.
[X] Rassit Attire: He has raced here as a Rassit, perhaps he should enter the Court as a Rassit, in the leathers and jackets and garb of a Rassit. Let them talk and let them gawk, it'll definitely make a sort of spectacle, and isn't that half of why Kiralo had journeyed so fast and so hard?
- Location
- Iceland
[X] Rassit Attire: He has raced here as a Rassit, perhaps he should enter the Court as a Rassit, in the leathers and jackets and garb of a Rassit. Let them talk and let them gawk, it'll definitely make a sort of spectacle, and isn't that half of why Kiralo had journeyed so fast and so hard?
Random Member
Gardener of Human Happiness
- Location
- Behind You
[X] Southlander Court Garb: Marking him as sophisticated in one sense, but also as a foreigner, whose cut and style of cloth and patterns are all unlike those of someone from Csirit. At the same time, it's at least appropriate for a court setting, even if not the one that Kiralo has found himself in.
[X] Rassit Attire: He has raced here as a Rassit, perhaps he should enter the Court as a Rassit, in the leathers and jackets and garb of a Rassit. Let them talk and let them gawk, it'll definitely make a sort of spectacle, and isn't that half of why Kiralo had journeyed so fast and so hard?
Bakkasama
There is always a greater fool
- Location
- Buenos Aires, Argentina
- Pronouns
- He/his
[X] Southlander Court Garb: Marking him as sophisticated in one sense, but also as a foreigner, whose cut and style of cloth and patterns are all unlike those of someone from Csirit. At the same time, it's at least appropriate for a court setting, even if not the one that Kiralo has found himself in.
WanderingEye
smol skeleton
[X] Southlander Court Garb: Marking him as sophisticated in one sense, but also as a foreigner, whose cut and style of cloth and patterns are all unlike those of someone from Csirit. At the same time, it's at least appropriate for a court setting, even if not the one that Kiralo has found himself in.
We're going to court so at least we should dress properly.
We're going to court so at least we should dress properly.
- Location
- Germany
[X] Southlander Court Garb: Marking him as sophisticated in one sense, but also as a foreigner, whose cut and style of cloth and patterns are all unlike those of someone from Csirit. At the same time, it's at least appropriate for a court setting, even if not the one that Kiralo has found himself in.
I think it sends the right message. Kiralo is from the Southlands and proud of it, but he is rather well-versed in courly matters, not some barbarian.
I think it sends the right message. Kiralo is from the Southlands and proud of it, but he is rather well-versed in courly matters, not some barbarian.
[X] Southlander Court Garb: Marking him as sophisticated in one sense, but also as a foreigner, whose cut and style of cloth and patterns are all unlike those of someone from Csirit. At the same time, it's at least appropriate for a court setting, even if not the one that Kiralo has found himself in.
- Location
- Spain
[X] Southlander Court Garb: Marking him as sophisticated in one sense, but also as a foreigner, whose cut and style of cloth and patterns are all unlike those of someone from Csirit. At the same time, it's at least appropriate for a court setting, even if not the one that Kiralo has found himself in.
[X] Southlander Court Garb: Marking him as sophisticated in one sense, but also as a foreigner, whose cut and style of cloth and patterns are all unlike those of someone from Csirit. At the same time, it's at least appropriate for a court setting, even if not the one that Kiralo has found himself in.
[x] Southlander Court Garb: Marking him as sophisticated in one sense, but also as a foreigner, whose cut and style of cloth and patterns are all unlike those of someone from Csirit. At the same time, it's at least appropriate for a court setting, even if not the one that Kiralo has found himself in.
- Location
- USA
[x] Southlander Court Garb: Marking him as sophisticated in one sense, but also as a foreigner, whose cut and style of cloth and patterns are all unlike those of someone from Csirit. At the same time, it's at least appropriate for a court setting, even if not the one that Kiralo has found himself in.
We're ALREADY going to make a bit of a stir by showing up so early. We've made the Rassit point, at least to our father.
We're ALREADY going to make a bit of a stir by showing up so early. We've made the Rassit point, at least to our father.