NavAARra: A little kingdom modestly refusing to go down

@ Enewald, not so much a lot of boys as a whole Family.

@ Magmaniac, thanks . Re the kingdom-snatching, thanks for the tip too. Since in 1112 Kingdom of Hammadid reemerges too, there may be room for a bit of that.

@ enf91, let's see:

1. You saved Ali by giving me a reason to wait for some event to happen that gives me (or a vassal) a claim on his crown.
2. Amat most certainly did. Some of them twice.
3. I'm afraid he's more likely to say the name of Rome backwards like Q V Soranus... But then, he doesn't want to conquer everything. So, no cats in this AAR .
4. Cristina was pregnant with Justa when Luis left Burgos. Don't let her catch you thinking otherwise. Remember what happened to poor Count of Sens (OK, it wasn't in the story, but he was hung upside down from his castle walls. Don't ask).
5. Most likely. But it's easier to move space into Navarra.
6. Not even Muña would bet on that .

Re the Pope, I only know that Doctor Zoviet had a hand in it, so it must be fearsome (if I can work it out). I also hear it's inspired in a 1907 book about the future of socialism and religion.

About the sons, I think he's raising Juan himself and palming the rest off on the monks, but I don't quite remember. In-game, we're late to change that...

June 1088
Given at the Keep of Monte Carlo, and sent to be kept by the monks of St Bernard in Schwyz, for the eldest son of King Sancho III of Navarra, if there is any that wears a crown.



So you are the eldest living son of Sancho, and you wear a crown. Thus you have a right to this story.

At the time when I left Hispania, Sancho had two sons. I have not kept in touch, so I don't know whether you are Luis or Sozzo, or some other brat I didn't get told about. And you probably don't know who I am or what I'm talking about.

Well, get this, kid. I'm History. With a capital "H". The past, and the future.

I'm also history because I will be dead by the time you get these papers. But that, at this stage, is irrelevant. The important part is that I was there when this game started, and I have lived to find out what it all means. I think.

You probably remember me as an old crone who played cards and kept betting books. Well, I was, too, in those years, and quite a lot of fun it was. When I left Hispania I set up a beautiful betting house in Monte Carlo, and I've been happier than ever. You may also have heard that in these last years I've been dabbling a bit in geomancy and kabbalah. Well, I say "a bit", but most priests would think that an understatement. The fact is that I have long worked in kabbalah, in the inner numbers and meaning of things, because of this story. I had to make sense of it. And I got very close.

You had not been born in 1037 when your great-grandfather fought, defeated and killed Bermudo of León, the last descendant of the old Kings of Hispania, blood of Don Pelayo, the heir of the long line of anointed Visigoth kings. That battle put the Jimenez princes on top of the Christian heap in Iberia, but it also put a curse on you.

Yes. You. Because I'm not a Jimenez, except by marriage.

To cut a long story short, whatever you've heard the last true Visigoth ruler was not killed in battle, but badly wounded and taken to our camp. There, he was carried to my husband Sancho's tent. And there, also, was I.

When Sancho arrived, he laughed at his enemy, who was a slight, frail man and had indeed proved a poor warrior on the field. And the vanquished took it calmly until Sancho left again to attend to the army. Then, left with me, he spoke with a low, grating voice, some words that I still remember too well. Picture this interrupted by coughing fits, pants, and wheezings, if you want a truer image.

"Woman", he said, "the usurper king of Navarra has finished my race, which was established long ago in the German forests and should have lasted for ever in Hispania. So from now on their own race is marked, by my curse and by my right. They will gather lands and kingdoms with effort and bloodshed, only to see them scatter and break apart again. They will scheme and fight, and they will lose it all, and in losing it they will lose their lives... until none remain, and Navarra is no more."

"A good story to scare the peasants" I said, putting a brave face on my terror, for the dying man was giving me the frigging creeps. "I don't believe the future is written."

He laughed. "It is not written, and your children will have a chance, but it will happen. Some of them will either thrive or die in bed, but none both, that I warrant. Until there will be none left. Unless one of them manages to understand this curse... and to break it."

"Break it?", I asked, caught in the spell.

"Yes, woman. The future is not written, as you said. But if the children of your King, who would be king of Hispania, want to escape the curse, there can be only one. Either that, or the circle is closed and Christ returns. Nothing else can save them."

"One? One what?", I was beside the camp bed, but the man was unable to speak. He coughed blood, heaved in place a couple of times, and was still. "One what?", I repeated, pushing him, jabbing him, and in the end kicking futilely at the corpse.

For he was dead.

May he rot in Hell, by the way. I think he's not there yet, because I've tried to invoke him enough times in order to wring a better answer, to no effect. In Purgatory, souls can avoid the summons...

Anyhow. I told your father, who didn't believe me and couldn't understand it either.

I meditated on the words of the dying Visigoth King. I consulted the oldest and the wisest, I racked Europe for answers while all you saw was a network of bookies. I dug into the numbers and the meanings. I found a lot, but I'm still not completely sure.

"Only one", he said. One Jimenez left in the world? One of the royal blood? One kingdom in Hispania?

I still don't know for sure.

Along the years I contrived to convince the king my husband that his kingdom was better broken down among his sons: I would rather see the kingdom scattered than him killed by the curse. Some of his sons did likewise, and died old; some, like your own grandfather, didn't, and were killed in battle. Every time that happened, I shivered. The Jimenez race diminished and diminished.

Then came your father, who swore to leave his kingdom to a single son, and he became the only Jimenez King, and the only King in Hispania. Did he break the curse? I don't know, and now I never will.

If he died old and in peace, without breaking up his kingdom, you will be free. If he died in battle, or his kingdom splintered, you will know that the curse lasts, and that the race of Sancho is still marked. If so, you will either use these papers to find the key, or perish in the same way.

On the other hand, it may all be coincidence... and the Visigoth's "curse" just a very good trick to fool his enemies into destroying themselves. Judge yourself after you read the papers.

Now I must leave you. There is a very holy bishop waiting at my gates, with a hundred guards, some scores of peasants, torches, pitchforks... you know, the usual barbecue kit. Can't keep them forever waiting. I've tried, but I'm running out of croupiers, arrows, and boiling oil.

Receive your great-granny's blessing, boy. Whoever you are.

Dowager Queen Doña Muña of Castilla, lately known as the Witch of Monte Carlo.



[The rest of the package is a wad of vellum quite spoiled by fire and water.]

June 1091
Given at the Royal Castle of Burgos

Hello my King,

I just received your brief update. There's a few things you should know.

First, it's over a year since your last long letter. Not to mention the time you've already been away playing with Amat and your other friends. Yes, I know, you had to avenge your father and finish his work and all that. But enough is enough. It's high time you got back and dealt with the real issues of running the kingdom. The clergy are getting overconfident, thanks to your penchant for crusading.



There's a rash of counties leaving your vassals, although nobody has dared declare war on you after what happened at Sens.



And those leaving are joining other kingdoms, so they won't be easy to get back. Plus, other Kings, like the Welsh and the Danish, are also grabbing at the remains of the Holy Roman Empire. Your father would have had something to say about that.

I have followed your instructions and called the Estates General. I got you the money, and I think I got you some more time. But I need good news from Outremer, or there will be trouble.



And that's not mentioning family. We have to find some jobs for the newer generation.



Second, I'm thinking of sending you our two little darlings. Garcenda was bad enough on her own, but now she's got reinforcements. You may remember Lodovica, the daughter of that D'Appiano who was such a friend of your father. She was already too smart for her own good, and now is fast turning into an evil genius under her influence. Their latest prank was to doctor the water in the Royal Palace, so everyone's mouth turned blue. And those that bathed in it got a beautiful new hair colour.

Luckily (for them) I neither drink water nor bathed that week. But this can't last.





Third, I don't really believe all those things about the Plan, the curse, the prophecy or the holy nephew. But there is something afoot. You say that Doña Muña's package, apart from the letter, was all spoiled and unreadable. Well, it wasn't when I sent it to you. There were some seventy pages full of scrawls, drawings, numbers, quite illegible but certainly not burnt nor spoiled. Someone must have heard about the documents and didn't want us to act on them.

And talking about Doña Muña. I know her letter sounded as if she was dead. But please notice that we have neither news nor proof of that.

In other words, she could be alive. And her real papers could be somewhere else, and the bunch you got just a substitute.

And that's all the news from the home front. Now, please get on with your work and return home. We all miss you.

Yours,

Cristina

@ Enewald, dunno. I'll ask my wife .

@ Doctor Z., there's ways and ways . I think dear Cris is on the right way.

In a few minutes, we'll have Luis' side of those months...

Given at the old Ptolemaic Palace in Alexandria, on the western Terrace
October 1091

Hello my Queen,

thanks for your last letter. It really helps me to see that you're on top of everything that happens and needs doing. I'll be home shortly, now. There's just one little visit to pay, and then we're back to Burgos.

By the way, this should be the last time my letters arrive by ship. The first messenger pigeons from Burgos are expected next week, and the ones from Palermo are already here; the ship that carries this letter also bears some hundred birds raised in Alexandria, to be kept at the Palace's pigeon-house and which you can use to get in contact with me fast. We're setting up a serious communications network to bind the kingdom close.

The last time I wrote things were starting to go downhill (in spite of Amat's ever-innovative warfare methods - the enemy commanders are beginning to complain that he doesn't stick to the conventions of war, or of civilized society for that matter: his latest attempt at breaking into Jerusalem featured three hundred mustachioed Palermitans climbing the siege ladders wrapped up in chadors, to the enemy's confusion).







We had overrun most of the sheiks in the Emirate of Jerusalem, but the Fatimid king of Egypt had finally got his act together and was rolling over our scattered armies, retaking Tiberias just after we occupied Hebron. He was bent on killing the refugees that escaped his conquest of Amman and Irbid. Not that I blame him for fearing the al-Murabitid-trained armies: many of the defeats we inflicted on him were the handicraft of my loyal ibn Ziri count. It was getting personal, between those two.





He was besieging Palermo, a province in our royal domain and also the home of our most effective division, the Spearhead (or Lancia, as they like to call themselves). And he had twice our troops. He was hitting us so much that we were beginning to hurt.

On the other hand, we had an expeditionary force heading for his main city behind the lines, and our commitment to Jerusalem was not binding. If the Pope himself didn't care about it, why should we?

Thinking that, I convened the Council with a view to telling them that I wanted to settle with the Emir and the King and head back home. We sat around the conference table and one of Amat's caporegime made a clear exposition of the state of the war on a wall-mounted map.

"Well, then", I said once he finished, "that's that. Now, what do you think of it?"

"Well! Certainly you deserve congratulations, Sire."

"Ehm... do I?"

"Hell, yes!", gruffed Amat from his end of the table. "We got 'em right where we wanted!".

"Eh... we do, of course. And that is...?"

"The Plan has worked, sire", said Laura. "We have a serious beach head, with a real beach in each one of them this time..."

"... yes, we won three new provinces, and that has cost us the two we started with. On the other hand, we do have the heads of my former counts, courtesy of the Fatimid..."

"Which is regrettable, Sire, but as you told me once in Africa, we wanted them as bait. And it worked".

"It... worked?".

Laura and Amat looked at me as if unsure why I was playing with them. Then Amat laughed and walked up to the map, gesturing at the different provinces.

"Sire, we have them! The Emirate is down and gutted, they'll sign anything you put in front of them. And the King of Egypt is done for!"

"Pity nobody seems to have told him yet."

"Oh, he'll notice as soon as you settle with the Emir, Sire. The Egyptian's put his balls where we can kick them", pointing at Amman and Irbid as he explained, talking to the rest of the Council. "We had no way to force an end of this war, but since he's grabbed these two provinces into his domain, *now* we can really hurt him. And our expedition from Venezia should land in his totally unprotected mainland any day now. We'll sack Alexandria, and we'll grab every vassal we can until the Fatimid King turns tail out of Outremer. And if he doesn't..." he growled, fingering his dagger while every eye on the room was on him, "we'll eventually reach Asyut, his last domain province, we'll grab his queen, and we'll play Bling".

"Bling?", asked Jatima, looking around. The rest of us kept perfect poker faces.

"Yeah", said Amat with a nasty smile. "Bling. We got her bending, and we stick it in".

That shocked the ladies out of the trance, and conversation started around the room. Which was good, since I needed some time to think.

"And if she doesn't like it, we can play Bass...", Amat was saying, impervious to criticism and outraged looks. "That's when we stick it up her..."

"Enough, Amat! Thanks for your very vivid illustration. I think everyone's got the Plan clear now."

"Thank you, my liege", he said, bowing and sitting down again. The guards by the wall were still sniggering, and Jatima was blushing to the eyebrows.

"There is only one other thing", I continued, "we need to raise the feudal regiments in Sicilia and get rid of the Egyptian invaders, or they will have some bargaining chips of their own".

Everyone nodded. Laura suggested that as soon as we had the Emir settled, we should also send a letter to the Fatimid King explaining exactly what was going to happen to the heart of his kingdom, among other places. I fobbed the Sicilian task off on Amat, to keep him out of more mischief (and also told him to write the letter, and make the message as direct as possible).

And, well, I don't want to bore you with the details. We did exactly as planned.











By the way, good job wrangling that money from the vassals... About that time, we managed to get the attention of the King of Egypt and soon he packed back for home as fast as he could.







He didn't arrive in time. So now we have Alexandria and a few other provinces along the Nile. Very productive, scenic, and all that. Lots of greeks around. And a wonderful library, which would probably help us decypher those papers that have been burnt... or gone missing on the way, as you suspect.

Anyhow, as I was saying at the beginning, we have one little visit to make before we sail back. It shouldn't take long.

Best, Luis

What's is it good for ?

There's no crusade on, and the only reason to go get it would be to wreak revenge on the Emir of Jerusalem.

And Luis is such a forgiving character. Besides, Queen Cris is pushing him to take care of other things.

Hello Kurt .

Sweden? That's the blue blots on the landscape? Hmmm. I'll let Queen Cris know about your idea.

Update incoming...

October 1091-August 1092. The story of the Welshing counts (and dukes)

Hello, hello again. Please come in. Make yourselves confortable. The dog too. Yes, yes, I know it's been a long time. Been out travelling and all that, you know. Oh, you've already heard? Good.

Allow me to introduce Cristina, Queen of Navarra. She's really running the kingdom these days. No, don't be modest, dear. It doesn't become you. And you *are* running most of the kingdom, you know it.

What's the last news you received? The Outremer campaign? My, that's almost a year ago. Let's see...

The first thing we did when I'd returned to Burgos was to get rid of the new counties, as the private domain was getting too large to control easily. I wanted to keep Alexandria, so I gave up Amman, and also Marrakech, and eventually Sevilla.







The second was to sit down with Cris here, I mean with the Queen, and have a look at those issues she had been telling me about. We started with Wales.

You see, Wales had been poaching vassals all over the map. Specifically, they'd poached quite a few Navarran counts from our dukes, but they'd also been poaching from the old kingdom of Germany: Wales now ran into Bavaria, Austria, and several scattered places such as Schwyz. Their domain was in Gwynned, but also in Oberbayern. And they were also sponsoring rebels in the middle or Navarran Ireland, which was especially galling for the Queen. As she said, it was all right to be pan-celtic, but the right way to go about it was to put every Celt inside Navarra.





The Schwyz issue decided me. I wanted a personal talk with the Abbot who had been in charge of Doña Muña's papers for so many years.

So in November 1091 we mobilized the eastern Irish duchies and also Carinthia. They had been chafing at the peace of the last few years, and complied fast.



They put the troops, we put the ships. I think we hired every boat in the isle.



And while the Carinthians reached Oberbayern and the Irish reached Gwynned, we took care of educating the children. That's the advantage of running a war from home.





Finally, in March 1091 (and after procuring a very nice fake title to one of his provinces) I sent a heartfelt letter to the king of Wales telling him that all those visiting troops were very grateful for the welcome and wished to stay. Much longer.



The war was rather swift. We had learned something from the Outremer experience, and this time our forces were quite massive. Besides, I wanted to avoid trouble with my dear ally, England... who could butt in if the war was too long.





The English did mobilize, and for a while it looked like they'd have time to actually do something...

... especially as we were temporarily distracted by a sore loss.



There, there, Cris... Yes, I know. I promise I'll do something about the climate.

It was a very cold and wet early spring in Burgos, and Justa was not the only victim.



The war news kept us from mopping, since they needed to be attended to. In April, Gwynned was pulled from under the Welsh king, and thus we had all his domain. Since we were in a hurry to prevent English intervention, I decided to try to do as we did with the al-Murabitids: offer the vassals separate peaces. The bad side was that I had to fake all those titles, and however nice the parchments turned out by the fake-factory of Ingeborg's in Cordoba, the sudden flood of claims took its toll on my reputation.

But the results were worth it. We had a corresponding flood of almost-spontaneous, enthusiastic pledges of fealty from ex-Welsh counts all over Europe. Even some Dukes. The Bavarians took the opportunity to welsh out on the King of Wales and then become our own vassals.





And the flood proved contagious. Thuringia did almost as Bavaria, and joined us.



That practically closed the gaps in our map, so I settled with the King of Wales: Gwynned and his purse in exchange for peace. He agreed. The English, lacking a nearby target for their war, settled and demobilized soon.

So at the end of the war, I had lost a lot of prestige, but I had gained a lot of land and quite a lot of goodwill from counts and dukes around the place. Besides reuniting Ireland.



And now, if you don't mind, we'll leave you. When you arrived, we were going over plans for the rest of the year... and there's still a lot of things my Queen wants me to take care of.

Besides, I have to plan a trip to Schwyz...

No longer .

BTW, does someone know where I can find a global map of CKworld, as I've seen others use in AARs? With provinces from Alexandria to Ireland, I can't easily draw the situation...

Yep, but it's either been disabled or doesn't work for three-letter words... I've found http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum...Province-income-map-for-CK-1.05-and-Deus-Vult but not a blank map. Yet .