Arakiel - "A Tale of Kings and Merchants I"

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You won't want me comment! It sucks! ....

No only joking , intriguing, I'll have to be reading

 

[Meresin]

Chapter 6 – Numaneia (Meresin)​

The repeated sequence of sounds from a musical instrument was being played by someone, a sound so beautiful, so pure, it raised from all other voices, slowly, everyone around stopped talking, selling, yelling and just listened…

A kid, not much older than Meresin, was playing a wooden music instrument with strings. Meresin and Arthur stopped their horses and watched him play, then Meresin noticed everyone around was waiting for an old man next to the kid to do something, all attentions were on him, not the kid. Then he understood why…

If I was young, I'd flee this town
I'd bury my dreams underground
As did I, we drink to die, we drink tonight

Far from home, elephant gun
Let's take them down one by one
We'll lay it down, it's not been found, it's not around
Let the seasons begin - it rolls right on
Let the seasons begin - take the big king down

Let the seasons begin - it rolls right on
Let the seasons begin - take the big king down*​

Then an only instrumental part came again. Meresin saw so much people around them, listening, just… listening. He had never seen such thing.
Arthur (whispering): We have to go, son. We are expected somewhere else.
Meresin sadly obeyed, they were already a bit far when the man started singing again. Meresin couldn’t understand what he was saying from that distance, but the warm it brought to his soul, was the same.

The road they were following was probably the main street of the Ciry, it was very large, maybe it was the confusion of people, but truth is, from one corner of the street, you couldn’t see the other corner, Numaneia was huge, it had merchants everywhere, and I mean everywhere, from outside the walls, on top of the walls, with their tents against the walls, on top of the walls, in the middle of the streets, and every merchant shouted, every merchant had “never-seen before” items, or something “best of everywhere”, it was difficult to pass through the crowd, Meresin and Arthur dismounted and had to lead their horses on foot.

After some tedious and slow time passing through the crowd they finally turned right to a little street where the horses could barely pass, with the cargo on the side.
When they reached a larger plaza, Arthur stopped and tied the reins of the horses to a nearby water fountain.

Arthur: We’ve arrived son.

The plaza was not that large, but had four good looking houses, one in each corner of the plaza, all of them with the door in the direction of the fountain, which was in the center of the plaza.
All houses had two guards at the door, all except one. This one was actually not so good looking, was simple, in white stone, like the good houses in Solimar.

Arthur headed to the simplest house, him and Meresin entered and there was a tall man and a fat man having lunch. The tall man was the first to talk.

Tall Man (serious): What is the meaning of this? Guards!
Arthur (dramatically): I come to take your life!

Arthur drew his sword. The fat man steadily got up and ran away through the back door of the house.

Arthur (placed his sword back on his hilt and shouted, so the fat man could still hear outside): I will kill you and make your friend my dinner for two months…! Actually, he probably can be food for three or four months.
Tall Man (with a smile on his face): Good to see you my brother. Is that little rat a servant? Tell him to go fetch some wine for us. I hope you brought wine?!
Meresin (confused with everything that happened there): I’m not a servant! I’m his son!
Tall Man: No you’re not! The son of my brother Arthur doesn’t have those chicken arms and legs.

Meresin was still confused and looked to his father for help.

Arthur (still looking at the tall man): Don’t mind him Meresin, he’s just trying to mess with you. You can’t imagine what it’s like to grow in the same house as this man.
Tall Man: This man? Can’t remember your own brother’s name?
Arthur: Not really, no, it started with a ‘G’ wasn’t it? Gnome? Gnolan? Gargoyle? I don’t know… So, how’s father?
Tall Man (a little more serious): He’s not so good, but he’s holding up.
Arthur: I’d want to see him.
Tall Man (intrigued): Is that why you’re visiting? Or is it the tournament?
Arthur: What do you mean? I sent a messenger to warn you of my arrival.
Tall Man: Unless he was disguised as a fat politician that just ran away from here, he did never get here.
Arthur: Weird… Anyway, it’s a long story… Let’s eat while I tell you.
Tall Man: I only have food for two. Send your son to get more at the market.
Meresin (confused again): I have no idea where…
Tall Man: Go to a merchant called Anil, he’ll have some extra food. Tell him you come from me.

Meresin looked to his father, for confirmation.

Arthur (sitting down): We’ll be eating, go fast son.
Meresin: Sure… Where can I find the merchant, Anil?
Tall Man (sitting down and starting to eat): In the main street. Go, go…!
Meresin: In the main street, alright…

Meresin left the house, untangled the reins of his horse and headed back to the main street. The noise was even worse than he remembered. It was actually frightening, probably because now he had no idea where to go, every merchant he asked about ‘Anil’, ignored him, told him to ‘bugger off’, or simply never heard of that name. Eventually, he gave up, and just ate some bread he had on one of the horse satchels. He wasn’t going back to the horrible Tall Weird Uncle he never even heard of, so soon, so he thought of the old singer, but when he got to the place he had been, it was only another place full of merchants. He dismounted and sat on the ground, his back against a house, with the sun toasting his face, full with sweat. Then a weird merchant approached him…

Weird Merchant: Hello, young man, my name is Olam, can I buy your horse?
Meresin: No, go away!
Olam: I’d give you silver for it…
Meresin: I said: no!

Olam was touching the horse, watching every slight, every tooth, then the horse stopped having fun and almost bit him.

Olam (stepping back): Darn… So, no deal?
Meresin: No! Go away!
Olam: Alright… Don’t need to be mad!

Olam disappeared into the crowd.

Then a voice came from the right of Meresin. It was the Tall Man again.

Tall Man: I hope you know that man stole whatever you had on those satchels.
Meresin: What? No way…

He went to confirm it, and it was true.

Meresin: It was only bread and some useless stuff…

He knew his father would be mad he let clothing get stolen, but in that moment he wanted to seem proud.

Meresin: So, sir… Where is my father?
Tall Man: My name is Golgan, your father had some business to take care of… He asked me to show you the city. Come.

Meresin took the horse and followed him.

Golgan: So, you’ve already met most of the merchants here, I suppose?
Meresin: Asking for Anil, yes.
Golgan: There wasn’t anyone called Anil? I could bet there was one…
Meresin (shocked): What do you mean? There wasn’t any Anil with food to pick up??
Golgan: I just said I could bet there was one… You’re not very sharp, are you?
Meresin (confused): I…
Golgan: Anyway, there are merchants, thieves, which you already met one back there, and I tell you: sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between those two kinds. There are the soldiers, the fat soldiers, which is a growing plague if you ask me… There are civilians which could defend these walls better than most soldiers, which I don’t need to tell you it is a really huge concern...
Meresin (proudly): In Solimar men don’t treat their body like that… We honor everything that is given in life.
Golgan (looking back at Meresin): You’re a good parrot, aren’t you? What else do you know about Solimar?

Meresin cursed the fact he never really cared when Sir Gallo talked about the history of Solimar. Then he remembered some chunks…

Meresin: I know Solimar was founded and built by men with desire to build a city of warriors, men with the will to achieve perfection in the art of combat.
Golgan: Do you know any of those men’s names? Do you know where they came from? Do you know why they wanted to do that?
Meresin (nervous): N-No…
Golgan: Do you know anything? Anyway, maybe you’ll remember something about Numaneia, after I tell you about it… But I’m only telling you because Arthur asked me too… Understand? Kid, do you understand?
Meresin (with his face red with a mix of anger and humiliation): Yes…
Golgan: So… Numaneia was founded by Julius Gaius, an eastern merchant, and Wiriatho, a local leader, three hundred years ago. They wanted to build a great empire in the West. Well, Wiriatho wanted to build a great empire, Julius Gaius didn’t mind to build it, but his goal was to create a massive merchant post in the West. This position is pure gold for trading, for lots of reasons you wouldn’t understand… Numaneia, as you can see, is indeed a very successful trading post, it was a very nice army to protect it, but the part to become a great empire in the West failed miserably… People enriching too fast, too soon, made them misuse their fortunes ridiculously, and instead of enlarging their territory they prefer to close themselves in these walls. Numaneia became, unfortunately, a city of corrupts and cowards. Solimar’s history is linked to Numaneia, you see, Solimar was founded to the North by some men of the lineage of Wiriatho and some other of the best soldiers and warriors Numaneia had at the time, nearly eighty years ago, since then Solimar has grown to be the warrior city Wiriatho had dreamed, but it’ll be long years until it can be a great empire, the fact is that Numaneia has the goods and the riches to build a empire, but doesn’t want to; Solimar has the strength and will power to create an empire, but doesn’t have the economic resources to do it, at least not for long years…
Meresin: Couldn’t Numaneia and Solimar work together?
Golgan: Are you as idiot as you sound? Obviously not, neither Numaneia wants to help rogues who ran from here to build their own dream city, neither Solimar wants help from the city they abandoned to build their own. At least, until extreme measures arise…

Golgan sighed.

Golgan (looking back at Meresin again): You know what’s happening in Solimar, at the moment?
Meresin: No…
Golgan: You must have some idea… Or you really are as dumb as you look?
Meresin (red face again): I think we’re going to be attacked, but I have no idea from who or where…
Golgan: Brigantian tribes, from the East. They are good warriors and have a good leader, I can’t remember his name, but from stories I’ve heard, he is a tough man. (he made a little pause) Are you scared?
Meresin: Why? No! We will defeat them!
Golgan: Your family might die, maybe not everyone, but maybe one or two.

Meresin had never thought of it that way and fear started to grow on him...

Meresin (trying to be confident): I’m not scared.
Golgan: You’ll be fighting one to four. In militaristic terms, it’s very bad.
Meresin (still trying to be confident): We’ll win. I know it.
Golgan: Well, me, I’m not so sure…


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*From “Beirut – Elephant Gun”

Next Chapter: Such Failure… (Arthur)

 

[Meresin]

Really late update, I tried to post it once a few days after I promised to post it, but busy server turned me down... :s

I even stopped writing for a while then, for no special reason, and every day I sat in front of the pc and thought: “I'll post it today”, but the patience never came... I knew I’d eventually post it, because it was done and the novel is far from over, but I didn’t want to say anything until I was actually doing it.

So here it is, finally! The next chapter is up for review and will be posted soon… (Can’t say more than that )

@Gigolocus: Thanks a lot, stay around

 

[Enewald]

Gaius Julius? :rofl:

Many of them actually.

But now it seems the lusitanis are not working together... so barbarians come and pillage... fun.

Keep the updates coming!



there are not many rome aars left.

 

[comagoosie]

good to know a little history between the two towns.