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Stith Drakas, capital of Nak Drakas
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Emperor Elixir Tyr Violorich peered at the rain lashing the windows of the Planning Room. Wind from the last vestiges of an Angraris hurricane buffeted the Trufel Citadel on its perch high in the center of Stith Drakas, the capital of the Drakan Empire. He clasped his hands behind his back, hands hidden in the long sleeves of a rich purple robe adorned with contrasting rubies and emeralds embedded in the high-necked collar. The dome-cloth of his gold crown matched his robe, which meant he had multiple crowns to match his wardrobe. Fire light from the crackling fireplace caught on his earrings, aquamarine earrings. They matched the aquamarine pendant that hung on his chest. Keen brown eyes looked past a hooked nose that dominated his perfectly groomed and dyed goatee. “It will take forever to get a trading fleet to Linkoralis,” he growled. “Have you seen the weather?” He pointed to the window. “Just sailing to the Warkenvaal will take, what?” He looked to Commandant Fritach, the commander of the Washentrufel, the secret police, for the answer.
“Three weeks your majesty.”
His eyes narrowed. “If they get there,” he snarled. “Damned Paleowrights. They will forever be the thorn of me, them, and every Ancient to ever walk the earth.”
“Regardless, highness, we should send them on their way, and while they are enroute we can pursue other means.” The voice of reason came from Lord Orn Blannach, overlord of the Nak Drakas Militaristrium—the entire military of the mighty Drakan Empire: army, cavalry, and navy. Lord Blannach wanted the mission to succeed as much as the emperor. The Linkoralis Antiquarian Church had finally decided to sell, openly, its stores of aquamarine and, most importantly, its Ancient artifacts, and with those relics the promise of technological advancements. Unfortunately, the Isuelt branch of the Church had taken issue with the largess of the Linkoralis branch and had so far successfully blocked all attempts to import goods from Linkoralis, such was the power of the Isuelt Paleowrights. The Linkoralis Paleowrights were not nearly as strong or as well funded, hence their need to liquidate their Ancient artifacts and sell the ore from their, as yet, small aquamarine mine. Blannach suspected the Linkoralis archbishop to be shrewder than what his Hebert counterparts gave him credit for. As Commandant Fritach had privately confided to him, Blannach expected the Linkoralis Paleowrights would copy the Ancient manuals, books, drawings, and offer to sell copies only. Regardless, at this point, a copy of an original was better than a rumor of an original.
“Fritach has already said the Isuelt Paleowrights are paying pirates to raid Tivor shipping bound for Linkoralis. The blockade appears to be working. What do you want us to do when our own fleet lands in Tivor to make the crossing? Attack the pirates; give aid to Tivor?” Shaking his head, the emperor said, “Neither of which we can do because the hell-spawned Paleowrights are our allies!”
Commandant Fritach mentally grimaced at the emperor’s vehement cursing of the Paleowrights. Fritach himself was a Paleowright, as were most Nakish. The month of Thomsa the Electrician was upon them, and that was Fritach’s patron Ancient. If only the archbishop in Hebert weren’t so ridiculously greedy with their archives, hoarding and lording over every little shred of paper, every useless scrap of metal. The whole thing was ludicrous and with it their dealings with the empire. Fritach feared the emperor would one day lose his temper and order an assault on the Antiquarian archives. He tried not to think about it because he was unsure of how many of his own men would follow him in that crime. Fritach himself was first and foremost loyal to the empire and the emperor, but that could not be said for the average Nakish. The Nakish loved their Ancients.
Blannach moved to the planning board, a table the length and width of a hay wagon. On it, painstaking crafted and agonizingly accurate, was a map, a diorama really, of the continent of Isuelt. Beside it, in a new extension to the Planning Room, was a similar map of Linkoralis, but it was mostly blank, with the edges gradually taking on detail. “Certainly, your highness, we are the trusted and faithful servants of the Ancients, and the Church is our spiritual standard and our guide toward Ancient greatness.” He smiled to himself as he leaned out over the map. He knew the emperor was fuming, but someone had to say the words. In a land full of Paleowrights, one could never let the façade slip. “We’ve been outmaneuvered in Tomis. The bishop there will be watchful of us to resume Linkoralis trade by alternate means.”
“And what course of action do you espouse, Blannach? Do not toy with me. My patience is naught.” The emperor stood firm not willing to be lured to the table.
Blannach reached out and put his finger on the side of a mountain just south of the east-west centerline of the diorama, some eight hundred miles from Stith Drakas. There, represented by a cluster of tiny plaster hovels, under his finger was a fair-sized town. “That is our other course of action,” he said.
Arching an eyebrow the emperor took the bait and came to the table.
“Commandant,” Blannach said looking past the emperor’s shoulder. “Inform the emperor as to your latest intelligence.”
Fritach had been expecting this. It was the whole point of the briefing.
The emperor listened to Fritach’s information. Slowly his perpetual scowl melted until he too was leaning out over the table peering at the mountainside town with a label flag pinned next to it. “Wedgewood,” he said to himself.
When Fritach finished the emperor leaned back from the table. “And your plan, Blannach? You always have a plan.”
Lord Orn couldn’t tell if that was a compliment or an accusation. It didn’t matter. As the overlord of the Militaristrium, the Marshal of the Army, he was the emperor’s closest advisor. “If the people of Wedgewood accede to Hebert’s demands, and give them the mine, we could take a page out of the Church’s own gospel and hire mercenaries to attack the town and gain control of the mine. It would be mercenaries versus Church pikemen and Scarlet Saviors. The Scarlet Saviors individually are good,” he said grudgingly, “but mostly they are bullies. Regardless, it clearly it is too far for us to directly intervene.”
“Yet,” interrupted the emperor.
“The other case, and for me the more interesting one, is if the town chooses the resist the Paleowright demands.”
“We’ve interrogated traders and caravanserai who have been there,” Fritach commented. “The town is mostly Life Believers and was built by a clan of Doromen. Though we don’t see many of them here in the northeast, word is they are notoriously independent. Even militant about it.”
“So we’ve suggested to our ecclesiastical brethren that should Wedgewood be captured it might make a good forward base of operations for the Drakan army.” Lord Orn saw the storm coming on the emperor’s countenance and braced for it.
“Wedgewood,” the emperor growled and pointed at the town and waved his hand towards the east indicating the eight hundred miles between there and the Drakan frontier. “You can’t be serious.”
“Of course not, your highness. But the Paleowrights need not know. All we want is for our Washentrufel agents to be invited to tag along, to offer guidance and perspective.”
“Ah.” The emperor almost smiled. “Then tell them whatever you want. Tell them the sky is green and the Ancients are returning tomorrow. I want that aquamarine mine. I want the whole thing, and I don’t want to share it. I want to dig aquamarine out of the ground, haul it by wagon to Hebert, and spread it like pixie dust in the streets. I want to look that sniveling archbishop in the eye with a bucket full aquamarine and tell him I will sell it cheap to everyone in the land, so they can all have their own part of the Ancients.”
“Unless,” said Fritach.
The emperor scowled. “Yes. Unless they start dealing and with us and open the archives. Wide open.”
