WORLD BOOK WORLD BOOK WORLD BOOK 0085 0085
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Chapter 4: THE CITIES
they push young warriors to maintain the tribal tradition of the Kod to keep them strong.
The city’s primary defenders since Estica’s founding have been the monks of the Deepshadow Order, in
league with several mysterious Trakeen who come and
go. The main monastery lies within the city itself, while
a newer cloister lies on the closest slopes of the Deepshadow Mountains. The monks patrol between the two
garrisoned monasteries and around Estica, their martial prowess helping maintain order and keeping this
among the few peaceful cities on the planet.
A tribe of bandits hidden among the Serpent Hills
keeps watch on Estica as it grows, planning and plotting, biding their time until they feel it worth the risk
to assault one of the richer surviving Khitan cities. What
keeps their numbers stable are the infrequent ambushes and raids they visit upon trappers or shepherds
among the hills around their cavern lairs.
Gathush
High on an escarpment overlooking still-rich equatorial
plains sits magnificent Gathush, a proudly Makadan city,
the most powerful human city-state remaining on Khitus. Colorful banners mark its rock-paved roads in all directions. Patrolled by festooned thakal cavalry, the roads
often teem with travelers and cart-bearing merchants. A
visit to Gathush is a glimpse back in time to see what Khitan human kingdoms were like during the Classic Age.
Gathush has escaped the worst of the world’s sharp decline due to its distance from the southern wastelands.
The rains that avoid the southlands still fall abundantly
here. Even its proximity to the expanding Krikis Hivelands has not dimmed the city’s renown. Having to bear
the brunt of all three Chitin Wars with little aid from
more distant human kin engenders a haughty pride
among the Gathusha over other martial societies.
Gathush is a beacon of hope and strength to human
refugees everywhere. Those who make the journey to
Gathush are welcome within its gates to enjoy the protection of its Kral, or King, and many armies.
Kral Rath’s dynastic claim to the Gathite Throne extends
back twelve generations. His many ahapshts (barons) and
opshto (knights) rule the surrounding smaller towns and
farming estates across the fertile countryside in his name
and they and their people remain fiercely loyal to the
crown. Rath rewards that loyalty with a unified effort to keep
Khitus’s decline at arm’s length. Chief among the ahapshts
is lifelong friend Jeoffry of Kalendor, married to the kral’s
niece. Kral and ahapsht often ride and hunt together on the
royal grounds with a detachment of guard cavalry. To the
commoners, Rath and Jeoffry are charismatic, generous,
and kind. Through their efforts, the Gathite mini-kingdom
holds the wider world’s grief at bay . . . or so it would seem.
The Hidden Darkness
Despite other successful efforts to the contrary, Khitus’s decline most definitely has a deleterious effect
upon Gathush. The number of human refugees arriving
overwhelms the city’s food and water supplies. Refugees
vastly outnumber available shelters, forcing many of
them into ramshackle camp housing outside the city.
The surrounding agricultural output is in decline, affected by the general change in climate despite being
so far north. Times are growing darker, but Sovetnik, or
Minister, Tyus Blunkt intentionally deceives Kral Rath,
Ahapsht Jeoffry, and most of the populace.
Blunkt takes it upon himself to keep Gathush’s diminishing stature and resources out of the public eye and away
from the kral’s attention. To accomplish this, he engages
in a variety of mundane plans, such as hiding the largest refugee camps further away from the city and behind
hills or forests. He falsifies reports on grain supplies and
water resources, ensures the sick and starving remain in
the countryside, holds treasury reports completely under
his purview, and gathers the kingdom’s remaining riches
closely around the kral and court. But even with all those
keen efforts, the Sovetnik could never mask the city’s
true desperation without magical aid.
Magical help comes from Blunkt’s pact with Griage Ensore, a Rikar witch of considerable power. Her spells over
the general population ease their unrest and keep their
minds conditioned. She asks only for sufficient slaves to
keep on her chain to absorb sorcery’s foul wrath. With
her aid, Blunkt hides the harsher necessities of his task,
such as secret prisons and banishments, all enforced by
a dire militia existing within the city’s regular troops
but secretly loyal only to the Sovetnik and his cause.
Together, these forces paint a more pleasant picture of
Gathush than what really exists. How long the kral and his
ahapshts remain so fooled has yet to be seen, but cracks
are appearing. Already, Kral Rath suffers nightmares that
Graige Ensore cannot erase from his sleeping mind. The
troubling images of a bleak future lead to sleepless nights
and days of nagging doubts and ever more questions.
Norden
North of the Jaggedlands and south of the Kneeding Hills lie the impressive stone buildings and strong
walls of Norden. For many historic and extant reasons,
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