Upon arrival in Shnudidishgu the officers of the Dragon Expedition were received by the prince, Hesadun, who had taken power only two years earlier after successfully having his mother, the Prince Nagidina, strangled in her bath, and poisoning or stabbing his four living siblings in the tumult thereafter. Rumor was that he conducted the critical act of matricide in person, using a thin chain. Though this was utterly impossible to evaluate and it would be exceedingly unwise to attempt any interrogation as to the veracity of such rumors, the prince possessed the physique and motions of a most capable warrior and wore over his eyes the dark metal facial visor only elite Nikkad warriors are permitted to bear. The prince may not have murdered his mother in person, she was herself noted as a capable knife fighter in spite of advancing age, but he certainly had the ability to have done so.
He was respectful before foreign dignitaries, though he remained seated throughout the audience and, according to Nikkad etiquette, all visitors were therefore obligated to remain kneeling, on painfully bare stone floor tiles until the prince rises. Nor did he serve refreshments of any kind. Though he acknowledged the exalted status of Husun the Fifth, and admitted in principle that an Emperor stands above a Prince or a Khagan, he sidestepped the question of subordination to the empire by citing his tributary position before the Khagan. A self-serving argument, but one of reasonable political dexterity. He was generally well-spoken, save for a tendency to descend into shifty whispers when speaking at length. This made certain proclamations difficult to parse, especially as my mastery of the Nikkad language was at that time still short of proper fluency. This whispering tendency was, regrettably, common to the Nikkad elite. Ishbanu, the Nikkad slave woman brought by the expedition as a translator, was obligated to speak the prince's words directly into Erun's ear to avoid the insult of repeating them louder than their originator.
I was careful to keep myself perfectly stony throughout the exchange. None in the court asked if any of the expedition's officers spoke the language, but it seemed pertinent to avoid drawing attention to my understanding of this discussion. Recording Erun's words, with gaps to add in the prince's responses later, was not remarked. Scribes did much the same on the prince's behalf.
The prince was aware of reported sightings of the dragon, but seemed little interested in the matter. Given the obsession with scorpions among his people, which it seems he shared, interest in the dragon among city and people was quite muted. Curiosity is not, as witnessed in these cities, a quality strongly associated with the Nikkad elite. The prince's vizier related that the dragon was most likely in the distant north, and that while the prince would happily offer his hospitality to the Emperor's representatives so long as they desired to remain there was still time before the coming of winter to proceed a great distance northward. This was a well-chosen argument to remove the complication the expedition's presence represented from the tangle of local politics.
Matters were not, however, settled so simply. In time, one learns to expect nothing to ever unfold in simple fashion with regard to the politics of the Nikkad. The prince's lackadaisical response to the expedition – rather than discuss anything regarding the Sanid Empire, he preferred to discuss theology with Princess Romou as a man of distinct and strong personal faith might when exposed to a new viewpoint – was in stark contrast to the piercing interrogation his grand vizier and sole remaining sibling conducted of Erun Nassah. She thoroughly exhausted Erun's dragon lore and requested an explanation as to why the expedition had brought with it mystics of a wide range of specialties – I suspect she believed one of our number was secretly a wizard to round out the options. Upon reaching a conclusion that any observer would consider broadly predetermined irrespective of testimony, she proclaimed that the dragon was a creature of great alchemical interest and proposed adding a member to our company in return for a substantial gift of critically important travel supplies.
Though the alchemical interest was no more than an obvious truth, as evidenced by the master apothecary already with us, any representative dispatched by the Grand Vizier would surely be a highly trained agent and doubtless a capable killer as well. Erun, of course, agreed immediately to the scheme, knowing that refusal would be a serious offense that could be used against the expedition. In addition to the gift of supplies, the city's bazaar's offered an essential source of trade goods and locally produced silver coinage that could be used without weighted exchange. Nor was anyone raised in the imperial court, where the stakes reach far higher than any single city-state could possibly offer, naive to how trivial it would be, on a prolonged journey through wilderness, to arrange for the elimination of this observer. A move the expedition's inspector would never hesitate to make. Truly, the willingness to so readily sacrifice such a piece for a trivial advantage of proximity to the expedition speaks to the ruthlessness of the Nikkad and the vizier's assessment of the dragon's potential value.
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The chosen sacrifice was a young alchemist named Kadish, a very common appellation, who was in some labyrinthine manner a relation of the grand vizier. He was, according to Master Oland's assessment, a talent in the making. He rarely spoke unless the topic of conversation trended towards plants, tonics, or poisons, which was welcome. Erun placed him under Master Oland's supervision, operating on the understanding that our apothecaries were more than capable of protecting their own secrets.
There was a banquet following this meeting, but due to communication barriers it was a relatively dull affair. While various members of the expedition had by this time taken additional language lessons during the several months of the journey and especially since leaving the fortress, most had focused their efforts on the broadly accessible and widely spoken Kharal tongue. Doubtless that speech was well-known to most of the prince's court, but they chose not to deploy it within the palace halls. The city hosted a representative of the Khagan, a vigorous warrior in the prime of life who could be regularly glimpsed walking through the bazaars, but he was not invited to this event.
It seems even the nominal dominion of the Kharal rankles upon the shoulders of the Nikkad elite. Hardly surprising, there are many records of rebellion and the dead listed on the memorial walls are noted as 'slain suppressing barbarians' more often than the outward presentation of peace acknowledges. Success in such endeavors appears elusive and fleeting at best. There is no indication that the Nikkad have ever secured a prolonged victory over the herding people of the sort that would allow them to exercise dominion over Shdustu.
Erun, a much more practiced military mind than I, found this history disappointing. I gather he would much prefer the company of those who understand farming to the wandering pastoralists. From the perspective of one raised at court this is hardly surprising. Though the Nikkad are only marginally less numerous than the Kharal, they are even less united and though their warriors are extremely deadly in their chosen way of fighting, they lack both the method and the cavalry to bring forth battle on the open steppe. Well-suited to the defense of their fortified homes, they cannot catch riders or easily contend with a cloud of arrows from all sides. From this balance a stalemate simmering with resentment festers across generations.
Unable to strike outward, the Nikkad elite turn their knives inward instead, bleeding each other endlessly in the manner only a society allowing multiple wives can possibly permit. These lives were pruned quietly. Street violence, tavern brawling, and peasant rebellion are almost unknown. Outside of the robust calls of commerce in the busy bazaars, the city holds an eerie silence at all hours. Equally soft was the mourning conducted for those claimed by these knives, darts, and droughts. Nikkad, especially those of some prosperity, simply considered murder an acceptable path to the resolution of problems. Protection was sought, if that failed evidence was raised in court, and if that too failed then the shadows offered a limitless supply of vengeance. Women resolved their feuds in this fashion just as men did, keeping the numbers even rather than producing a great surplus of either sex.
Though the Dragon Expedition lodged in Shnudidishgu for only a single week, it did not escape this pervasive undercurrent of violence. Presumably seeking to undercut either the prince or the grand vizier, two attempts were made upon the life of Erun Nassah. One was by poisoning and the other by nighttime assault through the window of the caravanserai where we had been granted free lodging. The first effort was thwarted by an emetic provided by our apothecary, though the culprit was not identified. The second was halted by the intervention of Yomat, who speared the attacker from his post at Erun's bedside. The assassin attempted to take poison, but Erun ordered the White Onyx Healers to keep the man alive, and they did so. Lady Indili then invoked pure essence to shatter his mind's resistance prior to interrogation, that his employer might be revealed and the name passed to the prince.
This was done, and the grand vizier ordered the entire family of those responsible, who happened be one of her own cousins, exterminated. The local Chapter House rebuked the Lady Indili for her participation, as sorcerers are held apart from politics and warfare between powers. This code remains in place in the Sanid Empire, but is somewhat more flexible, allowing for action to preserve the empire itself from external threats. She argued, convincingly, that because the successful location of the dragon was a matter of great sorcerous interest, the preservation of the expedition could be considered in defense of the Chapter House itself rather than a political act. Though this was accepted, she was thereafter restrained and careful in how to act when facing Nikkad and Kharal aggression toward the expedition. Despite the vengeance worked on the expedition's behalf, the grand vizier never apologized for allowing the attempt to occur.