Sarah looked tiredly up at the sky. It was a lovely clear autumn day. The sun was shining and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky, but she couldn’t bring herself to appreciate it. John was looking equally bored as he lay beside her. They had been on the road for what felt like an eternity now and they were both thoroughly sick of it.
“Who knew Mithia was so big?” Sarah sighed absently.
She had studied the maps of the kingdom many times, letting her imagination go wild as she looked at forests, mountains, rivers and exotic sounding towns and cities. What the maps didn’t show was just how long it took to get anywhere.
Laughter wafted over from the driver’s bench in front, compounding her irritation. The endless days on the road didn’t seem to bother either Grimald or Udoriol, who had gotten on famously since the ambush in the Liselnian marsh. They were now chatting amicably with their new driver, their fourth since they’d left Dave at Mill Hill about the virtues and pitfalls of the various Mithian wines.
“Can you keep it down?” John snapped irritably, “Some of us are trying to sleep.”
“It’s the middle of the day, laddie,” Grimald said with a laugh, “and you’ve done nothing but sleep since we left Mill Hill.”
“You two haven’t been to Corrington before, have you?” Gary asked. He was a trader who frequented the city often and was more than happy to bring four paying customers along.
“No, they haven’t,” Grimald grinned when neither John nor Sarah could muster the enthusiasm to reply.
“You should stand up and take a look then,” the driver suggested, “people always get a kick out of seeing it for the first time.”
“Come on,” Grimald said as he poked John’s leg with the haft of his axe, “if you don’t find it interesting, you can always go right back to lying about, can’t you?”
“Fine,” John groused as he struggled to sit upright.
Something to their left caught his eye and he got to his feet. Sarah caught the slack jawed expression on his face and pulled herself into an upright position. “It can’t be that impressive,” she muttered as she shielded her eyes from the sun.
“Oh my,” she breathed as the wagon crested a hill, “the books don’t do it justice.”
They were descending into a valley that rolled out before them like a patchwork quilt of fields and pastures. The city was built on both banks of a wide river that snaked its way through the valley. The two halves of the city were connected by a massive stone bridge which was flanked by two smaller ones. An intimidating citadel was built over the large middle bridge, that towered over the rest of the city.
Both halves of the city were ringed by tall stone walls including the parts on the banks of the river. Most of the city was built on the far bank on the south side of the river where a huge cathedral dominated the skyline, dwarfing the nearby buildings that were clustered together within the confines of the wall. On a hill on the north bank was a large palace complex. Large estates sporting well-manicured gardens stood nearby making the north bank the domain of the city’s elite.
The river seemed to sparkle under the midday sun. It was filled with boats going to and from a large dock just beyond the city’s south wall. Her attention was caught by a line of wagons that were crammed onto a road that meandered from the docks up to the city’s gate on the north bank. It was then that she noticed the hodgepodge of buildings on the outskirts of the city that had been built all the way up to the north wall.
“What’s that?” she asked.
Grimald frowned as he looked where she was pointing. “I don’t know, that wasn’t there when I was last here.”
“It’s the shantytown,” Gary said. The corners of his mouth curled up into a sneer, “Mostly made up of orcs.”
“Orcs?” John asked, “why are orcs allowed here?”
“It’s coz of the Treaty of Esthorne, innit?” Gary spat, “I don’t know what the Four Kings were thinking when they decided to give those savages free passage through the Four Kingdoms.”
“Those ‘savages’ got the raw side of the deal,” Udoriol pointed out softly, “the only reason they were given free passage was so that they could be kicked out of their ancestral lands that much quicker.”
Gary shifted away from the elf. “Listen here, friend.”
The emphasis their driver put on the word ‘friend’ indicated that he saw him as anything but.
“I’ve been enjoying your company and the novelty of speaking to a real life elf,” he continued, “but you’d best watch your tongue with talk like that round these parts. It was those orcs who started the war in the first place.”
“It was the Six Clans who fought the southward expansion,” Grimald said. He too spoke softly, as though he was revealing a deeply shameful secret, “And they were wiped out. The Treaty of Esthorne was signed by the leaders of the other tribes, who had nothing to do with the war, and with a sword at their throat.”
“You’re making it sound like the Four Kingdoms were the bad guys in the war.” There was a dangerous edge to Gary’s voice.
“There are no good guys or bad guys in war, my friend,” Udoriol said sadly, “only the victors and the vanquished.”
He paused as a melancholy look crossed his face. “And the victors have the privilege of deciding whose tale is told after the fact.”
The driver whirled around to face Sarah and John. “Are you listening to this? To what the other races are saying about us?”
“You seem to be a learned man, Gareth Southwind,” Sarah remarked as she moved to the front of the wagon, “did you know of the orcs’ reputation before the war?”
“The war wasn’t that long ago, Mister Southwind,” Sarah pressed when the driver didn’t reply, “it’s scarcely been two years since the Battle of Lanfer.”
“Who’d heard of orcs before they started intruding on our land?” Gary sniffed feebly.
“Oh, everyone,” Sarah said, unimpressed with his transparent lie, “back then, a mere five years ago, recently enough for one as young as I to remember, the orcs had a reputation of being more interested in fighting one another than the other races. They considered themselves the strongest of the civilized races and thought there was no honour in fighting a weaker foe. I read that they were so honourable that they refused to fight as mercenaries despite the considerable demand for orcish fighters amongst the human kings. I also read about the ferocious wars that often broke out between their clans, which kept their numbers low.”
Sarah paused and sighed sadly. “Now such books have quietly been taken away.”
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“Many were burned by the Treton Church,” Udoriol remarked, “I saw it myself.”
“And possession of them considered a crime in many parts of the kingdom,” Sarah continued, “you’re a clever man, Mister Southwind, I’ve heard you say so yourself. Why do you suppose the Four Kings have sought to rewrite the nature of the orcs?”
Gary scowled. “Listen, I’m just a merchant. I keep my head down and my nose clean and above all, I do not go against the royal word, eh?”
Udoriol exchanged looks with Grimald and Sarah before speaking, “You’ve been an excellent driver and an entertaining travel companion. Thank you for bringing us this far, but we’ll continue the rest of our way on foot.”
“Excuse me?” John asked from the back of the wagon.
“Come on, laddie, the exercise will do you good,” Grimald grinned before hopping off the wagon.
“Corrington is a good eight miles away, you know,” Gary warned.
“It’s a fine day,” Udoriol smiled as he pulled a hood over his head to cover his ears, “and we’ve been sitting in wagons for far too long.”
“No skin off my back,” Gary shrugged once Sarah and John had hopped off.
They waved stiffly as Gary pulled his wagon away and John whirled around on the others. “Are we really walking just because you disagreed with his view on the orcs?”
“We just found his manner repulsive,” Sarah smiled as she took John by the arm, knowing it would calm him, “besides, it’s as Udoriol said, it’s a fine day for a walk and it will be good to be able to stretch our legs.”
John allowed himself to be mollified and Sarah led him down the road. She turned her gaze to the city and sighed, “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”
“From afar, yes,” Udoriol allowed.
“Hard to believe it’s only Mithia’s second largest city,” Sarah remarked, “How gorgeous must the Royal City be?”
“It certainly is a sight,” Grimald said, “doesn’t compare to Vilnerg, in my opinion, but it’s still impressive.”
Grimald shielded his eyes from the sun with his eyes as he looked at the city and continued, “You can see the dwarven influence in both cities clear as day.”
“Mithia’s City of the South,” Udoriol breathed as they joined the line of foot traffic on the side of the road, “it was initially built as a fortress to protect the river crossing into the Mithian heartlands. This city owes its very existence to the orcs. That river used to be the northern extent of their ancestral lands.”
Sarah raised her eyebrows in surprise. “I didn’t know that. The border was almost a hundred miles to the south by the time the war broke out.”
Udoriol turned to her and cocked his head. “I think that’s a good indication of how far the orcs were pushed before they fought back.”
The elf turned back to the city and continued, “I hear the city profited a great deal from the war. A considerable portion of the Four Kingdoms’ armies came through here before heading to the front.”
The elf studied the shantytown that had been built around the city’s south wall and smiled grimly, “and now it looks as though the orcs are laying siege to the city that was pivotal to their downfall.”
“Are they not being permitted into the city?” Sarah wondered, “isn’t that a violation of the treaty?”
“I expect we’ll soon find out,” Udoriol replied.
They soon arrived at a small town built at a crossroads a few miles from town. They recognized Gary’s wagon among a queue of other laden wagons that were lined up on the road. A group of drivers were gathered just outside the tavern that was conveniently built on top of the crossroads. Sarah and John gawked at the lines of wagons that were lined up in each direction.
“They can’t all be heading to Corrington, can they?” John breathed.
“Some of them are probably headed back to the Southward Expansion,” Udoriol remarked, “those lands are fertile and must be feeding half of the Four Kingdoms by now.”
John nodded, remembering the call for settlers to move south after the Treaty of Esthorne had been signed. The terms were attractive, no taxes for five years and prime land to farm. Many youths had taken the offer, and towns across the kingdom emptied. Sarah knew John had been eager to go at the time. When they presented the idea to her parents, they had forbidden it. That was the frontier where rogue bands of orcs, dissatisfied with the terms of the Treaty of Esthorne, raided isolated human settlements to this day, leaving death and destruction in their wake.
That decision had probably saved their lives. All contact with the village of New Golton, founded mainly by people from their hometown had been lost for months and everyone feared the worse. Sarah and John hadn’t seen it that way at the time, and there had been a huge fallout between she and her parents. Being given permission to forge something of themselves within the confines of the relatively peaceful kingdom of Mithia had been her parents’ peace offering to her and one she thanked them for.
“Lovely day for a pint, eh chaps?” Grimald said as they approached the knot of wagon drivers, “any good ales on tap?”
“Summerbee’s is always a solid choice, Master Dwarf,” one of the drivers replied.
Grimald bowed in gratitude before turning to a barmaid, “Three pints, if you please.”
The girl in a flowing yellow dress that looked a little too light for the weather nodded towards Udoriol who had hung back. “Nothing for your friend?”
“Maybe later,” Grimald winked as he dropped a few coins in her hand, “he has an upset tummy.”
“What’s the holdup, gentlemen?” Grimald asked the crowd who looked at the newcomers curiously.
One of the drivers made a face. “Security’s tight on account of all the orcs at the gate.”
“Why are they at the north gate?” Sarah blurted, “doesn’t that mean they’ve come from Mithia?”
“That’s exactly right,” the driver replied. He was a surly man with a lived in face. His clothes were finer than most, and the brass buckle in his hat gleamed under the afternoon sun, “A lot of them were allowed passage into the Mithian heartland just after the war ended, but now they’ve decided they’d rather come back.”
“Why aren’t they being allowed through the city?” Grimald ventured.
“That’s just it, they are,” the driver replied, scratching the back of his head, “they just showed up one day and decided to set up camp at the gates of the city. No one knows what they intend to do, but they’re making everyone antsy and they’re making an eyesore at the nobs’ doorstep.”
“It’s not just orcs,” another driver groused, “the Church is on the hunt for a fugitive, as is the city’s Temple of Agni. They’re taking a good look at everyone coming through the gates.”
Sarah winced. The men at the bar must have overheard their conversation and informed the Church.
“Rumour has it they’re looking for two different people who happen to be travelling together,” one of the drivers remarked.
“Two people who’ve stirred up two different religions travelling together,” another said, “they must be worshippers of that Ratri.”
“They’ll be in good company here,” someone else sniffed.
The barmaid returned carrying three pewter tankards. Grimald took them enthusiastically. “Get those looks off your faces,” he hissed to Sarah and John as he handed them their drinks, “or you’re going to arouse suspicion.”
“I’ve heard on good authority that the one the Church is looking for is an elf!” another driver added.
That made Grimald blanch. Sarah looked over worriedly at Gary’s wagon and was somewhat relieved to see that he was still sitting on the driver’s seat, watching the line irritably. She knew it was a matter of time before he caught wind of this fact and the question was whether or not he would sell them out.
“Where have you come from, anyway, strangers?” the driver with the shiny hat asked.
“We’ve come from Lisel,” Grimald replied. He paused to drain his drink, “Now if you’ll excuse us, we should get going. We’d quite like to get into the city before dark.”
The wagon driver looked up at the sky and grunted. “You have a good chance if you go on foot. The Church is inspecting every inch of the wagons, as though we’d help smuggle such dangerous fugitives across.”
“Ratri worshippers spreading the word openly, orcs gathered at the gate and now fugitives being hunted by the Church and the Temple of Agni,” another driver remarked, “my nose tells me something bad is going to happen in that city. I only hope I can get through it and be safely on my way into the Southern Expansion before it does.”
“If Corrington goes down the spout, the orcs will overrun the entire Expansion in the blink of an eye,” another remarked.
“Why did I ever let my brother talk me into moving stakes there,” another said, looking to the south with worry, “the king said he’d send soldiers to protect the towns, but we’re lucky if they show up once a month. We’re all on our own down there.”
“The lands are huge, and the people don’t have to pay taxes,” another pointed out, “hard to pay for soldiers when you’re not collecting taxes.”
“Oh one last thing,” Grimald said after he drained his tankard, “I’ve heard there has been a spate of disappearances in the city. You chaps wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?”
The drivers exchanged uneasy looks and one replied, “There have been a lot, but it can be explained. You’ll understand once you get to the city.”
Sarah and John set their untouched drinks down on a nearby table as Grimald bade the drivers farewell. They set off together with Udoriol down the road that was crammed with wagons and kept their heads low as they walked past Gary’s, who didn’t seem to notice them. Once he was well behind them, Sarah breathed a little easier.
“How are we going to get into the city?” she wondered, feeling troubled by the ominous sounding reply regarding the disappearances.
“We’ll figure that out when we get there,” Grimald replied.