****Ch-24

It was just before the dawn of the next day. The sky was still dark, but the horizon was starting to awaken with dull yellow and liquid red. The birds were getting ready with wet throats to welcome a new day. Some birds tuned their throats one note at a time. Amidst them was one sad night jay crying for the dying night.

Pandit and his mother, Gande, had gathered outside Raesh’s home to send them off to the town.

Gande gave Mannat a large bag of fried chicken for the road, which Mannat held tightly to his chest. Pandit also gave him an earful of useless pieces of advice that Mannat heard from one ear and let out of the other.

“Promise, you will come back,” Pandit said. Mannat promised. They hugged before Mannat climbed the back of the cart and they started their half a daylong journey. There were no tears shed among the four of them, but the mood was definitely not one of happiness when they parted.

The road leading to the town passed through the field and close to Sardar’s manor. Mannat kept checking the roadside, expecting Sharmilla to be waiting for him. The manor road came and went, and he didn’t see a single burning spark in the darkness. The manor looked like a cold dark silhouette on an equally dark canvas.

The road felt no better than a shadow etched onto the land under the starry sky. It wound through many villages before reaching the town. Mannat remembered the last time his father had taken him there. That time they were paying a customary visit to one of the merchants. They had taken the trip in the middle of winter and barely met a soul on the road.

This time, summer was still in its infancy. It hadn’t been long since the free wind of spring had flown through the world. The night was still longer between the two siblings, but the weather was starting to shift toward warmer days.

For this reason, they met more people on the road. Some people walked to their destination. Those carrying things traveled by ox carts. Those things were slow and temperate but could carry a lot of weight. Most people traveled by horse-drawn carts like them. They usually had tented carts to create a living space where sometimes seven members of a family sat holding each other, staring at the wild yonder with dazed eyes.

The two didn’t have such a tent over their cart, but the wide long sword resting behind Raesh’s seat and his thick arms deterred many people looking for trouble, though not all of them. Those who tested them to see the contents of the conspicuous-looking barrel on their cart found themselves begging for their lives under Raesh’s sword. A Blacksmith’s strength was not something a beggar swordsman or a seasonal bandit could handle. Raesh was strong enough to lift the barrel full of arrows without any help. What were thin, sickly men that hadn’t had a proper meal in days?

It was a little before noon when Mannat saw a jet-black carriage climbing up the road behind them. Three wild stallions pulled it. Everyone on the road gave way for it to pass, as did his father. It quickly caught up to them. Mannat saw a man in jet-black cloak handling the reins before the carriage raced past them.

“They were in a lot of hurry,” Mannat commented.

“That was a carriage of the doctors association. They were probably hurrying to save a life.”

They didn’t stop anywhere on the way and were at the town’s large eastern gate by noon. Mannat was up in awe in front of the great wall fortifying the town. It was a behemoth of over fifty feet. Its gate itself was large enough to allow three or four carriages to pass through side by side. In comparison, almost fifteen men could walk in and out of it shoulder to shoulder.

The most important thing was not the wall itself. There were many such constructions in the land of the empire. Though most were not of such exaggeration, many nobles had their estates surrounded by such great fortifications to hide the wealth they had sucked out of the land. A larger number of late imperial fortifications were present in the regions bordering the enemy states.

However, this wall was different from those made under cold motives. It was not built under the Empire but was a relic of the past. It was older than the empire itself. Of course, time hadn’t been kind to it. Many sections of the wall had decayed, broken down, or had completely disappeared over time. Its reconstruction alone had taken well over one hundred years. Many said the count was a benevolent man, but he was also reaping the fruit of other's efforts.

The presence of such a monumental fortification in such a resource-depleted region had once sparked a lot of interest in the academic community. It helped raised many scholars and produced even more theories.

One of the most notorious theories called the region, humanity's last place of defense against the demons. Not only was the theory branded as heresy, but the Empire also branded the scholar a traitor to their cause and incarcerated her for life for spreading lies and trying to divide the people of the glorious Empire. Her peers abandoned her, but all the noise caused by the scandal made sure to spread her words to everyone from rich to commoner. Anyone who could read had probably read her words and cursed her for shaming their birth land.

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Raesh pulled the reins to slow Bhadur as they approached the gate. There was an unbelievably long queue of carts waiting to enter the town. The patched wall loomed over their heads like a giant reminder of the corrosive power of time as they fell in line behind everyone else.

Mannat couldn’t help wonder if there was an artifact from the lost ages that had survived the passage of time.

A child approached them a few seconds after they fell quietly in the queue. The boy carried a patched rucksack slung over his shoulder and held a couple of roasted corn shells in his hand.

The child, barely six or seven, nervously wound around Bhadur and stopped beside Raesh. He raised his dirt-covered face and asked, “Would you like roasted corn, sir?” Raesh was going to refuse when Mannat pushed a hand forward.

“Give me one,” Mannat said.

The boy quickly pushed an ear of corn into his hand as if worrying he would change his mind. He then waited for Mannat to take a bit before announcing the rate. “That’ll be 30 bronze.”

Mannat gave him another look then took another bite of the corn and praised the boy. “It’s good.” Raesh heard Mannat and reluctantly paid the boy, who pranced away into the crowd holding a smile on his face.

“I thought he was offering the corn,” Mannat explained. Raesh didn’t ask or complain. They overpaid for a piece of corn. It was a mistake, but there was no point worrying over it. There was a lesson to be had there. Mannat believed he had learned more from the incident than the monetary value they had paid for it.

He broke the corn in half and gave the bigger portion to his father. Raesh resisted at first before taking the corn and biting off a mouthful of the roasted corn and let out a smile.

It really tasted great.

The child wasn’t the only one selling things. There were others young and old selling hard candies, bread, and even milk to everyone waiting outside the wall. A boy Mannat’s age was going through the carts and quickly leaving after collecting money. Mannat didn’t see any exchange happening between them. What did the boy promise the people to receive free money?

He asked his father who glanced at the boy’s business and shook his head.

“He’s not selling anything. He’s a beggar.” Raesh explained. “There was a time when only people who couldn’t work used to beg for money. These days, all kinds of people are doing all sorts of businesses to get money. Begging is one of them.”

Mannat watched the boy go through carts and wagons, spreading a hand forward, saying a few words, and earning coins for doing no hard work. “He’s very good at it,” He said after watching him for a while. He didn’t see the boy leaving empty-handed twice in a row. “No wonder he would choose to beg instead of working hard.”

Raesh shook his head. “ I thought you would agree with their practice.”

“Why are most of them, children?”

“Most of them are orphans,” Raesh said. “Big towns and cities like this have their own problem. Your mother once told me, ‘you can find the real situation of a town by looking at the population of its beggars.’” He saw Mannat staring at him and added, “I think the count is doing a fine job.’”

It took hours for their turn to come. The sun was no longer overhead by the time they checked at the entrance.

The soldiers wore light grey uniforms with bulky black buttons. They were coke soldiers, the lowest-ranked in the army. One of them, a man in his late twenties, checked Raesh’s credentials but wanted to see the content of the barrel. He wanted to make sure they weren’t smuggling illegal objects of concern into the town.

His face changed color when he saw the invitation letter. The soldier stood up straight and told them to wait for a little longer. The soldier then left his position and dashed into one of the three rooms behind the wall.

He arrived with his supervising officer a few minutes later. The middle-aged man hurriedly approached them with eyes full of concern. The concern disappeared into relief when he saw their lackluster appearance. Still, he stomped and raised a hand in a military salute to Raesh, checked the invitation letter, and let them be on their way. He offered to accompany them, which Raesh politely declined.

The town unfolded in Mannat’s eyes as their cart moved forward. A large statue of a fat man welcomed them with a grin. The man in the statue wore a traditional long coat and high pants and stood using a pickaxe for support, signifying the importance of mining to the town.

The few carts and wagons ahead of them were circling around the statue to go either straight, left, or right. The statue was not just a show of prestige, but also a way to divert oncoming traffic. Mannat nodded in understanding.

There wasn’t any construction between the statue and the wall. The sun had also moved beyond the wall and was casting a giant shadow over the town. However, no matter how dark and long, the statue remained out of its reach. It stayed in the sunlight, guarding the town against outside evil.

Hawkers stood on the roadside with their things in their hands, shouting exotic names and exciting prices. Carts raced from one side to the other.

They followed others around the statue.

Mannat put a hand on his father’s shoulder to get his attention and asked pointing a finger at the statue. “Who is that man?”

“Who?” Raesh said before noticing where he was pointing. “He’s the man we are here to meet -- The count.”