Introduction ~ Yen Nolryn

Nyan rana yn Yen Nolryn, di nyan yn Maralu.

My name is Prince Nolryn, and I’m a rider for the King’s Own.

That sounds such a long-winded way of saying it, “rider for the King’s Own.” Maralu is such an easier word for it, though there’s no direct translation. Warrior is too general. Anyone with a weapon in their hand can be classed as a warrior, but the King’s Own, we’re something more special. Of the seventeen hundred Raykinians who ride with the kingdom’s army, only fifteen of us have the right to introduce ourselves as Maralu.

We ride Kazinian horses in place of Raykinian camels—as the saying goes, admonish your enemy, but never his wardrobe. Or hers, as the case so often is in Kazin. Not even His Majesty has the privilege of riding on horseback, it’s reserved for the riders of the Own only. Of course, I may well be the first Raykinian king to ride with his Own, but I’ll tackle that problem when I come to it.

Our swords, far from the mundane looks of the regulation army swords, would be as much at home displayed proudly over a nobleman’s fireplace, so elaborately decorated are they. My own has been crafted to look like a thrai, the kingdom’s deadliest snake, easily capable of killing the strongest man in ten minutes.

Let it be known now that I hate snakes. Majesty thought it would be fun to give me a weapon that looks like one. The swordsmen of the Own have the added bonus of being able to design their sword; everyone else’s is partly designed by Majesty, partly by the blacksmith.

Strangely enough, the mention of the King’s Own only ever conjures imagery of the extravagant home lifestyle we have, even among some of the riders. Horses. Swords. Coin. Fame. Travel. Almost inhuman skills with the weapon of choice. Only twice during my four years with the Own has Ni-Yana ever realised exactly why we have these privileges. Both times it has been when only fourteen of our number have returned from a mission.

Raykin puts us on too high a pedestal sometimes, on par with the Goddesses. None of us find it flattering. It’s true that a band of fifty Kazinian archers poses little threat to us, but we can hardly be called invincible. We’re human; we bleed. And yet the whole kingdom is stunned into stupefied silence when we return with one member less.

That I suppose is the aim of this document, even if only the nobility can read it. To educate the masses. Not to necessarily lower our standards or our profile, but to make people realise that we’re the highest paid in the kingdom for a reason. From mission briefing to what we hope will be a triumphant return.

“We hope,” the readers scoff, rolling their eyes, “Of course it will be a triumphant return! How could it be anything but?”

Herein lays the first mistake. Need I remind the readers that our last mission saw the death of our General, Rau? For this mission, we have a new rider in Haenel, and a new General in Nimay. Of course, we have complete faith in them both, but that hardly means we leave with any less nerves than for any previous mission.

I can’t speak for the other riders, but I am incredibly frightened before every mission. Yes, the stone-hearted, metal-fisted Maralu get scared. We’re good, but there are still only fifteen of us against the entire Kazinian army. I try not to think like that—both times I have someone’s died on the mission. It’s not a good mindset to be in.

Have I at least begun to change the perception yet? The life of the Maralu on the road (as we loosely term it; the truth of the matter is that there’s rarely ever any actual road) is not a glamorous one.

I suppose I should begin by introducing the boys. You’ll know us perhaps by name and weapon, but that is not knowing us, in the true sense of the word. You still think of us as being right up there with Lin and Aeia, am I correct? I figured as much.

I’ll begin with myself, seeing as I know me better than I do anyone else in this elite group of fifteen. I’m one of the four archers in the Own, as well as crown prince of this kingdom, meaning I’ll be king in a few years. This much people know, but on the road it matters little. As the healers have supreme rule in the healing house, so does the General in the Own. General quite easily outranks crown prince.

I’m one of the more extroverted among the Own, as anyone who’s been to the Golden Thrai in recent years will agree, but that’s not to say I don’t know when it turns serious. Yes, the ‘Thrai’s record holder can be serious.

Staying with the archers, Garuk is one of the veterans of the Own. He’s been in the ranks since 4041, more than a decade, so naturally he’s the best of the four of us. He’s one of the ones who always rides right in the centre of the group when we leave and return from a mission. He doesn’t handle publicity too well though, which is odd because he’s been there so long. It’s earned him a bit of a reputation for, well, throwing chairs. He’s tolerant of most things, but as soon as people start flinging themselves on him, he’ll lose his temper in a flash. Once he’s out of Ni-Yana though, he visibly relaxes.

Gylepi… isn’t as scary as he looks, really. He’s got a drop or two of desert blood in him, from five or six generations back, so that’s why he’s particularly tall. He’s the one who initiated this… journal, I guess you’d call it. Very much one for telling it like it is, is our Gylepi. Again, fantastic once he’s on the road, but has a tendency to get angry whenever people start talking up the Own without thinking about what we actually do. He gets more annoyed with himself though, mutters whenever he misses middle red in training or if he has to use more than one arrow to kill a Kazinian. He’d probably make Second Company with his sword, which is just a scary thought for any of us.

Finally Murali. He doesn’t want to be in the Own at all, believe it or not. He’d much rather be a General, even just Third General, but he’s stuck with us for the moment. He honestly wants to be First General more than I do, but of course I never can be, what with being next in line to the throne and all. Murali’s a bit on the quiet side, but you can just tell there’s something going on there.

So there are the four archers. We’re not too bad once you get to know us, just so long as you approach us in the right way. Please, don’t try and make out you’re better than we are, or idolise us with starry eyes and no minds to speak of. Talk to us as you would any other archer and we’ll happily chat, but really, anything more than that and we’ll either turn our backs or get angry. We get too much of it for it to be fun anymore.

Logically following the archers, the blade archers. Blade archers are terrible, annoying people, the two in the Own even more so. They always bring up the rear and are continually ripping things off tree branches and ditching them at anyone in front. Complete opposite of us more refined archers of bow and arrow, they won’t hesitate to take up any challenge, either at the pub or the training grounds at the palace. What amazes me is that people are actually stupid (or perhaps drunk) enough to actually challenge these two. Some people find them funny, but I’m certainly not one of them. They’re just annoying and… not funny.

Kaen is just that little bit more restrained in that respect, but we use the term lightly. He absolutely loves all the attention being part of the Own gets him, which does sort of sicken the rest of us somewhat, but he’s a blade archer. Purple shirts’ll do that to them. Sore loser, is Kaen, so it’s a good thing it doesn’t happen too often, otherwise we’d be pelted with pebbles and nuts even more than we are now. He could easily make Second Company with the archers if he felt like it, but he’s not dignified enough to be an archer. We have certain standards.

Yoryl is gay, obviously, and more than willing to flaunt it now that everyone knows anyway. More power to him, I say, just as long as he keeps it away from me. Which he naturally doesn’t, being a blade archer. Laziest guy in the Own, regards ‘training’ as going to the Thrai and challenging as many people to dagger toss as he can find. How he managed to be as good as he is, I’ll never know. He’s also the only guy in the Own who I’ve got the slightest chance of beating with a sword, so the rest of the guys have to naturally make bets every time we bear arms against each other. Which isn’t often, but great fun when we do. I like putting a blade archer in his place, so sue me.

The pikemen are generally easy-going, I guess because their weapon isn’t quite as easy to show off. Spears don’t have half the glamour of swords, and you can’t win coin or beers with them at the pub like you can with daggers. Definitely the most overlooked riders of the Own. It doesn’t bother them though—they don’t get people challenging them or flinging themselves over them like the rest of us do.

That said, Anganur is a very un-pikeman-like show-off, though with anything but the pike. Beer drinking at the ‘Thrai, dagger toss and arm wrestling are all particular favourites. He can only ever beat me at arm wrestling, and possibly dagger toss when I’m drunk, but he’s usually more drunk than I am anyway, so I tend to have the advantage there.

Inel I don’t talk to all that often, but he’s great to take a problem to. He gives the best advice, and always what you need to hear rather than what you want to hear. Of all of us, he’s probably the one least affected by the Own’s high profile. He’s always lived in a rich family, and being a pikeman means that really only the other pikemen idolise him, and they tend to be easy-going anyway, so he doesn’t have to deal with that kind of thing too often. Also loves various religions, but more for the stories that come with them than the actual religion itself.

Finally, the swordies. Seven of them, making up almost half the Own, which is fair enough I guess. I still say we could do with one less swordsman and another archer, but that’s just me. The blade archers think they’re the best; the swordsmen know they are. These are the guys most people know well, just because Raykin idolises the sword above anything else. Whether it’s being wielded or hung on the wall, the sword is undeniably more spectacular than anything else. Aeia damn it I’d love to be able to swing one better than I can.

As a bit of a novelty, the most well-known member of the Own right now is the General. I say novelty because it’s usually the best swordsman who people know, and the General’s the best tactician, not necessarily the best swordsman. More often than not, the poor guy never gets the recognition he deserves. Nimay though, well, she’s obviously a bit of a novelty, and was when she hadn’t yet become General.

Everyone, I should hope, knows the raw basics, so I won’t bore any of you with those. I won’t be confirming or denying any rumours about the bangle around her wrist, either. Nimay has never spoken a word, true, but that hardly means she’s silent. There’s the odd occasion when she’s obviously desperate to say something with words, but those occasions are few and far between. If you’ve known her long enough it’s easy to know what she’s wanting to say. It’s also rather handy when she’s telling us battle tactics in Kazin, when the slightest sound would give away our position. And, Lin’s blood, she is the absolute master of the silent treatment. Guilts a man into anything.

Melraan’s a good friend of mine, and was before I’d been accepted into the Own as well. Funny, funny guy, very dry, sarcastic sense of humour that you’ll either love or hate. He likes to boast that he’s the best swordsman in the Own, but I wouldn’t put him quite that high. The guys who are better than him aren’t the types to challenge the claim though, so we’re all happy. He’s very laid back except when it comes to training, which is something he’s pretty serious about.

Rumal, now he is the best, hands down, which is ironic because he’s a born and bred southern districts boy. You wouldn’t know it by looking at him now though—he’s the longest-serving member of the Own and has been living the high life for just about thirteen years now, so he’s left all that behind him. Good man. He’ll never live down the four scars on the back of his wrist though, and yes, those came from exactly what you’re thinking. Quite the little thief, was Rumal. The missing little finger though, that has nothing to do with that. He lost that in Kazin on my first mission up there. That doesn’t mean he escapes mockery from the rest of us though, much to his annoyance.

Emon would probably be ranked number two among the swordies. He’s so ridiculously modest about it though that you can just tell he’s fishing for compliments. We can see through this ploy of his, but the general public apparently can’t. He puts on such a “woe-is-me” performance that we can’t help but laugh, and consequentially be accused of being heartless towards the poor creature. It takes a while to earn his trust, but once he’s willing to let you in he’s incredibly loyal. I considered myself unlucky in love before meeting him—the poor guy has had eight girlfriends and counting. One left him when he didn’t get in the Own, then the next one left when he did. The current one lives in Ni-Mytaa, so he’s always the most excited when we leave on a mission because it means he can see her again. We’re still working on getting him to propose to her.

Kurae is our official cook. We have a roster for whose turn it is to cook the next meal, but Kurae’s are the ones to wait for. If he wasn’t a swordsman, I’d make Majesty employ him as head chef at the palace. He’s just that good on the road, so imagining him with all the right utensils and everything… that would be fantastic. He’s a bit stony-faced and quiet though, very cliquey with the other swordies. He doesn’t take compliments well either, but Aeia, it’s worth it to have one good meal in every fifteen while we’re on the road.

Ulkar’s our country bumpkin. He came from a town consisting of about fifty people, ten houses, a few farms and a pub. The population of the place is just about doubled when we get there, but he’s so incredibly proud of that little town. Living there has meant that he hates spending. Part of saving up in case of drought, which is of course in the mindset of everyone in the kingdom, but even more for people from country towns where a drought could very easily turn the place into a ghost town. He’s lived in Ni-Yana for more than half his life now, but he’s still such a country bumpkin… It’s just very amusing for the rest of us.

Finally there’s Haenel. He only just got accepted a few months after the last mission, so I barely know him. He seems a bit highly-strung to me, but that could just be nerves since he hasn’t actually been on a mission as yet. He probably feels like he’s trying to replace Rau as well, which was never going to be an easy task. He seems like the type who could very quickly get on my nerves, but we’ll have to wait until we’re on the road to find that out.

So there’s the Own as we currently stand. We’re not gods, we’re not invincible, we can’t defeat the whole of the Kazinian army without breaking a sweat. We get scared, we bleed, we break bones, and believe it or not, we can even die, much as we try not to. For the cynics, there are reasons why we’re the highest paid in the kingdom save for the Generals.

We’re not gods, just Maralu.

Mission Brief ~ Kul Nimay

Nyan rana yn Kul Nimay, di nyan yn Maralu.

Ah yes, the swordswoman speaks. I’m not completely incapable of communicating with words, only the spoken ones, but I don’t see them as a necessity. They’re used too often to hide what the speaker’s actually feeling. It’s so much harder to lie with your eyes. But this isn’t a deep and meaningful discussion of human nature, just a straight out retelling of a mission with the King’s Own.

How ironic.

Seeing as I’ve been lovingly appointed as General of this little group, I’ve been put in charge of giving the mission brief. It will be interesting to see how many of the guys read this once I’ve written it. The blade archers most definitely, Anganur I wouldn’t be surprised to see nosing into the file. How in Lin’s sweet name Rau managed to get them all to actually listen to the mission briefing, I’ll never know. I guess now I know why they’re mission briefs though. Anything longer than brief and I’ll have lost them.

Maybe it’s a male thing.

Two paragraphs and I’ve already made two deep and meaningful points on human nature. What can I say? I know people. And you wonder how I ended up as General.

Generally we get briefed on the next mission four to six days before we’re due to leave, giving us time to find everything we need, bid farewell to anyone who needs to be farewelled, and generally tie up any loose ends should we happen to die on the road.

Don’t any of you dare laugh. It’s happened twice in my time with the Own already, and much as we try to avoid it, it’s bound to happen a few more times before I’m forcibly retired myself. Of course, I hope for that to be by a Raykinian rather than by a Kazinian, but only time will tell.

For this particular mission, we’ve been given five days notice, which is probably just when this Aeia-damned heatwave will reach its conclusion. It would figure, that we’d leave the city behind just as there’s something of a reprise from the heat.

Nolryn and I were flaked out—wait. Should I be referring to him as Highness in this soon-to-be public document? Aeia no, I know him as Nol, so Nol he shall remain. Don’t anyone get the idea that you can call him by his first name yourselves though, because I can’t be held responsible for any injuries—to your person or to your coin purse—that you may sustain through the course of such actions.

So, Nolryn and I were flaked out yesterday in what is habitually the coolest room in the palace when Majesty dragged us to the throne room by way of a messenger. After simultaneous groans—there’s only one reason why the crown prince and General of the King’s Own are summoned to the throne room, plus it meant movement, which is never an enjoyable experience during a Raykinian heatwave—we trudged along behind the poor messenger towards the aforementioned room, which of course happens to be on the opposite side of the palace to where we were. Yes, Own life is tough.

The throne room, it must be said, is an impressive room, if somewhat ostentatious. Not as bad as the Llayans or the Kazinians, I’ll admit, but for a Raykinian room, it’s rather garish. Too much gold, I think is the problem, the single purpose of which is to impress said Llayans and Kazinians. The thrones themselves are carved from mahogany, which, as every Raykinian will know, is worth more than its weight in gold.

Majesty was not seated in his throne. It’s cushioned with velvet, very uncomfortable during a heatwave, and very impractical in that there’s no desk or maps handy. It works well enough for the less cartographically-inclined discussions with ministers for education and roads and whatnot, but debriefing for a mission with the Own needs a map, so we found him in his office off to the side.

Instead of being lined with gold and mahogany, Majesty’s study is walled with books and maps with various sheets of parchment scattered in what we can only hope is some semblance of order over every free surface. He was almost literally melted into the chair behind his desk—which is more table than desk. He may have once been with the blade archers, but any hint of fitness from that era has long passed.

“I hope you don’t mind if I’m half-dead while I’m briefing you,” he apologised wearily.

“Only if we can half-die while being briefed.”

“Knock yourselves out.”

Oh yes, those two are most definitely father and son.

“I’ve thought about what you were saying earlier, Nolryn.”

I blinked in surprise. Apparently our dear prince does have some good ideas. And here we thought he was bluffing the whole time.

“And since the outcome can’t be any worse than any other method we’ve tried, I figure we may as well try it your way.” More surprised blinks. “If this mission is pulled off without a hitch, then we’ll continue.”

It must be clarified now that a ‘hitch’ is basically a synonym for ‘death’. If we return from a mission with three broken legs and five broken arms, but nobody’s died, the mission is deemed successful. As Nol said in the introduction, there are reasons why we’re the highest paid in the kingdom bar the Generals. It must also be clarified that I, being General of the Own, don’t earn any more than the fourteen guys I work with. There’s not supposed to be any glory in this job, otherwise it could well cloud judgement, either mine or that of the men under my command.

Both Nol and I already knew from what Majesty had told us—that he was accepting Nol’s proposal—what the mission brief was, so we launched straight into questions. How many people have died already? Are the caravans still travelling to Silrona? Are there any professionals among them? Are they still rebelling against Silrona’s queen? How many are we up against? How much coin are we getting out of this? How many did you say we were up against again? And how much coin? Standard questions when faced with any business proposition, I should imagine.

I’m not entirely positive how long these meetings usually take during more pleasurable temperatures, but Nol commented afterwards that it was quite painless, so I can only assume they habitually take longer.

Lin save me.

From an hour after lunch right through until an hour after I would have liked to have eaten dinner, we were poking maps and asking questions, gleaning as much information about the mission as we could stand. Ordinarily we would then round up the other thirteen Maralu and condense that into about thirty heartbeats, but I’m a nice General. I don’t rule with an iron fist. Plus they weren’t all in a nice easy-to-trap group at the time.

So I sent out messengers to find each of them, most of whom were at the ‘Thrai or flaked out at home, and let them know to meet at dawn the next day, so they could all be home again and flaking out before the midday heat hit.

Like I say, I know people. As predicted, by breakfast they had assembled in my office, and I’d had them all briefed and back home before the heat of the day had reached its crescendo.

I have to say, mission briefing is one time when words would be useful, but we make do. Pointing at Silrona is usually enough to set the groans off. This particular mission though, as Majesty said, is a little different to how we normally tackle Silrona, in that we’re heading up there with our main purpose being to bear arms and kill some Kazinians.

In recent years, gangs of Kazinian bandits in Silrona and Sissillya especially have been attacking Raykinian trading carts as they travel through the regions, looting the wagons of any coin or other valuable possessions and, more often than not, killing every person riding with the caravan. On the odd occasion when the bandits have been merciful or lazy enough to leave the merchants alive, the news has been relayed down to Ni-Yana.

Trading stops, or at least slows, for the next few months while the valiant protectors of Raykin skip up north, do some valiant protector deeds, skip back down south and declare the trade routes safe once more.

Until now, our valiant protector deeds have been talking to various Kazinian officials—the queens of Silrona and Sissillya, ministers for crime, Generals of not only the Silronan and Sissillyan armies, but of the Kazinian army as well, and a few years back we even escorted Majesty into Assiraz to speak with Empress Shizaaqa. The fact is, Kazinians aren’t ones for talking.

The situation maybe dies down for a few months, but we suspect that’s more as a result of the Own’s presence along the trading routes and scaring off any bandit groups rather than any lasting effect brought on by whichever official we’ve talked to on that mission.

This time we’re being more proactive. The raw brief is to uproot every bandit group we can find between Raykin and the city of Silrona then return triumphantly to Ni-Yana. It’s no long term solution, but that’s just one mission. This is going to end up being something of a campaign.

The mission after this one will involve dragging the whole of First and Second Company up there, swordsmen, archers, blade archers and pikemen, and stationing them along the road for as long as it takes to make the Kazinians realise we don’t take lightly to our caravans being raped and pillaged. A year, a decade, we don’t know.

Of course, this then begs the obvious question, “Won’t Kazin retaliate?”

We’re hoping two things in this respect: that Kazin is too disorganised to actually initiate a retaliation, and that anything they are able to organise is too weak to deal with eight hundred of the best warriors in Raykin.

At present, there are at least fifteen separate armies in Kazin, one or two for each province and the two main Kazinian armies. The fight more often with each other than they do with Raykin. In most cases, the armies hate their Generals, the Generals can’t stand each other, the queen of the province has trouble controlling the Generals, the Generals do their best to outrank the queen, and everyone hates Empress Shizaaqa. Trying to get a simple “‘Fight!’ ‘Yes sir!’” out of anywhere in that kingdom is a near-impossibility.

I highly doubt they’d even notice our nicely organised little army until a year after it had arrived. That’s what we’re hoping, anyway. Silrona is likely the only region to care, and their army, should it respond, is only around four hundred strong, so they shouldn’t provide too much of a hassle. Our only worry is if the Kazinian army feels they should involve themselves, in which case Raykin… won’t be in the safest of positions. The full Kazinian army, at last count, had a good three thousand members. Raykin’s has seventeen hundred, less the eight hundred we’re stationing in Silrona. Nine hundred against three thousand. It’s not a happy prospect.

However, we’re not expecting the Kazinian army to be a problem. We could march all seventeen hundred of us into Assiraz and raze the city to the ground and they’d still be arguing over leadership and who should have the right to blow the battle horn. They’re not known for their organisational skills.

But that’s the next mission. This particular one is straight forward enough.

We’ve had reports that there are about ten groups of bandits causing problems right now, some with professional army personnel leading them, ranging between five and thirty members in each group, so let’s call it two hundred in all.

Two hundred against fifteen. Nothing we can’t handle. As we keep saying, there are reasons why we’re the highest paid in the kingdom save the Generals.

Of course, the odds aren’t quite as good as nine hundred against three thousand, but they’ll be in groups of at most forty at a time, and most of them have no formal weapons training to speak of. Fear not, gentle citizens of Raykin, we can take them. Or have already, as the case most certainly will be once this document is actually read by civilian eyes.

Which brings me to another point: Yoryl, Kaen, Anganur and any other Maralu reading this for the mission brief, you may stop reading now. There’ll be no further information to be gleaned from this, I’m afraid. Ask me or Nol if you still have questions. You all knew this document would be the raw basics anyway, with minimal technical references.

So there’s the mission brief, and now you know exactly what we’re up against. There are similar odds for every mission we go on, except that this time we’ll be attacking outright rather than essentially defending, so that probably swings the odds in our favour a little more.

This is how I think before every mission, putting things in perspective. There’s the raw number of fifteen against two hundred, but there are other things to factor in as well. If it was just us standing up against two hundred Kazinian warriors, we wouldn’t have a hope. We might be able to knock off a third of them, maybe, but not all two hundred.

So then you break it down. The two hundred bandits aren’t all going to attack at once. They’re spread along the road, and even if they banded two or three groups together, they couldn’t get more than forty together at once. We’ve taken on forty Kazinian archers before, and have emerged from the other side of battle with at worst three men with an arrow lodged somewhere on their person. These encounters have never been fatal though. It’s when numbers escalate to sixty or more that we get anxious.

And those are the statistics for professional archers. Bandits, with maybe two or three professional archers to guide them, would pose little threat if there were eighty of them. Two hundred at once would be cause for concern, but we’ve already established that there’ll be no more than forty in any one encounter.

That said, don’t take fourteen of your friends into Kazin and try to take on forty Kazinian bandits in one go. We’re not gods, but we have more fighting skill than anyone else in the kingdom.

So after the mission brief comes the preparation. I handed Haenel his list of requirements at the end of the briefing today, so he’s had a good giggle over that. Rau started the tradition of listing quite literally everything on that sheet of parchment, so that at first glance it’s the most daunting thing you’ve ever seen, but once you start breaking it down it’s just that much easier, and you have a bit of a giggle, especially once you reach item twenty-three. I’ll never forget Nol’s comment upon seeing that one before our first mission.

“I’m hardly going to walk over the bridge and say, ‘Hold up a moment, boys, I’ve left my horse behind.’”

I figured I’d keep the tradition going for any new member who makes it in. You end up crossing off all the ones that are going to come with you whether you thought about it or not—weapon of choice (sword, in my case), riding boots, army shirt, saddle, horse… And then there are some, like insect repellent, that’s only needed on certain missions. No insects will attack in the dead of the southern Kazinian winter. I’m tempted to leave my bow and arrows behind on every mission, but someone always thrusts the Aeia-damned things on me just as we’re saddling up to leave. They’re yet to serve any practical purpose. We have enough projectiles in the Own without having to add my less than adequate archery skills to the fray. Still, if it keeps them happy, I guess I should go find them.