Mokrъlъ It was a place of morass, deep bog, slough and stench. The peat pile rising and falling as it gave birth. They emerged from it, clawing and biting. Like a malformed bastard child of the elemental water and elemental earth. This great stinking turgid sludge, a homeland of their kind, shook and bubbled. Blind, caked in clay and sorrow. Heaving heavily. Spitting up bog. The first of their kind laid on the bank of the bog. Drying in the few glimmers of the sun which cast over Plut, but the fog choked it so, that it was seldom felt. That pale endomorphic fish-kill, laid there still, sucking in air into its mesocephalic skull through clenched teeth still filled with the matriarchal wet soil. With every squelching step their feet were sucked in, but they learned to dwell amongst the reeds. In this white realm of silky viscous fog, they sat about. Moving through the waters, which were like a spittle of a long dead god. In hollowed out logs as they pondered the nature about them. They bred in the swamps, and they knew not of iron. They worshipped cruel chthonian gods carved of wood. Piscine humanoid hybrids, crossing both the world of the living and the dead through that spiritually conductive element. The realm they called home was Plut. Plut was a repository to three rivers in the plain of Ku. These rivers were Hen, Sina and Dal coming from the land of Od and Tam. A grey and dull mud, bound with deep white fog. A fog which was a constant to this murky land. Making the landscape utterly milky on many a day. They learned to grow food from the forests they burned. Through those great black smouldering conflagrations nighthawks in great black swarms flew, upon the withered sky, disgusting progeny of bird and moth. The people of Plut knew little of pleasures. Beyond what their miserable moor could muster up from the wet soil and orange ferrous deeps. But it was when the they met the horsemen of Tam when they learned of pain. They came from the valleys of Hen, Sina and Dal on their stunted ponies. And they came to Plut following the smoke of the forests that were cleared for fields. They put the men of Plut kind into yokes meant for oxen. The servile folk suffered under this despotic dominion for an untold long. Working their soil, and during winters which gripped Plut with an ever greater painful oppressive white fog, they fed the horsemen of Tam, just as the hand picked women of Plut warmed their beds at night. In those wooden cottages, splintering from cold and moisture their lives awayed at servitude. Taken in as flesh shields for the wars waged from horseback. Their armour stuck together boards of drowned wood, shaft with a bog-iron tip and a flaxen shirt. They fought to please their masters and not to win honour or glory. They fought with dirt. On their hands, under their fingernails, between their teeth. Soil bound from head to toe. Tips of their arms washed in the fen deeps. The people of Plut bowed before Berehinia, the goddess standing on the mucky shore, she was a demon devouring travellers. Her face bound with ranine features as she stuck to the muddy shores. There was also her sister Rusalka, a half-dead half living goddess half submerged in the waters of Plut, on the verge of this world and the other. Morana the drowned goddess who swam amongst those in mokrъlъ, was the last of the triad. She watched over the souls suspended in the turbid yellowish urine of the afterlife. A divine wet triad of the Rot-sea and the bogs of Plut, to their glory people carved pillars, and them they gave gifts so that they would leave them alone. Just like to the Obrinn, the cruel horsemen of Tam. For there was a kinship in the minds of the people of Plut who could not defeat the Obrinn who to them seemed like the fabled giants. Things which outbid them in their strength and capacity. Forces which kept them bound to principles they felt no will of their own could move. The Obrinn stayed in Plut, or as they referred to it, in Tar. For these bogs were rich in that great dark viscosity. These horsemen, despite taking much interest in the winter stores, homes and wives of Plut, took little interest in their gods however. Once, it is related, Obrinn warriors went forth into the temple of the Plut gods, where the priests took to the ceremony of offering. Upon being desecrated by the cruel robbery of the horsemen, the priests of the wooden temple offered to elevate the Obrinn in their prayers as a divine force to spare their lives. To raise them beyond the mortal men that they were. The Obrinn, amused, decided not to destroy the temple. And from thence they were mentioned in the spat bog litanies of Plut priests. In the land of Plut-Tar where Obrinn and their subjects dwelt, bruise was the mark of life, torn skin and a head on a pole. Once when a drunk foolish messenger of the Obrinn in a war harness, peaked lamellar helm with a horse hair pony tail dyed red upon his brachycephalic head, begun to violently disregard the daughters of the people of Plut the local men rose up with weapons to claim him, nagged on by their wives. He could not oppose them all, for they purposefully scared off his horse, upon which his single edged sword was still. He was there alone and unarmed, and unhorsed, and they mocked him for he run clumsily upon his bent legs, and he was very slow without his horse. And they came upon him with axe and spear, and nobody was brave enough to bring themselves to slay the frightened Obrinn. He climbed on top of a roof of one of the homes, and they tried to shoot him down with notched bows. But it was only when a brave man, with a spear tipped in fermented ptomain of a rotted nighthawk, struck the Obrinn from down under that the matter was brought to a close. It burrowed right into his armpit, where there was no plates and it went deep. And it bubbled. And the Obrinn screamed and slid down from up high along the wet thatched roof, into the mud and he was soon made dead. And they carried the Obrinn's head trailed by two wispy braids about, to much amusement. But it was the last of their successes. Those who rose up with arms against the Obrinn had their heads chopped off and by their long hair paraded them, tied to horses' tails. Befouled by horse scat to the cries of the wives. Or for those who trully trespassed great cauldrons were rallied, and in them there they were boiled to a great stench and dumped into the bogs. Layers of boiling flesh, like a scum upon the waters. And the arched backs of their crying naked wronged daughters were used by the Obrinn to mount their horses as they departed. And the Obrinns were cruel. For their domain was great. They had no fortresses of stone, nor forested bogs to hide in. The only thing that kept the khan's wives and trove from his enemies, was a felt wall of a tent. Thus the only thing that could protect these people of a sea of grass, was absolute violence towards anyone who'd oppose them, and the fear of retribution. Eventually the people of Plut, sick of their agony, rose up against the Obrinn horse lords. And as they could not outdo them in their war which was their element, they decided to undo them differently. They packed up all their goods and they mustered all to depart away down towards the land where the birds would go. Where will they go? And will they reach the land where the winged beasts go? Where they solemnly cry? For those who go where the birds go, have no tomorrow scheduled for their return. And yet hope was in their hearts, that if they steal away with the crop of the land in the heat of the harvest season, and leave the Obrinns alone in those wooden homes, in their small numbers and hunger, flesh bursting cold of Plut would claim them. The people of Plut made arrangements amongst themselves to make great effort to harvest their crops right before the peak of harvest season, to leave the nighthawks in the trees of their Plut villages. They made their offerings to the elk horn topped crossroads pillar of Kresnik at the end of the village, the god of edges and patron of travellers, and they themselves took their path south. Carts full and their winter stores emptied, they abandoned Plut. Leaving only few fearful and uncertain. Those who profited from the Obrinn. And they were left to them. And an old man who attempted to stop the wagons calling for the punishment that would come upon those who would defy the Obrinn was struck down with a lean axe of a brazen youth. Dazed, bruised and with a split temple, he was left in the mud of the village. He did not die from the trauma nor the blood loss of which there was little, the very wet ground seeped the life essence from his withered frame. All the heat was taken from his corpse, and he died of cold where he was struck down, overnight. His soul swallowed up by that fell fen. The travelling wagon trains split amongst the people of Plut. Those who travelled at the forefront, begun to call themselves the Serves, for their servility. Those in the rearguard were known as the tribe of Slaves, for their slavish nature. Those in the middle called themselves in turn the Sloven, for the Obrinn employed them in the most gruesome and untidy of tasks. Serves emerged from their white homeland of fog first. Marching in a solemn line. The Slaves were not far behind, but as the path went on, the two went about their own tempo of march, and they lost their cohesion in a migratory mitosis. In a grand council held under a perennial oak, they decided to split their ways, in case of a pursuing Obrinn host. Thus they each looked for different paths in a similar direction. It was an image worthy of a painting, but seldom anyone remembers it. Obrinn spoke an ancient tongue, a tongue of oppression. A tongue of the Skuthian desert. Place where a plough, runs afoul arrow heads and bones of men more often than stone. This tongue was once spoken by gold bound kings, to whom the taste of man flesh was not unknown. As they drunk sweet imported wines from the skulls of fallen Kimmerian kings of Rot-Sea, from which they licked off fleeting droplets of crimson, off of the lapthorine bone structures. And with that tongue the Obrinn asked those pathetic Plut remains, of what came of those others who were there. And the winter claimed many of them, and they took to the desert to winter in difficulty. But the fogs of Plut where truly deep in their milkish whiteness, unforgiving as much to the eye as to the flesh. And they weaved themselves about that pale land. And neither the Serves nor the Slaves knew what came of that place. And the Slaves walked for many years. They followed the annual trails of birds, expecting to find something exquisite in that part of the world.
Romoi They left the bog which was their home. The one into which their boiled flesh was dumped. And where their drunk kindred, returning home at night, drowned. And where their offals were discarded and trash dumped. The one where their gods resided. The one which stank and gave off foul vapours and odd fires at night. They were on their way south. Leaving behind the sump of Plut, they went past a peninsula of Rotten Sea where those unknown to them as Gutans whom they'd called Němьcь shook in their realm of mud volcanoes. Having migrated at a time of great frost, when hedgehog mothers ate their own barns stricken by the frost madness, they made themselves masters there. In a time when pines burst from the cold in the lands up north. Causing great stir to all their neighbouring realms. In times long past, much like the Serves and Slaves did just now. But neither knew of this. And in their walk they came upon people who spoke gibberish. Who taught them of iron. And so the Slaves overpowered their men off with iron spears forged in their apprenticeship to them for there was much few of them, and then they took their women and children as servants. The reason for which they never found out. They left most of their men in their hovels and moved on south. They called them thus the Němьcь, for they were mute and their speech was incomprehensible, and amongst the Slaves they were given no right to speak in public. And they knew that they had no souls for how could they, if the gods understood not of what they spoke of? Later yet, long long after the heroes of our tale are perished, an exalted king of this race would come set out to bring down the Obrinn domain with swords. Slaying them like sheep after the horse murrain had crippled their warcraft. Thus the Obrinn were subjugated and once the warrior king left them, the remnants of Plut's folk devoured what remained of their former masters.
And thus from thence forth those known as Němьcь would be synonymous with slave. And some of the Slaves by various parties were made nemc. For they would steal, or kill or maim others. Or they angered those supreme amongst the Slaves, or broke divine laws. Such were the old ways, of which in their gruelling walk they'd forget at times, lost to those milky fogs now far. They walked on through these forests of far realms they knew no names for. Seemingly without a purpose or destination. They travelled so far they were travelled through a mountain pass. It's in these mountains they presumed god Kresnik lived. And they admired them, and some few of them stayed in those mountains, those who desired not to push south. But most of them pushed on in the fear of pursuit and abuse. And once they cleared these granite mountains they were welcome upon a woodland green realm. And they fared yet further south until after the great gruelling walk, the Slaves, now alone in this realm, found themselves upon a coastal plane. And upon this coast there stood a great city, unlike any the Slaves ever built or witnessed. They built their camp amongst arcane circle of Skuthian crones. A ring of ancient make depicting robust humans, of granite carved of the mountains of Kresnik, pathetic spirits left naked in the fields. With thin arms clutching at their naked frames trying to cover themselves from the howling winds, which weathered their faces. Stelae marking the once nomadic dominion over this land. Now stone was used for different means by the local people. And they did wonders with it. There was the city you see, shaped like a crescent around a natural harbour. The people of the city called themselves the Romoi. And they could do wonders with stone. The walls of their city were thick, and they had the means of hurling giant boulders through the sky further than a bow could shoot. And they had manifold customs. And they were subject to a far off king who was at present preoccupied and cared little for the fate of his sea side polity. The Romoi looked upon the Slaves of the wetlands with suspicion. And there was little understanding amongst them. After a time however it came to light that some of the nemc of the Slaves, whom already acquired the tongue of their masters, spoke also a dialect language of the mercenaries living in the city. As these mercenaries were of their same race, much akin to the one spoken by the people of the Rot-Sea. And they spoke through them to the Slaves, and through the mercenaries to the Romoi. A lot was lost in this roundabout translation but they communed. The Romoi spoke of these wetlands' people, that they came from the land of Pluton or Tartarus. And that they ate bird feed rather than proper grain. And they were rather bemused by their custom and simple dwellings, which were made of mud and twigs. The Slave women took to a nearby lake, which they had to share with the Romoi. In that place they washed their linens, dirty with the dust of the road. And they named it Rusalka's Shoals. And erected a pillar to commemorate her. So that the goddess ensured all grime was cleaned from their clothes and that the women were safe from water spirits. For the waters in which they washed their garments were riddled with water spirits. Thus the Romoi mocked the Slaves for their totems and their practices. But they themselves worshipped a wooden pole in their stone temples. Despite the fact that their temples were also adorned with gold, and imagery of great tales of patriarchs and heroes. And gilded gates leading to unknown realms. And these painting showed a grave and old tradition of devotion to a long dead God. Yet still they worshipped the pole instead. Besides the great priests the city was governed by an archon. A man in a golden circlet. But he ruled the city with a council of townspeople. Yet he held power which amongst the Slaves was unthinkable. And the city guards wore lovely ovoid shields, marked with the saltaire rune of their dead God. Which was supposed to protect them from the sword strikes of their foes. And they carried long spears. And helms with steel crests. And they watched from the walls of their city, and the gatehouses for trespassers. And their leader was one Praetorius Picander, a man of great size and strength and well knowing strategy. They looked at the Slaves from their posts with wariness. And the Slaves shared some pastures with the Romoi, but the Romoi shepherds coveted their great kine. So they protected their cattle by supplications to the god of the dead. A shepherd of the fallen souls. For who would dare cross a morbid deity of the dead at whose command the spirits could rise? And his name was Volos and they put Volos' curses upon their kine and it was protected from hands of men. And they erected a pillar to him so he would look over their kine upon their pasture. And he was the god of the Viles. Undead maiden spirits, which knew the secrets of magic and dwelt in the sunken under-earth caverns. And those who would bring upon themselves the curse of Volos, and their relations, for the theft of greater cattle, they'd sell to the city to prevent their homes being haunted by the dead. And their city was full of various strangers. And it was so for a long time. For that city stood there as an ancient colony amongst babblers as they called the Němьcь and the Slaves alike. And the Slaves sold squirrel skins to the city, and some of their own kind as slaves and the city men were much delighted. And paid with luxurious goods in turn. They gave them wine, which they much liked. It wasn't long before the Slaves took to practising growing it themselves. For grapes grew in this region abundantly and with ease, and as they held much love for things fermented. Petrunka
And Petrunka was born to the Slaves. And he was a hero. For he had a pronounced suborbital ridge, and he combed his moustache with a golden comb. And Petrunka thought that his people, the Slaves, had the primacy over other people. And that they were warlike at heart, and brave. And that their gods were above others and stronger and wiser. And that their custom was superior, and Petrunka loved his people. And he wanted them to prosper. And he hated it when other people took advantage of his people. And he was ever so brave. And he would hunt bears with spear and axe. And all were in awe of his endurance which was great. And he could out swim all the youth of the Slaves, and he did it oft for Petrunka was much fond of water. And a man named Bayda died among them, and he was a cruel man and he owned much in land and in kine and in nemc. Yet he was dark spirit, one who broke the laws and customs and denied hospitality. Yet through his power he escaped punishment of the living. And so to silence him in his grave, so that his bruxism would nor rouse him to devour the living, a rock was lodged in his mouth. And they appointed Petrunka to do the deed, before Bayda would be roused by the touch of a mischievous Vila. And so Petrunka lodged a stone within his mouth. Took a wood hatchet, depriving the body of its head, he lodged the stone filled head betwixt the corps' thighs facing the ground. So as to confuse the spirit. And he was hailed a wise man, and a slayer of the ǫpyrь. Before that, in the days of Petrunka's youth it was so that many of the Slaves took to Rusalka's Shoals and they were taken into the congregation of the dead-God's worshippers. The Romoi priest made it so, through some trickery, that their god inhabited the water. Just like their three maidens did. And their dead-God made the water powerful and significant. And the Romoi were glad and smiling at all the half submerged Slaves for their conversion but they knew not the name that the Slaves gave to the place, and embraced them as brothers. And the significance of it was lost on them. And they allowed the Slaves to settle on the outskirts of the city. Build their own farms and take land as was assigned to them. And so were Petrunka's mother and father. And amongst them were those who took much to the Romoi before the rest. And they bowed to their new bestowed god of the Romoi temple. And they hailed him Krstnik, as he reminded them of their old god Kresnik. It was also due to the fact that the rune of his name was spelt with a saltaire And they lived amongst them in the city for a long time. And those who did, did so under their leader who was a foremost worshipper of Krstnik and he took on a name of the Romoi during his embrace in the waters. And he was the first priest of the dead-God amongst them and they named him Neander. And many would take that name after their embrace be it of those who dwelt for long amongst Romoi or those of the villages about the city. And there was made many Neanders. It became a custom to call those among Slaves, whom took the faith of Krstnik Neanders. It was in mockery, but the Slaves of the city took to use it as their own. But as Petrunka was thus amongst the Neanders, and the enchantment was done by the Romoi priest, he felt the tip of his small toe touched. And he knew it was the touch of Rusalka. For she'd not abandon him to the foreign power, and he knew that their enchantment was made none for she bestowed upon him a blessing. She was in the muck, buried deep, and her slender hand, weaving its own magic made it so the waters did not taint Petrunka. But when he recounted the story to his mother she said it was likely a catfish and then she beat him sore for disobedience and imagining things. And they were thus all allowed to settle close to the fish sauce maker's hut. And it was a place of great stench and Petrunka much hated it. And they were told that yet new people came to settle nearby some distance away on the other side of the city by a lake. And like the Slaves they supposedly came from afar. For it came to light during their meeting with these new people, that indeed these were the Serves which they lost along their path south. Late arrivals made revelled as their kin were found again. To hear a comprehensible tongue was a joy to the Slaves and the Serves alike. And they much mingled and they made the countryside of the city their roam. And they intermarried. But the city guards were ever more watchful and their gazes grew ever more wary. Despite this connection it was at that time when a row grew between the neighbouring races in the days of Petrunka's adulthood. The vegetable farm of one known as Letivit was invaded by kine of a Romoi known as Xilotectus. Upon this invasion Letivit tried to intervene and chase the cows off with the help of his farmhands, but Xilotectus had his own cowherds fetch guards. And they came running and Letivit and his farmhands were forced to disband. You see, Xilotectus took a Slave wife. Her family was deprived of land by the family of Letivit due to some private reason. And it was a way for him to take vengeance on Letivit for Xilotectus desired that field. Letivit was much wrought of this. And there was ill word between the Slaves and the Romoi of the fields. It was in those days that Petrunka took to work in the city. He would do trade with the people and drink of their wine and learn of their tongue. And in that time Petrunka learned from the Romoi that the Obrinn were not what was told in the amongst the tales of Plut. They told him of how they once were slaves to a far off and yet greater horse lords. And for that reason the Romoi called them Uarkhoni, to remind them of their place, which was that of swineherds. They knew this for they had diplomacy with them as the Romoi king would pay them to ravage lands for him. Their current name, Obrinn, they stole from their old masters. They were simple slave shepherds who took the smaller and greater cattle and tried to strike out on their own. They sought greatness after their old masters were wiped out by the annual migration of griffins. Which travailed from the western sea to the east. Just like birds followed their way south. Thus as they went, the Obrinn did so much war that they forgot how to be shepherds, and lived only off of strife and pressing those they found living off the land. But despite their proximity, there was hostility in the air between the people. And the tensions grew greater yet, for it was in those days that the first blood was shed between neighbours. As one of the Romoi by the name of Silander struck down a Slave by the name of Rotbor. The matter played out in a place known to the Romoi as capilieon, outside of their township. Silander, it was related was a peddler of liquamen and had his home nearby to the place where all, Slaves or Romoi, would supply themselves with dried meat and wine. And there it was where he struck Rotbor down, due to a matter of money. It was said that Rotbor took a loan from Silander and refused to pay it back to him. As Silander confronted him for instead of paying him off, he took to pay Obospeus the owner of the capilleon for the wine instead. And whilst Rotbort was leaving, he mocked Silander to spite him. And that it was when Rotbor took a great step outside of the capilieon threshold. Silander being stout and robust of frame and in his middle age, enjoying good trade and good eating, but not being of too great a physique struck the back of Rotbor's head with a clay cup. He struck him over his long fine hair for which Rotbor was renowned amongst his people. For they'd often say "Oh look, at who it is who is going, if it is not Rotbor the golden of hair" even when he walked with his back to them and from far away. And many maidens would fawn over his locks, many out of envy and some in the wish to have their children bare such strong and sturdy manes, for Rotbor was still a young lad. Blood gushed from Rotbor's head in a long streak about six spans in length, but to the fault of the matter, he slipped right on the big gap of the tavern. His legs left slipping on the door frame, his head falling back, and so it was that he left the building, his temple upon the hard granite stone and Rotbor's head was dashed out on the doorstep of the capilieon. His hair was made disordered. People were gathered. Mostly of his own race. Some said he kicked at the mud for a few moments but his eyes were blind and covered with an odd fog that ought not come upon faces of people of such youth. And they feared to touch him. Silander was at first cooled from his screaming and wrath. And then bid Rotbor not to mock him and stand up. But he was quick to realize, once they tried to feed him water, that Rotbor was dead. Silander wept like a woman. And that was what caused all the Slaves to rise up in their wrath. First they wrecked the home of Silander's. He himself at the time was in hiding with his family. They gathered in a great host, all of their kind was up in arms, bearded Slaves and Serves all. They brought out spears and maces and farm tools and torches from their homes, and they begun to come together into bands and groups. They carried them as arms and they were much boastful and all the Romoi hid in their farms. The Slaves were proud and paraded through the farmlands with arms. They came upon Silander's home, and smashed the stinking vats of putrefying fish. Petrunka lead the charge. They run through the muddy courtyard of his home and workshop, mud running thick with brown fish liquid. Fish spines and heads mashed into a great lake of filth. Square headed maces in hand, they set upon the store of the house. Some would wretch upon this smell. It was as if the very goddess Berehynia was walking amongst the living. Benches, doors, windows and every single amphora of garum, despite the fact it was worth much to the people of the city, was smashed into splinters and shards. There was little in a way of desire for gain in their minds, and they themselves used the fish sauce scarcely or not at all in their private cooking. Then they set for the capilieon, poor Obsopeus, who had many friends amongst the Slaves watched as his home and place of lives' work was being wrecked by hungry drunks. All the wine and cured meat was taken before men with torches came. They carried flame and mockery and drunkenly they set light to the capilieon and it was burning fast. Once the news of it reached the city, the council sent out a detachment of their fine guard. Which in a single formation marched out into the surrounding countryside to scout the uproar. Their leader, Praetorius Picander in his steel crested helm fastened hard to his mesocephalic skull questioned many friendly Romoi farm people of the event. Finally he decided to extract the offending liquamen maker, so that no violence would be made upon him. They marched past the cinders of the capilieon and made their way into a border farm belonging to a certain Romoi known as Melanchthon. As gates were opened for them they secured the farm and all dwelling there in. Yet the few menials employed on the farm, who themselves were long haired Slaves, run for to tell the people of what took place. As the guards took Silander and his family out of Melanchthon's farm rocks and muck fell upon them for a crowd gathered, informed of their intention. Yet they shielded the cowering man from harm with their sky-blue shields. And after a lengthy and unpleasant march they entered the city. Two Slave youths who were cowering in the reeds spying from nearby had arrows fired upon them from the walls. Many Romoi of the farmlands at that time sought refuge within the city walls or fled altogether, their ox wagons wobbling upon the horizon as they made eastwards. For many knew that now they were in fully at the mercy of the Slaves, and that Praetoriusius Picander would not save them all. And these mobile military colonists came after them, hurting them with spears and banishing them from their farmlands. It was in those days that Letivit came after Xilotectus taking his wife as his own, taking the old Romoi's life in the process. He thus used his blood to anoint his cows with the curse of Volos'. Wife of Xilotectus, Dobra, after she finished her mourning, was indeed happy for this ordeal, as she was reunited with her family's land and her dowry. In this time, once the thudding echo of the gates of the city were the only thing hanging in the air, both the Romoi and the Slaves took to their respective council. There was much to be decided upon. For all knew that the matter would not be resolved without strife.
Větje
The council of the Romoi went as follows; First Polviander the common man, said that no Slaves ought to be left in the city and all ought put to sword. But once their numbers were counted he changed his mind to banishment. They knew they could not be fully rid of them, as the city relied on their grain, and now that no Romoi were left in the countryside, someone had to tend the fields. One Nikander of the council wanted to give all the power to Praetorius Picander, for most of the men of the city grew fat, round and docile on garum. Silander being the foremost example of the Romoi man of the time. But Praetorius Picander politely refused, saying he was a servant of the city. And by a long tradition of their race, they decided to dived the people of the farmlands which rose up against them, to re-establish Romoi rule amongst them. Causing strife in their midst, through bribery or lies, would make them prevail. After a time it was decided after the council of the wise Philomela, lady of the council, that the Neanders of the city would go out to their kin, for they spoke their tongue. And they would treat with them. And thus either there would be peace between them, or the Neanders who were once Slaves would be made gone form the city. For Philomela was a wise maiden and much renowned amongst the people of the city.
The council of the Slaves went as follows; Zemovit a young prosperous son of Bayda, the owner we spoke of afore, claimed that the men of the city ought not be roused. He saw their guards parade in their garbs. And their shields were beautiful. And they had crests upon their helms. And they had long spears, and it amounted to much. In turn Chirnimir who claimed Melanchthon's farms and wore old farmer's petasus, spoke that there were many of their own kind who were in the city. And many of them made nemc by the Romoi. And that they ought to be freed from their captivity. Upon being reminded that most of them were sold to the Romoi by the Slaves themselves, he did not speak again during the council. And then Belovit the blind elder spoke, his white wispy beard shaking as he did. There was a stringed lyre resting upon his legs, for he was a player and a singer of tales. The whites of his sage eyes impermeably white like the winters of Plut. He said that for spilling the blood of a man, the fat Romoi had to pay before the Slave gods. And there would be a punishment from Volos to those who do not avenge their dead. And he begun to scream and then begun to sing. And they bid him to be quite. Once he was calmed Zhenka the washerwoman of Rusalka's Shoals which she represented and which grew to be quite the sizeable village in those days, begun to speak. She claimed that there was enough in the farmlands for the Slaves to enjoy. And they needn't rouse the Romoi hive any more. And many others spoke but few listened and all were drowned out by the chatter. And they decided to send a council to the Serves. And they appointed Petrunka who presided over the whole gathering. And he spoke little for he did not like when many voices were raised. And he was glad when there was action.
Thus he came to the village of the Serves which they called Ezero and the Romoi called Helos for it was built about a lake. And he counselled with them a clever ambush. He knew Praetorius Picander well, and he knew him to be strong of will and of a strong sword arm, and that him men would not give the city up easily. And that they knew how to stand strong together shield to shield. And that upon their walls they would be scantly able hurt them with their spears and arrows. So he proposed to them a notion of how to undo the Romoi and their armoured guard. The Serve elders looked upon each other with surprise, and they decided.
Their men were armed, in round shield and spear, and they gathered in the centre of Ezero. They marched after Petrunka the brazen youth to the village of Bolto known to the Romoi as Mixa, from where the Slaves hailed. They gathered all their men with whom Petrunka spoke. And they were all taken in by the Serves, their hands loosely tied behind their backs. Thus preparations were made.
Upon claiming captives of the Slaves they were met with the Neander envoys. Which saw in what form the Serves took the Slaves captive. They made their business known to all. And Petrunka as one known to the men of the city, was sent forth once again to represent, but this time both of the parties. So Neanders led by Petrunka went back to the city. Petrunka bore a great symbol of the Dead-God upon his neck, to remind the Romoi he partook of their rituals. And he explained to them thusly. That Serves came upon the Slaves and took their men as captives. They had them all bound, and they wished to bring them to the city to hand them to the Romoi. So that they would do with them as they pleased, but that they'd take the Slave women as their own. Petrunka was the one whom brewed up this betrayal! The Romoi wished to accord but Praetorius Picander spoke against this notion, and he had still much gravitas and authority from the time they wanted to appoint him the master of the city. So in order to make the Romoi feel strong in their own city and to not outnumber them the Serves would give them to Praetorius Picander and his men. They in turn would take of them captives as they found fit, and they'd share the burden of the captives amongst themselves. Petrunka was much tense in this moment, for he knew his well being relied on this one decision. Praetorius Picander was much in the mind of banishing all Neanders from the city, he saw in them all a danger to his people. As more often than not he'd hear them speak their own language at the city market, and he knew not what was in that Slavish tongue which made it drown out his native one. There seemed to be more of them every day it seemed, or at least they seemed to speak louder by the day. But he agreed with Petrunka, for he respected him, though he was a Slave. And he reasoned that little reason can be had from people who believed that worshipful ghosts and spirits lived in the water which they drank.
Thus Praetorius Picander and his force entered with the Neanders into the village of Bolto where a great gathering of men awaited them. And they begun to mingle. Picking their favoured captives and those they wished leave to the Serves. And Praetorius Picander spoke with the chief amongst Serves. The Neanders stuck to the Romoi for they did not feel welcome amongst their own for some reason. Petrunka in the meantime slipped off amongst the huts and set to see if all he pondered up was in order.
For there were Slave men with notched bows and slings hiding behind the thatched huts of the Slaves, upon an order of a horn they were to climb and fire unto the Romoi. And he set to see if the wagons of rubble were filled, and they were. Blackened rocks of the capilieon's foundations were broken up and set into heavy wagons, which were to be pushed unto the way out of Bolto to slow down the Romoi retreat.
The councillors of the city looked off towards the village with worry from the city walls. And the hands of the archon shook, as he adjusted his circlet of metallic gold, for he knew that something was disordered. And the sign was given by Petrunka, and wagons moved into place and archers to their positions. And the tied up Slaves cast off their bindings and were armed by their wives whom carried bundles of spears. And the guards who were dumb found by the betrayal were suddenly surrounded with the Serves and their spears and round black and orange shields all pointed at them with screaming. And there was much ado and cruelty amongst them. But as the battle of Bolto came to a close, the few of the guard were running for the city gates, leaving their pretty sky coloured ovoid shields with the rune of their god trampled in the muck with their own shoe prints. Along with their slain comrades. The Neanders where the ones to be slaughtered to a man in the hail of arrows and stone. They disarrayed the Romoi trying to hide in the midst of their shieldwall. And those that were fell by arrows and stones where then pricked to death with spears. Praetorius Picander stood upon the wagon of rocks with a Romaic spathion in his grasp, crying out to his fleeing men. And no one understood him, some of the fleeing thought that in a bout of madness he begun speaking Slavish tongue, but in fact his teeth were dashed out by a Serv shield. He cried to them not to flee for the city, so that foes could take it thus. Which was attempted but the gates stayed shut by the order of the archon and arrow fire stopped any Slave or Serve from approaching.
Praetorius Picander was fell, his head resting by the wagon from which he was pushed off with spears. His great mesomorphic body, wrapped in the struggle in a great Tyrian cape like a heroic shroud. He laid there like a hero, sinking a span into the muck. Petrunka looked upon him as he laid there bleeding whilst his men took the harnesses of those taken in the village and arrayed those taken captive. He uttered to Petrunka one phrase; "Ave Slave" before he perished. For the "ave" in the name they bore was said much like the term of hail, rather than that of "cave". At least that's what was related.
And they dipped their arrow shafts in middens. And painted whirling angular patterns on their shields, and comb tipped cruxes. For they readied to storm the city. For Petrunka became their councillor and he had them mingle in a single house and feast and drink greatly.
And the Romoi fired flaming projectiles from their mighty war engines on their walls, burning a village house close to the walls. Sending the Slave wife and husband fleeing for their lives and dooming their geese to a fiery death. And in came a vessel from afar to aid them. An army ship bearing goods and supplies to the city. And those upon the ship wore the same steel crested helms like the guard of the city but they were few. And in those days there were seldom few crested helms in the city that bore not the notch of a Slave axe upon their proud crest. And the people in the docks raised complaints to the mariners that they are few and that a greater yet band of their men were lost behind the gates, many taken captive. Yet the mariners knew not what to say but hand out bread and olives. There were five dozen hand picked men, and they carried long swords, but little to no armour.
And Petrunka had his people gather dugouts from many and far villages around. And with this fleet of spear wielding fishermen he set out for the harbour around the city defences. And as they did, they managed to take a ship which was moored outside of the harbour, and it was a military vessel which bore upon itself a war engine. And the boat was ceased by spear wielding Serves. And those upon it, whom were much disordered were forced, upon spear tips, to fire unto their own home city with their siege engine. And as the city was deprived of a battery in its harbour, efforts were made to move one from its position on one of the towers. These were the mariners of their master's city, well versed in the art of war. And with dugouts and rafts and flotsam they blockaded the harbour, which wasn't very broad, sealing the fate of the city.
And Petrunka bid his men assault from sea and soil, for by his cunning he took command over the tribal gatherings of Slaves and of Serves which much adored him. Storming the walls with ladders and harbour with dugouts. The city folk were overwhelmed quickly, and the gates we ceased from them, for it was women and men out of shape defending their walls. Throwing down rocks and amphoras to crash upon the Slavid heads. Men and women of the Romoi were pushed off of the walls with spear and axe, and they scattered amongst their houses of stone. And Slaves and Serves made for them, and slaughter was wholesale. And little quarter was given, and wonton cruelty was had. The city burned with a thousand cries. But many of the Romoi and Neanders of the city took to seek refuge in their robust stone temples. There was a temple of each in the city. The temple of the Neanders was smaller so it was the first to be breached.
As so thus the Slaves went to the nearby field where they kept their kine, and they unearthed the pillar of the god of death. And they used it as a battering ram to break the doors of the temple in which the Neanders hid. And despite their Slavish cries, they were made dead or servant by the whim of the warriors. The stronghold in which many of the people along with the council hid was given to the Slaves by cooks and servants which were sold to the city. And another wholesale slaughter of the day ensued, and the arms of the Slaves ached from all the hacking of flesh. And many Romoi were cast off of the walls. And the archon was struck upon the skull with a spathion by Petrunka, chipping his circlet, which he clutched, spilling his brain. Petrunka took thus the chipped gold circlet as his own. Finally the temple of the Dead-God which was made of stone, was set alight from the roof down. And the people cried and tried to flee but the roof collapsed upon them, and none tried to help those trapped within. Petrunka looked upon the heaps of mangled Romoi corpses in the streets of his city and presumed their souls gone to mokrъlъ where they would forever suffer suspended in viscous garum. And thus all the Romoi of the city were made into slave.
Άρχων
And once he was given the chipped crown of an archon he begun for to govern with a manner taken from the Romoi. He learned from them and took what was best of their war and organisation and he begun to implement it. And he begun to become like the autocrat of the old city. Petrunka made the new city guards wear ovoid shields, marked with the saltaire rune of their Dead-God. Which was supposed to protect them from the sword strikes of their foes. And they carried long spears. And helms with steel crests. And they were made to watch from the walls of their city, and the gatehouses for trespassers. And he had a fortress built for himself upon the rubble of the fire claimed temple. And to it added a wooden terem, which had a bridge connecting to his bed chambers. And there he had his wives and concubines. Some of the Romoi yet still lived amongst them. At the edges of the city. Those were left to tend to their own matters and weren't disturbed, but took to live on the edge of this new polity of Petrunka's. Petrunka however, the older he grew the more he grew fond of the Dead-God's faith. The more he carried his symbol on his neck. And the more he deliberated on it. In his youth he carried out raids and set out on campaigns with his hosts. And they did much in his days against the Sloven whom settled not so far from Petrunka's realm. And the Serves begun to whisper among themselves that Petrunka, in his youth, would go for to hunt dragons just like god Kresnik did. And yet there were still many of Slaves who remembered Petrunka as a young boy and they did not recall it being so. But the Serves insisted. And they would say "Petrunka would go with Kresnik, and he'd eat the flesh of the hunted dragons". In their custom Kresnik was a god-hero, who stalked the edges of the known world and would hunt dragons. Himself being the deity of fire. As anyone knew that a campfire drew a cricle of light about itself, a natural border in which Kresnik stalked. And the sun was like a great fire upon the edges of which Kresnik stalked. And he was a great god, and that of flame and of glory. And his head was topped with golden elk horns and for that they hailed him gold-horn at times, and yet still, he was a farmer, which they greatly admired. But as it pertained to Petrunka, some would say that he couldn't have done these things for the all knew him and were raised with him. For which they were mocked, for it was obvious it's not the same Petrunka they speak about! For Petrunka was born to the Slave a hero. For he had a pronounced suborbital ridge, and he combed his moustache with a golden comb. And there was a maiden named Rada whom, claiming seniority over Petrunka, said she had him as a boy. And that she took his innocence from him and boasted knowing much of his privacy. Which she took pleasure in unavailing. They'd say that by Petrunka they meant their new archon, not some smutty Slave! And there was a Romoi farmer named Erigeron who claimed young Petrunka stole plums from his tree. And he caught him and he beat him sore, and he saw Petrunka cry. The Serves would reply, this can't be our Petrunka! For our, the dragon slayer Petrunka remembers the old ways, the ways of Plut! And Petrunka was crowned the archon of the city. And both Slaves and Serves hailed him. And as the Slaves and Serves mingled, and their tongues became one again, they begun to call themselves one name. As in many years how they went after Petrunka the archon to do war, they were unified. And they had much plunder and much captives and adventures under Petrunka. And they took some customs of the Slaves and some of the Serves. Half of each, "Sla" of the Slaves, and the "erv" which they morphed into "ver" for it was a formula more common to their tongue. And since then they were known as the Slaver-men. And under Petrunka they did much war against the Sloven of the Kresnik mountains. Petrunka ruled them well under that chipped metal circlet smelling of spilled brains. And he was the foremost of them. Yet there were signs upon the heavens. As many years into Petrunka's reign a great period of rain came, wrecking their crop. And nighthawks sung their solemn songs, and their wet feathers stunk up the air. For the Obrinn were here. They emerged from the white void. And watched the city from a hillock nearby. And the Obrinn sent envoys to the city. And they were listened to by Petrunka the archon. They were the men of Plut. But they appeared wild to Petrunka. Their soggy shirts, the soil on their hands, the wild manes and beards seemed foreign and repulsive. Their hair black, their clothes dirty and lacking luster. Even more so than the Sloven against which he made war, and which in custom and dress differed from the Slaver-men still. And they smelled different too. Even the lilting manner in which they spoke was little lispier than what Slaver-men were used to. And the wan Plutonians bid the people of the city bow before the Obrinn lords and the Qur khan. But Petrunka, the brazen old man now, stood up to them and screamed upon with all the power in his lungs, and of that he had much for in his day he was a passing good diver. That in these halls there are no Obrinns, and that they are to be known as Uarkhoni. And not to rouse his anger we shall call them so from now on... All the necessary preparations were made. Spears honed and arrows stashed to fight against the Uarkhoni host and their serviles. Plutonians played on pipes and bowed on their odd instruments of musty wood, their sad music to their Uarkhoni overlords as they pondered the possible avenues of the destruction of the city. Since the time they were left in Tar the Uarkhoni did increase their domain. The white fog of Plut spread. Not through strength of arms but influence, and so these musicians from a far off, you see, came to sing for them. They sang a tale of a fisher-warrior who in his youth came upon a fish woman, and made a wife of her. With her progeny he settled an estuary town that was named after him. And in their revelry seldom could one tell the Uarkhon from Plutonian apart, they were so much akin in speech and dress. Yet as the old king was practising his word strikes and seeing to his companions harnesses. The council of the Slaves as well as the council of the Serves were gathered in secret, for Petrunka did not like when many voices were raised. Each in their own personal deliberations came to the same conclusion. That Petrunka grew too much in strength. They took the city to their liking and they couldn't leave it now. They sent few strong lads with weapons to his abode. Even his guards aided them in this act faced with the reason of the council. They slew him in his bed. He slept there with his young concubine. They spared her from slaying as she run naked through the castle, screaming of murder all the while. And she was like a spirit Vila, and she run barefoot and naked a long time for none seemed to care that the archon was being butchered. And she was made odd since then. Petrunka however did not give his life cheaply. Armed but with his hands, with the strength of a bear fought all the assasins, and he gave each of them sores. Pierced score fold, he succumbed to the wounds. His body was wrapped in the now bloodied bedsheets in which he slept and they drove him off on a cart. But once they arrived at the camp of the Urakhoni they realised he wasn't fully slain, and they had to pin him to the bottom of the cart with a spear again. And they kicked him sore off of the wagon. And they threw him against the wagon and hacked his head off by one of its the wheels with a slashing sword. And it wasn't until then that they were certain, that Petrunka was slain and would not return, unless in a form of some twisted ǫpyrь. And they feared there wasn't a rock big enough to lock Petrunka's brazen jaw. But they were leaving his head to the Uarkhoni so it was their problem, and theirs to deal with along their custom. Petrunka's head was sent to the Uarkhon khan, and he had it turned by his foremost artisan into a gilded cup. Yet the city did not fall. Qur khan sipped from this mesocephalic goblet as goods streamed from the city, and many cohorts of Slaver-men were mustered to his service. And together they marched unto the great Romoi cities in the East. But then came a time when horse-plague ravaged Plut and the nearby lands, and the Uarkhoni were thus undone and swallowed up by the people they once oppressed. Some said that it was Petrunka's malignant spirit that conjured up the disease. When the nightingales sung over the southbound kurgan where the gilded head of the hero with a pronounced suborbital ridge did rest, at a horse-lord's side, eternally joined. In nemc silence both made slave to one almighty God.
