Berra — Politics 01
????, Fire Season
Context
While waiting for Rajar’s armour to arrive, so they can go fight Chaos properly dressed, Berra and Rajar have a conversation about the future in Sartar. Just after [[[s01:session-28|Session 28]]]
Events
“RAWR!!!!! i hope they brought all the other little axes. They’ll get lonely.”
“Yes, it would be bad if the axes got lonely… No doubt you remembered to order the axes. ‘Don’t bring the one with the notched handle. It’s ill. Leave that one tucked up in its cot.'”
“I had to have my best axe repaired. One of those horrible lunars damaged it.” Rajar sighs.
“That is unfair.”
“Totally. And then he teleported out just before his head came off. I will remember that one.”
“I’m impressed you can remember a face in the heat of battle. But I also recall you remembering Onjur’s in the heat of the market.”
“That one yes. I mark foes that escape me. And my axe was just about to bite through his neck. Onjur too. Perhaps it is a Praxian thing. Our tribes and clans move so much we often meet with new friends and foes. Your people stay put in these mountains. Your lands are fertile and your herds do not need to move.”
“Aaah, yes. I remember words better than faces.”
“Your neighbors do not move much. Remembering details is important. Who said what and when. In Prax it’s more immediate. We meet. We raid or trade and we move on. Till the lunars came.”
“Odd, because I spent a lot of my life moving. But I was always thinking about home. Home is a place as well as the people.”
“For your people. Mine is perhaps the tribe. Or the shadow of the Blox. Or the plains of Prax. Or Stormbull’s breath on my face as the hot wind blows. Or this axe and a foe to kill. I have spent more time standing still in one place since I met you all at whitewall than ever in my life. Stormbull has no home.”
“For my people, yes. For me. But I loved walking in Prax. I felt it could go on forever, and so could I. That’s the only time I haven’t really cared about the Where.”
“I love the big skies. It’s a bit claustrophobic here sometimes. Did you ever see the Stormbull*?
The wastes are different. Bigger but you can’t see it because of the dust and haze
* (( He manifests as a huge stationary cloud over northern Prax.))
“The big cloud, that isn’t Orlanth? I had him pointed out to me, but we didn’t get close. Marched there, fought, got fever, marched back here, met Mellia. The big skies are good, but I like the big ground. I’d forgotten I can run. How can you forget a thing like that?”
“((orlanth cloud is over sartar, Urox is Prax)) “
Prax gives you space.
Perhaps we’ll go there after we kill all these chaos things. It’s good we came to your people’s lands.
“(( Yeah. The one that isn’t Orlanth. Although I think in this game the Orlanth cloud is 3000k wide, at least according to us. ))”
“Perhaps. Argrath was all the way over here. I don’t know what’s going to happen if he’s successful and Kallyr is. I was given a task by Venna that was right over at the border.”
“Likewise Venna gave me a task. Which technically still isn’t really complete”
“What was it? Can I help?”
“It’s ensuring Stormbull is correctly honoured in Whitewall. Which means ending those rift’s. Which means healing sartar. Which meant healing Kellyr. So now I build a shrine to Stormbull here in Melias temple and another in Whitewall.”
“That’s a big task. It’s also a way of putting Praxian effort into Sartar, though.”
“I see it as strengthening our allies. I’m mildly surprised we’re not in the field against the legions”
“Not Fire season yet. We’re going to have to fight them but they are not all professional soldiers either, right? And they need feeding. I mean, last year all the fighting was in the right seasons. But last year seems long ago already.”
“Oh yes… Really we should raid Tarsh.”
“I think it may have a lot of Lunars in right now. Where we right then depends on Tennebris and the High Sword, I think. Then Tarsh will be empty or we will be broken.”
“I think raiding and scouting Tarsh is the way to go. But that is my opinion and I am not high command. Likely Eril is…..”
Berra’s voice is respectful, careful. “He called up our Wyter. Made us. And he’ll be talking strategy with others who understand it. I’ll probably march with the Humakti. I haven’t been told yet, but I’m planning to offer my whole season to the temple, if I can’t find a better way.”
“The Stormbull temple in Boldholm would have me as part of their warband….but I think we might do more good as a group. It depends on if people wish to settle down and farm here.” A little sniff from Rajar.
“I think Mellia wanted to. I talked to her about Sartar, though, and the Lunar danger, and helping here by helping outside. I don’t think people will want to settle. I would have, only last year happened.”
“its good to found a temple to the white lady. As long as it has a shrine to Storm Bull of course”
“This is not a place I would make a shrine to Humakt. That should be places he is already strong, but most needed.”
“Whereas Stormbull watches over rural folk against…” Rajar gestures around. “This happens.”
“Death is everywhere. Mostly, it doesn’t need help.” Berra looks over the landscape and shudders.
“Yes.”
“Oh, if I die, my sister is my heir, and Mellia can have a thing I asked her to look after.”
“Having to have an actual temple to Storm Bull is a very bad thing.”
“Yes. I can imagine that… Well, I think I can… Well, I am trying not to.”
“Yes. Alda Chur has one for example. With a large number of mortuary votives.”
“Snakepipe Hollow.”
“Yes.” The thought makes Rajar shudder.
“Upland Marsh. There is a hill Sacred to Humakt there, which you can go to if you need to prove yourself. Hold it during the times it’s holy for, burn any corpses that you kill. That’s my Hollow. It’s a good way to die, if you want to.”
