Spring 67: embassies
Dearest Zann,
One of the first things Candur did once I became a corporal was to introduce me to the castellan. He’s called that even though this isn’t really a castle. He’s the guy who handles all the details of maintaining the buildings, including dealing with the guards. Which is us. Well, us and the Immaculate Zone, whoever or whatever that is.
The castellan is an elderly lauran man with a twinkling eye, named Senrralar. When Candur introduced me, he said, “This person is honoured to know you, Corporal Ybel.”
It caught me off guard and I blurted out, “Which person?” and he grinned, which I had never seen a lauran do before or since.
“The one who is speaking to you, young warrior,” he answered, getting a detail wrong. “This person hopes your service here is long.”
So I got him to like me, by accident, I guess. Seems like a decent old fellow. Candur and Delega (another new corporal) and I spend about an hour with him going over palace details; there’s a lot of coordinating with non-routine events we have to do that I never knew about before. I guess Sergeant Vasro can’t be expected to do it.
One thing I learned was about all the embassies in the palace. There are many kingdoms and things that border Crideon, and they all have their people here, and so do some of the other places who deal with Crideon a lot. They actually live here, in what’s called the Green Hotel, down sort of near the water. I never had any reason to go down there; we don’t guard the ambassadors. They have their own people for that. But there’s a little courtyard off to the side where you can see the banners of all the different countries and things who have embassies here. It took me a while to figure out what they all were. But I got it. There’s
the Kingdom of Amaydya (to our south)
the League of the River (allied city-states upstream of us on the Crideon River)
Jephiel (also to our south)
Rin Sharuane (cluster of ancient forbidden ruins to our east. Of course it has an ambassador)
the Raness (almost completely uninhabited wilderness, to our east)
New Omhelos (powerful city, nowhere near Crideon. Way to the north? West? Northwest?)
the Duchy of Marannum (to our southwest)
the Masters of Despair Swamp (to our west)
Gallan Island (independent island in the Crideon River, downstream from the city)
the Ias Empire (huge empire far to the south)
the Principality of Kiyet (to our west)
Peiland (to our north)
You’ve probably noticed that Brebitze isn’t on this list. I don’t know why they don’t have an embassy here. We’re not at war with them. We’ve got a huge border on our west with them. The city is full of Brebitzians on every kind of business. Doesn’t make sense to me.
Love,
Ybel
