Through the last months of the previous year there has been a rise in missing ships from Alanian ports. Mostly trade ships flowing from Berlengas have not made their returns as expected in growing numbers. Eight have now gone missing, with no explanation found. Piracy is beginning to be suspected, as the last major raiders of the region, the former dynasty of Frostheim was silenced decades ago during their brash assault on maritime commerce of many small and large realms alike.
These days the realm of Balurmark, it’s successor is known for it’s amicable and agrarian nature, after the scars of Cennewethian rape and plunder, and the brutal but just sacking of Astorian legions.
Ostara 490
What was thought to have been a bad storm or navigational errors has most certainly been confirmed to be piracy, as washed up survivors in Alanian shores and ships slowly being lost near their shores has confirmed that with the rich and full holds of the southern trade, bandits of the sea have seen fit to stake the contents of honest merchants for their own plunder.
Their size, unknown, their ports of call, mysterious, and yet they exist, and brutalize the isolated and distant cogs and hulks of slipping between the shore and horizons of southeast Yevia.
Ships that have been missing for over two months:
Alanian: 1
Alpan: 1
Portucalense: 1
Silitonian: 2
Astorian: 4
Pestinese: 1
Brethon: 1
Travelers passing through the western roads have begun to remark upon a curious tightening of guards near Pinsicalvo, and of a site there that none but sworn men are permitted to approach. No banners fly, no market has grown around it, yet carts come and go with regularity, and skilled hands are said to be gathered under royal protection. From this, the usual guesses have followed.
Some say it is merely another storehouse, though few storehouses require such silence. Others claim the Prince of Portucalense has gathered tinkers and learned men together to fashion devices concerned with time itself—measures of hours more precise than bells or shadows. These accounts come secondhand, from those who have spoken to dockmasters, scribes, and craftsmen turned away at the gate. What is agreed upon is little more than this. The Crown has taken an interest in regularity. Ships are said to load and depart with fewer disputes, clerks to keep longer tables, and overseers to speak of “the hour” with unusual confidence. No devices have been seen openly, and none offered for sale, which has only deepened speculation among merchants and guilds alike.
The Church, it is noted, has raised no protest, which some take as reassurance and others as cause for curiosity. Whatever is being fashioned near Pinsicalvo is spoken of as orderly rather than wondrous—meant to serve offices, harbors, and labor rather than courts of marvel. For now, the gates remain closed, and the guards remain firm. Yet as with all such works, word travels faster than wagons. Whether these instruments will bring clarity, control, or something yet unnamed is unclear. Outsiders can only watch the roads, listen to the bells, and wonder why time itself has become a matter of royal concern.
In the Kingdom of Alpa, the crown has made several decisive decisions to consolidate and charter further development within the Weslifian realm. The moves of Kingdom are ones not marked or predicated by conquest, but instead by institution and foresight.
In a formal session of the court, His Majesty ordered the granting of several new charters for guilds across the realm, extending the Crown’s patronage. Guilds for clothmakers, shipwrights, tilemakers, distillers, carvers and joiners, and glassblowers are just some of the fine crafts that are receiving royal charters, representing a deliberate broadening of Alpa’s productive base.
Royal administrators in Alpa’s major settlements made clear the charters are not mere honours, but are to be instruments of the future for Alpa. Through them, the crown will seek to bind skill, reputation, and commerce into stable institutions, ensuring that Alpan goods are not only known for their increasing abundance, but a continued reputation of high quality across Weslif and Yevia.
In a decree that soon followed, the Alpan Crown also announced a set of far-reaching land reforms, one that openly acknowledges the traditions of the past and the necessities of the future and the tension that comes with it. For many generations, Alpa’s heartland has been worked as a patchwork of smaller plots, sufficient for the Kingdom on the edge of the known world. With the recent decree, it is now declared that this time has passed.
Following completion of this years’ harvest, Crown and noble lands in several of the most fertile provinces of the Kingdom hundreds of plots will be reformed into larger estates that will be given to and administered by members of the Alpan gentry. Commoners working these plots this year will still be tied to the lands - regardless of association to the crown or or not.
Taken together, these measures reflect a clear choice and direction. Alpa is no longer content to rely on chance or tradition alone. Through expanded guilds, estates, granaries and the riverlands, the Crown is laying the foundations for further prosperity.
Most merchants in Pestin are not given to grand declarations. We weigh, we tally, and we wait to see if a thing holds. For that reason, I will say only this: the Duke’s recent proposal regarding the Order of Merchants and Seafarers appears sensible.
Those of us who keep the guild halls know well the strain of long voyages. A ship may sail under Pestinese colors, yet once she clears the horizon she becomes a small island unto herself, cut off from familiar hands, speech, and comforts. Months pass. Crews scatter in foreign ports. News arrives late, if at all. When trouble comes, it often comes alone.
The idea that a Pestinese sailor might step ashore in a distant harbor and find a door marked for him, offering food he recognizes, a bench to rest upon, a healer who speaks his tongue, or simply a place to ask honest questions is no small thing. It is not charity. It is maintenance.
We are told these Chapterhouses will not trouble the locals nor preach where preaching is unwelcome. That is wise. Trade thrives on good manners. Let our faith be present, but quiet. Let our assistance be offered to our own, without spectacle. I am also pleased that these houses will gather notes on winds and tides. Any captain who says the sea cannot be learned is a liar or a fool. Knowledge, patiently collected, is as valuable as any cargo.
No merchant I know expects miracles from this endeavor. But if a sailor avoids ruin because he found shelter, if a captain makes better time because a tide was better understood, if Pestinese ships return home a little less worn than they departed, then the effort will have earned its cost. Sometimes the best policies are not those that promise glory, but those that keep the wheels turning and the men alive. On that count, this proposal deserves a fair trial.
They told us it was a new sort of plough, but to my eye it did not look like a miracle when it first came down the road. More iron on the front, a strange curve to the blade, heavier than what my father used and his father before him. I remember thinking it would only tire the oxen faster. Some fancy prince from Crecy had invented it amidst his books and candles; as if that were what made true farmers.
But we tried it, because the steward said we were to. Because the Baron would find out if we didn’t.
The first thing I noticed was how clean the earth turned. The old plough scratched and broke the soil, but this one lifted it, folded it over itself like a good loaf of bread. The furrows came out deeper and straighter, and the wet clay that usually clung to the blade slid off on its own. By the end of the day, we had covered more ground than usual, and the oxen were no worse than they’d been before.
Come planting, the seed took better. Come summer, the rows stood thicker. Not by a marvel’s worth, no songs will be sung about it, but enough that you could see it without counting. A fuller field, fewer thin patches. When the harvest came in, the granary doors shut a little later than they used to.
What pleased me most was not the extra grain, but the feeling that the land was being worked properly. Fewer broken handles. Less wasted strength. The smith who came with it showed us how to keep the blade true, and he did not charge us more than fair. In fact, none of my neighbours were charged more than fair.
They say the same plough has gone to Melosia, where the King’s brother rules. I like that. If the house that governs us eats from the same sort of fields, then perhaps they will remember what a bad year feels like.
I don’t know about universities or dynasties. For all the talk of a great Voltigeur kingdom that will come one day, my people care not in our small corner in troispilier, in my father’s father’s time, Charmesia was free and independent. These matters are all talk to us common-folk working the land. I know this: when winter comes, my bins are fuller than they were last year, and my sons talk about taking a second field instead of leaving it fallow. For a farmer, that is enough to call something a blessing.