Lore of Eternal Shadow: The Fugitive King

Chapter Six

Zicone, Runa, Lauren, Jannick, and Alyssa cleaned up their most recent campsite quickly. They were a few hours' walk from Narbon now. The mountains had long since disappeared behind them with the exception of Mount Darin, the tip of which could be spotted on a clear day. They had crossed about five-hundred miles in their journey but still the thirty-five mile high mount poked just over the horizon. Now that they were near the largest city in Galgaroth, the fields were tilled and growing all manner of edibles for the big city with precious few forests dividing them. Around the time for their Morning Tea, they beheld the great fortified city of Narbon at last, the capital of the Narbonese Empire.

Zicone looked at the shining city of white before them; so many towers that seemed to gleam stretched for a sky that stood in stark contrast. His eyes set on the Palace of the King... a place that he had lived in once. The high domed complex loomed in the center, the white marble structure not supported with the techniques of man alone. The Council of the Regency resided there now, but they only used a modest meeting hall that technically wasn't even part of the complex.

The city's buildings convened in dense clumps with many blocks cumulating in towers ten or twenty stories high. The city was almost a great forest of white marble in the center of a vast country of plains, not unlike the green forests that occasionally popped up. At the city center, the great River Mor met with Ballista River. River Mor had long been the main vein in and out of Narbon while the Ballista River flowed up a day's journey to Lake Gunsten, providing clean water and retreats for the rich. Surrounding the city was a great series of walls in grey stone. As the party came closer to one of the gates, the buildings within disappeared behind their walls. Soon the height of the wall even obscured the greatest of the city's towers.

The five passed through the gate. None of the guard squad spoke a word. Judging by the long stare that one of the guards gave them, she wouldn't have exchanged pleasantries. Even a decade after the demise of King Zanrai, things were uneasy. Politics and successions: Zicone and Lauren had both had to live with these things until they managed to escape. The cold and cruel division of Zanrai's powers, treasures, and wonders amongst the oligarchs and weasels had made Zicone numb to the pain of his parents' deaths.

Not much had been done with the Palace after the king and queen had been killed eleven years ago. It was obvious even a mile distant as Zicone saw the great castle down one of Narbon's main streets. The Palace looked dirty; the grounds looked overgrown with weeds. Narbon couldn't justify keeping up the place without a king living there. Zicone coldly wondered if they'd even bothered cleaning up his parents' blood from the family solar. It would've been dried now...

Alyssa guided the others toward the hall were the Summit was to take place. It was hard to navigate through the crowds down the main market street. Jannick had never seen this many people at one time—and he was the most travelled of his siblings. The building holding the Summit was on something of a central forum. Jannick and Runa had never witnessed such a grand square.

Taking up one side was the grand entrance to the Royal Palace, a massive marble complex of buildings rising up from the ground in grand domes. There was a balcony that hung high over the square, usually for the King to announce his decrees. The Council of the Regency met in a small round hall on the left corner, almost discarded from the rest of the complex. The other three sides of the square were populated by great halls, temples, museums, and even shops all in white marble and everyone was attempting to reach one building or another. People of all walks of life dwelled here: students, urchins, soldiers, politicians, shopkeepers, peasants, farmers, mages, sages, beggars, and village idiots. Jannick would be hard pressed to find a more suitable cross-section of the human species.