Opokomees Eeahnos wept, openly and unashamedly, when he set eyes to Thoheeks Grahvos astride his tall horse. Even after the thoheeks had dismounted and warmly embraced the old man, kissing him on both his scarred cheeks, the tears continued to flow down those furrowed cheeks and the still-powerful body shook with sobs.
But when a brace of log drums began to boom insistently from the palisaded village, the oldster gasped, “Pahteeos, send a galloper to Komos and tell him that our dear lord, Thoheeks Grahvos, has at last returned to his lands and us, his people. He must have seen the warband below, and thought the hold to be under attack again.”
“At once, my lord Grandfather.” The boy spun on his heel and raced away, the crossguard of the sword slung across his back clanking rhythmically against the nape-piece of his helmet. Both dismay and pride of race sprang up in Grahvos when he saw that the twelve-year-old child already bore the scars and exuded the bearing of a veteran warrior. This boy’s youth was yet another thing that greedy, grasping, selfish thoheeksee had robbed and stolen from the land and the people, and it must not ever happen again, he and the others must do all within their power to see that the land never again became ripe for such, nor was Grahvos the only one of the thoheeksee in that party to make similar vows to himself during that terrible journey from Thrahkohnpolis to Mehseepolis.
The detachment of lancers that Grahvos had sent out ahead had delivered his messages, and the way was prepared for the Council before its arrival in the new capital. The Mehseepolis ducal palace was roomy enough for most functions and lodgings, and more room was provided by the adjoining citadel. Grahvos’ family and household were already on the way to his alternate seat, well guarded by their retainers and the lancers.
Inside the thick, high walls, the councilors found the steep ways of the city in a riotous tumult of celebration of the return of their thoheeks. If any of the noblemen had before doubted that Gahvos’ people loved as well as respected him, such doubts could not have survived all that they saw and heard that afternoon.
By the time that Captain Thoheeks Mahvros and his warband arrived at Mehseepolis in company with the loaned Confederation troops, work had already been begun, on marginal land below the city, on permanent installations to house and otherwise provide for an army of modest proportions. Mahvros made the thirteenth affirmed thoheeks for the new council, but the welcome addition of the trained, well-armed men he had brought with him assured that he would not be the last nobleman to appear at Mehseepolis for affirmation of his titles.
As the months rolled along, a succession of thoheeksee, komeesee, vahrohnohsee, mahrkeeseeohsee and evenopokomeesee came from near and from far—from very far, in some cases—all of them with sizable and well-armed retinues in these unsettled times, all of them seeking to ingratiate themselves with this new government and to be granted confirmation or reconfirmation of titles and lands and cities they had inherited or assumed or conquered.
In some cases, there was more than just a single claimant to a few of the richer holdings, and the disputations over these gave more than a few sleepless nights to the Council until, finally, they came up with a formula for most decisions of this nature:
Sons, grandsons, brothers and nephews, in that order, were to have precedence over adopted sons, the husbands of daughters, granddaughters, sisters or nieces, but in any case, no claimant would be confirmed or reconfirmed to any title or holding unless he was willing to accept and to serve the new order (in the case of thoheeksee, swearing most formally to never seek to make himself or any other thoheeks king) so long as he should live. Immediately upon returning to his lands, a confirmed noble must assemble those men whose overlord he was and take from them written, witnessed oaths to the Council and the Confederation, it being made abundantly clear to each that his own confirmation would not be considered as final until Council was in receipt of said oaths.
The wealthier magnates were persuaded by fair means and foul to make “loans” to the new government—in gold, silver, grain, wine or whatever they just then had the most of—the value of which was to be deducted from their future taxes along with the sizable interest.
Thoheekseewere all urged to set their home affairs in order, then return to sit on Council with their peers, that they might be certain that their particular interests and desires were served. They and all of the others, save only those presently threatened severely or themahrkeesee-ohsee, were urged to send any surplus troops to Mehseepolis to fill out the ranks of the army that Council was building to safeguard them all.
But it was pointed out that the lands were not to be stripped to provide spearmen, for it was considered imperative by Council that an orderly agricultural cycle be reestablished as soon as possible and that all arable land be put back into production, orchards and vineyards be replanted, herds be built back up, towns and villages be rebuilt and made safe for repopulation, outlaws and bandits be exterminated, roads be laid again and maintained.
And slowly, fitfully, it began to come together, after a fashion. Sitheeros, Thoheeks of the triple duchy of Iron Mountain, returned to Mehseepolis with enough troops to scour the countryside along his route for bandits, arriving with sack on sack of decomposing heads and two wainloads of weapons, armor and other assorted loot taken from those bandits so unlucky as to be swept up by him. He also contributed to the army a third elephant cow which had had a modicum of war training, but which had proved difficult to manage since herfeelahks had died of a summer fever.
Nor was this service and the elephant the last or even the least of Sitheeros’ generosity. He brought for the army a full and fully equipped regiment of pikemen, a half-squadron of lancers, some three thousand keelohee of cornmeal, several wainloads of the famous and fiery Iron Mountain brandy, additional wainloads of cured pork, barrels of pickled vegetables and not a few pipes of a middling wine. To the Council, he presented some twelve pounds of gold and two hundred of minted silverthrahkmehee.
“Ten pounds of the gold, the soldiers and the elephant are my personal contribution, gentlemen,” he told the council. “The silver—well, the most of it—the bulk of the corn, the pork and the wine and vegetables are fromvarious of my vassals. The brandy is from my brother-in-law, Ahrkeekomees Kohnyos. All of the folk of Iron Mountain are most pleased that there never will be another kingship to breed squabblings and usurpations and ruinous civil wars. Now, true, save for creating endless and rich market for our manufactories, our farms and the like, the chaos that has so torn this land has had little effect on us, for all of the other combatants rightly considered us too tough a nut to crack, but we would all as lief see and live with a slower, steadier market and a land in peace than with all that has gone before of recent years.”
In his retinue, Thoheeks Sitheeros had brought along skilled master weaponsmiths, along with their specialized tools and a goodly amount of semi-worked metal, and these were quickly put to work to properly outfit the army, allowing the long-overworked local smiths to get some sleep and then return to more mundane tasks for the nonmilitary populace of the duchy.
A year after the capitulation of what was by then left of Zastros’ host in Karaleenos saw a council of twenty thoheeksee ruling a bit over two thirds of the onetime Kingdom of the southern Ehleenoee, all but the very largest of the bandit and outlaw bands extirpated within the lands under Council’s sway, roads being re-laid, towns and villages here and there being rebuilt by their new occupants, crops ripening in reclaimed fields, the ferocious packs of wild dogs mostly eradicated and the cattle rounded up and fattening in reclaimed pasture-lands.