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CHAPTER 1

Magic and Iron

I reic of the Plainspeople

I was eight and my father had taken me with him on a trip to the outpost on Franner’s Bend We had arisen before the dawn for the long ride; the sun was just short of standing at noon e finally saw the flag waving over the walls of the outpost by the river Once Franner’s Bend had been a military fort on the contested border between the Plainspeople and the expanding kingdom of Gernia Noell within the Gernian border, but souarded the gates, but the trade stalls set up against the mud-plastered stockade walls behind them dimmed their ferocity The trail we had followed fro the remains of one, leaving the shells gaping at the sky like empty tooth sockets in a skull I looked at them curiously as we passed, and dared a question “Who used to live here?”

“Plainspeople,” Corporal Parth said His tone said that was his full reply Rising early did not suit his tempera to get out of bed so early

I held ue for a time, but then the questions burst out of one? Why did they leave? I thought the Plainspeople didn’t have towns Was this a Plainspeople town?”

CHAPTER 1

Magic and Iron

I reic of the Plainspeople

I was eight and my father had taken me with him on a trip to the outpost on Franner’s Bend We had arisen before the dawn for the long ride; the sun was just short of standing at noon e finally saw the flag waving over the walls of the outpost by the river Once Franner’s Bend had been a military fort on the contested border between the Plainspeople and the expanding kingdom of Gernia Noell within the Gernian border, but souarded the gates, but the trade stalls set up against the mud-plastered stockade walls behind them dimmed their ferocity The trail we had followed fro the remains of one, leaving the shells gaping at the sky like empty tooth sockets in a skull I looked at them curiously as we passed, and dared a question “Who used to live here?”

“Plainspeople,” Corporal Parth said His tone said that was his full reply Rising early did not suit his tempera to get out of bed so early

I held ue for a time, but then the questions burst out of one? Why did they leave? I thought the Plainspeople didn’t have towns Was this a Plainspeople town?”

“Plainspeople don’t have towns, they left because they left, and the houses are broken because the Plainspeople didn’t kno to build any better than a termite does” Parth’s low-voiced answer i

My father has always had excellent hearing “Nevare,” he said

I nudged lanced at , and then said, “Most Plainspeople did not build permanent towns But some, like the Bejawi folk, had seasonal settlements Franner’s Bend was one of the the driest part of the year, for there would be grazing and water here But they didn’t like to live for long in one place, and so they didn’t build to last At other times of the year, they took their flocks out onto the Plains and followed the grazing”

“Why didn’t they stay here and build so permanent?”

“It wasn’t their way, Nevare We cannot say they didn’t kno, for they did build nificant to them, and those monuments have weathered the tests of time very well So Spindle But they did not overnood of their people And that hy they re folk, prey to the Kidona raiders who preyed on thearies of the seasons Now that we have settled the Bejawi and begun to teach thees and schools and stores, they will learn to prosper”

I pondered this I knew the Bejawi Some of them had settled near the north end of Widevale, s I’d been there once It was a dirty place, a randoe and offal scattered all around it I hadn’t been ihts, he said, “Sometimes it takes a while for people to adapt to civilization The learning process can be hard But in the end, it will be of great benefit to them The Gernian people have a duty to lift the Bejawi folk and help them learn civilized ways”

Oh That I understood Just as struggling with math would someday make me a better soldier I nodded and continued to ride at his stirrup as we approached the outpost

The town of Franner’s Bend had become a traders’ rendezvous where Gernian merchants sold overpriced wares to hooods and trinkets from the bazaar for the city ent there, with its barracks and headquarters, was still the heart of the town, but the trade had become the new reason for its existence Outside the fortified walls a little co up around the riverboat docks A lot of co out their existence with handouts froer comrades Once, I suppose, the fort at Franner’s Bend had been of strategic importance Noas little s were still raised daily with reat deal of ceremony and pomp But as my father told me on the ride there, duty at Franner’s Bend was a “soft post now,” a pluiven to older or incapacitated officers who did not wish to retire to their family homes yet