Wayfarer (Wanderlust 2)

Chapter Nine

The next morning, the sky was clear, and they were on their way. Tanden sat up front with Jale, asking her questions, but now in Teltish so Soren could listen as well. He asked her questions about where they were, and the names of the types of trees they passed, but mostly he asked her questions about Tallenese culture. One thing kept coming back to mind.

"So, the whole eetorikey system." He heard Jale sigh but ignored it. "How did that start? Its just really unique. Is there some sort of religious reason? Maybe the gods—"

"The gods are brothers and sisters," Jale interrupted. "But there is a reason. Tallen Tiya used to be four separate kingdoms, each following the same gods, of course. Tiya, the Summer Kingdom, to the East. Tier, the Winter Queendom, to the North. Till, the Spring Queendom, on the Western Shore. And Tigo, the Fall Kingdom, in the middle. We're in Tigo now," she explained. "And the four countries were separate, but related, for many years.

"Till supplied the inner countries with fish and trade from the ocean, and was the richest, but the smallest of the countries. Tiya was the largest, and is a giant plain between the hills of Tigo, the lake and the mountains that border the whole country. It was also very wealthy, and provided the other countries with crops and livestock. Tigo is like this." She gestured at the trees around them. "Thick forests, mountains and hills. They provided lumber, and mined minerals and building materials. Tier was just as large as Tiya, but very sparsely populated and very mountainous. They did some mining as well, but really, Tier has always been the weakest of the four countries."

Tanden wasn't sure how this story was going to answer his question, but he was riveted anyway. "So why didn't another country just take the land?"

"No one wanted the land," Jale said. "But also, Tier's capital is very well protected by mountains, and it wasn't worth it. But then, hundreds of years ago, a young king, King Tallenarador, inherited Tiya. He looked at the other three countries and wondered why he couldn't control them all. Tiya was the biggest, and while not as rich as Till, was still quite wealthy. So he started the—" she paused. "In Teltish, it would be the War of the Seasons. He built an army and rode against Tigo, and then Till. He took them both easily and held them for an entire year, waiting for the snows to melt enough to move on Tier. He eventually took Tier, but he lost a lot. Scholars looking at the war now say that if he hadn't taken Tigo and Till first, and bolstered his army, he would have lost against Tier."

"But you said it was sparsely populated," Tanden said.

"Yes. But it wasn't the Tier people who almost defeated him, it was the weather. As if Tier herself was fighting them."

Tanden looked around at the snow, and found it very easy to believe that an army could have been defeated by the weather. "So then what happened?"

"Well, he wanted to turn the kingdoms into an empire, named after himself and his own kingdom, of course. So Tallen Tiya became the full name of the empire, and he named himself Emperor. But he wanted to link himself to the ruling families of each province, to prevent them from rising against him. So he sent out a call that each king or queen send him their eldest child. His wording was vague. Till and Tigo send him daughters. Tier sent him a son. Emperor Tallenarador married all three of them. He was the first eetorikey to marry multiple people and call them all his eetos."

"Nobody thought that was strange?"

"I'm sure people did," Jale said. "But he had just done the impossible and linked the kingdoms, so I don't think anyone was willing to speak up against him."

Soren cleared his throat to get their attentions. "Do you know if he married the prince for show, or did he like men?"

"I don't know. Different versions of the story tell it different ways. I once met a man from Tier who told me that the Tier Prince was actually the Emperor's favourite eeto. But I think every province twists the story that way. Growing up I was also told the Till Princess was the favourite. She bore him more children, and the royal family today is descended from her line."