Chương 308: 3.9

Jewel's musing on Alder's song the previous day was banished as they came around the bend to witness their next destination. She could not help but gawk as she finally cast her gaze on the largest city in Viznove. Kaeketeh was the capital, the beating heart of the southern Ridgetails. Empowered by its place where all land routes from further north of the central vault pillar could converge and begin their transit by water south, or start the land route further north.

But here was the gate city by which the deep subterranean lakes and rivers of the world joined the southern half of the Ridgetails to vaults beyond. The trade in the Ridgetails from north to south might meet in Kaeketeh. But Here was where nearly the entire world passed into and out of Viznove. All by one harbor. A teeming and sprawling place that no Count or Countess of Viznove had tried to hold directly. That had remained eerily independent since the time of the Tyrant War.

And it was not always a vassal of Viznove. Even to this day Jewel could see in some of the rising minarets the claim that Magarska and its predecessors had put upon the city generations ago. Many of them glinting well past the city with signal fires in deep caverns, shining out of the dark above the waters underground like glowing teeth. Light's End was a strange place. At a distance it was a city which in character reminded Jewel of the Capital of the Realm.

Like Burning Depths Ford it was a city built upon the place where water flowed from a vault into the depths of the earth. Like the Capital of Cantor Reborn it was a teeming place of ship travel, barges and stone structures built high in rising tiers. However where Burning Depths Ford was settled in the very nader of its vault with multiple rivers overlapping via canal, Light's End was built up along either shore of the Vah and up into the cliffs of the southern Ridgetail's Vaultwall.

It also was considerably taller than letters had led Jewel to believe. Even when taking up all the space of both banks the city crawled up the southern cliffs and carved back into the stone of the Vault Wall itself. Forming the arch of a colossal and extensively engraved bridge of city terraces. The majority of the sun that touched its inhabitants was taken up in those buildings connecting the east and west banks of the Vah. It made Light's End resemble nothing if not a kind of gaping maw of a city.

Perched in place so it could drink eternally from the largest river in The Ridgetails. Endlessly swallowing water and vomiting forth the glowing forms of cave sloops and their guided cargo barges. Glinting and dazzling with its lantern towers and light houses deep in the dark throat calling distant travelers to its harbors at all hours night and day. It was a dazzling expanse not quite like anything Jewel had seen. But there was no time to marvel.

They had already been noticed on their approach south alongside the Vah. Light's End's west gate was bristling with a welcoming formation of guard a good hour before they were upon it. Two lines of men keeping the road clear of a teeming mass of people to either side. Armored footmen in the city's starkly bright colors stood at attention well before the gates.

Flanked by a crowd of curious onlookers which Jewel could only assume were peasants and poorer freemen crowding in at the edges or peering from windows of their houses. Much like Viznove's other cities, the walls were well since overgrown by buildings. All decorated in the same colors as the guard even here! White, yellow and a vibrantly bright single line of imperial cantor purple on display in every man's tabard and at each house's door in pennant form!

As they passed the crowds already waiting outside the city proper the guard began to march in time with her own entourage. Moving deeper down the streets ahead of her. Calling out her name.

"Make way for the Countess Jewel of Rochford! Make way for the Shining Wyrm of Viznove!" It was all a bit much. Sending the traffic of the city scattering from the main road they took uphill. Those that lingered and crowded as she passed gave Jewel her first impression of Light's End, most of them had a common Ridgetail look. But there were foreign colors of hair and skin mixed and mingled with the paler crowd.

The smell of their bodies wafted up to her with the not unpleasant aroma of men and women that had labored and sweated hard. And so many more pennants and banners in the same rich hues! It seemed far too ostentatious for Jewel's taste. This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there. They were practically giving her a triumph simply for arriving! Had Paul not gotten through to the Lord Mayor Bortond?

Or was his word that Jewel simply wished to arrive with minimal ceremony ignored despite his place as Count Consort and her harbinger? She'd exchanged letters with the Lord Mayor but honestly besides his arrival a few years ago to kneel and swear fealty to her upon his 'election' she had hardly dealt with the man before. His family or one of three others had held the mayorship of Light's End for close to two hundred years by records. But they involved themselves little in the affairs of the rest of Viznove.

According to the records Light's End paid well in excess of the tithe for all four of its noble families to avoid service in war. The Barony was also quick in giving Grain, a kind of dried salted fish and use of its merchant fleet of Cavern sloops when war called for their support. But in levies the city and its lands both along the Vah and deeper into the caves of the Sunless waters gave next to nothing. The Bathory family had been content with this arrangement for their entire rulership of Viznove.

More recently it was in fact a fortunate boon to the wealth of Light's End that had enabled Viznove to offer up loans to the High King of Cantor Reborn under Jewel's predecessor. And seeing the wealth of the place before her own eyes Jewel could finally believe what had until now only been receipts and accounts from Adelyne. While Kaeketeh was growing rich and overflowing as the first stop for Wyrmspun wool to the rest of the world by water? Light's End teemed and glittered with the riches it had amassed.

All traffic and trade by the Vah had to pass under the carved arch of this one port before it could reach another Vault. And ruling over both common and noble law in Light's End was the Lord Mayorship. A strangely changing position handed back and forth between the nobles with 'elections' among the guild heads and noble families. As if the city was some unimportant hamlet electing a headman to save their lord's attention. Not the vast edifice of wealth that it was.

Their road into the city passed stone built towers and complexes, then rose in gentle switch backs of polished stone hewn from the cliffs itself. The way softened by centuries of feet. Sweeping arches wrought both by skilled masons and old Cantor sorcery intermingled and wove in tiered layers. And everywhere was the festive mood and the shining, lavish colors of the city! White, Yellow and that exorbitantly rich streak of violet on pennants, over windows and at every gate.

Surrounding Jewel on all sides in opulence. Even some of the fair merchants dispensing smoked fish on a stick out of carts had the color on display! The yellow made her feel like she was being followed by a swarm of particularly wealthy bees. All rising up with her until finally they reached a building which anywhere else would have been a Keep or maybe a Temple but here in Light's End was the house of office for the city Mayorship. An edifice of old cantor foundations lavished in additions.

Covered now in intricate carvings of stone heraldry. Painted in brilliant lime white, edged in gold and then accented in rich imperial purple. Not Even the Blood Countess before Jewel had ever done something so blatant anywhere in her home. Not even the Capital of the Realm seemed so insistent on displaying its wealth in color. It made the Black and Bloodred banners of the County of Viznove almost drab by comparison. A simple banner hanging beside that decadent profusion of color.

There to greet them was Paul of course, in his dress armor. Black stained iron was traditional for his family's and the county's colors. With an understated crimson accent in the cloth. His face strained to stillness in that way he got when he knew Jewel was not going to appreciate the news he brought. And there beside him, a man that was perhaps half a foot taller than her husband. Face flushed pink despite the constant cool breeze which blew through the city at these heights.

The Mayor was dressed in a billowing of bundled finery that seemed excessive even for the opulence of the High King's court. The imperial purple soaked through her own Wyrmspun wool on almost every inch. Leaving only a few streaks of sun bleached white wool and gold embroidery not drenched in the color. His head was fitted into a purple (of course), white and yellow affair that if Jewel was being honest looked a bit like he was wearing a giant dyed bulb of garlic on his head.

But shining in faux flame was most certainly the most expensive ornament of the ensemble. That last absurd touch was the staggeringly large feather, as long as his arm. Sewn into his hat like the stem on an apple. The amber red tines of the thing flared and sparked with tongues of actually visible sun yellow flame. Jewel did not know from what lairspawn or divine beast the feather came but it was likely worth ten times over its weight in gold at least. It also looked absurd.

This was the second time Jewel met the Lord Baron Mayor Bortond of Light's End. But he had not worn anything near as garish as this in Kaeketeh. And she was pretty sure the sweating man before her had put on quite a few pounds of weight since last she met him too. None of which smelled like muscle.

"Greetings! Countess Jewel of Rochford, I offer my hospitality and house as your humble servant and mayor of our fine port." At least he dipped his head to bow to her. The move waving that absurd and obviously sorcerous feather in a bobbing waggle as he did. Jewel could feel the heat and smell the scent of burning hair wafting off of it. Ah so that was why he looked half cooked. What an absurd man to dress himself so uncomfortably.

However Jewel was a refined lady and she did not offer comment to his choices in fashion.

"I thank you for your ostentatious welcome, Lord Mayor." She would discuss this with Paul to find out why the man had insisted on making such a production about her arrival. The expense in dye alone would have been astounding, there must have been thousands of those banners she passed. But first the work of a Countess continued.