My Country

[Esterlen 4499]

 

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18 Harren’s Folly, 1741

 

Somewhere in the foothills of Mount Saint Catherine, the clinking sound of a shovel digging in the dirt echoed through a secluded crevice. It was an old, decrepit thing - both the shovel and its wielder - which both seemed to unearth less and less with every clink. This was no labourer on the payroll of Count de Reden. Instead, his frilled sleeves stained with brown-and-grey dust, his periwig askew and his jaw customarily slack, a Harrenite man-of-letters took the role of ditch-digger. 

 

It would be almost an hour before he found it, for he was far past his prime, but when the shovel gave the familiar clank of hitting its target he ushered a sigh of relief to know that it had not been uncovered. With some difficulty and ragged breathing, the solicitor dragged the chest out of the ground (a few earthworms and beetles coming along with it) while fumbling with the key he usually kept around his neck. The last time that key had been used, Godfrey II was emperor and reigning victorious over mankind. What he had buried here was enough to have him hanged in those times. He wondered if the worms had eaten it as he stuck the key in and flipped the latch, rusty and embossed with the letters ‘J.M.C’, open.

 

They had not. A crusty old inkpot, a series of different quills and a worn leather cylinder for carrying all sorts of scrolls and papers remained inside. Most impressively was the collection of parchments and books that had been organised within the chest. It was a practical portable museum to the cause of Joseph of Marna - he remembered that he had original copies of all of the infamous Circular Letters (except two, which were re-prints), a number of old poems, war plans and tomes. 

 

Years ago, even in defeat, he had been so proud to have fought in a rebellion, to the point where he had saved this memorabilia rather than burn it as most other revolutionaries had done. Now it just made him feel sick. 

 

Some of it had been written by his own hand. He had encouraged the rebel lord to put his name to his own writing, subjugating the fatal flaw of pride that had governed him since he was a young boy, and yet that same pride had not allowed him to destroy it. What the solicitor wanted to keep, he put in the messenger’s cylinder. What he didn’t, he would burn later, but he first took up the quill-and-inkpot, leaning down against the closed chest’s lid.

 

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To His Excellency, the Vice Chancellor, @NordLord

 

I am writing to you today to indicate my immediate resignation from the office of president pro tempore, and my imminent retirement from the Imperial Senate representing Kaedrin at the next round of elections of 1742. 

 

It has been my honour to serve the Empire in this capacity, however, in times of Nordling aggression, I am best placed to serve my country in ways other than that of a legislator for the time being.

 

I must assure you that my resignation is unrelated, entirely, to your recent appointment to that office. I do encourage you to take a more active role as presiding officer than your predecessor Lord Selm did within the chamber, however, if you require a member of the chamber to be appointed as president pro tempore I give my unfailing endorsement to the right honorable gentleman from Helena, Dr. Napier, or the right honorable gentleman from Kaedrin, Mr. Gurbanguly-Levi.

Yours sincerely,

 

Frederick Armas, esq.

Senator from Kaedrin

 

18 H.F 1741

 

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The Harrenite folded the paper neatly upon completion, sequestering it within the messenger’s cylinder he had by now hoisted over his shoulder. It was a familiar feeling, the leather bandolier having practically worn a groove into his neck all those decades ago. He hesitated a moment, just before departure, before deciding to write another letter.

 

A gnarled hand picked up the ink-pot, wondering if it what was left was too dry to write with. Armas sighed, kneeling down to see what he could do.

 

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To His Excellency, the Archchancellor, @Cracker

 

When we were first introduced you indicated to me that we were one and the same. For what was truly the difference between a Rhenyari and a Harrenite? Both are maligned, shunned, unusual in a land which prefers sword and powder to rhetoric, or as you would say, logos. 

 

You were both right and wrong. Right insofar as that we are both Imperial, through-and-through, whether we like it or not. To be Imperial is to be Orenian and to be Orenian is to be human. You were wrong in that you have served our country where it must be most earnestly served, whereas I have grown frustrated and bitter for it not living up to the history it is built upon. I have at times taken that frustration out on you, but the past year has shown that mayhaps you are made of stronger stuff than I. I have disagreed with the decisions of your ministry, and that of Helena and Selm’s, more often than perhaps I ought to have. For that I apologise. 

 

I am not a Josephite anymore, no more than I am a Tarusite, a Norsemite, a Torrhenite or an Arnite. Come the conclusion of this session of the Senate, my term shall expire, and I shall not stand for re-election in the year 1742.

 

I am not finished with public life and perhaps I shall return for a future term. In any way that I can relieve you in your valiant defense of our country, I offer you all I have. I am nearing sixty, but I will die in the army if need be to defend against this Nordling invasion.

 

God save the Emperor,

 

F. S. Armas.

 

18 H.F 1741

 

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The outgoing senator secluded the second missive away in the same fashion he had done with the first, closing the chest with a light tap of his boot and leaving it, empty, in the crevice. It was time for him to find the Governor-General.