Chapter 19
About three weeks after their plan to open relations with the Brayherds, on the 21st of May, year 1660, the Baron and his entourage arrived at the outskirts of Caprae Loco. They were still a couple of miles away, but the flat planes that Caprae Loco was built on allowed for excellent visibility, enabling them to see it’s impressive walls from a distance. Even from the distance they were from it, the walls looked both imposing and beautiful. The beige color of the walls were a welcome change from the grays and blacks of the Imperial holds. The watch towers built directly into the walls themselves were carved into caricatures of the Brayherds themselves, their full bodies sculpted all the way from their hooves to their horns, their eyes seemed to follow you wherever you went, even with the great distance between them.
The rest of the walls were sturdily built and perfectly straight across with strong looking merlons placed in perfect spaces across the walks of the wall. The walls gave a sense of both opulent wastefulness and utilitarian usefulness, like they some noble’s vanity project as well as a citadel made to repel attack. From what the Baron had read about Brayherds, that feeling perfectly describes the general demeanor of that race, opulent, yet hardy.
“Man, that looks really cool!”
Udo stared at the wall in naked awe. The Baron looked far more incredulous.
“Well, it’s certainly...different from our walls, that's for sure. less imposing, but probably about as strong.”
“Aye cannae say whether aye like it or not. Donnae like those eye’s lookin’ at me, that’s for true!”
“I do believe that is the point, to unease your enemies, similar to the reason our walls are generally all black or gray. Well, like it or not, that is where we will be staying for the next week and a half.”
Udo quickly spurred his horse into a gallop, yelling in excitement as he sped past everyone.
“Let’s go see the cool stuff they have!”
The Baron quickly chased after him.
“Don’t rush too quickly at them! They might shoot you! Slow down you damned ape!”
The Baron’s precession spent just another 30 minutes making their way to the walls, where they were met by a brayherd wearing a toga flanked by an honor guard of eight fully armed brayherd soldiers wearing a roman style kit, red segmented chest plate with a red leather skirt and cape, as well as immaculately polished steel Galea complete with large red horse hair plumes. Instead of shields and gladius each of the seven and a half foot tall soldiers carried strange looking weapon whose name he couldn’t quite place. It had the handle length of a zweihander with the blade length of a longsword. The blade itself was single sided and decently thick, the tip was rounded and sharped like an executioner sword instead of the point a normal sword ended at. The weapon felt distinctly unroman to the Baron, more like an oversized cane knife, but that was neither here nor there. The brayherd in the toga stepped forward and raised his arms in greeting, palms facing up in a pose similar to a prophet giving a sermon. He opened his mouth and produced a low rumbling for a second before the words came out.
“Welcome, envoys of Imperium Hominis! I hope you enjoy the amenities we can offer you, here in the greatest city in Exculta Mundi!”
His voice was far higher than anyone was expecting by his massive frame and the low rumbling that preceded his words. his accent sounded very strange to the Baron, like Italian with less bounciness to it. Aside from the inherent strangeness of hearing an accent that did not exist anymore in the Baron's world, he tried to gleam as much information about his personality from his voice as he could. The brayherd's voice was haughty and smooth, far smoother than would be expected following the low rumble before he spoke. The Baron assumed that this brayherd was some sort of noble, not only did he carry himself with the haughtiness one would expect from a noble, but he was sent here to make a first impression for their new guest, meaning he would have to be at least somewhat important.
“We thank you for hosting us. I am the Baron von Bickenstadt and this is my entourage. As I am sure my son made clear in his correspondence with your senate, We are here on behalf of Bickenstadt, not the Empire.”
The Brayherd smiled, or at least the Baron thought he was smiling, and his throat began rumbling.
“Of course, Baronis de Bickenstadt. We would never allow such a thing for our Legati, but things have always been done differently outside de ovili pecus popularum.”
The Baron’s couldn’t quite stop his face from twitching at that. He wasn’t sure if that was supposed to be an overt insult or not, it seemed a little early for that kind of thing after all, but it was still quite annoying to be condescended to. The Baron tried to make sure his displeasure didn’t cross his face any further as he responded.
“Well, such is life, I suppose. I look forward to learning how your systems operate in comparison to ours.”
The Brayherd smiled again and began to speak.
“And we, yours. I am senator Flavius Sabatius Julii and I will be your guide for today. These are my Honoris Custodes, Rufus Custodibus. They will be accompanying us throughout our tour. May I ask you to identify your Honor Guard?”
The Baron took a moment to consider his words, scruffing his beard in thought before responding.
“I have no honor guard in the traditional sense, but these two men are my lieutenants, the blonde one is Udo Fudopfiegler and the red haired one is Fergus Ulpaghain. I pride myself on not requiring an honor guard, it projects a certain strength of will and martial prowess not to have one.”
He was making that up for the most part, he didn’t have an honor guard but he wasn’t quite sure why the Baron neglected to have one. But he could return a subtle dig at the brayherd by implying having an honor guard makes him look weak. If it bothered him he didn’t let it show.
“Quite the interesting train of thought! And one that would suggest you are quite the strong fighter, perhaps you would like a tour of our coliseum soon? And perhaps a chance to compete?”
“That would be lovely. In the meantime I ask you to allow us to tour your great city. Additionally, do you have people to escort our baggage train to our lodging?”
Flavius waved his arm at the gate and a dark skinned human man hurried over. He was wearing a shortened toga, the cloth only flowing down just above his knees.
“This is my famulorus Thabo, hailing from some tribe in the Assai’id confederation to our south, across the Magna Divide. Thabo, where do you hail from again?”
The man frowned and quickly responded “Swala’ardi.” before running off to show the baggage train where to go. The Baron frowned slightly at this. Though they weren’t chattel slaves or anything he still didn’t like the idea of indentured servants, slavery is slavery no matter what flowery language you use.
“Baronis, you seem displeased. You have chattel slaves in your Empire, do you not?”
The Baron was very annoyed with that statement. They couldn’t have known that he is here to recruit them for a rebellion against the Empire partly because of its use of slavery, but the
acknowledgement that he is not free of sin still grated against his sensibilities. Perhaps it would be hypocritical to use their help to rid my lands of slavery. Whatever, any port in a storm.
“Bickenstadt has been free from slavery for the better part of 70 years now. The Empire at large may endorse its use, but Bickenstadt does not.”
Flavius pursed his lips in thought before deciding to change the subject.
“Very interesting. Allow us to begin your tour of Caprae Loco! For now you will simply see things from the outside, tomorrow you can decide where you will spend your time touring in depth. Gather up who will be touring with us and we will begin immediately.”
The Baron was glad Flavius wasn’t going to push the issue, he didn’t particularly wish to debate his hosts about how wrong they are for having slavery, that would come after.
The Baron’s group followed Flavius through the city streets for a couple of hours, marveling at the various marble buildings and strange architecture as they went. The Baron silently compared everything he saw to his tour of real roman buildings from his vacation to Italy, and he found some very strange differences. The builds were more angular than the ones he saw in Rome, close to a brutalist style at times, though with more Grecian and Roman style pillars, and using pure marble instead of concrete. Overall the style was very interesting. That was the word the Baron found himself thinking the most. Interesting. Everything was so alien to him, he was having trouble figuring out what exactly to make of everything.
“And this is Cibum et Habitationem Regio, I believe that translates into Food and Habitation District. As the name implies, this is where the papulatio live, as well as where food is cooked for them. If I may ask, Baronis, is it true that cives of the Empire have kitchens of their own to cook at their leisure?”
“It depends on where in the Empire one lives. In Bickenstadt the average house in the capital city of Bickenstadt, eh, Bickenstadt city, has a kitchen attached, yes, but smaller villages have a communal oven. I do not know the state of the rest of the Empire, though I imagine it is quite a similar story no matter what province one travels to.”
“A communal oven? Quam Novis! We have no such thing here in Caprae Loco. Senators and merchants have the funds to afford a kitchen and personal cook, the papulatio buy their food from bakeries and restaurants, though the state makes sure their prices are reasonable of course.”
“Interesting.” The Baron commented blandly.
After spending the afternoon getting a rough tour of Caprae Loco’s districts, the Baron’s group were escorted to where they would be staying for the remainder of the trip. Their rooms were in a building connected to the senate building itself built specifically to receive foreign dignitaries. Each of the Baron’s entourage received their own room. The Baron was staying in the largest and most decorated of the rooms built to house the most important guests of the senate. The room felt very different from the guest rooms of the Empire, much brighter in color scheme than the Imperial ones, due to their construction using marble and other lightly colored types of stone. The room was large but furnished well, with a massive opulent bed, sturdy looking desk, and a private bathroom. The Baron looked into the toilet and was greeted with a hole that seemed to go down forever. He quickly tried to think of something, anything else than what the bottom of that hole led to. He knew it could be nothing any man was meant to deal with, or any other race for that matter.
The Baron sat down at his desk and grabbed a bottle of a pale amber liquid. He grabbed a glass and smelled the liquid before he poured to make sure it was something he wanted to drink. It was not. The smell was very fishy, it reminded him of the smell of Bickenstadt’s fish market, though not nearly as putrid. He turned the bottle around in his hand and sighed as he read the label.
“I almost just drank Garum. As the green bird always told me, Garum non bibis. He never really said why though...”
The Baron eyed the Garum suspiciously before bringing the bottle to his lips. Yup, he thought to himself, That’s fishy.
After pouring himself the wine the Brayherds had actually meant for him to drink, the Baron leaned back into his chair and contemplated what he would do. He needed to get the Brayherds to agree to support his rebellion, how exactly will he do that? He grabs a piece of parchment paper and begins to scribble ideas down in Russian to prevent someone else reading it. Since Russian didn’t exist in this world, he figured it would work well as something to use when he doesn’t want to be snooped on.
“They’re roman, republican rome, so do I emphasize the democratic angle perhaps?”
He writes down and circles “демократия”.
“Well the romans didn’t really like actual democracy, they were rather exclusionary weren’t they...but if I refer to my plan as creating a republic…maybe they'll be into that?”
The Baron drew an arrow connecting “демократия” to “республика”.
“It’s not exactly lying, is it? Oh what do I care! I can stretch the truth to an extent, I can say that my system is inspired by theirs or something along those lines. Though, perhaps it’s more inspired by their inspiration...no even that’s not quite right, the greeks barely had a democracy, certainly not in the way I want mine to function…do they even know about the greeks? They’re roman but not actual Romans, so they might not even know the origins of democracy proper...though the way their system is set up is no accident, some actual Romans had to have actually set it up...hmmm.”
The Baron sat back in his chair and crumpled up his parchment. He was getting nowhere.
“Well, I could always just lie through my teeth...perhaps if they don’t know about the greeks that could work in my favor...I could just portray them as an egalitarian people and say that since they are the inspiration of the romans, like the actual Romans...then I am taking inspiration from their system. Yeah sure, we'll see how that goes. Should be fine!”
The Baron tried to be convinced by his words but still found himself thoroughly unimpressed by himself. He would have more chances to create a real plan later, his actual audience with the senate was in two days, he could create a better plan after getting a sense of what their society is like first hand.
The Baron went to lay in his opulent bed, sturdy wooden bed frame covered in intricate carvings with extremely lacy sheets. The whole thing was very ugly in his opinion, but neither the Baron nor him in his past life really enjoyed conspicuous consumption. Just as he was removing the sheets he eyed the bottle of Garum sitting on the desk.
I mean...it wasn’t that bad...perhaps just another sip
