Supplement Four
Mongoose
NOTES ON THE VARIOUS PEOPLES OF THE AGE 10
The Eastern Lands
But, what is east? East of Shem and Stygia? East, I know — and my knowledge comes from experience rather than the tittle-tattle of adventurers.
East of the Hyborian kingdoms and their southern neighbors lay the Hyrkanian empire of Turan. It sits athwart the azure waters of the Vilayet Sea, that vast inland ocean that serves as a natural buffer between the Hyborians to the west and the Hyrkanians who drifted out of the blue and mysterious East. The Hyrkanians of Turan and their steppe-dwelling kin are generally accounted a tall folk, slender and dark. They are a horse people, and they place a greater value on their steeds than they do on their fellow man.
Indeed, in the slave markets at Aghrapur — where the palace of King Yildiz gleams like a jewel beneath the harsh sun — children of the conquered western marches can be purchased for three small coins, while a warrior may save a lifetime’s worth of plunder and still not be able to afford a single mighty Bhalkhana stallion, so renowned and sought
after is the breed.
The expansionist policies of indolent King Yildiz, coupled with the commonplace brutality of his nobles, has given rise to a nomadic nation of vengeful and broken men: the kozaki — the wastrels of the steppe; they seek redress through brigandage, much like the Red Brotherhood of the Vilayet seeks remuneration via piracy on the inland sea. If an enterprising freebooter were to weld the two together...alas, such an act is a mere fever dream of the Western mind, for the ingrained apathy of the East is too formidable an obstacle for any man to overcome.
East of the Vilayet Sea is an ocean of another kind: a great sea of grass that extends from horizon to horizon in unbroken monotony: the Hyrkanian steppe. It is featureless, as uniform as the surface of the ocean, and it is home to clans of steppe dwellers who have taken proficiency with the horse and the bow, to unheard-of extremes. Most are indistinguishable from their Turanian kin, though there is a strain of steppe dweller who is squat and bowlegged, with the almond-shaped eyes of Khitai.
The Eastern Lands
But, what is east? East of Shem and Stygia? East, I know — and my knowledge comes from experience rather than the tittle-tattle of adventurers.
East of the Hyborian kingdoms and their southern neighbors lay the Hyrkanian empire of Turan. It sits athwart the azure waters of the Vilayet Sea, that vast inland ocean that serves as a natural buffer between the Hyborians to the west and the Hyrkanians who drifted out of the blue and mysterious East. The Hyrkanians of Turan and their steppe-dwelling kin are generally accounted a tall folk, slender and dark. They are a horse people, and they place a greater value on their steeds than they do on their fellow man.
Indeed, in the slave markets at Aghrapur — where the palace of King Yildiz gleams like a jewel beneath the harsh sun — children of the conquered western marches can be purchased for three small coins, while a warrior may save a lifetime’s worth of plunder and still not be able to afford a single mighty Bhalkhana stallion, so renowned and sought
after is the breed.
The expansionist policies of indolent King Yildiz, coupled with the commonplace brutality of his nobles, has given rise to a nomadic nation of vengeful and broken men: the kozaki — the wastrels of the steppe; they seek redress through brigandage, much like the Red Brotherhood of the Vilayet seeks remuneration via piracy on the inland sea. If an enterprising freebooter were to weld the two together...alas, such an act is a mere fever dream of the Western mind, for the ingrained apathy of the East is too formidable an obstacle for any man to overcome.
East of the Vilayet Sea is an ocean of another kind: a great sea of grass that extends from horizon to horizon in unbroken monotony: the Hyrkanian steppe. It is featureless, as uniform as the surface of the ocean, and it is home to clans of steppe dwellers who have taken proficiency with the horse and the bow, to unheard-of extremes. Most are indistinguishable from their Turanian kin, though there is a strain of steppe dweller who is squat and bowlegged, with the almond-shaped eyes of Khitai.