The Arx Imperium
The Arx Imperium.
My home.
My prison.
I do not understand my father.
He holds me here in solitude aside from a few retainers and tutors. I have no friends. My teachers and servants are fastidious in their wariness of anything that could be construed as friendship. I have learned to treat them as being far beneath me, not worthy of an ounce of my emotion. For this they are grateful.
They teach me warfare, economy, finance, ethnology, geography, history, politics, astronomy, poetry, religion. It is clear from my studies that my father is set on a destructive path.
The treasury is exhausted after a decade of reckless conquest. Investment in vital industries is spurned. We live on extension after extension of credit. Our client states fail to pay tribute year upon year. The inability of the army to force the barbarians of Gosember into submission is never spoken of. The repercussions, however, are felt acutely here in the heart of the capital. I see it in the furtive glances of staff as they check the skyline from these upper floors. I feel it in their cowed attitude as they complete their tasks. I see it in the tightness of my father’s face, words and actions.
I feel it in the question I ask myself every evening as darkness approaches and I watch my teacher for the day scurry to his quarters before curfew: what sort of Empire is it that I will inherit?
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