Chapter 357: The Goats In Pot

"Не оставяй днешната работа за утре"

"Never leave today's work for tomorrow." 

-        Bulgarian Proverb

Almost every single important figure of Drama is now being gathered in this court yard, by their lord Antonius, accomplishing some thing almost impossible as despite these people all being roughly the same in nature, they are divided within themselves in to different alliances and trade unions due to their conflicted interests in various areas of incomes. With the pressure applied from Antonius they managed to finally gather together in one area to have a conversation, they are now in the same minacious situation, like a group of sailors together on a sinking ship, grappling to one pole and if one loses his grip, the others shall see their fate to fall in to the waters as well.

Honestly speaking, even the most renowned saint like figure of Drama, the elder chairman Borislav cannot do any thing to that middle aged Caesar when the later has the uncontested advantage in force and power, they have already became desperate knowing that no matter what the final outcome is, their fate is most probably not going to end well. 

True, they are not stupid, they have evaluated through the reason why did the lord descend such a heavenly blasphemy of rage on to them, it must be their illegal gathering of wealth and profits with out going through the system of Antonius, and so they never paid one single copper of tax to him, which should be why he is fuming with rage. Thus they have already discussed a solution, to offer one third of their worth to the Caesar in order to cease his anger, and also please him to let them continue being their usual roles of being land lords, slave owners or monopoly in the market. 

This decision is not being made by a sudden brain storming session, but it is from the experience and ideas from last time. During the period of Ottoman rule, and also both the Roman and Latin rules over Drama last time, they also used to do the exact same kind of things, on a even more flagrant scale than now buying and selling slaves with lands in public. The Ottoman and Roman officials do come and seek problem with them some times, but what they needed to do is only to offer a portion of their wealth to them as a form of bribe, then every thing shall be settled; It has always been working last time, there is absolutely no reason why it will fail this time round. 

The merchants and land lords quickly went back to where they are seated facing each other, exchanging eyes with one another. Finally, one man could no longer resist his urge and stepped out of the line squeezing a smile that looks worse than a wail on his face, despite the elder shaking his head signaling him that it is not the time to say their offer in this negotiation now, the man still decided to open his mouth. "My lord… I must tell you some thing."

"Say it." Antonius put up his hand. "We are the citizens of one country, there is no reason for any one of us here to be stressed in expressing his or her views, come on."

The man bites his lips hard and continued kneeling down. "We have realised our mistakes! Please! Sheathe your God like fury back in to your wrist and gift us with your lights of pardon and forgivingness! In exchange for your generosity in pardoning us, we are willing to offer one third of our total wealth, which is almost ten times of the annual income of Drama… Please! Honourable Caesar! I am begging you on behalf of all my counterparts! Forgive us!" 

The elder Borislav sighed and shook his head slightly in agony, knowing that saying these words now would only achieve the opposite effect. He is right, hearing these words Antonius said nothing, he did not even bother continuing to give this greedy bugger his attention. Instead he clapped his hands thrice and stood up once more raising his wine cup giving every one here a toast. "Honourable gentle men, I know that you have been both famished and parched staying here for all day long… Come! Let us have a feast first to soothe the tense atmosphere of tonight like a family!" 

Following Antonius' signal a full fleet of armored troopers stormed in to the terrace giving these people another fright, especially the merchant who is still kneeling there with his head lowed, these clicking sounds of armors and the ground trembling almost gave him the false impression that the Caesar is going to take his life first. But still he dared not raise his head or stand up fearing that this would anger the Caesar even further. 

The troopers carried five gigantic bronze pots, a bunch of utensils and pots of fresh wine in to the place putting them down, and poured wine in to bowls placing them on the table in front of every one, spilling out some wine in the process. Then these troopers carried five goats that are still alive and screaming, attaching them to the sticks being erected in the middle of the crowd, and began executing the sheeps letting off the blood in front of the eyes of every one. 

Every person here have lived through the age of chaos and have definitely seen blood and blades in their life time, but when the blood is combined with this tense atmosphere and the amount of troopers with blades and armors made this feast much more chilling for people to handle. 

Noticing the dropping morale of his counterparts the elder Borislav had to stand up once more bowing to the man of power. "My lord… May I ask that what does all these things here means?" 

"Oh, it is nothing, do not be afraid honourable elder." Antonius giggled and raised his wine cup to Borislav. "This is merely a custom that we have in the army brought in by our Mamluk allies, that every time after a victory we would gather around for a celebration, and in the celebration we shall kill some goats for fresh meat and distribute these meat to every service men, nothing to be afraid of… As for the bowls, I am sorry to say that we currently do not have enough wine cups, so we had to follow the rules of the army to drink wine with bows, I am deeply sorry." 

Borislav could only make a shy smile on his face nodding alongside with the admiral's words, reemphasizing that he understands and agrees with his lord, but inside his minds, he is thinking that since these huge bronze pots with the radius of a meter can be used to cook an entire goat, then can it also cook an entire man inside?

The answer is pretty obvious, maybe the admiral is planning that if some one over here said some thing against his will, that fellow is going to have a bathe in one of these bronze pots. 

And soon as if the admiral still feels like the atmosphere is not yet tense enough, he ordered the few standing Mamluk soldier to start preparing the mutton. The team of Mamluk soldiers swiftly started boiling the water inside the pots, and then proceeded on with cutting the meat. They stuffed a piece of cloth in to the mouth of the death approaching goat, turned it around and tied its foe hoes to a stick, then the Mamluk soldiers proficiently sliced through the goat's under belly, letting its blood flow freely in to another bronze sink beneath it. After the blood is drained then did they start to remove the goat's inner organs and wash the goat's interior. 

All of these are being done in front of these land lords and merchants, most of who have neither butchered an animal with their own animal, nor have they witnessed so much blood flowing before. It did give some of them quite a scare turning their faces pale white like sheets of paper, um perhaps not paper of this era. Especially when these merchants relate the goat to themselves, the thought scared them even more making many feel sick and disgusted after a while. 

"What a tyrant." A merchant whispered to his pal at the side. "Only the tyrants from ancient Persia would do this to scare their people in to submission." 

His pal by the side nodded in agreement. 

Well of course it is inappropriate for Antonius to slay a few living goats and letting their blood flow in front of these 'kind gentlemen'. But Antonius did not realise it because this kind of practice is what they used to do in army camps all the time, Antonius and the others are not here to stop and advice him too, so he decided to approach matters in a more personnel way. These merchants and land lords of Drama became the lucky first to have a taste of Antonius' way of doing things.