113 Hidden in Plain Sigh

"Asto, is it? Welcome to Saniya."

Although he had already gone through most of Saniya before his arrival at the inner city gates, this was the first time he had spoken to any of the city guards. Even then, it had been the disguised Tawo himself who had made contact first. Confounded by the lack of any checks or supervision, a nervous Tawo had come up to a guard along the opened inner gate to introduce himself with his new, fake identity. However, even then the guard reacted with disinterest.

"One moment, is this not strange?" Tawo asked back. "Why are there no controls throughout the city? Last time I was in Saniya, the guards would not let me so much as get close to the inner city without a control, and the outer city itself was guarded as well. Now the king gives a banquet on Saniya's central islands but there are no inspections at all."

"New lord, new rules, I guess," the disinterested Yaku guard answered. "King Corco doesn't care about all the stiff separation of the walls. He'd much rather see all off us prosper together. So the king has decided that commoners will be allowed into the inner city, no matter what. Now please move along, peasant, you're holding up the line."

A look over his shoulder revealed that indeed, a line of people had formed behind Tawo, though the cheap wine and out-of-tune songs they carried with them meant that for now, he was safe from any of their complaints.

"Don't you want to see your kids? They're studying in the Royal School, right?" the guard added. For a moment, Tawo didn't know how to answer and only stared at the newly promoted warrior. "I hear it's a great place for learning, filled with true wisdom. My brat's been going for half a year himself and he's already smarter than his old man."

"Yes, of course!" Tawo's shout of enlightenment interrupted the chatty guard. At last he understood why there were no specific inspections for the newly arrived farmers. Once they met their children, it would become obvious whether or not they were nothing but simple farmers. However, Sawo had prepared his cousin for this very instance. After all, the invitation to the festival had cost them an arm and a leg; some additional service could be expected. "I will go meet my son right away," Tawo smiled, before he marched past the useless guard and into the inner city.

Only a short while later and the warrior turned bandit found himself in front of the great central square of Sillu Island. Many times before had he come here, then as one of the masters of the city. However, now that he was back after only two seasons of absence, the entire island was unrecognizable. He had heard that a good portion of the former Sawo warriors had worked to improve the city itself, but he had never expected such a tremendous change.

The barren island, garnished with only a single tower and a few sheds for supplies, had turned into a full-blown city of its own. The wide, winding alleys led along the riverbanks and deeper into the center, through rows upon rows of luxurious new courtyards, filled with greenery and great houses. Confused by the strange environment, he had pretended knowledge and simply picked a path towards the center. To his luck, he had not embarrassed himself and soon found his way to what he could only assume to be the central plaza.

"When was all of this made?" Tawo asked in a breathless voice, choked by the sense of novelty.

"I dunno. Never been here," answered the disinterested youngster who walked behind Tawo. The warrior had had acquired the young farmer son's company only a short while ago. Titu Asto, son of the village chief who had sold his festival invitation to Tawo. All they had to give up in exchange was the entire remaining treasury of Kullu, the Sea Otter.

"So the commoners are not allowed on here, are they?" interested in the new rules implemented by the king, Tawo decided to dig a bit more.

"Only the king's crafters are."

"The who?" More confusion annoyed Tawo. He really didn't like this feeling of bumbling about in the dark, not with the audacious feat he had planned.

"The king's crafters," Titu repeated. "They're craftsmen who work for the king and only do the work the king wants. They don't sell to anyone neither. All their work is bought by the king, as I hear it."

"...commoners working for a noble? What an audacious action! How come no one stops him?"

"It's his land, ain't it?"

"True, it is." Tawo answered with a cramped smile, before he looked around the little square before him. "So where are our people then?"

"Over there," the kid pointed towards a corner of the plaza, where a small assortment of gray-clothed farmers had grouped themselves around an ox cart.

When he met up with the rest of Asto's villagers, the ones who had transported the king's harvest to the capital, he was confronted with a slew of awkward greetings. It was a shame that the bandit's silver couldn't make them better actors, but Tawo would have to make do.

Best to leave contact with them to an absolute minimum, he thought. Even though he had only just come to the decision, the portly warrior's resolve was tested right away. Fascinated by the contents of the Asto harvest, Tawo picked up a strange vegetable off the cart and turned the hard, red object in his hands.

"What's this?" he asked in confusion.

"Da' didn't tell you a thing, did he master?"

"Don't call me that, boy!" Tawo snapped. "I am your father at this moment, remember? We payed your family good money for that title, so you best play along. Don't forget what would happen to your family if the king found out you disrespected his invitation."

"Of course, father. Excuse me, father." Although he felt a bit bad about admonishing the youth with such harsh words, Tawo had to stay firm. After all, he would be dead once his charade was uncovered. He couldn't die, not before he had finished what he had come here to do.

"Continue. What is this vegetable? I am well versed in all manner of Medalan food and this is not one of them." Tawo shook the plant in his hand.

"It's called a red beet," one of the other villagers replied. "The king asked us to plant some of those, stars know why. We tried them after harvest, but they're no good. Hard as ice. Boil 'em for a bit and they go softer, but they're still not a good eat. So we sent all of it over here and kept more wheat instead."

With a nod, Tawo signaled his understanding. The beets might serve a different purpose for the king beyond food, maybe as a red dye. Once he had figured out their failure as a food item, the beet fell back onto the cart. Whatever was special about these mysterious roots, his interest had been sapped by the commoner's description. If even the common folk wouldn't eat them, there was no way a gourmet like Tawo would even consider the curious red beets.

Instead, his eyes began to roam across the square to get a better look of the happenings around himself. In the center of the plaza, a large pyre had been erected, like the ones which would usually be stacked up in all villages of Medala. In Saniya, every individual quarter of the outer city would make their own during harvest season. In the pyre's surroundings, representatives from every village under the king's employ had gathered in small, isolated groups, together with part of their harvest. There weren't many.

In a symbolic gesture, the harvest would be piled up around the pyre later today and used as part of the banquet. Only when the entire pile was gone would the festival end. To the convenience of the guests, benches and tables had been set up close to the pyre, to create an open and genial atmosphere. For now however, no one had taken a seat yet. The commoners were used to taking orders, not initiative. They would move no step until they were commanded to do so. Since Tawo himself was mighty tired already, he tried to identify who would be the one to do so. It turned out to be a bad idea.

In the distance, beyond the rising stack of wooden logs, he found the Taytakura, the head priest of Saniya, in talks with Hieronymus Bombasticus, a man Tawo had seen a few times when he worked on the roads as a laborer.

*This is bad.*

Not only was there a decent chance that this Bombasticus might recognize the disguised Tawo, the alchemist was also one he had been urged to avoid by Kullu. After all, Bombasticus had spent the year traveling through every village in the Chawir marshes and would have met every single village chief. There was a good chance the foreigner would see through Tawo's charade as soon as they met. Before an unfortunate accident could ruin his plans for good, Tawo stepped back to sneak deeper into the crown behind him. However, an uninvited guest made things only more difficult.

"You must be the chief of Asto village, right? I've heard good things about you." The loud voice was answered by a nervous jolt from Tawo's tensed shoulders and a manic swerve of his head. What greeted the shaken warrior was a young man in fluttery, gray clothes. Even though the cloth was cheap, the amount of wasted material proved that this one was a rich farmer, just like Asto himself.

"Excuse me, but do we know each other?" a confused Tawo asked back. How could anyone here ever recognize him as the village chief?

"Ah, I'll introduce myself. I'm Khuno Sayala. Village head of Ayala village, only two over from your own Asto village."

His suspicion still retained, Tawo nodded his head. All the while, he glanced over to the preoccupied alchemist, just to make sure.

"We have never met, have we?" he guessed.

"Ah, indeed we have not. I mean, as the heads we don't ever leave our own places. The harvests are all out of wack too, so everyone just goes to the city whenever they feel like it. I just guessed, because of the clothes..."

In an epiphany, the warrior looked down onto his own amalgamation of gray folds. Although every fiber of his being revolted against the tacky dress, it was an unavoidable part of his disguise. Calmed down at last, Tawo smiled and returned Khuno's greeting.

"Ah, please excuse my rudeness. My name is Iqtana Asto, myself village head of Asto village. What can I do for a fellow patriarch?"

"Ah, that's fine with the rudeness. You see, I said before that we never really meet, right? That's why I'm here for a talk. Now what does that mean when we never see each other, huh? Means that we can never talk. But this time, our king has done something good for once. This time, all the villages are together, at least a couple of them are."

With a sigh, but without permission, the commoner let himself down on Asto village's ox cart, next to the fake village chief Asto.

"So here's what I thought," Khuno continued. "Wouldn't it be good if we talked, all of us together? We could work together, get some better benefits. I mean, Lord Corco has been generous and all, but if we all talk in a voice, we could do a whole lot better than we have, don't you think?"

A sly grin overcame Khuno's face as he introduced his bold plan. Meanwhile, cold sweat ran down Tawo's back in response. Weren't the commoners supposed to be obedient? How dare one of them talk about resistance against his own lord out in the open? Not to mention the trouble Tawo would be in if he were to get caught up in a second conspiracy.

"King Corco has already been far more lenient than any other lords before him when he left so much of the harvest for the villages. Why would we want even more?"

"So you're fine with only what we got? Sure, we ended up with more than usual, but we also lost a lot. Just look how grain much our new lord has taken, even more than the previous one. I think we should band together, and demand that we only pay the same number of sacks as before."

*Greedy.*

This greed would be the commoner's undoing, no doubt. It seemed as if King Corco's leniency would come back to bite him, but for Tawo, it would be a divine gift. This was his chance to solve a crisis and distinguish himself in front of the king, his chance to get close. However, before the warrior could formulate a proper plan in his head, an old woman showed up to interrupt their talks.

"Don't listen to the liar!" she shouted.

"Curi Sinyala, you old hag! Stay out of my hair," Khuno pointed at the old commoner woman. Unperturbed, the Curi Sinyala only got louder.

"You want to trick even more people into this bandit group of yours, brat!? Be careful," she said with a look towards Tawo, "this one isn't the village head of Ayala, I am."

"So what, I'll be head as soon as you kick the bucket," the fake village head Khuno barked back. At the same time, he took a step towards the old woman and straightened his back.

"And until you do I'll stop that crazy plan you and your disloyal family have been spinning. Whatever you want to do with this group of yours, the Sayala family will be on top, right?" Unwilling to give in, the old woman stepped forward as well and buried her index finger in the folds over Khuno's chest.

Already Tawo was prepared to jump in, but just before the two could turn their verbal disagreement into a physical one, a thunderous roar interrupted all talks in the plaza. Shocked and confused, Tawo turned towards the castle the noise had come from.

In the distance, Rapra Castle was brightly lit, but he thought he could see hectic shadows run about. From the look of things, Saniya's banquet of the commoners wasn't the only one laden with conflict. The harvest festival was off to a turbulent start.