The air smelled of freshly cut grass and ocean breeze even though the closest body of water was several dozen miles north and the grass here showed no signs of being even-plained. Even the musk of the horses and cattle was not enough to mask the fragarance that the land emited. As I reared past the third wagon of guards, I finally had him insight.

    Goos Fraba was a powerful man. If the thousands that followed behind his back, watching his shoulders like tuning rods, wasn't proof of that, his militarial success north was proof enough. I had convinced the previous guards that my intentions were purely historical and they let me past without too much arguing. But, I had no doubt convining Fraba's own personal guard would prove to be easy.

    After the third attempt at trying to penetrate his entorage and being shooed back, the lord lost his temper. He halted his great stallion and spun it around, almost colliding with my soft brown Merl's head. The look he gave me was angry to say the least. "Enough! Your attempts have drawn my patience! If my men are as daft to let a little knat like you through their guard, they will need to be punished indeed!" Suddendly, I was able to see the Lord Fraba's more realistic details. His gut protruded from his robes, barely held back by his ruby-gilded belt and his unkempt beard spiked across both of his chins. "But. My men can wait. First will be you!" His voice cracked as he said you. Before I knew it I was wisked off of Merl and thrown face-first into that pretty smelling grass. As I turned face-up, I couldn't help but notice the circle of guards surrounding me. I laughed, if not because it might be my last but out of nerves.

    Fraba dismounted his horse and two guards (and a half of another guard) stepped aside to let the Lord face me. He looked at me with his bushy eyebrows slanted fully downward (or as downward as they would go). Meanwhile, hushes and whispers reverberated down the caravan's ranks about an a female assassin who tried 3 times to knife the king in his spine, a thief trying to pick one of his saphires from his robe, and a beggar demanding the Lord's shoes. I had a feeling all three of those refered to me.

"Girl! Your suspicious activities frame you as obviously guilty of ill-intent! The charges for such behavior amongst one of my status is death at least. Do yo understand!?" I slowly reached under my cloak--still a guard slammed my face into the ground with a wide hand and had his spear tip relaxing against my lower neck. The one eye not being forced closed against the ground saw the guard pick up my quill and parchement.

"I-I just want to ask some questions!" I burped out in a helpless voice I hated. As all this was going on, a second circle of guards surrounding a white mare with a rider riding with both legs on one side had raced up their position in the caravan to see what the commotion was about. The rider dismounted and revealed herself to be the beatiful Lady Marlis, Lord Fraba's wife. As she joined her husband said she asked in an angelic voice, "What happened my dear husband?"

Meanwhile, Fraba had been eyeing my partchement and the inscriptions I had written there. It was obvious he couldn't read them. "What is this kind of *Muchka? Some assassin's code. The plan of my assassination is that it!?"

"Dear!" The lady called out in a more stern, but still gentle voice. Those are the writings of your soldiers! The Lord looked at his wife quizically. I could hear faint whispers responding to Lady Marlis's statement travel down the Caravan. Then Fraba bit his tongue at the parchment.

As I was stood on my knees and yelled, "It's **Tuan!" How dare he, I thought. The Lord Fraba, who was supposed to be the Great Leader, was accusing me of trying to kill him. But, what was worse is that he couldn't even recognize the script of the people who threw themselves to death in order to defend his realm. My teeth grinded against eachother and tears gathered below my bottom eyelids.

"Enough of this! The lord screamed. "Guards take this girl beyond that hill and have her executed. I don't care how it is done!" Fraba pointed at the hill in question and turned to mount his stallion. The guards looked confused but hefted me up and dragged me in the direction of said hill regardless.

*****

    (Might add more later tonight or tomorrow. During the meantime I am exhausted for only running on 3 hours of sleep all day. XwX. Look below for the answers to those asteriks in the chapter!)

*A Munchka is a language a person has the knowledge of before the are born. While each Munchka is unique to that person, some close-knitted members share similarities between their langauges. Often times a clan will adopt the language of an important person as a lingua franca.

**The Tuan were a tribe living in Northern Elezai of simple fishers and farmers.