Military Map of the Battle of Pstatar Gap. Imperial Cartographic Corp. i0007.
Collected and edited by Bookmaster Altus Puk* 4:581:IRL- 2
Collection Date and Location: 21 Ninyena, i0062 - Eternal Library, Myzos Branch.
LIBRARY CLASSIFICATION CODE: Restricted - Level 1 of 3.
HASNA N’UZ
Fisherman. Veteran of the Battle of Ptsatar Gap.
Hasna insists that we talk at the Last Hearth. We always meet later in the evening after he brings his day’s haul in from Myler Bay, where I will buy his dinner and listen to his stories. It is clear why the chieftains insisted he join the fight all those years ago. Even at his advanced age of seventy-nine, you can still see strength in him. The years after the war, spent lean and tough, living on fishing boats along the coast of Myler Bay, seem to have kept him from losing his warrior’s frame. Like most N’uz, Hasna still wears his hair long, bound in a single braid gathered on the back of his head in a tight bun, and his long, unkempt beard scrapes the table as we talk. Even in the relative comfort and safety of the Last Hearth’s dining hall, he has his dagger on him at all times, which he uses to cut and butter his bread.
HASNA: I’m sure the history books talk of the Chiefs and my old general. The dumb decisions they made and that they put us in the Gap in the first place. Idiots. They should have known. We couldn’t fight the Empire. They was coming north regardless, to be sure. Coming for our families. Coming for our homes and our lands. Coming to change our way of life. Is it true they built one of their fire temples in Temyrqala? Not that I’ve been south to the big city, but I hear tell they’re damn near done doing so.
ALTUS: The first ceremony was two months ago.
HASNA: They should’ve known we couldn’t stop them. They should’ve, but they didn’t. Or they just didn’t care. I hope the history books will remember that, too.
I don’t know. Now that we’re talking about it—and up here, there are few who want to—now that we’re talking, maybe they wanted to prove a point to the rest of us here in Rishea. About who we are. How we won’t back down. How we fight ’til the end. How there ain’t nothing but the struggle. You know your old tongue?
ALTUS: [Shakes head]
HASNA: You Southern kids. Vagra is the word. Tough to translate, but it means all the things I just said. Keep that in mind ‘cuz it’s in your blood like it is for all us Risheans. All of us who come from the stars. Every time someone comes to take what’s yours. Comes to spill your blood on the ground or that of your family. It’s vagra what keeps your spear swinging at them. Vagra. It’ll save your way of life, but it just might take your life as payment in the same breath.
But I’ll tell you, barely a one of them Chiefs was feeling vagra at Ptsatar Gap. Ain’t none of them carried a spear next to me or used their shield to block an arrow coming for my chest. Nah, they just stood on the cliff looking down. Most of us was N’uz, you know. No tribe to speak of. And the Chiefs just watched us die by the hundreds. I doubt it’ll happen, but I hope the history books’ll remember that, too.
You been there, ya? You seen the statues of ‘em? All in a row on horseback, staring out over the edge of the cliff? Ya. Ain’t no monument to the N’uz up there. Ain’t no carved face of my brother or my cousins. You’re Ushykhei, ya? Don’t worry, ain’t no Verushans here at the Last Hearth. You horsemen don’t know much about N’uz but trust me when I tell ya that there ain’t nothing new about no one caring about us. Ain’t nothing new about that, and ugly truth is it’ll never change. Ain’t no folk song ever written about no N’uz, ever. Make no mistake, I love them songs. I know every single one Dorta there sings by heart. But ain’t a one about N’uz. We’re them that history forgets. We spill forgotten blood. We’re them that vagra taxes the worst.
ALTUS: What do you remember about the battle at Pstatar Gap?
HASNA: You don’t forget that. Not ever.
ALTUS: Can you tell me how the fight began?
HASNA: Imperials, they like shiny armor, ‘specially back then. We heard talk that each soldier was made to polish his chest piece and shield every day, and there was rewards for them that kept their armor shiniest. Don’t know how much that’s true, but when we saw them come marching through the gap, I says it to myself, and it sure felt true. The idea was to blind us, see. To make sure that we know they was coming. And ya, when there’s a lot of them, marching together in time with the war drum, it sure works. There was nothing but blinding light coming up through the Gap, like a shiny baysnake stretching back as far as we could see.
The plan was to keep them stuck in the Gap, you see. Keep ‘em where we could make it hard for them to fight more than fifty or so across, to match our numbers. It was a dumb plan, but someone let the Temyri Chief think he knew what he was doing. As usual. Everyone thinks Temyri come up with the best plans… ‘specially them.
Well, problem was Big Chief Hasus had us too far back from the entrance to the Gap, so instead of fifty across, there was more like seventy-five, which was way too many. Fifty was already too many, and seventy-five? Impossible. Second problem was no one told us about their damn war monsters. You know what I’m talking about? I don’t know what you call ‘em, but they them big beasts that Imperials love to charge at the ranks and bust ‘em up.
ALTUS: Dejakaar.
HASNA: Sure. Whatever their name is, using them works perfect, and we found that out real quick-like.
Remember. I’m no soldier. Wasn’t back then, never was, never will be. My sheyat was a fisherman, like me, as was his sheyat and the man that bore him. I’m a N’uz and ain’t none of us N’uz grow up learning how to do battle. That’s for them with tribe names. And also, guess who was in front?
I got lucky that day. When we drew numbers, I got row seventeen of the shield line. When them war animals, dejakaar you call ‘em, they broke into us, and the shinies charged us, they got through fifteen rows before we heard the horns calling us back. Thank Zhawa they did, otherwise I wouldn’t have made it out of the Gap that day.
(At this point, Hasna grabs his tall mug of dark beer and stares down into it. He mumbles the Living’s Prayer, then drains his drink in one gulp.)
Miss Miza in the back there, her drink keeps me alive for sure. I been coming here ever since I got back, even got to name me a stew. Growler thighs and spuds with green carrots and tohras. Named it Koshbee’s Sipper, after my brother. He was there at Ptsatar Gap too. He didn’t get so lucky. He pulled number one.
During the years leading up to the Tymer Revolution of i0057, Bookmaster Altus Puk was singularly focused on documenting the experience of the laypeople of Rishea under the first century of Imperial rule, recording the oral histories of veterans to share the experiences of those who fought against the Roaring Throne during the Conquest. He traveled across Rishea, particularly in the northern country where many of the foot soldiers were from and used charmed fragments of arcane stones that would record their voices.
His discovery, as is common in conquered lands, was that the line between allegiance to the Empire and resistance against it was razor-thin in these early days of the occupation. Where it not for the immense amount of money, land, and other riches offered to the leaders of the Royal Tribes to ensure their continued approval, an open rebellion would have been inevitable.