[Inner Wall] Riparian Mining Company

[BlueberryKitty]

Hidden behind the Inner Wall of Riparia exists an almost entirely separate town. The Riparian Mining Company produces a cloud of dust and steam overhead, a grand cacophany of sound, and a good majority of Riparia's income.

The Inner wall was built of large blocks of dark red granite. The sides were smoothed and polished with patterns of exposure to the winds and rain, sparkling in the sunlight. A gate large enough for wagons to pass through exists, proving the thickness of the wall to be several metres thick. It would have to be thick, to halt flows of lava from Aslan's Forge for any length of time. The wall existed, perhaps in the beginning, to defend a small town at the base of the mountains. After more than one eruption of the active volcano, that site had been abandoned, and a new town built from the smoking ruins. Why anyone would remain near to a volcano certain to explode? The veins of ore and rock that were brought up from the depths of Telath were worth the expense to those either greedy enough to mine for it, or bound to it by their blood.

The wall was not the only existing defence against the looming thread. A series of ditches and baffles existed to slow down approaching lava as well. These were the result and debris from the construction of a plain, wide road ran from the Mining Company toward the mountain, and began to snake it's way up to the heights. Along this road, at any given time of the brightening, was a train of horses and wooden wagons, hauling the ore and rocks down, and returning back up for another load.

Buildings stretched along the Inner Wall, a few clustered about the winding road. All were built of stone, that being the best and least expensive building material just lying about the location. The faces were plain and undecorative. These were the offices of the Riparian Mining Company.

There were rooms for rent, for those workers too tired to go home, or for those who didn't have a home to go home to. Kitchens sold meals, bars sold ale. No wine was found on this side of the red Inner Wall. A waggoner's barn stood, the great double doors thrown wide to reveal workers inside either building new wagons, or repairing old ones. Next door was a smithy, turning out parts and tools for the Mining Company.

But before one could get into the Mining Company Compound, one first had to get past it's guards. A steady flow of men, dwarves and a smattering of elves were in line, showing their Mining Company IDs before they were allowed to pass the heavy iron gates. Some were shuffled to one side; apparently applicants for jobs. "S'rale. Who be you, and what business have you wit' the Company?"

[Antonin]

Time Stamp: The 43rd of Cyaxatum, 5th Ioannolia, Era XI Post Fractum in the Age of the Darkening, summer

A thousand days and a thousand more had been lived by Antonin, son of Raleik, son of Ghola. Entire lives had been lived out in his mind, he had dreamt of his ancestors, he had made up tales of people who lived now, who would live, who had lived. In his mind a million different paths unfolded in the course of a cycle. This is what would have happened had he turned down that mysteriously dark alley, this is what would happen if he were to say that to the girl who skipped through the market every day with her tall, dark haired, broad shouldered father. More worlds than Ioannes himself could create lay within the mind of Antonin, son of Raleik, son of Ghola. In his mind where he dreamed the dreams that he dreamed of once in a lulaby...

Though he be a dreamer, he was also a practical man, a man of reality, a man who was an observer of life. He had observed that a man doesn't feed his family on dreams, he doesn't sleep comfortably trying to fulfill childhood fantasies. He had observed that artists weren't as celebrated as they should be, though their gifts were more precious to the world than a mountain of gold. Being a practical man he did what practical men did when they left home, they got jobs. Arakmat was ruined when he left it, and Riparia was a nearby prospering city, a city that had jobs which needed filling. Practical men took practical jobs and lived practical, observent lives. He would observe Ioannes, the almighty God, he would observe the law, he would observe the sustainment of his future family, he would observe his parents and his grandparents. Antonin, son of Raleik, son of Ghola, would observe where observation was necessary.

"Serale, my business with the company is the business of sustaining its business. Life is what I seek, and life is wrought from the hands of working men, sweating, and labouring men. I do seek naught but to earn a living. What say you?" Charismean was not Antonin's first language, it was his second and he had learnt it from his mother's brother, who was a poet. Though he thought little of how he spoke Alleria's language, others surely did. His manners of speach were odd perhaps, but what else could be expected from a young man who had been raised by a family of artists and intellectuals. He would have stayed in Arakmat and carried on the family tradition, were the city not brought to his knees when he left. The majority of his family had survived, the only ones who had died had been distant cousins...aunts and uncles he had never met, a niece or a nephew he wasn't actually related to. He thought that geneology was no the pursuit of practical men. His father would tell him it was important to know where you came from in order to understand what you are, Antonin would say he knew where he came from, Ioannes.

[BlueberryKitty]

The guard grinned. It wasn't his fault he wasn't intelligent enough to do more for the Company than hold a sword, and decide who to let through the gates and who to keep back. After all, not everyone had the heart and soul of a poet. Rougher, coarser men need exist purely to make those made of better material stand out all the more. Of course, that didn't mean it felt any better when they laughed.

A coarse laugh issued from the RMC guard's throat, while his eyes shifted around to those companions near to him for sympathy or appreciation. When he found none, for everyone else was far too busy with their own work or waiting the sound subsided, the grin replaced with something akin to a sulky snarl.

"If'n ye be seekin' sweat, stinkin' men, and hard work then ye've come t'the right place. Ain't no life here, though- just work, hard work, and lots o' it. Fancy talkin' ain't gonna get ye nowhere, n' I bet ye hands be as sof' as ye tongue. But if ye thinkin' ye really want work wit' t'Company, then ye'd best be showin' me yer Visa. Nobody gets inside wit'out a Visa." A grimy hand as coarse as the Guard himself reached forward, expecting Antonin's Imperial Visa to materialise quickly.

[Antonin]

Weapons were the tools of inane men, men who didn't have it in them to talk in a reasonable manner of reasonable things. His father had once told him that weapons were the instruments of Jorel, and that a truly pure creation of Ioannes would never take up arms against another living thing, he said that if one wished to combat evil the way to do it was to highlight the beauty of the world and be a beacon of light to guide the wayward back to the path of the almighty lord. Antonin firmly believed that to be true. The very philosophy, however, caused him trouble, for he had been taught to love all beings equally, but how could he love something evil? It was something he often struggled with, respecting men who would embrace those things corrupted by the influence of Jorel. A man of stronger faith like his grandfather would have found great love in his heart for an evil man.

In his mind he drew his grandfather, a powerful figure surrouned by a glow of white light...his leathery hands reaching out, pulling a beleagured man to his feet. His grandfathers very presence pushed back the all-consuming darkness that engulfed the surrounding world. Though he was a frail man he had an aura of incredible strength. His hair was black and white and coarse and curly. His eyes were warm and dark, in the picture Antonin drew in his mind they seemed to be shimmering pools...

In accordance to the guards request Antonin reached into his back right pocket and took out his Imperial Visa, sorting it from his house deed first. The visa was a little worn around the edges and was showing the slightest sign of fading, from being in his back pocket it had developed a curve. Antonin held it out to the guard between his right thumb and the side of his index finger.

The mans comments had sparked his curiosity, he couldn't understand why the man was talking of fancy speach, "These hands are as soft as life allows, and with lifes demands they oft grow all the rougher. Why doth thou speak of fancy talk as though one would speak richly to move? Words do not have wheels but for a dreaming man, and yet you infere that they grant wings."

[BlueberryKitty]

The guard twitched the Visa from Antonin's hand without ceremony. Flipping the red leather cover open, he glanced down at it, and back up to the human several times. At the further fancy speech of the visitor the guard merely looked confused for a moment, as if what had been said didn't make a lick of sense to him. Which of course it hadn't; but he wasn't quite stupid enough to mention it.

He was stupid enough to erase the blank look from his face, and scowl back at Antonin as he snapped the Visa shut and tossed it back against his chest. There was a reason such an unpleasant man was given guard duty- firstly he wasn't capable of much else, and secondly he was very good about keeping sight-seers out of the Mining City.

"If'n ye still wanna job, go on through." Reaching into a leather pouch at his belt, he brought out a metallic badge with the symbol of the RMC hammered into it. The profile of Aslan's Forge rose in the background, with a shield quartered, emblazoned with a crossed pick and hammer. "Wear this- else you'll run into trouble with t'guards inside. Look fer t'stone building, go inside. Firs' door on t'right." He flipped the badge to Antonin and looked to the next person in line. Obviously this pleasant little interview was at an end.