Middle ages were times of cruelty and ruthlessness. Kingdoms and empires were ruled by inconsiderate monarchs who rarely cared for their subordinates.
When Morgarath set his path to claiming the Crown of Araluen for his own, his actions led not only to war, but they also exponentiated slowly growing social-economical crisis. People started to starve, the value of traded coin was decreasing and work became unrewarding labour. Morgarath then gained power upon Oswald and imprisoned young prince Duncan, who started to grow bitter and hateful against all Morgarath's subordinates. The baron of Gorlan fief realized, that even though he is an inch away from being crowned the king of Araluen, he cannot possibly rule nation on brink of extinction. He started to look for possible options to increase Araluen's economical outcome. Soon, many barons gave up their fiefs to his control, hoping Morgarath will find a solution. Morgarath domain was spread all over eastern Araluen, up to the southern borders of Norgate to the Mountains of Rain and Dark reaching to the eastern border of Celtica. It didn't take long and Morgarath made a declaration. "Our weaknesses lies in our separated ecnonomical agricultural units," he stated. Upon this statement, all little farmholds had been subjected to biggest ones in regions. prices of goods had been stabilised and united. People weren't starving any further, coin began to circulate once more. Nonetheless, many of ordinary folk grew displeased as their economic freedom was restriced to leaving most of their agricultural earns to owners of leading farmholds.
Young prince Duncan grew more bitter in his imprisonement and shadows bending the reality took place within his mind. One day, he found himself freed by the remains of ranger unit, subjected to his father. Together with Crowley, Halt and young baron of Redmont, they managed to bring Morgarath to his knees (metaphorically) on the tournament of Gorlan.
War was then unleashed upon the weakened nation of Araluen and as Morgarath disappeared in the Mountains, his fragile economic system started to crumble.
People were starving again, there was no money to fund Duncan's army. In his hatred towards Morgarath and in his misted and shadowed mind, Duncan took an unspeakable decision. He set up a slavery system and enslaved most of folk in Morgarath's former territories. Creating new 'goods', coin flowed again, not only within Araluen but with other countries as well. Upon the first defeat of former baron, the system was firmly estabilished.
Newly renewed Ranger Corps grew uneasy and uncomfortable with Duncan's decision as their loyalty was sworn not only to the king but common people as well. Sadly though they realized that once the system was firmly engraved into Araluen's economics, there was no way without creating mass crisis, even bigger one than before. Halt and Crowley decided to put their hope into the newly born Duncan's heir, princess Cassandra, who was hoped to bring peace and honour to the Crown once more.
Hello! My name is Arcanoid and here I am, contributing with my first fic. First of all... Can someone explain me, why we don't have Pauline in list of characters? Second of all... Ehmm, this fic was created to raise awareness of a problem called "slavery system". Many people think it is matter of ancient cultures and then colonisation of America. But in reality, slavery was spread all around the world, including mediaval Europe. Eventhough the Vikings were most most known for the slave trade in Europe, the slavery was estabilished in all kingdoms up to the late Middle ages, including mediaval England.
This fic is basically another building of dynamics and relationship between Halt and Will, based on the mutual trust. Please, I would like to inform you beforehand, this is not slash between them. I do not ship them and I never will. Nor do I write smut and graphic depictions of rape, so even though there might be some implied references, for example in Will's memories, do not expect these things be corner stones of this fic. It's supposed to be mainly about developing a trust between Halt and Will and believe it or not, it has story if its own. The story is loosely based on events of the first book, but I changed some things for my liking.
Comments and critics are welcome as to if you have any objections against my writing, I will try my best to write to your liking.
Yours Arcanoid