THE CHOICE

………………KING KORALE…………

THE CHOICE…………

In those days Men had many wives and from them were many offspring provided whereby did their numbers greatly increase upon the face of the earth. Those Easterlings who were late in coming into Eriduah still clung to those traditions, unlike so many others who had been led by the Fair rulers of Mithar to dissuade such barbaric leanings. For long had it been the Nasilian custom that if a man was not given a firstborn son, he had the right to take a wife until one had been gifted him, and yet it remained his first wife who ruled the home above all the other wives. But, under the Mitharian lordship such practices were nullified and forbidden as unrighteous before the Divine Eru.

In those days there came Utubrin, such a man who cherished the old ways and with him his nine wives and thirty-one children, along with many she and he-goats. Utubrin was a tanner of skins by trade and considered most blessed and wealthy by his Nasilian kinsmen. Through all their travels to the west Utubrin had greatly desired to settle down behind the comfort of city walls, residing no longer in nomadic tents. But since their founding the Mitharian Kings had grown all the more powerful due to their wickedly zealous Priests who pushed for greater control over the people in their midst.

The Tanner Utubrin sold offerings of fine pelts throughout the realm of Eriduah, and in doing so his wealth came to the attention of King Korale who was most displeased on account of his priest’s ill perceptions of Pagan rites. The King confided in his vizier Laomuntus, who himself had given up the enslavement of three additional wives. “Go unto this arrogant Tanner, newly come to Slavath’s village, and divulge your own reform, and say to him as well from your king, ‘If only you would do likewise and put your other wives aside, he shall greatly reward you most handsomely before the people and before Alno their only God.”

Later that evening Laomuntus came before the King with lowered eyes. His words betrayed the King’s eagerness, “My Lord, the Bedouin boldly refused your gracious blessing, saying, ‘I would rather lose eight fingers than those most precious to me!”

Instantly Koral’s anger blazed, “Send out the blade of Kurgarru telling him to retrieve those cherish sixteen to me! Then inform the Tanner and Priests alike he is welcomed nowhere in the realm and the like shall befall those who shall. ”

“Without fail your majesty.”

Two hours later and the King was presented a box with the eight fingers of Utubrin, and several sackcloth bags with the heads of his eight wives, of which Koral called to be spiked on either side of the southern Sibling Gate. From that time onward Utubrin no longer showed signs of rebellion; however, it was not so with his eighteen sons.

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