The Rivan Codex

by David Eddings

  The twelve hundred years which followed the destruction of Nyissa was spent by the Rivans in their endless (and futile) quest for the heir to the Rivan Throne. Persistent rumors based on the sketchy and confused testimony of witnesses to the assassination maintained that the youngest son of the Crown Prince, a boy of nine,44 escaped the knives of the Nyissans by plunging into the sea. Had this in fact been the case, the child would surely have perished, for the Sea of the Winds at Riva is bitterly cold throughout the year. Rumors persist, however, long after reason despairs, and the Rivans have painstakingly tracked down each vague hint or clue. Scores of impostors have emerged over the centuries, but the Rivans would appear to have some ultimate test which none yet has passed.

  The quest for the heir to the Rivan Throne was interrupted only by the Angarak invasion of the west under Kal-Torak in 4865. It was the thirty-first Warder of Riva who was the overgeneral of the western forces and who led the assault upon the rear of the main force of Kal-Torak before the walls of Vo Mimbre in 4875, and it was this same thirty-first warder (traditionally named Brand—although the Warder is selected rather than ascending to his position by birth) who met and defeated Kal-Torak in single combat. (See the prose epic ‘The Battle of Vo Mimbre’ for a colorful though basically accurate description of that duel.)

  Following this amazing display of prowess, the assembled rulers of the west pledged allegiance to the Rivan Throne in an outburst of enthusiasm over the crushing of Kal-Torak, and only the presence of mind of Mergon, the Tolnedran ambassador to the court at Vo Mimbre forestalled the immediate installation of Brand XXXI as Emperor of the West. The concession wrung from Mergon in exchange was the aforementioned Agreement of Vo Mimbre, which specified that upon his return the Rivan King will be given to wife an Imperial Tolnedran Princess.

  Upon the completion of the battle, Brand XXXI returned to Riva, and since that time Rivan traders have been seen throughout the known world. Although they are shrewd bargainers, it is commonly believed in the highest governmental circles at Tol Honeth that these ‘merchants’ are in fact agents of the Rivan Warder engaged in that centuries-long and obviously futile search for the heir to the Rivan Throne.

  Whatever their motives, the Grey-Cloaks are a welcome addition to the world of commerce, and it is to be hoped that in time the Rivans will outgrow their secretive ways and assume their proper place in the family of nations.

  Riva

  COINAGE

  GOLD

  A 1 ounce gold coin called a ‘Rivan Gold Penny’ equal to a Tolnedran ‘Noble’.

  1⁄2 ounce gold coin called a ‘Rivan Gold Half-Penny’ equal to a Tolnedran ‘Crown’.

  SILVER

  A 2 oz. silver coin called a ‘Rivan Silver Double-Penny’. 10 Double-Pennies = a Gold Penny = a Silver ‘Imperial’.

  A 1 oz. silver coin, a ‘Silver Penny’. 20 = 1 Gold Penny.

  A 1⁄2 oz. silver coin called a ‘Silver Half-Penny’ = a Tolnedran Silver Crown.

  BRASS OR COPPER

  Called a ‘brass’ or a ‘copper’

  Theoretically equal, but in practice a brass is worth 2 coppers 100 brass = a Silver Half-Penny 200 coppers = a Silver Half-Penny

  COSTUME

  There are no class distinctions in Rivan costume, but the nobles and the wealthy wear slightly finer clothing. The standard is a tunic, long-sleeved, belted and reaching to mid-thigh. Long, fairly wide sleeves. Also leggings (wrappings) laced around with thongs or cord. The standard grey cloak is a heavy, sleeveless mantle with a hood.

  Rivan clothing is grey—undyed wool. Rivan sheep have a curious grey color and extremely fine, thick wool.

  On state or formal occasions a blue linen tunic with discreet silver embroidery is worn by all ranks.

  SHOES

  A soft leather half-boot (felt in the winter)

  ARMOR

  Chain mail and pointed steel helmets

  RANK

  The distinction between noble and commons is generally indicated in the weaponry. The customary weapons of the Rivans are a four-foot broadsword and an 18 inch dagger. The sword-belts of the nobility are gold or silver-studded. Those of the commons are plain.

  WOMEN

  Wear linen gowns, long sleeved and sober and decorous. Belting is a concession to vanity and the gowns are cross-tied to accentuate the bosom. The hair (usually blonde) is worn long and flowing with elaborate braiding around the temples to give a coronet effect.

  COMMERCE

  Bread, again a standard, costs slightly more in Riva than in Tolnedra, but the Rivans are thrifty and industrious so there is virtually no poverty on the island. Fairs are held in the meadows along the River of Veils behind the city of Riva and there is a great deal of barter as opposed to cash transactions. Trade items—wool, sheep, a few cattle, hogs, produce. Useful goods, shoes, pots, pans, etc.

  RANK

  THE WARDER

  Selected by the nobility in conclave at Riva. Invested with the name Brand and wears an iron circlet on state occasions.

  THE BARONS

  20 only. Each represents a district in the city of Riva and is responsible for its maintenance and defense. The residents of a district are the Baron’s men. Some Rivans live in the out-lands—a few shepherds, some farmers, etc. This is a largely self-contained society with a remarkably stable population.

  MODES OF ADDRESS

  ‘My Lord Brand’ to the Warder.

  ‘Sir John’ to the Barons.

  ‘Friend John’ to the commons—not unusual for a lower class Rivan to call a Baron ‘Friend John’ as well.

  POPULATION

  The population of the city of Riva is about 100,000; another half million or so in villages and on farmsteads.

  RELIGIOUS OBSERVANCES

  Temple of Belar in the city of Riva

  Religious observances standard Alorn (See Cherek)

  Honor is also paid to Aldur

  Religion: see Cherek

  MAJOR HOLIDAYS

  Erastide—The world’s birthday—a week-long celebration in midwinter.

  Riva’s Birthday—Early summer—Patriotic rededication to the defense of the Orb.

  Gorek’s Day—Or a day of national mourning over the death of Gorek the Wise—early September.

  Festival of Belar—Spring. A religious holiday. Feasting, some drinking.

  Brand’s Day—Celebration of the victory at the Battle of Vo Mimbre. Military games. Midsummer.

  Cherek

  Cherek is a mountainous peninsula on the northwest coast, extending northward to the polar ice. With the exception of the valley of the Alorn River and the fertile basin south of Val Alorn, Cherek is too mountainous to be arable. There is some fishery in the Gulf of Cherek, and fairly extensive mineral deposits in the mountains—iron, copper, gold, silver, tin, certain gem-stones. The capital city at Val Alorn is a town of some 40,000, walled, stone-constructed, with narrow streets and high-pitched roofs.

  THE PEOPLE

  The Chereks are, of course, the elemental, archetypal Alorns. They are a noisy, boisterous, hard-drinking, rowdy race with little reverence for proprieties and little patience for subtlety. They are master ship-builders and superb seamen, but unfortunately have always had little taste for honest commerce, preferring piracy on the high seas to legitimate trade. It has been observed that frequently even the most stable merchant among the Chereks will fall back upon this predilection when the opportunity presents itself, and Tolnedran vessels are therefore always wary when meeting a Cherek vessel at sea.

  Perhaps because their stock is more undiluted than that of their cousins in Drasnia and Algaria, the Chereks are a taller, somewhat blonder people. Their social structure is clannish, but the clans all pay homage to the Throne at Val Alorn. Such feuds and disputes as periodically erupt are either settled by the King or decided in ritualized single combat.

  THE HISTORY OF THE CHEREKS

  It is evident that the Alorns have occupied the Cherek peninsula for at least four millennia. The gr
eat Temple of Belar, the Bear-God of the Alorns, at Val Alorn has been reliably dated to the eleventh century and is a truly remarkable example of prehistoric architecture. It appears that the Alorns were a fairly extensive tribe of northern nomads who settled in Cherek sometime early in the first millennium, and, although artifacts of the primitive Alorn culture have been found in northern Drasnia and in the mountains of Gar og Nadrak, it is quite evident that the Cherek peninsula is their ancestral home.

  Runes dating back into antiquity have indeed identified the country as Aloria, but this name appears to have been changed to Cherek in honor of Cherek Bear-shoulders, a great king who reigned over the Alorns at the end of the second millennium. Apparently a man of enormous power, King Cherek held sway over a vast northern empire extending from the Vale of Aldur to the polar ice and from the west coast to the far eastern reaches of what is now Gar og Nadrak, encompassing all of Algaria, Drasnia, Gar og Nadrak and northern Sendaria as well as the Cherek peninsula.

  The exact cause is unclear, but during the later years of his reign the empire of King Cherek was broken up into four separate Alorn Kingdoms, and the Alorns withdrew from the east to the borders of Drasnia.

  The first contacts between Cherek and the Tolnedran Empire came during the 25th and 26th centuries when Cherek pirates began systematically destroying all Tolnedran vessels which strayed into the Sea of Winds, and Cherek Berserks made landings all up and down the west coast, sacking and burning cities in Sendaria, Arendia, Tolnedra and Nyissa. The City of Tol Vordue at the mouth of the River Arend was burned to the ground eight times during those two centuries.

  By the beginning of the fourth millennium, Tolnedran emissaries had concluded a series of treaties and trade agreements with the Chereks, and relations began to assume some semblance of normalcy. In 3097 the Accords of Val Alorn opened the sea lanes to the city of Riva with certain provisos. (See the History of the Isle of the Winds.) Following the eventual opening of the Rivan commercial enclave, the city of Val Alorn began a modest trade with the Isle of the Winds and with Drasnia to the east. The bulk of Cherek commerce, however, derives from the sea transport of goods from the Drasnian port of Kotu through the Gulf of Cherek and the Cherek Bore in the Straits of Sendaria around the hook of Arendia to the southern ports. Despite the splendid system of highways constructed by Emperor Ran Horb II (see the History of Tolnedra), Cherek vessels, modeled on the long, narrow Cherek warships, move much more rapidly than the caravans of other merchants traveling the thousand leagues from Boktor at the western terminus of the North Caravan Route to the Sendarian port of Camaar. Thus Cherek merchants can easily put their goods on the docks at Tol Vordue or Tol Horb or even on the wharves of Tol Honeth months before similar goods can arrive via the overland route. The Chereks are also able to avoid the innumerable tolls, taxes, duties, port fees, bribes, gratuities and gifts which are the lifeblood of commerce, and this more than makes up for the occasional vessel lost to weather, uncharted reefs, or bad luck in those occasional encounters at sea of which the Chereks are so fond. Tolnedran merchants have bitterly complained about this advantage to the whole succession of Tolnedran Emperors for two thousand years without notable success, since the wily Cherek negotiators agreed in the Accords of Val Alorn to a tax of ten percent of their net upon any goods sold in Tolnedra to be paid directly into the personal treasury of the Emperor.

  In 4002, apparently in accord with a secret treaty with the Rivans, the entire Cherek fleet sailed southward and participated in the assault upon Nyissa. Since that time it has been no secret that there exists an Alorn confederation—an illegal arrangement in direct violation of numerous treaties with Tolnedra, all of which contain a clause of exclusivity forbidding the signatory nation from concluding treaties or agreements with any other power without Tolnedran consent.

  It must be conceded, however, that these secret agreements were invaluable during the war against the Angarak hordes of Kal-Torak (4865–75) when the Alorns arose as one people in response to the near-destruction of Drasnia and the wasting of the Algarian herds.

  It was in 4875 that Cherek warships appeared for the first time at Tol Honeth and conveyed virtually the entire Imperial Garrison north to the River Arend and thence up that river to the vast plain to the west of Vo Mimbre that they might fall upon the Angarak right flank. Further, it must be conceded that it was the presence of the Rivan Warder which mobilized the entire west against the Angarak threat. His leadership of that unlikely force of Rivans, Chereks, Sendars and northern Arends who assaulted the rear of the Mallorean Horde was the final blow upon that bloody field, since Algar cavalry, the remnants of Drasnian infantry and Ulgo irregulars had already begun the assault upon the Angarak left. This three-pronged attack, the most concentrated effort in military history, is generally conceded to have been the only thing that could have stemmed the Angarak tide.

  Cherek has prospered in the years since the defeat of the Angaraks, gaining advantage by assisting the Drasnians in the rebuilding of Boktor and Kotu and in the repair of the causeway across the Aldurfens on the Great North Road.

  The present King of Cherek is Anheg IX (called by some Anheg the sly). He has been on the Throne in Val Alorn for nine years. He is a large, dark-haired man with a brutish face. Though he appears to share the Alorn fondness for rowdy drinking and boastful swagger, he is in fact, a highly educated man and a shrewd politician. He is fully aware of the complex politics of the southern nations as well as the more elemental alliances of the Alorn Kingdoms. He spends much time in study, and is generally held by those who know him to be the equal at least of the Tolnedran Emperor, who has had the benefit of instruction by an entire university. The King of Cherek, however, conducts his own studies, and, it is rumored, has even learned old Angarak so that he might read in the original the forbidden BOOK OF TORAK, a work accursed by all civilized nations and religions.

  The palace of Anheg is a vast warren of unused chambers and dank corridors—befitting, perhaps, a building that has been three thousand years in construction. His private chambers are given over to study and to obscure experimentation.

  Anheg’s closest friend and advisor is his cousin Barak, a giant Alorn warrior with the temper of a Berserker and the subtlety of a Tolnedran ambassador. Barak has, it is reliably reported, been entrusted with a number of highly delicate missions for his cousin. Our informants in Val Alorn, however, report that he is generally believed by Cherek nobility to suffer from some obscure stigmata or ‘Doom’, as our northern friends call it, and is periodically morose and even melancholic. What the nature of this ‘Doom’ might be is a matter which causes tight lips and white knuckles on the sword-hands of our Cherek friends and an absolute refusal to discuss Barak’s affliction—even under the most skillful prodding.45

  Cherek

  COINAGE

  GOLD

  A 1 ½ oz. gold coin called a ‘shield’ equals about $200

  A ¾ oz. gold coin called a ‘half shield’ equals about $100 Cherek gold coins are octagonal and the weights are not very exact. They are usually hoarded and are seldom seen in trade.

  SILVER

  The standard of trade in Cherek

  A one pound silver bar milled on the edges and stamped with the King’s rune. Called a ‘Silver King’ equals $100.

  A ½ lb. silver bar called a ‘Silver Queen’ equals $50.

  A 4 oz. silver coin (very big) called a ‘Silver Prince’ equals $25.

  A one oz. silver coin called a ‘Silver Princess’ equals $6.50 (Tolnedran silver Noble)

  COPPER

  A copper penny 1 oz. octagonal equals 6.5¢

  A copper half-penny round equals 3.25¢

  Note: Copper is slightly more valuable in Cherek because of its scarcity in that country. (No brass coins in Cherek.)

  COSTUME

  MEN

  Basically Viking—lots of furs. Linen tunics. Leggings. Shoes are very crude. Cherek men are armed almost all of the time. Swords, axes, spears, like a boar-spear, javelins
, daggers. Helmet—various shapes decorated usually with the clan totem on top—no horn on helmets. Chain-mail shirts or heavy bull-hide with steel plates sewn on. Beards common.

  WOMEN

  Linen gowns. Belted. Cross-tied bodice to accentuate the bosom. (Cherek women are busty and quite proud of that fact.) Hair is braided and frequently bound up into elaborate headdresses.

  COMMERCE

  Extensive bartering. Market-place in most towns and villages. Ship building is a major industry around Val Alorn.

  RANK

  THE KING

  Hereditary. Always wears his crown. (Has a crown built onto his helmet for wars.) State robes are very fine and trimmed with ermine.

  THE EARLS

  Actually Clan-chiefs. Some 30-40 of them.

  LORDS

  The hereditary nobility. Associated with land. Can be invested at the King’s whim.

  WARRIORS

  Not exactly noble, but treated with more respect than commoners.

  COMMONERS

  Unlanded men—farm workers, dock-hands, etc. largely drawn from the descendants of Thralls (Thralldom was abolished at the end of the 2nd millennium).46 The social structure of Cherek is quite fluid and upward mobility is very common. Any man with a sword or axe can rise to warrior status and can in time be made a Lord by the King. Chereks are quite concerned with proprieties of such things.

  MODES OF ADDRESS