Steel and Sorrow: Rise of the Mercenary king

The last flicker of hope that Harmway’s citizens had clung to—that their island might return to the embrace of Romelia—was shattered the moment they saw the pirate ships turning toward their harbor. Any illusions of a swift liberation crumbled as the battered remnants of Romelia’s forces were paraded through the streets, bound in chains. The long lines of prisoners, some limping, others staring hollow-eyed at the ground, were the final nail in the coffin.

There would be no salvation, no return to the golden days of trade and prosperity.

Many among the people had already begun to yearn for the past, for the days when the Romelian banners flew high and Harmway thrived as a bustling hub of commerce. Back then, the docks had never been empty. Each sunrise had brought with it a fleet of merchant ships, their hulls heavy with goods from across the seas. Romelians, Azanians, and traders from the southern princedoms all converged upon the island, their languages mingling in the markets, their coin fueling an economy that relied entirely on the flow of foreign trade.

But now? Now the great port of Harmway, once teeming with life, was as good as abandoned. The mere sight of the Confederation’s flag had been enough to drive merchants away, fearful of being harassed, blackmailed and raided. Trade routes that once wove through Harmway now bent around it, treating the island like a plague-ridden corpse. And with no ships coming in, no goods changing hands, and no money flowing, the city’s lifeblood was cut off.

Businesses shuttered their doors. Warehouses that once overflowed with grain, spices, and exotic wares now stood empty, their owners unable to sell what they could no longer acquire. Even the taverns, once filled with sailors and traders boasting of their journeys, had grown eerily quiet, now only being filled with pirates speaking about their latest catches.

Harmway had always been an island dependent on the outside world, but now, under the Confederation’s rule, it found itself adrift—cut off, forgotten, and suffocating under the weight of its own isolation.

The only merchants who dared to set foot on Harmway now were the brokers—those scavengers of war who thrived on chaos, dealing in whatever spoils the pirates could bring them.

With war raging between the Free Isles and Romelia, the usual trade had dried up, and these men, ever adaptable, had turned to the one commodity that was never in short supply after battle—flesh.

A few weeks after the fighting had ended, Harmway had transformed into something grotesque. The island, once a proud and thriving trade hub, had become nothing more than a vast storehouse for human chattel. The docks that had once welcomed great merchant ships laden with goods now bore witness to a different kind of cargo—long lines of prisoners, shackled and silent, marched off ships and herded into makeshift holding pens. Some were Romelian soldiers, captured when their fleet was sent to the depths, others were civilians, unlucky enough to have been caught in the chaos.

Weapons were also plentiful, taken from the dead and the defeated, but steel could only be sold once. People, however, could be sold again and again, and the brokers knew it well. The main business of Harmway was no longer in grain, nor cloth, nor precious metals.

It was in bodies.

The market for flesh stretched out beyond the city walls, a sprawling, chaotic thing hastily built from wooden stalls, makeshift tents, and hastily erected platforms where men stood in miserable rows, waiting to be sold.

Bartos of Aracina pulled his cloak tighter around himself as he walked through the throng, ignoring the press of bodies around him. Normally, he had to scrounge, haggle, and fight for every silver coin he spent. But today? Today was different. Today, he had no limit.

A merchant near him shouted, his voice hoarse from hours of barking.

”Strong backs for strong work! Good Romelian stock! Look at this one—no scars, no deformities, fit for anything! 9 silver to start—don’t insult me with less!”

Another bellowed from a platform, standing beside a man with hair the color of honey.

”A rare beauty! Think of the prices he’ll fetch in the right market! Gentle hands, a piece of meat, 15 silverii !

Bartos barely heard them. The weight of the coin pouch at his belt should have been comforting—should have made him feel powerful. But it didn’t. It wasn’t his money, and the weight of it felt heavier than coin had any right to be.

He had no idea who the coin belonged to. No name, no face.The only thing he knew was that they had his family.

His jaw clenched as he walked, eyes scanning the rows of captives. Somewhere among this wretched sea of misery was what he had been sent to find.

Bartos came to a halt in front of a stocky man with a thick, greased beard and a tunic stained with sweat and old wine. The merchant stood behind a row of gaunt, sunburnt men, their wrists bound in front of them, their eyes hollow from exhaustion.

Bartos wasted no time. ”Which of these are sailors?” he asked, voice clipped.

The merchant’s grin was wide and yellow. ”Sailors?” He scoffed. ”Oh, you don’t want sailors, friend. I’ve got strong backs here! Fighters—the best of the Romelian dogs who put up a real struggle before we took ’em down. They’ll serve you well, break ’em right and—”

Bartos cut him off with a sharp glare. ”Are you deaf?” he snapped. ”I asked for sailors, not warriors. I don’t need men who swing swords—I need ones who can tie a proper knot and know a rudder from their own ass.”

The merchant’s grin faltered. He scratched at his greasy beard before shrugging. ”Aye, got some of those. Eighty-three of ’em, fresh from the wrecks.”

Bartos exhaled through his nose. ”I’ll take them all.”

The merchant’s eyebrows lifted slightly, but he wasn’t fool enough to look surprised. He pulled out a small slate and began scratching rough numbers onto it with a stub of chalk, murmuring to himself. Finally, he looked up. ”Five hundred eighty-one silverii,” he said smoothly. ”But since you’re clearing out a full lot, let’s call it five-seventy. Consider it a gesture of goodwill.”

Bartos didn’t care for goodwill, but he did care about saving time. He reached into his cloak and pulled out six small bundles wrapped in coarse cloth, dropping them into the merchant’s outstretched hands with a dull thud.

The merchant grunted at the weight, setting them down on a nearby crate. He peeled one open, revealing neat stacks of gleaming silverii. His lips curled into an appreciative grin.

”Hundred in each,” Bartos said flatly. ”I expect thirty back.”

The merchant cracked his knuckles before opening another bundle, his fingers working quickly as he counted out the silverii one by one. The coins clinked softly as they stacked atop each other, his lips moving silently as he kept track of the numbers.

When he reached one hundred, he set the bundle aside and pulled another closer, repeating the process with the same methodical care. By the time he finished counting the second bundle, he nodded and scooped out thirty silverii, handing them back to Bartos.

”There,” he said, tucking the rest into a leather pouch at his waist. ”That settles it. But I’ve got other goods too, you know I-.”

Bartos, slipping the returned silver into his own cloak, tilted his head. ”Would you like to make more coins?”

The merchant raised an eyebrow, intrigued. ”Always,” he admitted. ”Depends on the deal.”

Bartos leaned in slightly. ”I need another two hundred and twenty sailors. If you can find merchants willing to part with them, I’ll pay you a fee of one hundred silverii.”

The merchant’s eyes gleamed with interest.

”And,” Bartos continued, ”if it works out, we can repeat this deal twice next week—for three hundred men each time.”

The merchant scratched his chin, clearly considering the offer. ”That’s a lot of bodies to pull together,” he muttered, rolling the numbers over in his head. After a moment, he exhaled through his nose and gave a slow nod. ”I’ll see what I can find for now.”

He turned to one of his helpers, a wiry young man who had been lounging nearby. ”Go around the market, find Vorti , Rashin and Vrisk ,” he ordered. ”Ask who’s got sailors to sell. If they do, bring them here.”

The helper didn’t hesitate. He got up with a nod and disappeared into the crowd, leaving Bartos and the merchant to wait.

The merchant clicked his tongue, glancing at Bartos with a curious smirk. ”That’s a lot of sailors you’re buying up. You got a ship to put them on, or are you just collecting them for decoration?”

Bartos turned his head slowly, his gaze like a dagger slipping between the merchant’s ribs. ”Do you want answers,” he asked, his voice flat, ”or do you want coins?”

The merchant blinked, then raised his hands in mock surrender. ”My mistake,” he said quickly. ”Didn’t mean to pry.” He shifted his weight and cleared his throat, suddenly far more interested in the bustling market around them.

The two men stood in silence as they waited, the merchant idly rubbing his thumb over a silver coin while his eyes flicked toward the crowd, watching for his helper to return, not knowing that the sailors he was currently selling would one work for one of the player who in the future would fight for control of this sea, as the area around Harmway would in the future be in a tornado of chaos.