Serialized Pulp Novel: The Rogue and the Merchants (Part 3)

Below is Serial #3 of my pulp novel, The Rogue and the Merchants. Here is a link to the full transcription thus far: The Rogue and the Merchants

It was near a month's journey on horseback from the tyrannized city of Tabun-Stoh to Drossus, and the wilderness seperating the merchants from their city to that forest principality was not the safest. Their first difficulty was that there were only sparse roads. They were on the edge of the Empire of the Griess. The city of Tabun-Stoh was the last great population center for hundreds of miles. The lands were infested, too, with wild bandits who were related to the ancient Verdin civilization, which was lost to dust nearly a thousand years ago. On top of that, the scrub lands were not plentiful in terms of game. There were a few wild herds of bison, but they were a skittish animal. A stampede would truly mean their quick death, if they didn't watch out. They were well stocked with road rations, twice-baked biscuits, dried meat, and dried fruit, but the rains in the lands east of the city made it difficult to keep their stores dry and safe from molding. There only hope was to move along tentatively and be on the lookout for any settlement that seemed at least slightly civilized.

This worked in the first weeks outside of Tabun Stoh. The villages they came upon outside of the city at first were not much different than the city itself. The people spoke the language of the merchants. They built their houses using techniques similar to that of their homeland. And their music, drink, and food had a familiar, though slightly different, feelt to it. It was the beginning of their third week that they began to struggle.