July Content Update: A Land of Obscene Criminals (and also Bandits) (Patreon)

A Land of Obscene Criminals (And Also Bandits)

The Iron Marches! A land of opportunity! A lad of freedom! A land for the brave and the enterprising to make their own fortunes, or so they would tell you. Well, let me tell you something different. I have been to the iron Marches. I have travelled up and down the Iron Road, visited every little settlement and town, and I will say this: the statements are accurate, to a degree. The Iron Marches surely are a land of opportunity - to be robbed of everything you own. A land of freedom - to be exploited and treated no better than an animal. A land for the brave and the enterprising, for you would have to be both to put up with the constant suspicion and hostility of the wretched, greedy, vicious, and small-minded miscreants which call it home.

"Yes, of course," you reply. "The Iron Marches have a bandit problem, we're all aware of that". And yes, that part is very true. The Iron Marches do have a bandit problem. It's the reason why most travellers go in groups, even along the Iron Road. It's why every little settlement has its own militia and tall fence around its perimeter, and why every inhabitant carries a long knife and a stout club when they go out of doors, even if it is just to relieve themselves. Travel the Iron Road alone for any period of time, and you'll run into bandits soon enough: ragged, glaring sorts who will point and prod you with spears and axes demanding your valuables. Usually, it's a good idea to give them over: bandits won't attack travellers unless they're absolutely sure that those travellers will make for easy enough targets.

Yet the bandits are almost the most hospitable of the Iron Road's people. Make a pitiable enough of a scene, and they will let you keep a few pieces of silver for yourself. Show that you have nothing, and some of them will even share a little of their own spoils for you, before asking if you would like to join them. Show yourself to be wearing armour, or a sword, or travel in the company of those who are, and they will even go so far as to politely step aside, and apologise for the intrusion. For folk with no permanent homes, no families, and no regular craft, they are remarkably solicitous, especially to those whom they see as fellow vagabonds and members of those parts of society dispossessed by bad luck.

No, the real thieves are not those lacking home or work or family, but those with all three. The danger comes not when you are on the Iron Road, but when you step off of it, past the gates, and into the dirty, rutted streets of one of those little towns or settlements which string themselves across the length of the road like pieces of rancid meat along a skewer. When you travel the Iron Road, it is not the bandits, but the "honest" folk you need to fear.

"But how could that be true?" I can already hear you asking. "The people of the Iron Marches keep close communities. They have to trust each other to ensure their settlements survive against a hostile environment!" 

All of that is very true. The folk of the Iron Marches would lay down their lives for their family members, their friends, and their neighbours. They would saw off their own foot to feed a starving friend, and if another in their village finds themselves in trouble, the whole wretched settlement will come out to help them in any way they can. All that is very true, I have seen it for myself. The smaller settlements of the Iron Road are more like extended families in their own right, always willing to help, never afraid to make whatever sacrifices necessary to ensure the well-being of others of their village.

But you aren't of their village, are you? No. When you show up to their little collection of cottages, you're a stranger, and as far as they're concerned, that makes you less than a farm animal to them: a wretched waste of space here to take up their bedding, eat their food, and cause trouble for their little community. At best, you will be an inconvenience. At worst, a mark. They will seek every opportunity to remind you that you aren't welcome in their little world, and they will take every chance to swindle you out of everything you own, just to make up for the inconvenience they seem to think you pose them. If they do offer you food and drink, it will be at five times a reasonable price. If they offer you tools or clothing which would normally cost silver elsewhere, they will invariably demand gold. To negotiate for a place to sleep in such places is something very much akin to robbery - for if you do not pay for the nominal protection of someone's yard or barn, you will almost certainly find yourself waking up with your pockets and pouches picked clean in the morning.

Yet for all of their suspicion and greed and cruelty, these wretched creatures are only the most petty of the criminals which infest the Iron Road. No, that becomes clear enough when one sees the fruits of their criminality: trinkets for a miserable little cottage, enough money for a spare cloak, or pair of boots. How can such folk compare at all to those grand criminals who do not rob individuals, but entire peoples? Those whose profits purchase them not a few baubles or a mangy sheep, but an entire city, all under their direct control? Whatever the people of the Iron Road do as individuals, the Iron League does on a grand scale. Where villagers and backcountry rogues might sip illicitly from the stream of honest commerce, the Iron League dams up the flow entirely. It is they which make the Marches a land of criminals, for it is through their criminality that they rule over them.

It is often said that the Iron League controls Montfort. One might imagine that they control it the same way a lord might, or the council under them. Yet such bodies will only impose laws and leave the rest to the inhabitants within the walls. The Iron League does not allow for such freedoms. Their control of Montfort would make a Captain-General of Mazzare think of rebellion: every guild within the walls is under their direction. Every tavern and ale shop is run by their underlings. Every workshop and market stall only exists with their leave, takes loans from their bank, and pays them for the pleasure of their protection. Those who do not agree to such terms are quickly convinced otherwise through violence, with no recourse to the watch or the Watchers or body of knights - the Iron League controls them too.

Worse yet, the League's masters and agents use the criminality of those who live along the Iron Road to reinforce their own. For protection from bandits, one must ride along with a League-sponsored caravan - no others are allowed to ply the road. To accompany such a body is like being locked into a cell with a dozen professional extortionists. Every drop of drink and scrap of food must be paid for. Bedrolls and spots by a campfire incur fees, and if the locals sell you no food and offer you no place to sleep, then you must necessarily pay those fees. Refuse, and you will be thrown out, put at the mercy of the perilous wilds and the bandits which inhabit them - who may in fact give you the only reasonably humane welcome you will ever encounter in the Iron Marches.

So, my friend, don't listen to the stories - or better yet, do. Listen to those stories, and keep in mind that they are falsehoods intended to sway the gullible and romantic. Keep listening to those stories, enjoy them, but do it in the familiar tavern of your hometown, and never set foot in the real Iron Marches. Your feet, your coinpurse, and your sense of faith in others will thank you for it.