Chapter 34: Vesna Roguskt-Orsktacktna

So, Danka Siluckt’s travels ended when the Path of her Life finally brought her back to Rika Heckt-nemat. Who would have thought she’d end up precisely where her journey started? Certainly not the traveling singers and story-tellers, who already were making up increasingly sorrowful and outlandish versions of her adventures.

It seems that she lost all desire to travel after she married and became known to the world as Vesna Roguskt-Orsktacktna, Farmer Tuko Orsktackt’s wife from the east. She became the partner he needed to repair his broken farm, and in doing so, she helped him repair his broken soul. Within eight years she bore him seven children, of whom six survived to become adults. There were four boys and two girls, all of whom were vital to the rebuilding of Rika Heckt-nemat. One son became a city councilman, another became the town Church’s leading priest, another served in Parliament, and the youngest boy ... the roughest one who was always causing trouble, eventually became captain of the city guard. The two surviving girls did just as well: one married the mayor of Rika Chorna, and the other stayed behind, to marry a farmer and double the size of the Orsktackt estate. The Orsktackts became one of the leading families in Grand Duchy of Upper Danubia during the nineteenth century.

Although she lost the desire to travel, Vesna’s soul remained restless. She took over the abandoned trading house in her city and converted it into a medical research center. The project had humble beginnings, just a few doctors, alchemists, and potion-makers studying medical texts and cadavers, but over time the medical library grew, a hospital was added, and the project flourished into the medical university that we have today. Vesna frequently visited the hospital, constantly asking questions and occasionally assisting the staff when they had to set broken bones.

Rika Heckt-nemat started to recover the same year the girl-with-no-name secretly returned home. Farmer Orsktackt impressed upon the city council the need for rat-control programs and improved sanitation. When word got out that the city was safe, outsiders came to take advantage of the free houses in the town and the free land outside. Eventually there were enough workers to re-start the aqueduct project. Workers returned to farms and orchards, the harvests were good, and the plague and famine of 1750 became a distant memory. Farmer Orsktackt and his wife continued their rides and hunting trips in the fields and forests, observing the countryside and noting with satisfaction the province’s recovery.

The Grand Duke of Danubia spent the following decades working on a multitude of projects. In 1761, the son of the Lord of Novo Sokut Tok went to the capitol to talk to the Grand Master of the Trader’s Guild. From there he planned to travel to Austria, to see about procuring some new muskets for his father’s militia. The night before he was supposed to leave, he accepted an invitation from the Grand Duke to have dinner at his castle. Seated with the sovereign was a beautiful young woman who had just braided her hair. The young woman captivated the visitor, and turned out to be available for marriage, very much so. Three days later, without understanding what exactly had happened, the son of one of the men most loyal to the Vice-Duke of Rika Chorna was in the Great Temple of the capitol, getting married to the daughter of a man his father considered an enemy. The ceremony was very public and greeted with the blessings of the highest clergy members in the nation.

The young man had to cancel his plans to go to Vienna. Instead, he returned home with the Grand Duke’s daughter and the shocking news that his entire family had just switched allegiance. Along with his marriage certificate, the young man brought home a letter from the Grand Duke addressing his new in-laws with kind words of greeting and the “pleasure we will have working with each other as we address the challenges the Destroyer has placed at the feet of the Grand Duchy of Upper Danubia.”

That marriage was the first out of many. Some ambitious politicians even traveled to the capitol to intentionally seek an audience with the ruler and bring back one of his daughters. In 1763, a junior council official from Platnackt Dek persuaded the Grand Duke to allow him to marry one of his daughters. The ruler normally would not have given a daughter to such a low-ranking official, but there was something about the young man that appealed to him. Perhaps he saw a lot of himself in the petty representative. Anyhow, he reluctantly followed his instincts and allowed the man to take away one of his less attractive offspring. Upon returning home the councilman used his new family alliance to seize control of the entire city, declare the area loyal to the sovereign, and appoint himself the local governor. The Grand Duke was very impressed with the young man’s audacity and rewarded him by adding several nearby towns to his jurisdiction and making Platnackt Dek a separate province.

Because of their perception of public honor and Danubian protocol, the Grand Duke’s sons-in-law never warned anyone else not to travel to the capitol or let their friends know how they had been duped. They had to pretend they had willingly married the sovereign’s daughters. As a result of the informal code of silence, years went by and no one could accurately calculate how many daughters the ruler actually was marrying off. Over five years the Vice-Duke lost family after family of his best allies to the wiles of his rival’s daughters. By June, 1767 he realized that more than half of the provincial governors, town council leaders, and guild chiefs had someone in their family who had married a daughter of the Grand Duke. At that point the idea of starting a rebellion or threatening a rebellion as a political maneuver had become impossible.

The Vice-Duke realized another awful fact; that his two surviving sons had recently departed for the capitol. The Vice-Duke desperately sent messengers to find the young men, but already it was too late. An elaborate entourage of Danubian Clergy members, Royal Guards, and ministers were escorting the happily-married young men back to their homes in the east. The Grand Duke led the procession, bringing with him gifts and bottles of his best wine to celebrate with his new in-laws. The Vice-Duke became dishonorably drunk at the festivities, while the Grand Duke looked on and coldly smiled.

The Vice-Duke died the following year. One of his heir’s first announcements was that farming taxes throughout the Vice-Duchy would be reduced. The heir also announced much of his father’s artwork and jewelry would be sold-off to pay debts.

In 1770, after a decade of planning, the Priests of more than half of the parishes in the Vice-Duchy declared they were switching allegiance to the Old Believers’ faction of the Danubian Church. The religious coup brought western Danubian religious traditions to the east and ended all foreign religious influence in the Grand Duchy of Upper Danubia.

The Grand Duke’s attentions were focused on the Duchy’s borders and securing control of the east, but occasionally he received reports about the plague town Rika Heckt-nemat and its recovery. Yes, a town that he had considered completely dead seemed to have recuperated and was starting to prosper. He sent a group of doctors to investigate the inhabitants and see if the quarantine should be lifted. Sure enough, not only was the town’s population healthy, but a new medical institute was operating, using a lot of the knowledge from the Cult of the Ancients. The messengers brought back news of the impressive work of the town’s leading couple: the farmer Tuko Orsktackt and his wife Vesna Roguskt-Orsktacktna.

The Grand Duke lifted the quarantine and re-routed the trade road to enter Rika Heckt-nemat. He decided to pay a visit to the city to see its progress for himself and investigate what the Crown could do to assist. Tuko Orsktackt, the town’s entire Clergy, and the City Council received the ruler in the most elaborate ceremony the city had seen in many decades. The Grand Duke and his ministers attended the Council to listen to suggestions that would improve the region.

The Grand Duke visited the medical institute the following day. He was eager to meet its director and see if she really did have knowledge from the Cult of the Ancients. When she approached him and saluted, he stared at her in shock. She looked very familiar: no, it was impossible, but there she was, right in front of him. He was looking into the face of his favorite concubine, the smart young Follower who had mysteriously vanished during the Great Fire. Yes indeed, it was her!