Speaker 1: The scum Kings, created and written by Mike Daltrey, Episode nineteen,
The Shadow of the Wall.
Speaker 2: We crested the last hill and the world changed. For weeks,
our world had been nothing but gray trees, empty roads,
and the dirt beneath our boots. Now laid out before
us in the valley below was gray Mark. We had
been marching toward a name on a map, an idea,
But an idea doesn't prepare you for the reality of
forty foot stone walls. It was a true city, bigger
and more imposing than any story had described. Massive stone walls,
scarred by age but unbroken, encircled it completely. Watchtowers flew
the banner of a local barren, a snarling badger on
a field of green. At the main gate, a steady
river of humanity flowed in an out, merchant wagons, farmers
with their carts, travelers on foot. It was a display
of order, wealth, and power, unlike anything we had seen.
The handful of silver Solari and Selaine's purse, which had
felt like a king's ransom on the road, suddenly seemed
like a beggar's pittance. I looked at the faces of
my crew, and I saw the city reflected in their eyes.
Systiggen stared, his mouth slightly agape. It wasn't fear I
saw on his face, but a warrior's awe. He was
a Northman looking at a mountain made by the hands
of men, and he respected the hell out of its strength.
To him, those walls were a challenge, a testament to
a power he understood. Cob was another story. He shrank
behind Stiggins's bulk, his eyes wide with terror. It wasn't
the walls that scared him. It was the people, that endless,
noisy river of them. To Cob, it was a tide
that would surely drown him. Selaine saw neither walls nor people.
She saw costs. I could practically hear the numbers clicking
away in her mind. Two coppers per man for the
gate toll, a silver to bribe the sergeant to ignore
our weapons, the price of a room, the price of information,
the cost of being noticed. Her face was a mask
of cold, economic calculation, and Bryn Bryn hated it, every
part of it. The distant noise, the smell of so
many men and beasts packed together, the unnatural scar of
the city on the land. She was a coiled spring,
her hand resting on the hilt of her knife, every
instinct screaming at her to flee back to the silence
of the woods. She looked at gray Mark like a
wolf looks at a trap. We stood there for a
long time, a pack of ragged press editors, staring at
a beast far larger than ourselves. It was also who
finally brought us back to the grim reality. He let
out a short, dry huff that wasn't quite a laugh.
We can't afford the city, he said, his voice cutting
through our thoughts.
Speaker 1: Not yet.
Speaker 2: He pointed not at the grand main gate with its
banners and guards, but to the west, where a sprawling,
chaotic shanty town clung to the city's outer wall like
a festering disease. It was a chaotic maze of mud
and wattle huts, leaning timber buildings, and smoke choked alleys.
Our kingdom starts there, he said, his voice flat. He
pointed down into the slum, the gutters. The final sliver
of our hopeful optimism died. We were kings without a kingdom,
rich men without enough coin to even be called poor.
We left the clean dirt and the quiet of the
wilderness behind, and began our descent. We walked down in
the shadow of the walls, toward the noise and the filth.
We had finally clawed our way out of the bottom
of the world, only to find ourselves standing at the
gates of a bigger, deeper gutter.