post save 5/23/2019

##The Summer Sea

>*As one would expect, the life of a mercenary is an unsure one, and their Free Companies often follow the same path as the lives of the men that comprise their organizations: men have formed these orders amongst their fellow sellswords at the start of the year, only for their captain to perish in the first battle the company sees, and shortly thereafter dissolves as it's members seek work elsewhere. Nonetheless, some of these enterprises of blood and steel last for generations, and the author has labored to offer a recording on all those known as of the time of writing.*

>*[...]*

>*The Salt Sons, unlike the aforementioned Salt-Tongues (which saw their destruction at the hands of an Elyrian monarch in 183 AC by all accounts) are composed primarily of privateers and exiles from Westeros. Indeed, if the company's oral legend is to be believed, even the founder of the Sons had fled from the Iron Islands in search of more lucrative opportunities in the East.*

>*Some more hyperbolic retellings of this even list the founder as a man of either Greyiron or Hoare descent, but these tales are likely exactly that: hyperbole, as the recorded extinction of House Greyiron took place centuries before we have the first mention of the Salt Sons opreating, and the 'Black Line' of the Hoare Kings was well documented - and none would have survived to start anew in the Stepstones.*

>*Whatever their history, this company has developed a reputation for ruthlessness, and enjoys the patronage of many of the Free Cities.*

^(*From 'A History of the Narrows' by Archmaester Ronnel, Archmaester of Cultures and Languages, dated 332 AC*)



Gorold wondered: could one ever grow bored of the sea?

He assumed so, of course - a man could grow to loathe anything with enough exposure - but, in his three-and-thirty years upon the waves, his love for it had yet to wane. The ocean was simple: waves rocked, sails billowed, cogs lounged ripe for the pickings upon the endless stretch of blue that made up the horizon, and things made *sense.* It was a simple binary as a pirate: you lived or you died, and he favored it far more than the intricacy of politics upon the mainland.

##Braavos


>*Attitudes towards men of war vary from Free City to Free City: in Lys, the career of a soldier is seen as dishonest and 'below' a magister, and yet in Volantis the Tiger Party celebrates such strength whilst dismissing the mercantile interests of their rivaling Elephants as weakness. In the middle of this spectrum rests the Free City of Braavos, 'the Secret City', for it both champions trade thanks to the Iron Bank and prides itself upon it's massive armada, led a congregation of various warlords under the aptly-named Sealord of Braavos, whose control of the Shivering Sea is undisputed in thanks to this fleet and the Arsenal, a massive shipyard within which the officials of the Bastard Daughter claim could construct a war galley in only a day's time.*

>*Residing within this city is the First Company, a mercenary order led by the Norolys family. According to record, the first Norolys was a sellsword of Pentoshi stock who betrayed his native employers to Braavos during the Second War Against Subjugation, in which Pentos fought Braavos to remain within the slave trade, and was rewarded in turn with wealth and the personal patronage of Sealord Florran Sollys until his death in 214 AC.*

>*With such lofty clients, the First Company enjoys a level of reputation rarely afforded to mercenaries, and it's First Captain often finds himself invited to feasts and celebrations alike by magisters in the northeast of Essos, for many wish to curry favor with the man who leads some three-thousand of the continent's best-trained men.*

^(*From 'A History of the Narrows' by Archmaester Ronnel, Archmaester of Cultures and Languages, dated 332 AC*)


*Norolys' Charge.* For now, it's legend spread only amongst the defenders at Lorath, for no information had yet to bleed through this city under siege.

Instead, Ilaros still held out hope that his sibling had lived, as unlikely as it was: the men of Ib carried a foul reputation, and for good reason. His grandfather had made a career of repulsing them from attacks upon the Axe, and his father before him had spoken of the ghastly men's barbarism with beards soaked in whale blubber and decorated with bits of bone taken from their fallen foes. He had likely exaggerated, of course - his great-grandfather did enjoy to scare his great-grandchildren - but now Ilaros found himself half-believing these tall tales to be true.

He supposed he'd find out soon enough.

##Myr