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When for generation after generation a land is paid for in blood, no price is too high for peace.
For centuries it was not known how large the lands of the Gaels remained, but year after year they would come. Fire, theft, and death. Such a diet hardens a people, and unlike those to the south, the citizens of Tirnalis know one end of a sword from another. Reprisals were common enough, until a veritable river of red flowed from beyond the horizon to the very gates of fair Tirnalis.
And so for a time it continued, the Gaels never breaching the walls of the City, the men of Tirnalis never quite being the match for the Gaels in the wilder lands to the north.
The origin of the first truce is unclear, though a combination of exhaustion and mutual respect seems likely. As always with such things it required the wisdom amongst the leaders of both peoples before an accommodation could be reached, to the benefit of all. But such change is not sudden like the wind but gradual like the season, and with the passing of such leaders so ended the first truce.
The idea though would not die, and other truces followed until this one, now in its sixth decade.
Raiding still occurs, but many of the tribes have agreed to hand over those responsible for such deeds. Whilst such cooperation helps to keep the truce, some have questioned whether those who are handed over for justice carried out the deed for which they will be judged.
Where Tirnalis originally made its mark on the assets it claimed from the Gaels, now it is by means of trade with said same people that its wealth is made. Coastal settlements have been discovered far to the north, and each day more boats and ships travel in that direction as opposed to their more traditional southerly route. Local merchants rejoice at the new and wondrous crafts that they purchase from the Gaels, creating new markets in Roma that will see them increase their investment threefold.
As the spring of peace tries to turn to summer, dark clouds can be seen gathering in the south and the east.
In the south, Mytil has been enthusiastic in using Tirnalis as a base of operations for its missionary work into the lands of the Gaels. The Gaels show their displeasure by returning the heads of such fools back to Tirnalis, presenting the City-State with a problem as it finds itself stuck between these two competing beliefs and their peoples.
The same difficulty exists with Vetiver to the east. Lacking the experience and wisdom that history can bring to a people, the noble lords of Vetiver perceive the Gaels as undeveloped wildmen in need of a feudal yoke. And so the citizens of Tirnalis are witness to their history as the same mistakes are relived as before. This stand of neutrality though has not been well-received by Vetiver, and in response the price of bread and wine has risen substantially in recent years.
A time may come when the citizens of Tirnalis may have to make a fateful choice.
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