#andragoras

Let's talk about Verkāna, and for those who might be new to my AU, it's the homeland of Shapur and Isfān, located in the northeast of Pars. Good? Good.

I don't know how coherent this will be since I'm in tremendous amounts of fucking pain (double painkillers not doing anything, yaaaaaaaay) but I will certainly do my best!

[EDIT: as I'm writing this, it turned out to be a Verkāna secedes from Pars + wtf was Arslan up to in Ecbatana during the siege double whammy post because I realized the two were inextricably linked, you can't explain one without explaining the other, so enjoy!!]

So. Verkāna. Name is derived from irl Hyrcania, which in turn was derived from the Old Persian name Varkâna/Verkâna (𐎺𐎼𐎣𐎠𐎴) meaning “Land of Wolves” because Verkā in Old Persian means “wolf”!

It's located in the northeastern corner of Pars, bordering Turk and Turan.

It was actually a small autonomous territory once upon a time, only to get annexed by Pars somewhere between 200 to 300 years ago.

So we know how it was said that Kaykhusraw “united all of Pars” but I don't think Pars' borders stayed all the same throughout the entire run of this dynasty. I mean, just look at the shit-ton of invasion attempts by other countries + one by Pars in recent pre-canon and canon times!

I do think Verkāna was invaded by Pars pretty early on, though.

So y'know how I attempted to give the region a lot of Central Asian influences

This region was originally ruled by a chieftain, perhaps a Bey?

There was this chieftain, Pars faced difficulty invading the region because of the entire mountain range in the way. I think at one point or another I read about how parts of northern Iran were difficult to invade or control because the mountains and terrain made large-scale military movements, especially the transport of supplies and heavy equipment, extremely difficult and slow— I think there was even a place that withstood multiple Mongol sieges? Anyways, very much pulling inspiration from that even if my application of this is slightly off from the historical version.

But oops! The Bey dies and leaves behind two adult kids— a daughter and a son. For whatever reason, probably because she was just more capable, the Bey actually wanted his daughter to be his successor, not the son.

This made the son very salty.

Cue succession feud.

And then! Uh-oh! The Parsian army comes knocking at the door

The two seemingly put their feud aside to repel the invaders BUT! The brother betrays the sister, colluding with the Parsian army to bring her faction down. Her troops were wrecked but she managed to escape.

And then the brother tried to betray the Parsians again because he wanted to be Bey, not be subordinate to Pars, but he got killed.

Hearing this, the sister (the Begum/Beygum? I still haven't decided on the spelling but basically the female equivalent of the Bey title, or I might just straight up call her Bey since the term was primarily used to refer to wives and daughters of Beys historically from what I can tell, not ladies who ruled in their own right) rises up again with whatever is left of the survivors but alas, she too was defeated.

The next step is kinda murky but in any case it ends with her being given as a bride to a prominent Parsian general at the time. Their offspring and descendants would form the local noble line that would arrive at Shapur and Isfān.

She was inspired by two historical figures: Khutulun (succession crisis) and Hangaku Gozen (the resistance effort + the marriage to the enemy after being defeated)

Still ???? on her name but tentatively putting down Merey meaning “fame, prestige, honor” in Kazakh?

I haven't decided exactly when but Shapur at one point after the Mardi clan massacre re-examines the story (it was heavily romanticized and sanitized, with tales often saying the last Bey and the Parsian general were in love before her defeat or that he fell in love with her and that's why he asked to marry her, etc etc) and realizes that the massacre wasn't a new horrible thing, the violence was always there. This predictably gives him some Complicated feelings which will be important later on.

Anyways, Verkāna is kinda culturally distant from the rest of Pars (Central Asian influences from its origins + from bordering Turan and Turk, there's a syncretism between Parsian and Turkic/Turanian cultural aspects that isn't present in the rest of Pars— that is not to say Pars isn't culturally diverse bc it is, anyways this is getting off-topic), and it has this remembered history of having originally been Something Else. Keep that in mind.

Also, as y'all know, the Mardi will come settle on Shapur's territory, and they also have Bad Experiences with Pars itself (helped Kaykhusraw defeat Zahhak only to be betrayed by him who waged genocide against them + the clan is literally made up of runaways and abandoned people and abuse victims like everyone knows someone who was hurt by society + ALSO HELLO THE CLAN MASSACRE) which have been simmering for a good long while.

The Mardi integrate themselves into the local community and politics of Verkāna over the course of a decade so their mistrust of the outside world has kiiiinda bled into the locals who already kinda ehhh bc of, y'know, that pre-existing history.

Keep all of that in mind, because we're jumping ship onto Ecbatana now!

So. Remember this post I made? About the Temple wanting control over Arslan? If you haven't seen it, go read it because the context is important and I'm not adding it to this already long post!

Anyways, for fear of the Temple trying anything funny while he's gone off to war, Shapur entrusts his son Arslan into the care of Sām who would remain back in the city to man the walls in case of a siege. Neither of them were quite expecting a siege though, so theoretically it's the safest place Arslan could be, right?

Anyways Arslan goes to live with Sām temporarily.

I headcanon that Sām either lives in a gatehouse or a building literally attached to the walls around the city so that he can have easy access to the walls. Arslan gets a room there.

Things go... okay, at first. Arslan asks to be put to work (scribe work, healing work, inventory work) because he just has this Bad Feeling and he thinks working will distract him and besides, he wants to repay Sām for the protection and hospitality he's offering the boy.

The first ten/eleven days of the stay? Normal. Just waiting for the main army to come back.

The next ten days, though?

All hell breaks loose.

Lusitania comes. They didn't catch Shapur, but he and his troops were forced to retreat the wrong way to shake off pursuers and now they're trapped outside the city. They're probably stringing up either another Marzbān or an entire row of soldiers and torturing them for psychological warfare.

Arslan gets put to work there too but I haven't ironed out the details so we're skipping forward a little bit!

Lusitania starts inciting the gholams to revolt and open the gates.

The gholams start doing exactly that.

Which is a no good very bad thing to happen during a siege.

Garshasp does what Garshasp does in canon and kills a bunch of them.

Sām and Arslan go to de-escalate, Arslan says something that pisses Garshasp off SO BAD that he slaps the boy across the face, sending him flying towards the ground.

As per the linked post, Arslan became rapidly popular among commoners and the enslaved during his approx. month and a half stay in Ecbatana due to the stunts he pulled.

Naturally the gholams present at the scene start riling up again because to them this just proved that you can't reason with the elite and that their salvation is the Lusitanian army outside the wall.

Arslan has to hurriedly stand up again and try to de-escalate. AGAIN.

He puts on a brave face, and tells them that while he's honored that they're mad on his behalf, they should prioritize themselves first and rioting like this will only get them killed. He promises that he will speak to the Queen and ask her to free them on the morrow, so if they would just stand down and wait for now...

Y'all. This boy is spit-balling because he's so scared and anxious and wants to save these people and wants to save the city and he sees a mass manumission as the only way out of this situation. He doesn't know how he's even gonna convince Tahamenay but good GOD the pressure is on him.

Sām is shook. Garshasp is aghast. If I decide that I want Narsus to be here in the city he's gonna start screeching too.

Anyways, they go. Narsus may or may not be present but I haven't yet decided where to put him yet, fuck. (Maybe he thinks he'll piss off the court if he appeared so he just tried to equip Arslan and Sām with the best talking points he knew to give them a better chance? Does he accompany them in? In any case though, things don't go well.)

As I said in that post of mine, Tahamenay... rejects their petition and decrees that the Temple essentially owns Arslan now.

I checked the timeline I made (slapdashed together the novel timeline and early manga chapters) and the city literally falls the day the petition was made, apparently???? BAD BAD BAD TIME.

The Grand Temple was just gonna start trying to use Arslan as a hostage + propaganda double whammy (this just pissed the gholams off even more) but they didn't even get the time, damn

Anyways y'all know what happens after the Lusitanians start sacking the city— Arslan escapes from the Temple, sections off a part of Ecbatana as a “safe zone” and starts up a clinic there + directs people to rain down projectiles on Lusitanian soldiers, leads prayers, heals people, conducts funerals, maybe even smuggling people out through the secret tunnels the kiddie trio found if I end up keeping that idea. His resistance lasted all of eight days before it fell apart (partly due to Team Zahhak interference) and he was captured by the Lusitanians. They were gonna burn him at the stake with the texts from Pars' royal archives.

But then he gets yoinked by Team Zahhak too and everybody is running around like headless chickens.

BUT. This is where shit comes back around to Verkāna.

The survivors who had been smuggled out by Arslan and Narsus' combined efforts, they meet up with Shapur's troops who are in hiding

And it is from them that Shapur hears about what happened to Arslan.

He's not usually one to completely break down (short-tempered outbursts aside) in front of his soldiers, especially not in such emergency circumstances where he has Responsibilities.

But his son might be dead.

Anyways, remember how rumors spread that Andragoras abandoned his men and ran away? How Shapur's faith was shattered there, even if he tried to pull it back together afterwards?

Also new detail: he probably tried to beg the Shah to not give into the Grand Temple's demands of wanting the Shah to issue a royal decree handing Arslan over, because the Shah is probably the only figure who could resist the Temple (because remember that I'm pulling from the Sassanid dynasty for this and the priestly class held so much political power in that dynasty bc Zoroastrianism was the state religion and iirc it was believed that the Shah derived his authority from divine mandate or something like that? I might be wrong but it IS true that Zoroastrian priests held a lot of power in that particular dynasty precisely bc Zoroastrianism was the state religion, unlike say something like the Achaemenid dynasty where shit was more tolerant iirc), Andragoras probably either agreed or at least agreed to put it off or made a deal with Shapur (he usually wouldn't defy the Temple, he's all too happy to let the Temple run amok as seen in the linked post, but he needs Shapur's total focus and loyalty for the upcoming battle, sooooo)

So for: 1. Andragoras to seemingly abandon his army to run away alone, 2. Tahamenay who is acting in Andragoras' stead as his stand-in to deliberately betray/breach the agreement Shapur had made with them (or even without a formal “deal” or promise to protect Arslan, just the fact that the royals gave a Marzbān's child away like property while the Marzbān loyally fought for the Shah, even coming from distant lands, would be taken as a grave insult I think), like, it's bad. It's insulting to his honor, his service, what have you.

So now Shapur must take his men and the refugees back home. He tasks someone with the mission of riding off in advance to deliver the message of what happened + that he's coming home. He rips off his badge (still haven't figured how bc the Marzbān badge seems to be riveted or welded onto the armor itself, I might change it into a cloak clasp OR have it be damaged/weakened in battle and that's why Shapur can rip it off w his bare hands), hands it to the messenger, and tells him to give it to Isfān with the message of “Take it, and lay it at the graves of Sâyezân and Aýnabat.” Isfān would understand what it means, especially when combined with the rest of the stuff the messenger is supposed to convey.

The messenger goes.

Isfān receives the message, and his world is violently shaken.

Still, he does as his brother says. He understands what this means.

For Shapur, someone proud of being a Marzbān despite everything, despite the disillusionment, for him to discard the symbol of his service to the Shah and offer it to the graves of the people who were murdered by Pars' systems?

No longer would he bow to Pars or its royalty.

Verkāna's history, the Mardi's history, it all culminates into this— what happened to Arslan was the straw that broke the camel's back.

Verkāna does like, vigilante ish work, an expansion of their prior work of bringing in runaway slaves and whatnot, just expanded to include refugees and kicking the asses of any Lusitanian who marauds too close to the region.

But they officially pulled away from the larger Parsian politics.

Which starts the issue of like, numerous factions wanting their support and such and they are just Not Having It.

Hilmes especially wants their help because 1. good PR and military support but also 2. CAN WE PLEASE DO SOMETHING ABOUT THE MAGICAL THREAT THAT I ACCIDENTALLY ENABLED??? HELP????

Verkāna does not fucking trust him yet, is the issue

Also Andragoras breaks out early potentially because Team Zahhak lost contact/control over Hilmes and they're thinking “oh, shit, we still need a pot-stirrer who will cause problems and make a royal yoink Rukhnabad, uhhhh who is the person that will cause the most problems once he's free? OH YEAH ANDRAGORAS BUST HIM OUT”

Andragoras is of course Not Fucking Pleased and he promptly labels Shapur and the rest of Verkāna traitors.

The situation Clumpens when Turan comes with their invasion attempt, ALSO bumped up earlier in the timeline because Pars is very, VERY rapidly fracturing in this AU.

Wtf is going on w Sindhura? Fuck I haven't figured that out

Anyways this is how Verkāna kinda sorta seceded from the rest of Pars. They've had enough! There's only so much they can take!!!!!

Also Daylam gets involved one way or another because they're geographically close to Verkāna and also isolated from the rest of Pars in many ways and also hey Verkāna had Narsus who the Daylamites love!

Meanwhile I have relocated Arslan from having a roadtrip w Hilmes to instead roadtrip with Merlane. Hilmes can roadtrip with Ashaya instead, which I'm sure neither of them are pleased about.

(before anyone panics this is last month's chapter, I'm just super late)

This is mainly going to be 'why I think Merlaine is going to die' with some novel spoilers in here as well, though I do quickly want to look at Arslan's last conversation with Vahriz first.

So Rukhnabad, the blade Arslan can't draw, is confirmed to be Zahhak's weakness. I feel like we all already know it, but Rukhnabad is not destined to be sidelined as a 'junk sword', it will clearly be instrumental in defeating Zahhak.

But what also really stood out at me is Arslan highlighting both his similarities and differences to Kaykhusraw, in that both have no royal blood but Arslan is not alone. It feels like Arslan is being set up as the one to defeat Zahhak (the one to wield Rukhnabad as well, most likely), but he WON'T DO IT ALONE. This gives me hope that we won't see characters lining up to fight Zahhak one on one and die before Arslan finally defeats him, but that it will be key for them to work together somehow.

And who knows, maybe that will also apply to Rukhnabad? @blitzdragonking suggested Hilmes could draw the sword and toss it to Arslan, and that's a fun possibility. The one thing (okay two things) putting me off is that I think Rukhnabad has to allow itself to be wielded by a person (see that scene where Hilmes hands it to Zandeh and it appears the sword homes in on its scabbard like 'nope, big boy doesn't have royal blood, byeeee') and also Hilmes himself, who (while he has had some much-needed development and perspective change lately) surely won't let go of his main character syndrome enough to simply let Arslan be the one to wield the sword. In fact, I could see him feeling like HE needs to be the one to defeat Zahhak and try and make things right, putting himself in that danger as a way to try and atone for his role in it, much like he chose to face Kharlan (though... thinking about that scene, in the end it was Team Hilmes as a TEAM who won the fight, so hopefully the memory and importance of that has stayed with him... if not then Arslan can tell him. Neither of them are alone!).

OKAY onto the 'why Merlaine is going to die' (or might already be dead) essay, hope you enjoy. My apologies to @tired-reader-writer

First of all, I'm assuming everyone's read novel spoilers by now, so you know that Merlaine dies in the last novel and that it's Zahhak who kills him (and if you didn't, you do now, which is what the warning at the start of this post was for!). While I can't see Arakawa ticking off all of the novel deaths, I wouldn't be surprised if he goes down here in a similar way, too.

Why?

A few reasons. One being that we've just had the conclusion of the fights against the undead warriors, and all of the gang have survived. However, we've seen how hard those fights were, we've seen some of Pars's finest warriors sustain injuries, some of them grave. Now Zahhak is here, a threat that seems magnitudes worse. A death right now would cement that. It would hit us readers hard, just as we've breathed a brief sigh of relief.

And it would hit Arslan hard. Right on the heels of him counting himself lucky that he's not alone as Kaykhusraw was. And while Arslan would mourn all of his comrades, I feel like his grief for the death of someone like Merlaine would cut especially deep. Merlaine isn't a lord or part of the Parsian military like someone like Isfan or Zaravant. Merlaine would never have served the Parsian royals just because they were royals. He agreed to help Arslan specifically. He, his sister, and the Zot clan, would not be there if it weren't for Arslan.

I don't want him to die, but narratively it feels like it would weaken the story if someone didn't get offed by Zahhak at this point.

I started getting bad vibes as soon as I saw the panel of the Zot's black flag, especially when they mentioned that 'Prince Arslan made it specially for us'. This black flag is in Merlaine's possession when he dies in the novels. It gets cut down in the same instant that Merlaine is beheaded by Zahhak.

Just as Tahamenay's manga death scene echoes elements of her novel death, perhaps Merlaine's will as well. There are some aspects present already. In the novels, Merlaine managed to loose an arrow at Zahhak before Zahhak destroy his bow (a bow which he has cherished for years, apparently).

The bow and quiver seen being cut in half here?

That's Merlaine's.

(I could probably find a better reference image but this was right there in the same chapter).

That's a lot of blood being splashed about on that last page. Clearly, people have died. And when I say 'maybe Merlaine is already dead', I say it because we cut to Andragoras-Zahhak up on the rampart when the Zot clashed with him down at the gates. If Merlaine is going to be killed by by him, it's already happened at this point, we just haven't seen it yet. Those last panels of Andragoras-Zahhak are after this all went down.

So we know Andragoras-Zahhak gets past the Zot, cutting down their flag and shedding blood. Do you think Merlaine would just run? I don't.

In the novels, Alfarid dies before him, and he carries a lot of anger and bitter grief over what happened to her. Here, the two siblings are alive and together. I think Merlaine would choose to stand his ground and face Zahhak while ordering Alfarid to escape and go to warn Arslan.

I mean, I keep thinking about all the ways in which Merlaine is completely unlike Andragoras, whose body Zahhak has chosen to occupy, whose traits he shares. Having Merlaine face him and die in order to save his sister feels very telling of those differences.

Andragoras has royal blood and is a member of Pars's highest class. He is held aloft in the minds of the soldiers and the majority of the populace. Merlaine is a bandit, looked down on by many due to their classist attitudes and prejudices (see Hilmes scathingly referring to him as 'peasant', how even Narsus, who is otherwise progressive, has incorrect assumptions about the Zot, and in this chapter how the soldiers immediately judge them negatively as bandits).

Unlike Andragoras, Merlaine has morals and they are very important to him. The same is true for the Zot in a wider sense. The same is also untrue of the Parsian royal family in a wider sense.

While we now know that Andragoras did not murder Osroes, the fact remains his hands are stained with his own family's blood. He set the palace fire at Osroes's request, but even if that request hadn't been made, I'm dubious about whether he would have allowed Hilmes to live when killing Hilmes meant that he could take the throne.

Conversely, when Merlaine's younger sister was selected by their father as future leader of the Zot clan, he goes out of his way to try and ensure that role goes to her. Regardless of what his personal feelings might be, he respects the chosen order of succession and doesn't try to grab that position for himself, even when Alfarid claims she doesn't want it.

We all know of the feud between Andragoras and Osroes over Tahamenay, and how both of them longed to posses her with no regard for her feelings. Contrast this with Merlaine's obvious crush on Princess Irina, yet despite this and despite Hilmes being totally unpleasant when they meet, he still does his best to reunite her with him as per her wishes.

I could never see Andragoras laying down his life to save a family member. But I could see Merlaine doing it, and yeah, I think him facing Andragoras-Zahhak to save his sister says a lot, both about the characters involved and what's wrong with Parsian society on a wider level. And while I may be totally off with this prediction, it feels like something Arakawa might utilise, similar to how she tied Isfan and his curcumstances to the wider issue of slavery.

Merlaine saw the danger before Alfarid did. He's a realist, I think. If the only way for his sister to survive is by him laying down his own life, I think he'd realise it fast. If this happens, it'll be heartbreaking to see, but I just can't see that both of them will survive. And I just can't see Alfarid being the one to die here. There would be some irony in Merlaine having to taking temporary command of the Zot to order her to flee, knowing that in doing so she will live on to take her place as their leader in the future if there's any Zot left.

Puppy boy acquired ! Does andragoras asks him to bark ? (He gets him a bowl of food later)

He takes him for a walk, how adorable ! :D

It is fine, as he does not wish to. His “father” lets his people starve, feast on the glories of war, on the tears of his mother, and it is not a path he wishes to follow, not when it leaves a sour anger pooling in his guts, threatening to breach through with every mourning wail of his people.

But in the middle of all this hate, Arslân can still remember those sweet, sweet times when his father told him thousands of stories at night before sleep, remembers the soft, caring smile on his lips as if he was the most precious of his loots, the one jewel, the one piece of gold which shone brighter than any other.

And Arslân is bitter, bitter for these times forever lost seized from him the moment he grew into a man and no longer stood as the boy his father once knew for he became a threat to his reign, became the one who would one day take the throne away from him, although Arslân never wished nor longed for it.

So, Arslân is a prince. But maybe it is, he was never meant to be king.