The Council of Merchants-Mages
Welcome to Soul Jars! In the city-state of Amathus, Galáteia awakens millennia after her death in a new artificial body and with no memory. A magical soul from the ancient imperial family, she is bound to serve her creator, given a knife and pointed towards a rival's tower... Come explore this new world with her!
Introduction to the story | Galáteia | Soul Jars | Novella upcoming
Introduction to the story | Galáteia | Soul Jars | Novella upcoming
Table of Contents
The most powerful—and ruthless—of Merchants-Mages, form a council that is ruling with an iron fist over the city state of Amathus. All obviously intend to rebuild the old Propoetides empire and become the next Mage-King. Their only obstacle is each other...
Who are they
The Merchants-Mages are all powerful mages. Their names derive from two facts, first that were mostly not born into wealth and privilege—many of them even started as self-taught mages before they were noticed and taken on as apprentices by another mages—second that they use their magic in combination to trade to build their own little kingdom of influence.History
Shortly after the fall of the Empire of Kýpros three thousands years ago, the first Merchants-Mages appear. However, it is only in the last century that they truly came into their own and became a considerable power into the Amathus. 63 years ago, they finally managed to expel all foreigners from the city and to retake control of their own destiny. They erected themselves into a ruling council and re-established Amathus as an independent city-state. Their power is still limited regionally, but if there is one thing that unite all Merchants-Mages, it is their ambitious. Nowadays, the Merchants-Mages of Amathus all meet one day once a month to discuss any matter linked to ruling the city, trade, or they magic experiments. Anyone able to open the wards for themselves is allowed to attend. In practice, this requires a minimum amount of magic—which is rather low—and the basic skills to manipulate wards. This means that a lot of "nobodies" are allowed to attend, but there is no guarantee that anyone will be willing to speak or listen to them. Hierarchy of power are strictly enforced by the threat of being killed on the spot by anyone offended by your existence in their vicinity.The council
Among all the Merchants-Mages, the most powerful ones form a ruling council that meets once every week. To be in the ruling council, one has to be recognised as superior to the rest of the population. Of course, current members of the council don't want to dilute their power by admitting anyone else among their number, and so any candidate need to make a really impressive and unquestionable display of power. And once elected, they need to survive the welcoming assassination attempts.Members
Some of the most prominent Merchant's-Mages are the Mistress and Rival.Other citizens
Merchants-Mages see themselves as the gracious leaders and guardian of Amathus, who are going to bring it back to prosperity and admiration. Beyond this rosy view, they are ruthless and only respect such quality in others. This has not facilitated the creation of any solidarity organisation between the poorer of Amathus citizens. Among those, the Merchants-Mages are all hated and feared, but no one would ever refuse the chance of working for one of them, and they are treated with reluctant respect.
Galáteia and the mistress by Annie Stein (nnie)
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