Marvel Comics has a wonderful concept called “What If…?” Writers extrapolate alternate timelines from the official one based upon different choices or outcomes in old storylines. The concept also covers all storylines set in the future.
While visiting Alais‘s home in Matlal, the young sorceress Amanda thu-Darelir has a dream-vision of terrible consequence:
In [the] provincial government [of the Ottoman Empire] no distinction was drawn between civil and military authority. The administration of large cities like Damascus or great provinces like Egypt was entrusted to pashas, this being a title, not an office, indicating that its holder had been admitted to the highest ruling circle of the empire and membership of the Divan, or State Council. These officials were regularly transferred from one post to another, to prevent them from developing local loyalties or building personal systems of patronage and power. Practice was somewhat different in the conquered territories of Balkan Europe…where senior officials normally retained office for long periods of time. European Turkey was considered to be an administrative unity called the Eyalet of Rumeli, whose supreme governor was the Beglierbeg; during the 1540′s [C.E.] two new Hungarian beglierbegliks were created, with their capitals at Buda and Temesvar. The area was subdivided during the fifteenth century into sanjaks, most of which were reorganized during the sixteenth century into twenty-four pashaliks, governed, as their name implies, by officers of the rank of pasha, who were, however, as in other frontier regions of the empire, entitled begs.
— Paul Coles, The Ottoman Impact on Europe, pp. 43-44
Emphasis mine.
Xenograg’s title of bey is a cultural variant of beg.
I still role-play Xenograg live on Rings of Honor, Dragon’s Mark Red Dragon Inn, and AOL Instant Messenger. I log all chat sessions and occasionally transcribe one into a proper story. My latest page in the Other Fiction section is one of these. Xenograg summons one of his students, Wyheree, to Dojo Darelir for a secret mission:
I came across this pair of blogposts on Tankards and Broadswords:
The first contains a clear imagining of what a Bronze Age setting could be like—would feel like. The second illustrates the cyclopean architecture found in the period.
Xenograg’s homeland is supposed to be Early Iron Age. Bronze armor and, weapons, and architecture are still seen in some places, and the magical arms in tombs will likely be of bronze. I even have a house rule that says bronze is better than iron for enchantment.
My compliments, Badelaire.
The coaching technique profiled in the New York Times article “Teaching Golf Pros What They Already Know” is just what I strive to impart as Xenograg to his dueling students. He does not impose his style upon a student, but seeks to enlighten her regarding her1 own natural style—and to trust in it (and thus herself).
Here is the key quote:
“I don’t teach; I help these guys learn,” Lynch said. “You can’t tell someone to do XYZ because they won’t do it out there.”
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