SILBARIUM HEGILBURG

For many years in the fourth century, Silbarium Hegilburg had held the title of mayor, ostensibly governing the city of Mareilon from his official residence at the Firestone Manor. In reality, the mayor himself played very little part in the actual functioning of the city bureaucracy. Petty civil servants overtaxed the poorer parts of the town, malicious mailmen pillaged the postal coffers, and the price of food was kept obscenely high by a closely-knit group of tradesmen looking out for their own interests. All if this of course went on without the mayor having the slightest notion that anything at all was amiss. His select group of advisors did their best to make sure that he was not actually advised at all, that in fact he was kept deliberately out of touch with the true situation in Mareilon. His idea of serious was a chariot parking violation.

One interesting political move of Spildo Umberthar, the mayor of Galepath, was his repeated attempts to shore up his support in the other cities of Quendor in 398 GUE. In a rare moment of insight, he had realized that the people of Galepath, firm believers in the union of their city and Mareilon, were likely to be very impressed by an endorsement of Spildo by Mareilon’s government. For weeks, emissaries had traveled back and forth between the two proud metropolises, exchanging vaguely phrased, tricky political communiqués. All these efforts on Spildo’s part produced no visible results. Hegilburg flatly refused to see the last ambassador which Spildo had sent, turning him away right at his doorstep.

In 398, Zarfil, with proof that he was a descendant of Prince Argonel, one of the original princes of Mareilon, demanded the resignation of Mayor Hegilburg in favor of a regime that would bring about the immediate and unconditional succession from their league with Galepath and those who ruled from Largoneth. Once Mayor Hegilburg of Mareilon received word of Zarfil’s rebellion, his head quickly was flooded with news of shadow conspiracies, inevitable revolutions, political convulsions, and numerous traitors in his midst. These tidings sparked his desire for action, resulting in a secret summoning of Zarfil to the Firestone Mansion (which Zarfil had planned all along). Along with Pouilzre and Ezkinil, Zarfil marched proudly into the Firestone Mansion, where he boldly declared to the mayor that he would take control of the city one way or another no matter how long it took, and demanded that authority be passed to him. Hegilburg refused, ensuring Zarfil that he would do everything to hang him. Spitting in disgust, Zarfil walked out alive, assured that the mayor would never have him in his grasp again.

That night, Zarfil organized large mobs to instigate riots in the streets, robbing and beating anyone who got in their way. Buildings were set aflame, the gangs began their revolution against the Mareilon government. Hegilburg spent the better part of a sleepless night resting uncomfortably in his office’s hard rosewood chair, nervously absorbing the various intelligence reports that gradually leaked in from beyond the Citadel walls. The simple truth that a number of Millucis homes had been struck by arson spread through the interlacing networks of word-of-mouth communication that gradually inflated the story into the epic proportions that reached the mayor’s ears: the entire city would soon be up in blazes, or in fact already lay in ashes. Three different reports left Hegilburg with three different figures describing the size of Zarfil’s rebel forces, the last of which was several times the population of Mareilon itself. As the Citadel was the most defensible place in the city, the mayor hoped that from there the rebels could be held off until sunrise, when they would have enough visibility to gain the upper hand.

Hegilburg sent his lieutenant off for the last time, hurrying away from that place of dust and stagnation towards the front lines of battle, bestowed with Hegilburg’s task of mustering the city militia for a final defense. The mayor would never know the outcome of his mission. Ordering the Citadel guards away from the building’s front doors, the Mayor assembled them all in the outer hallway leading to his office. They would be his company, his own personal armor in the surreal deathwatch that he insisted on enacting. He stole much of the city’s wealth before attempting to flee the Citadel to Largoneth with his closest advisor Eeble. Hegilburg sneaked out of the Firestone Mansion through the rear supply entrance at nearly the same time Zarfil's troops entered the mansion. Dodging from house to house with only his friend Eeble for company, the mayor managed to avoid the patrols quite successfully until his urgent desire to reach the northern gates brought him out into the open just a moment too soon, and he was captured.

Storming with energy, Zarfil drafted another public notice, this time detailing Hegilburg’s crimes against the city of Mareilon. Trial proceedings were brought against the former mayor the next day. A formal charge of treason was announced, and the jury was handpicked from among Zarfil’s Millucis revolutionaries. The outcome of the trial was never in doubt. Former mayor Hegilburg died at the scaffold early the next morning.