Dear Citizens of Shallam,

You may have noticed me the past few months making visits to your city,
along with many other citizens of the Bastion of the North. You may have
noticed your guards dying. Your fellow citizens who came to attack us
dying. Perhaps even you came to attack us, and died. But perhaps you
don't know exactly why.

Oh, didn't your Viziers tell you?

Or perhaps they did tell all of you, and I'm just being paranoid as
usual about corrupt governments who hide certain truths from the bulk of
their citizens. Like the fact that our strikes against your city's
guards have been retaliatory efforts against your Viziers' terrorist
activities in Ashtan. That it was your Viziers, Brinn, Bulvai and later
Brandilar who first, fueled by religious hatred and need to force their
worldviews upon the rest of the world at large, six months ago led a
team of your citizens into Ashtan to slaughter our beloved city guards
without provocation.

Listen well, Viziers. Our city guards are not the lookalike mercenaries
you hire to patrol your streets to make sure no one's getting drunk in
public or maybe not tying their bootlaces in the prescribed correct
manner. Our Warwitches, our Freedom Fighters, our Knights of the
Illuminati and the others have Ashtan blood running through their veins;
they are the willing and noble protectors of our city, and they stand
for all that Ashtan stands for.

And Ashtan stands for them! We will sit and watch our loyal guards cut
down by your acts of wanton terrorism. We will not idle while you
threaten the sanctity of the City of the Free. You challenge the Bastion
of the North, in your smug, blind assurance that your way is the only
way, your right is the only right, and death to those who disagree. What
you, in your bloated hubris attempt to take from us, we will take from
you tenfold. Every time that one of our guards falls, we will avenge his
or her death tenfold. I tell you these things simply, as one who
dislikes braggadacio and posturing, as a statement of fact.

Regards,

Shakti Devi, Overseer of Ashtan.

Penned by my hand on the 15th of Glacian, in the year 309 AF.