The scribes who had kept the Cillician histories brought a parchment for the King of the Cillicians to read.
These paper were shared by the Greeks and the Egyptians with the Cillician merchants.

Shazir still preffered the good strong durability of the clay tablets and the stone carvers.

QUOTE:
The return to the friendly Hellenes had not been as peaceful as had been hoped.

The Great King of Hellenes, Dogun, had celebrated and treated the Cillicians well.
However he had mentioned a word of sorrow to Shazir.
A grief at the loss of lives and property to the seas around the Roman coasts.
This had raised suspicions but no great worry in Shazir.

Seeing that his own people were skilled at sea, Shazir took the news as a sign that he had come exactly when he was needed. He agreed to sail those dangerous waters and put an end to any threat. Sea serpent beast or man with heart of a serpent, it would not matter.
Together the Hellenes and Cillicians would sail as brothers.

Along the way the Romans had raised concern.
As the sight of such a flotilla prepared for combat rode the waves off the Roman coastlines messages began to arrive. Messages welcomed by Shazir.
This was his first introduction to these people. A people other leaders had named as great.
His opinion of their manners was that they were well minded. However they relied heavily on word and reading and less on action. Not a bad thing of itself. It could make great officers of them because they learned.

The messages though did little to increase confidence of their protection on the waves.
A kingdom with so much sea-coast should surely have become better at defending both land and wave.
Still, no guarantee of the merchants safety came from Rome. A pity.
The Hellenes would surely continue to lose ships and men and profits.

Shazir continued hunting and now included writing letters to the Carthaginians and Sicilians who traveled these waters. Only the Carthaginians responded.

After coming across a pirate and running him to his port the Cillicians and Hellenes were joined by a fleet of Carthaginian warriors. Together they rid the lands of the vermin in Castagniccia and in Corsica.
Among the dead were found many trappings of the Roman warriors, but each man who wore them spat and denied the ancestry written plain upon his face.

Having been told of the civil war that the Romans had endured, Shazir understood that these men and women did not act under the senate command. They were outcasts who had fallen from power to become nothing more than armed thieves. Sea brigands. Nothing more than pirates although better trained than the ones on Crete had been. Shazir was of the opinion that the outcasts were traitors and should have been given no place to rest. Had they actually joined a better cause and kept their honor.....maybe.

This problem began with Rome in Shazir's mind. Began there and was permitted to exist by their negligence.
So, wether they directed it, Shazir was going to bring a small refund of the blood cost they had created.
A blood debt owed to Hellenes and Carthaginians, and at least half price to be paid by Rome.
He notified the Roman High officials of this debt and told them to expect it to be collected within a month.
A warning with honor.
A lesson plan to an intelligent people who would not learn if they did not understand the reason the lesson must be taught.

As he handed the parchment across to Tigrania, He looked to Jarucha of Carthage and to Dogun of the Hellenes.
These two had already lost good people to this cause...... he could not call himself friend to them if he was not willing to risk the same.

As the planning slowed Shazir excused himself to go check on his two sons.

I must get this all writ in the stone and in the tablets of the archives before I die. Although I do not think that it will be on these Roman shores.
Cillicia will endure and so should the words of their voyages across this world.

Two loves I have lost, I must keep the parts that remain for me.
So my sons, if they rule or not, can be proud of their people and their heritage!