Even among mages, fluency in High Ikosian was not common. Thus, if Zorian wanted to question people for information and negotiate, he often had to resort to common Ikosian. The worked out pretty well in Altazia but quickly became a big headache outside of it. It was true that both the Shivan Archipelago and the Xlotic states were once part of the Ikosian Empire, but while these places spoke common Ikosian, it was such an alien dialect, at least to Zorian’s ears, that he could barely understand them. Additionally, many of these places were like Zorian’s own home region, in that many of the regular inhabitants spoke mainly in their own native tongue and only knew the smattering of common Ikosian for use in trade and such. The Ikosian Empire may have conquered these places and forced the Ikos
