Roderick kept his gaze fixed on Orlan, a promise of steel in his eyes, but the castellan merely made a languid gesture towards the empty chairs, as if they were at a wedding banquet rather than a nest of treachery.
– Do sit down, my dears – Hector said, his voice muffled by the dressing on his face, yet still loaded with a poisonous courtesy. – Steel is a poor tool for a conversation between men of vision.
Alistair hesitated, catching the scent of the spiced wine steaming in the chalices. He leaned towards Lucius, who was trembling beside him.
– Never trust a man who offers you a chair after trying to gut you – Alistair whispered, though exhaustion was winning out. – Wine served by an enemy always leads to one of two things: either it's seasoned with widow's poison, or it comes with a long, boring story full of justifications nobody bloody asked for.
Hector and Orlan exchanged a look of complicity. It was the bastard of Verdegrande who began to speak, sketching the world with his hands over the table as if moving pieces on a marble board. He spoke of the humiliation of the Kingdom of Aurelia, of the open wound the War of a Hundred Winters had left in the soul of the people, and of how the Green League of Silvania had reduced them to shadows of what they once were.
Alistair straightened his chest, trying to mask his terror with his usual mask of tavern wisdom.
– Ah, yes, politics – he remarked, with a vague nod of the head. – Peace treaties are like a port whore's promises: they're just necessary breathers to catch one's wind and get back to sharpening the swords.
But the mockery died in his throat when the talk turned grave. Orlan leaned forward, the torchlight accentuating the cruel lines of his face. The revelation fell upon the group like a hangman's blow. King Alaric Dorian II, the monarch whose name was supposed to be Aurelia's bulwark, had been captured in the disaster at Riberaforte. Now, the King languished in Calentis, a pawn in the hands of his captors, while the banners of Solterra advanced like a tide of fire, pressing against the borders of the Duchies of Ventora and Calentia.
The silence that followed was absolute. Roderick felt the weight of the realm collapse upon that small watchroom. This wasn't just about bandits or a land dispute between minor lords. The kingdom of Aurelia was bleeding, with its neighbours' teeth sunk into its jugular and its king in chains.
Orlan set down his chalice, and the sound of metal against wood rang out like a funeral bell. The glint in his eyes wasn't that of madness, but of a sharp, merciless lucidity.
– You think this is about gold? – Orlan enquired, his voice low like the rasp of a dagger in a leather sheath. – You think the blood I spilled today was to claim a title that the laws of men deny me? You know your Viscount poorly, and you know the son he raised even worse.
The castellan leaned forward, the torchlight revealing the contempt etched into the lines of his pale face. He then revealed the rot festering at the heart of Verdejante. Viscount Lorenzo, the lord of the silver vine who had welcomed them with silken hospitality, was nothing more than a merchant of kingdoms. Orlan had discovered the sealed letters, the promises whispered in Solterran, and the deals made in the shadows: Lorenzo was preparing to betray Aurelia, throwing open the region's gates to the enemy army that, like a famished wolf pack, sat camped to the west, ready to devour the lands of Verdejante without breaking a single spear.
Hector smiled, and the gold in his teeth caught the light, giving him the look of a pagan idol.
– The patrols we ambushed, the firearms we brought, the destruction of that garrison... it was all necessary – he explained, wiping away the blood still seeping from beneath his eye patch. – A rabid dog must be put down before it bites its master. We needed to clip Lorenzo's fingers before he could hand the keys of the kingdom to the Solterrans. We want to topple the Viscount, and with the steel that remains, march to rescue King Alaric.
The irony of the situation rose in Alistair's throat, more bitter than any vinegar. The world, he realised, was a place where the colours of overcoats lied and where honour was a coin that flipped faces depending on the light.
– By all the gods – Alistair murmured, letting out a dry, joyless laugh. – This is a joke worthy of a drunken fool. The 'traitorous bastard', the man we tried to rescue through the mud and smoke, turns out to be the greatest patriot in this room of shadows, and the 'noble Viscount', the generous lord who gave us bread, a roof, and a clean bed, is polishing the bolts to let the enemy in through the front door.
The silence that followed wasn't that of a banquet hall, but of an execution antechamber. The crackling of the wood in the hearth sounded like the snapping of bones, and the air in the watchroom was saturated with the acrid, lingering stench of gunpowder that had seeped into Hector Duvall's crimson silks. It was the smell of the new world – a world of smoke and lead that had no patience for songs of chivalry.
Hector leaned forward, the wood of the chair groaning under his weight. The dressing over his wounded eye was soaked in a dark crimson, but his good eye – a globe of icy, predatory grey – fixed on Alistair with the precision of an arrow aimed at the heart. The leader of the Brigade rested his elbows on the table and spoke with a golden smile.
– The board has changed, mercenaries – Hector said, his voice low and rasping like a blade on a whetstone. – You came to these lands looking for silver coins and a roof that didn't leak, playing at heroes on the coin of a Viscount who'd sell you to the Solterrans for a bunch of grapes.
He paused deliberately, letting the weight of reality crush any scrap of bravado the group might still try to muster.
– You weren't part of this quarrel. You were just rats running between the feet of giants. But now... now you're knee-deep in shit, and the smell isn't coming off anytime soon.
Duvall tapped his fingers on the table in a slow, fatal rhythm.
– The question is simple, and Solarius isn't going to send an orphan-hugging angel to whisper the answer: what are you going to do? Will you join the side of justice, however filthy and bloody it may be, or would you prefer I put you well and truly in the shit and let the crows decide who was right?