“Has there been any word from Stonewood?” Zusa asked.

  “A messenger arrived late in the night,” Brynn said. “A fact I suspect you are already aware of.”

  Zusa shrugged. It was true. “I grew inattentive in my older years. I aim to rectify that.”

  The queen smiled as she led the pair toward a stone arch fully wrapped in green vines that sprouted pale yellow blooms. The woman walked with a slight limp, an injury suffered during the chaotic rescue from the hangings. Zusa masked her own injuries with her thick dress, but a careful observer would note the bulges in the fabric across her arms and back from the many bandages.

  “The same sin falls upon me, Lady Gemcroft. I thought my harshest battles would be fought claiming this throne after Loreina’s death. Never did I think, when celebrating a future peace, I would experience the cruelest betrayals and bloodshed.”

  “And yet, so very much true to the fate of Dezrel.”

  “Indeed,” the queen said, and grimaced.

  They passed underneath the archway, meandering along a path of smooth stones looping through rows of crimson irises. Zusa had requested this meeting with Brynn, yet so far the queen had patiently waited to hear the reason, instead treating the day like a relaxing social call amongst the flowers.

  “There is the matter of the Keenan estate assets,” Zusa said, forcing the matter.

  “Assets claimed by the crown, given her traitorous actions and her lack of an heir,” Brynn said. “I was unaware there was much to discuss.”

  “In Neldar, members of the Trifect often bequeathed their wealth to their fellows if matters of heirs were uncertain.”

  “We’re not in Neldar, are we?” the queen said with a harsh edge entering her voice. Zusa pretended not to notice, and instead bent down to smell an iris.

  “No, we are not,” she said, closing her eyes. “But given the role my daughter played in saving your reign, and your life, they might have been considered a fine reward. But let us not bicker on what is already decided. If you would keep them, then I would ask you to consider a new proposal.” Zusa stole a glance over her shoulder. Queen Brynn was not even trying to hide her wariness.

  “Speak it,” the queen said. “I am listening.”

  After one last brush of the flower across her nose and lips, Zusa stood, hiding a wince from the pain it caused by a bandaged cut across her thigh. “Trade between here and Angelport is only starting to flourish,” she said. “And much of the land across the Ramere is currently without owners. Whispers have long insisted that Ker shall lay claim to what was once the nation of Omn. Is that true?”

  Brynn crossed her arms. “It is. Between boats sailing to Angelport, and our people slowly returning east across the delta, those claims are inevitable. Omn is lost, and Angelport is best within my control.”

  All was as Zusa expected.

  “You will need supplies to rebuild the towns, especially those first few crossings over the rivers,” she said, resuming their walk through the irises. “And it would be useful for you to have a firm voice speaking in your favor to the survivors of Nahorash’s cruelty. Much of Angelport still belongs to my estate, as do what lands we reclaimed after the war demon’s death.”

  Zusa paused to lock eyes with the queen. “You need me. Let us be partners in this expansion. Your reign will grow, and with it my wealth and prosperity. Keep the Keenan trade routes, merchants, and craftsmen, if you wish. I have no desire to make an empire in Ker. My eye has always been on the abandoned east.”

  Queen Brynn remained silent for an overly long time. Zusa refused to back down, and as the silence stretched it only hardened her resolve.

  “You’re a woman used to getting what you desire, aren’t you, Zusa?” Brynn asked, finally breaking the quiet.

  “I merely walk in the footsteps of my wife.”

  At that, the queen laughed. “I am sure there will be finer details to quibble over, but know that we are in agreement in the grander picture. With Mordan still licking its wounds, we are in a prime position to expand, and you would be a most helpful ally. I shall have one of my advisers meet with you to confirm these points.”

  “Not I,” Zusa said. Their circular path had taken them back to the entrance of the garden. Nathaniel stood waiting, prim and proper in his suit. A smile was on his face as he laughed and joked with one of the soldiers assigned to keep watch. “Nathaniel will be assuming control of most of our estate’s day to day operations. When it comes to discussing these new arrangements, your advisers shall be planning them with him.”

  The queen crossed her arms behind her back and joined Zusa in observing Nathaniel. He was so young and lively, and so fully at ease joking with a man he just met that it was hard to remember when he had been a shy boy more content to read in Alyssa’s mansion.

  “Does this mean you are retiring so he may take charge?” Brynn asked.

  Zusa’s heart swelled pride. Between Erin and Nathaniel, she held no doubt the future of the Gemcroft family was in good hands.

  “It means I will go back to doing what I do best,” Zusa said, and smiled as her fingers brushed the firm weight of a dagger hidden within the folds of her dress. “Watching from the shadows.”

  38

  THREN

  Thren limped about his little abode, finding it hard to leave.

  “It must be done,” he told the empty room. He could not stay. Staying was wrong, and so he had gathered what he needed into a single rucksack and strapped it to his back. All that mattered now was picking a destination beyond Angkar. So far, he had none. Perhaps a small village somewhere, a place where his gold would carry far while he learned anew how to make a home.

  Thren exited and walked the quiet streets of the capital. The day was young, the sun barely peeking above the walls of the city. Perhaps he imagined it, but he smelled blood on the wind, and not from the fishermen already out on the waters beginning the day’s catch. Yesterday’s battle against the elves and Tori’s mercenaries would leave their scar, just as Veldaren had endured the remnants of her own invasions and plots.

  And then the city would heal, and thrive, as most cities did, for they were the strength of their people. Those here in Angkar were strong, and would remain so with a woman like Brynn to lead them.

  Two guards stood bored at the north entrance of the city, giving cursory glances over anyone coming and going. They mostly just yanked down any lifted hoods to inspect ears, in case any elves remained within Angkar and sought to escape. Thren endured their scrutiny and then passed through the gate to the sprawling openness beyond. He looked upon the grass lit by the rising sun and reminded himself for the twentieth time this was proper.

  “Where are you going?”

  Thren flinched, a reflex born from the weakness of old age. He should be able to control himself better. Slowly he glanced over his shoulder, only half-surprised to see Erin leaning against the brick of the outside wall, dressed in clothing painfully similar to Aaron’s attire as the Watcher. Her arms were crossed and her grin amused, but he sensed the nervousness within her.

  “Out,” he said, and began walking.

  Erin pushed off the wall and jogged to catch up with him. “I knew you’d do this,” she said as they walked the road.

  “Did you, now?”

  “Yes I did, even if I don’t understand why, only that you would.”

  Thren stared straight ahead, refusing to glance her way. The city slowly shrank behind them, granting them privacy on the well-worn road north.

  “My decisions are my own, child, and I will not have them questioned.”

  Erin sprinted a few steps ahead and then planted herself in his path. Her hands clenched, and she set her jaw as she glared. “No. I’m not letting you get away with this so easily. You’re my grandfather. Why are you leaving me? Why, when you promised to train me?”

  Thren stopped, wishing his heart hadn’t stung so much hearing the word ‘grandfather’.

  “Between the half-orc, myself, and your mother, I think you’ve had all the training in the world one might need,” he said, and pushed on past her. To his shock she drew a saber and whirled on him. His instincts took over, his left hand drawing a dagger and blocking amid a sudden flourish of his cloak. Their weapons locked, the briefest struggle before she yanked her saber away and jammed it back into its sheath.

  “That’s not an answer,” she said. “No one is making you leave, yet you are anyway. Why? Tell me why, so I can at least hear it from your own lips and don’t have to wonder.”

  “I have made my decision,” he said, resuming his walk. “If you must hear a reason, know that decision is the one I view best.”

  “But for who?” she snapped. “For once, couldn’t you think of someone other than yourself? For once, couldn’t you do what’s right?”

  Thren froze. He fought down his initial anger and instead allowed his heart to be naked. It was a vulnerability he had not shown since his days married to Marion, but he would give his granddaughter this, if only so she might understand.

  “I know who I am,” he said. “I know what I am. What stories you know are but scraps of the sins I have committed. My hands are soaked in blood, and no amount of atoning will ever wash them clean. There is no changing this. There is no redeeming this. And it is that stubbornness, that immutable nature of mine, that led to my defeat at the hands of my son.”

  He reached out to gently place calloused fingers upon her young cheek.

  “For once, Erin, I am thinking of someone else. I am leaving, because it is the right thing to do. There is strength within you, and a light that blinds. But there is also darkness, and a will to be greater than you are. I will not feed it with my presence. I will not tip the scales to the values that led to my breaking, and the Watcher’s reverence. I would see you walk a better path. I would see you follow in my son’s footsteps…but I cannot walk that path alongside you. It is not within me.”

  Thren removed his hand, and he felt a tear drip upon his finger. Erin had started to cry. She held herself together well, the sorrow not reaching her voice.

  “I thought you were strong,” she said. “I thought you were the strongest there was, the fearless, the one man no one could break.”

  Thren’s pride stirred. “I was, once.”

  “Then why are you so afraid now?” Erin’s earnestness threatened his resolve as she pleaded. “If you fear nothing, then why do you fear this? Is change truly so impossible? Why do you look at yourself and see the one foe you cannot defeat?”

  “And what would you have me become instead, little one?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know. A different man. A better one.”

  “It is not that easy.”

  Her sorrow turned to a tired smirk. “Nothing worthwhile in this life is easy.”

  Thren looked away from her, his head tilting back and his gaze upon the sky. This…this wasn’t possible, was it? He knew his place in the world. He knew the role he played within it, the culmination of his beliefs and deeds over a lifetime.

  “Erin,” he said, his voice falling to a whisper. “I cherish you above all else, and yes, I am afraid. I am afraid I will fail again. I am afraid I will lose you, as I lost Aaron. This is the safer path. The better path. What you ask of me…”

  “No.” She closed the distance between them, and this time it was her hands on his face. She held him captive with her deep brown eyes. “No grand speeches. No pronouncements. Stay, Thren. Stay, and become someone new.”

  “Someone new,” he said, folding his hands over hers.

  “I don’t know who,” she said. “But maybe it could be someone your son would be proud of? Someone your granddaughter would be happy to still have in her life?”

  Thren lowered her hands, and he held them before her. A strange chill swept through him, the fear of an unknown he had never once contemplated. For so long the brutality and ruthlessness he imparted upon Aaron had been necessary to thrive in the cruel world of Dezrel. Aaron’s heroics as the Watcher had only confirmed that in Thren’s mind, regardless of his son’s protestations.

  But what if?

  What if?

  “So be it,” he said, and began walking alongside Erin back toward Angkar. Toward home.

  “For you, I will try.”

  Epilogue

  HARRUQ

  The year 613 IA

  Aurelia held Harruq’s hand, clutching it tightly as the noise of the crowd grew louder and more eager outside the carriage.

  “You ready for this?” she asked.

  Harruq squeezed back.

  “As I’ll ever be.”

  Together, the pair exited onto a crimson carpet running through a crowd of staggering size. Thousands of people were gathered on both sides of the street, as well as crammed onto the rooftops so that barely a shingle was visible. Up ahead was a cleared platform, wreathed with flowers and atop which stood a marble statue of Ashhur. The god wore no armor, and he wielded no sword. A god of peace, as Dezrel now needed.

  Harruq and Aurelia walked the carpet, each dressed in their finest. She wore a brilliant green dress set with so many tiny emeralds the fabric sparkled and shone with her every movement. Her hair was tightly wound into dozens of interlocking braids, tied behind her head, and then wrapped with silver threads. Harruq felt plain beside her, his outfit an absurdly expensive suit that his wife insisted was currently in fashion. It was all black but for a bit of green where the undershirt was visible. No swords, no armor. Like Ashhur, the Godslayer came only for celebration.

  As they walked, he caught sight of a familiar paladin along the rope-lines. Jessilynn stood wearing a plain but finely sewn blue dress, flanked by a dozen young men and women. The Orphans of Ashhur, they were called, a new school of paladins she had opened in Mordeina. Their eyes met, and she winked at him. He smiled, happy to see her in attendance.

  He wasn’t quite as happy to see another face lurking from the rooftops above her, his dark hair and face wreathed in ash. Deathmask had fully established control of all the guilds of Mordan, though they were a far cry from what they had been in Neldar.

  They exist to keep the wealthy and noble in check, Deathmask had insisted once during a rare visit to the castle. They exist to ensure the littlest among us are not forgotten and abandoned. Leave me and Veliana to our work. If you do not forget your roots, half-orc, then you need not fear our presence.

  Harruq pushed the thoughts aside, for there was no room for them as he climbed the platform.

  “What a fine couple,” Jerico said, waiting for them atop the stairs. His long red hair was tied behind his head in a knot, his beard freshly combed and oiled. He wore a suit akin to Harruq’s. As requested, all armor and weaponry had been left behind. “All will speak of the elven beauty tomorrow, for certain.”

  “Today is not for me,” Aurelia said, and she winked. “But I appreciate the flattery nonetheless, Jerico.”

  Harruq and Aurelia took their place on the left of the platform. He took his wife’s hand, a comforting presence needed to calm his shaky nerves as he stood there, visible to all the people of Mordeina.

  “This is insane,” he muttered, shocked by the sheer number of people in attendance. Every roof was covered, every nearby street, full. Men held their children on their shoulders so they could see over the throng. Soldiers lined the ropes stretched to form crowd-guides, stern and necessary to hold back the teeming masses.

  “Everyone’s excited,” Aurelia whispered. “Enjoy it.”

  The next carriage arrived. Various lords and ladies of Mordan, come to pay their respects. Far more interesting, and earning a much more visceral, excited reaction from the crowd, was the carriage that brought Ambassador Moonfang. The wolf-man needed to bend into a low crouch to even fit into a carriage never built with someone like him in mind. He emerged and stood tall, his fur carefully brushed and cleaned with oils. He was the appointed representative of the Freedlands, the small nation of beast-men in the far north of former Mordan, given sovereign rule in the wake of Tessanna’s sacrifice.

  “Looking fine, Moonfang,” Harruq said as the wolf-man walked past him to take his appointed spot.

  “I stink of flowers,” Moonfang muttered, earning a laugh from several atop the platform.

  The eagerness of the crowd swelled, a continuous thrum of shifting, muttering, and whispers. The final carriage had arrived. The doors opened, and Harruq’s heart swelled in his breast with a love he could hardly believe himself capable of feeling.

  His Aubrienna, his wonderful, precious Aubrienna, exited in a stunning white dress. Diamonds sparkled around the neckline. Lace swirled around her arms and waist. Her face was subtly painted, her hair done up in a similar manner to her mother’s, only it also bore a veil. That veil was positioned so that it did not cover the sharp point of her ears. Her lovely eyes sparkled as she looked upon her fiancée, Prince Gregory, now a grown man in his own right. He offered her the crook of his arm, and she took it as the pair walked the carpeted aisle between a crowd that cheered and clapped with an energy that left Harruq weak in the knees.

  “I can’t believe it,” he said as Aurelia leaned against him. Somehow he was crying. He didn’t know when he started. “That’s our girl. That’s our little girl.”

  Aurelia kissed his cheek and gently wiped a few of his tears away. “Our little girl, now and forever. But to the people of Dezrel, she will be their queen, and I pray they love her as much as we do.”

  The royal couple climbed the stairs, with Gregory purposefully bringing Aurelia to her parents. The young man vibrated with nervous energy while Aubrienna looked ready to explode from happiness.

  “Hey,” Harruq said to her, at a loss for any other words.

  “Well?” Aubrienna asked as the soldiers did their best to quiet the deafening crowd so Jerico could officially begin the ceremony. “How do I look?”