Verris

“I can't believe that bastard is still alive,” Verris's growled.

The shabby little room and the bed, just some straw on a wood platform, were far below what Verris knew he deserved but they were still homier than they might have been. A lover will do that to a bed, however shabby. And during the daylight hours he and Fylati hadn't had much else to do. They were hiding out from the emperor's troops, of course, so trips outside had been limited. They'd only ever gone out in the dead of night, to lay the groundwork for their plan. Which focused heavily on killing his father, like most of Verris's plans, and which he was almost ready for. It had taken some improvising though. Jajess had taken security to an insane extreme. Or, considering the emperor's current mood, maybe not all that insane.

Hallek, meanwhile, had been winning.

It was the talk of the entire city. The arena had thrown everything at him. Dinosaurs, mammals, gladiators. He'd had to fight over a pit of fire. He'd fought venomous snakes and slobbering giants, he'd fought against single champions and hordes of men. And every time, every single time, he had won. And the more he won the louder the rumors got. He was the lover of the Emperor's betrothed. He was fighting to win her back, because the emperor had stolen her and held her captive. The fact that slaying beasts in the arena couldn't possibly directly affect what the emperor did or did not do with his betrothed, captive or otherwise, was beside the point. If anything it made the story more tragic and, therefore, attractive.

“Forget about him,” Fylati sighed. “I know hate makes you strong, but he's not here. And the emperor will get him eventually.”

Verris had tried being a rebel and it hadn't gotten him very far. Logically, and assuming no great moral or principled stance against current leadership (a near certainty for someone like Verris,) that meant the best thing to do was to stop being a rebel. This could be a tricky process, particularly if the person you had been rebelling against knew your face from when he met you once before in mortal combat. But Verris had an out, his father.

Jajess had thrown all the blame for his own failed coup attempt onto Verris. Verris had decided to throw it all right back. It wasn't like the emperor didn't already know he was a backstabbing little bastard. He'd be very open about breaking into Balrok to rescue Fylati, and he could honestly say he'd left Hallek for Dryss to take care of. As for Jajess, well, all Verris had to do was kill his traitorous father. Preferably at some large function, like the emperor's wedding, where he was obviously intending some kind of assassination attempt. I mean obviously. And then Verris would explain, very calmly, how he should definitely inherit the Patrician's estate because the Patrician was a vile traitor who had framed his own son for his crimes.

“Sweet Gods Fylati it's even half true!” Verris had laughed when he came up with the idea. “Alright, I don't get to be emperor. Yet, anyway. But I'll take my father's money and power as a consolation prize. Especially if I get to kill him.”

Happy memories of ambitious planning were cut short when they heard a commotion outside. Fylati ran to check the window.

“Guards.” That word had taken on a new meaning the last few weeks. If you meant the city's police force, you said the City Guards. If you meant soldiers, you said soldiers. When someone just said Guards, they meant the emperor's personal guards. Who still did not officially have the power to make arrests, but lately that had been doing very little to stop them. “They're taking people out of the buildings.”

“Dammit,” Verris said. It was possible the guards were there to arrest him, specifically, but it was just as likely they were there to arrest the whole neighborhood for reasons existing entirely in the emperor's mind. That had been happening a lot lately. “Come on.”

They grabbed the bags with their things in it and Verris strapped on his weapons. It only took them a few seconds but by the time they were ready the guards were already in the building. The door was kicked in and three armored men ran in.

“By the order of the emperor--” their leader began.

“Wow!” Verris said. “I have bad news and good news!”

It was such a weird thing to say that the guardsmen blinked. And then his eyes went wide as he recognized Verris.

“The rebel!” He gasped.

“That part was the good news,” Verris nodded. “A real professional achievement, good work. Now as for the bad news....”

Verris felt the man's nose flatten under his fist. When he pulled his hand away there was blood on his fingers. The other two guards weren't much more difficult.

“There's more coming,” Fylati warned him.

“I know,” Verris said, heading to the window. “Hold onto me.”

He cracked out with his whip and caught the opposite roof. He swung out. The infused whip was strong enough to take their weight and mobile enough to lift them up to the roof on the opposite side. Busy with their own problems, like arresting and/or being arrested, no one even looked up.

“Now we go...” Verris pointed to the arena in the distance. “That way. Plan's still on. We're crashing a wedding.”

Shylldra

“So beautiful, my lady!” the maid said, pinning part of the dress in place and quickly sewing it tight. “You look like a real princess now!”

Shylldra thought she looked ridiculous. Alright, there was nothing wrong with the dress. It was made of golden thread, with a wide belt encrusted with gemstones. On her head someone had placed a golden circlet with a downward pointing triangle in front and a shock of many colored gemstones on the back. On someone who wantedto be a princess it would be just fine. Shylldra could hardly recognize herself. She wanted her robes back.

But Lekarik was smart enough to keep her religious affiliations as far from the wedding as possible. She was already becoming dangerously powerful, and not just in court. Word had gotten out that when a petition needed to be brought to the emperor it was safer to give it to Shylldra. And when Lekarik brought in his mass arrests it was Shylldra who begged and argued with him to pardon as many as she could. It was disgusting really, the way she turned doing the right thing into a piece on the game board. But it had done the job, and turned her into the focus for every political malcontent in the city.

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And there were plenty of them, especially since Lekarik had started arresting beggars for being too close to the palace and bards for making fun of him. Not that it was always obvious or even logical how the song about the little brown bees could possibly have been making fun of him, but these days it was the emperor's definitions that mattered.

Tyrannosaurus thinking, Shylldra side. My territory. All challengers get crushed immediately...and all those poor beggars and players were challengers, as far as he was concerned.

“Leave now,” Shylldra said. “I have to talk to my attendants.”

“Yes lady,” the servant bowed. “But you will let me come and finish won't you? The dress has to be perfect for the wedding.”

“Of course,” Shylldra said. As the servant left she turned to Dyryl, Illeth, and Krazzek. Krazzek was sitting behind a screen, to prevent terminal embarrassment. “We've got a rough night coming after my wedding.”

Krazzek snorted. Dyrly punched the screen in the vicinity of Krazzek's head, drawing a quiet “ow.”

“You intend to let him touch you?” Illeth said with disgust.

“No I don't,” Shylldra said. “This whole wedding is just another play in a game, Illeth. And I honestly think it's aimed more at Hallek than at me by now. Lekarik's plan is probably for Hallek to see him grope me in public, go mad, kill his way through a few expendable wedding guests, and then get put down by an army of guards.”

“You sound very calm about that,” Dyryl said.

“Because we're never going to let it get that far,” Shylldra said. “If I'd had a few more weeks to work on the nobility, to get more of the court on my side...but we don't. I don't have anyone willing to check Lekarik's power yet, and I'm starting to think I never will. So we go with plan...I think we might be on plan Q by now. I'm sure it's before plan V, whatever it is.” She had been thinking about the Acrocanthosaur. The one aspect of Maia she'd never come to terms with. She still couldn't feel it inside her, not really. But she knew Lekarik had to be stopped. “I need a dagger.”

“What?” Dyryl said. “But you don't even fight!”

“So I'm the only person in the world he won't expect to stab him in the throat,” Shylldra said with a firm confidence in her voice that was 100% grade-a fiction. “Which is why I have to be the one to do it.”

Lekarik

They were buzzing around him again. Servants were carefully painting the makeup on his face. They seemed to view applying their beauty techniques to his scaled and horny brow ridge as a professional challenge. Lekarik found their determined cheerfulness thoroughly irritating, but he had to look perfect for today so he let them go at it. He could always kill them later.

The problems were so simple once you realized killing someone was a catch-allsolution. It had served Lekarik very well the past few weeks. Like how swatting a fly makes the annoying buzzing stop. But the problem with problems was pretty much the same as the problem with flies. He would swat one, and there would be the broken bleeding corpse to prove he had, only for a dozen others to fly at his face. The thought made him feel like making a joke about whores and things flying at faces, but he couldn't think of a good one.

And it all came back to hypocrites. Thousands of them. First, everyone was upset because he'd been a weak emperor—and he had, no question about it—and hadn't had enough control. Now he'd taken control and what did they do? Complain, mostly. And sing mocking little songs about bees around a flower. Bees buzzing around a poor helpless flower that could do nothing to defend itself or stop the endless droning of the worthless bugs. He'd seen through that right away. It was him on his throne, surrounded by bees. He'd practically seen there faces. Hallek in the arena. Shylldra, in the palace. Buzzing buzzing buzzing.

He'd pardoned the singer. Shylldra had done that. Pointed out that bards and jesters were supposed to have protection of the crown, by order of Third Emperor Jethk. It was a stupid rule, but one he couldn't break yet. So he let the singer go, bur he forbade him from singing. He'd been merciful. And what had that gotten him? More complaining. In the end he'd banished the lawmasters from his presence, if all they were going to do was poke holes and babble precedent and complain about his decisions.

“Emperor,”A voice said. A voice full of a respect that somehow managed to coat the word, the office of the emperor without actually managing to touch Lekarik, as if he were a filthy thing found lying on the ground. Lekarik waved the face painters away and turned his chair.

“Grand General Fennik,” Lekarik said. “I assume you have a very good reason for bothering me on my wedding day?”

“It's the forest tribes, your majesty.”

“Oh them,” Lekarik rolled his eyes.

“All of the Birdfang villiages are empty. Same with Fishjaw and Catstail. The smaller tribes are mostly gone too. All of the Scarred Men have vanished into the palms. I can only think they mean war.”

“Isn't that what they do?” Lekarik waved a hand dismissively. “They've been at war with us since the empire was founded. Isn't that why they're here in the first place? Invaders who were too petulant to admit they'd lost and go home after Milkaamek spanked them with his new armies?”

“That was centuries ago,” Fennik said. “Now those forests are more theirs than ours, at least when it comes to stealth and woodcraft. And I think at least half by law, though the treaty between the tribes and the empire is a little too complex a document for me...”

“No, Grand General, they are mine,” Lekarik snapped. “The palm forests are mine. MY TERRITORY. I don't care what treaties signed hundreds of years ago by crusty old men said, what rights they gave to a bunch of barbarians sulking in the woods over a centuries old defeat. The forests are mine.”

“Of course,” Fennik said with a bow. “But nevertheless, the tribes are moving.”

“So what can they do to us?” Lekarik said. “The legions and even the rangers vastly outnumber them. Our troops have better training, better discipline, and more often than not better arms and armor.”

“Quality of arms and a number of men don't matter so much in the palm forests,” Fennik said. “That's close, sneaky, brutal fighting. And they're good at it. They won't face us in an open fight, or any fight if they can help it. They'll pirate the rivers and bandit the roads. The people and goods of the whole northern half of the empire comes through those palms one way or another. They could weaken our supply lines. And if bordering nations decided to take advantage of the chaos we could be in trouble.”

Lekarik rolled his eyes. Fennik really was such an old woman. He had the Axe, he had the legions, what did he care about irritated tribesmen?

“What I can't understand is why we didn't get an envoy,” the Grand General continued. “That would have been their normal practice, to send an envoy before moving on to war.”

“Oh there was some whining tribesman who came the other week.”

“There was what!?” Fennik exclamation was a half gasp half snarl that did a marvelous job of encompassing shock, horror, and disgust all at once.

“He was irritable and didn't show me nearly enough respect. I couldn't be bothered with whatever he was complaining about so I had him thrown in prison.”

“You...your majesty you just...you threw an envoy of the tribes in prison? For not being respectful enough?”

“Don't take that tone with me, Fennik!” Lekark snarled, and the power of the Fang welled up behind his eyes. “I am still the emperor. I wield the Axe. My predecessors may have let law and precedent dictate their actions, but I will not. The man irritated me, so he was thrown in prison. You are beginning to irritate me. Do I make myself clear?”

Lekarik saw Fennik contemplate regicide but decide against it, as Lekarik knew he would. He was still tangled up in his oaths and duty. And besides, he was a devotee of Maia. The shield and plate armor he wore were for defending the weak. He could be aggressive on the battlefield, but murder out of rage and hatred was beyond him.

Besides, Lekarik could kill him easily. He was sure he could.

A coup, on the other hand, wasn't beyond him. And Shylldra was getting dangerously close to giving the Grand General an opening. He'd have to be dealt with after the wedding. Maybe Lekarik could announce the execution as part of the party, and let the legions try and stop him. Oh, more problems again. To the hells with popular and rebellious generals!

“If you'll forgive me your majesty,” Fennik said hoarsely, “I believe I should leave this room now. To prepare to attend your wedding, of course.”

“Oh of course,” Lekarik smirked. “Don't let me keep you.”

The general bowed stiffly and exited the room. Lekarik wondered if he'd still be that stiff on his way to the executioner's block.