‘Hate is too great a burden to bear. It injures the hater more than it injures the hated.’

-Coretta Scott King

“You…you what?”

Marcus gripped the underside of the war-council table as he rounded on Verulex.

“The Koboldssss are being treacheroussss and ssssscheming,” the robed rat said. “They are being thrown back into the gulch and left to rot there.”

“I am betting it was a good sight to see,” Festicus chuckled. “How I long to have been there to-“

“ARE YOU A FOOL!?”

Marcus’s raised voice caught the rat-assembly off-guard.

“Two HUNDRED soldiers!” he practically screamed. “Two hundred! Do you have any idea how much of a difference they could have made to this war?”

Even Shrykul seemed to bite his tongue at this outburst, but Verulex, this time, was not to be cowed.

“You are wisssshing ussss to trussst in thossse little hereticsssss?” he spat. “They are an affront to He-Who-Festersssss.”

“Has your God not eyes to see when fortune favors him?” Marcus retorted. “Think of how much Ix and his Yips have aided us – even now they train our marksmen to become better after mastering the longbow – and you not only turn them away but gut them like fish!”

“It isssss the will of the Unclean-One, Sssssire. You are not being one of usssss. You are not knowing what an affront it isssss to be harboring the enemy. He-Who-Festersss is leaving no room for doubtsssss – thissss Underkingdom isssss belonging to ratmen, and to us alone.”

“Then he is a fool deity, just as Skegga is!”

“Marcus!” Shrykul shouted, banging his fist on the table with such uncharacteristic force that everyone jumped in their seats. “That is being enough! The name of He-Who-Festers shall not be mocked in my War-Council.”

“You mock his own name with stupidity like this!” Marcus retaliated. “Why was I not informed of this, when I have explicitly explained to you all the importance of parley with your enemies? Your nation wishes to become an Empire – you can’t accomplish this by simply eradicating all your foes, especially when they come to you on their knees! Those Yips could have had vital information on Skegga’s defenses. They could have had weapons we could use! Tell me what madness possessed you to do th-“

“It issss the will of the Unclean!” Verulex howled, throwing a torrent of green bile across the table as his temper finally flared out of control. “The unbelieving are not being worthy to walk our Kingdom. Those who have thrown in with thissss heretic bosss Sssskega are desssserving of only death. Ssssshal we really be permitting thesssse cretinssss to join our Empire – thosssse who would be sssssooner planting a knife in our backsssss as ssssson assss we are turning away from them?”

“Sire, Marcus,” Festicus said. “I am meaning no disrespect, but are you forgetting the sights we are seeing in Battle of Razork Field? These Kobolds are stringing up rats of Clan Red-Eye – rats tortured almost to point of death – and are parading them before us on the field of battle. They are being savages, Sire, they are not being capable of anything more.”

Marcus turned to the broad-shouldered rat. “Don’t tell me you agree with this insanity?”

Festicus did not bow before the accusatory stare of the human. “You are not fighting this filth for as long as we are, Marcus. Us, or them, this is the only way.”

“And we are being on the right ssssside of hisssstory,” Verulex sneered. “We have preached already to the villagessss of how the Koboldsss came before usssss on their kneesss, only to be lossssing their headsssss. Such gloriousssss ssssscreamsssss they are making. Ssssssuch lovel-“

“Oh, shut up – shut up, for once!” Marcus roared, standing abruptly, and making to grab the dagger at his hip. Only Skeever’s sudden, firm grip stopped him from attacking the priest then and there.

“Sssssire Marcusss issss ssssshowing ssssskepticccccism about the Unclean One,” Verulex said. “It issss ssssomething many of our priestsssss are noticccccing. Thisssss issss mosssst troubling.”

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While Marcus fought to break free of Skeever’s hold, the latter calmly stood to address the ratmen.

“Where Sire Marcus is coming from,” he explained. “There is being questioning of Gods all the time. These things are being natural. The Shai-Alud is knowing how important our faith is, otherwise, he would not be allowing Verulex to build churches to the Unclean in the new villages and Fleapit, remember?”

Marcus spared a look at his one-armed commander and saw the strict look in his eye. It was a look that he had never seen from a ratman subordinate before. It was a look that said, ‘Let this go. Or you’ll be in trouble’.

And so he put a stopper in his rage, grit his teeth, and sat back down, head bowed in his hands.

“Can none of you see the value in at least a little mercy?” he asked them. “Skeever, you know how much Ix has helped us.”

“They have been most useful,” Skeever agreed. “It was after all Ix who is cementing victory at Razork.”

“But a few good Kobolds do not speak for a whole mad race,” Festicus replied. “Brother Skeever, are we not both believing this? Or are you forgetting the bloodshed your men have suffered?”

Skeever cast one sidelong look at Marcus before bowing his long snout.

“No, Brother,” he said. “I am not.”

“Sire Marcus,” King Shrykul then broke in. “We are appreciating your leadership, and your meticulous planning. But in matters of state and policy, you must be leaving things to us. If we are starting to treat our enemies with kindness, we will be destroyed from within. My Brother Kings can be overlooking a few Kobold auxiliaries, but they shall not be permitting large swathes of the enemy to live among us. I will not be having my Kingdom destroyed by Civil War because our Shai-Alud wishes us all to make peace.”

“Such peacccce,” Verulex added. “Wassss never an option. The yipping demonsssss chosssse their God. They chosssssse their death.”

“And you have chosen yours,” Marcus said, rising and ignoring Skeever’s tugging at his wrist. Ignoring, too, the voice of Mari who pleaded in his mind to cool off his temper.

“A homogenous race has never once created a global society that could stand the test of time. An expansionist civilization needs to innovate. It needs to incorporate. It needs to welcome those who would serve a common cause – and it needs to give them a banner worth standing beneath. Anything less, and you don’t get an Empire. You get a world-spanning ruin.”

He bowed and then turned without listening to anything else. Someone might have shouted something back at him. Someone might have called him naïve, or ignorant of the ways of the society he was currently existing in, but he didn’t care to hear. He’d heard enough. And he’d realized only now what kind of war they’d had him fighting here from the start.

“You might achieve victory for your people today,” he said before he slammed the door in their faces. “But all you shall have won is a slow, protracted demise.”

…

Idiots.

Back in his private quarters in the palace, Marcus’s’ quill was taking the words out of his arm more than he was telling it what to write.

Idiots! All of them!

His scrawlings were intense enough that he felt the parchment break beneath his fingertips.

Why should I have expected anything more? Of course, I shouldn’t have. These rats are little more than the European Great Powers carving up China in the wake of the Opium Wars. They have an entire species arrayed against them – one which they know values strength over any kind of ideological devotion – and all they want to do is put them to the torch even as their spirits begin to waver in the face of weakening strength. I give them evidence of Kobold worldviews, showing them that they can contribute to the war effort, and they throw it right back in my face. I have handed the keys of victory to these creatures in order to watch nothing more than a genocide of their own making take place.

He threw down his quill and wiped a sweaty palm over his face.

Why do you care? A little voice in his head then asked him as he swung back in his chair. You weren’t planning on sticking around here, were you? You didn’t really aspire to make this kingdom a better place or some horse piss like that, did you? If you did, you’re just as naïve as they think you are.

Marcus closed his eyes and rubbed his tired temples. No matter how many meetings they all had, he kept coming back to the same problem: they wanted him to give the command to make a final charge – to wipe the Kobolds from the face of the under-earth.

Not even Skeever could stop that from happening. Faced with the will of his King, and the representatives from two other Clans, the Talon-Commander had had to back down. Not that Marcus blamed him.

It’s time to stop mulling over what you think should be done and start focusing on what is practicable. You want to go home, don’t you?

Marcus listened to the little voice’s question and held his quill between his fingers as he was about to write down his response.

Don’t you?

Just then – a knock at the door.

“Sire Marcus?”

The voice was unfamiliar to him, so he merely gave it a curt response.

“I’m not receiving visitors,” he said.

Normally, that would have prompted the guards at his door to spring into action and remove the adoring servant from his door. This time, however, he heard the hinge bolts clang as they hit the ground, and his door effortlessly creaked open.

“I said I’m not receiving any visitors!” Marcus repeated. “I don’t care who you are or what Clan you hail from. Go and see a priest if you want to hear about m-“

When Marcus spun round, his voice caught in his throat.

What he was looking at was no rat. Its cloak was far too long, its skin far too scaly, its eyes far too slitted and colored with the dark amber of a predator.

And the blade it held in its hand was far, far too long. And sharp.

“I’m afraid I have to insist, Shai-Alud.”

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