Nero
Floyd informed Nero and the Griffin Republic that the Expert’s Commonwealth navy refused to send more than 100 ships for fear that the Lake Republic would attack defenseless cities. The president thought about sending a response but decided that their logic was somewhat sound, and the time lost trying to convince them to send the rest of their fleet wasn’t worth it.
So, the next day all the Griffin Republic ships set sail to the north. They were to meet up with the few Expert’s Commonwealth ships that would be joining on the attack and then set sail to continue north along the Leozan shore until they could head due east to avoid the shallow waters of the Starved Sea.
Nero was on the docks watching the sailors take off at dawn and wondered how many of them would come back. There were thousands of stories behind every one of the sailors’ eyes, but many would meet a premature end in the same event.
He looked upon the sailors and saw the sailors with the scar that he saw come back scared from his last mission. The scar of a hole in his cheek was still there, but it was no longer red and looked like more of a dimple. Nero thought about going up to him, but he was sure that the sailor didn’t want a royal breathing down his neck. Councilman Daniels was enough foreign influence for a man to bear, but as the man boarded his ship he thought of his story. If he came back, Nero wanted to promise himself that he would but couldn’t out of fear of failing on a promise.
And so, the ships sailed into the rising sun, but before they were out of sight, Nero saw a figure fly through the air from the west and meet up with the fleet. It was Lucius. His flapping seemed slow, but Nero contributed that to the distance and hoped everything went well. Hopefully, everything went according to plan, and the ships would only attack military assets, and as many civilians would be spared as possible.
#
Nero decided that it was best if he spent some time out of Godmouth. The sound of brass sounded so unnatural to him, and the nature of the people came to a tipping point. Maybe he was used to the content, serious, and glum nature of the Dymish, but the Tolmans—at least in the southeast—were too gleeful for Nero. No matter what was happening around them, they seemed to make themselves happy. There wasn’t a single reason for it, but Nero contributed the major reason to be the alcohol consumption, but even with the tax, it didn’t seem to change much.
It made plenty of money for the government and helped alleviate the budget, but oftentimes, (especially in rural areas) businesses ignored the taxes and bought and sold alcohol freely. Do they not realize they are poisoning themselves? Nero thought. He never saw or met anyone who was enhanced with alcohol. Their senses were always duller; they stumbled through the streets forgetting how to walk. Nero wondered how such a thing could be viewed in a positive light; how the people didn’t want to desperately get rid of such a substance. But no, they hadn’t seen the destructive nature of the poison; they never had a friend die at the hands of a drunken man.
Nero sat on a log a couple of kilometers away from the city. It was green and warm, the opposite of what he would be feeling if he was home. He wondered what the both of them were up to. It was a shame that they couldn’t find a place to send a letter to, but now that he had a somewhat permanent residence, he would soon find out.
The new year had passed three days ago, and Nero reflected on what had happened in the year. Last year started so peacefully, but starting June 1st, everything had gone to shit. The death of a griffin, the death of a queen, his exile, and the death of too many innocent men in the sea. There was only one accomplishment that he could point to but even that wasn’t enforced half of the time.
For the first time in months, Nero had some peace and quiet. Not only a quiet moment where no one spoke but where he felt at peace. It wasn’t complete silence as that would mean something was wrong, but the sounds of birds going about their day gave him some hope that there was something that stayed consistent and beautiful. The partying in the capital stayed the same throughout the war, but that was different. The partying was careless behavior. Birds had no concept of war or remorse, but the people of the Griffin Republic were capable, yet it seemed that they gave little thought to the men risking and giving their lives for them.
However, the peace and quiet were destroyed by one shriek that ripped through the sky. Nero looked up to see what it was and through the small gaps in the trees, saw a Griffin flying southward. His flying motion was the same, but it was weak. Nero never heard such a terrible noise before and rushed back down south to chase after Lucius.
Nero hopped into the back of the carriage and told the taxi to rush and go south until he told him to stop. They followed Lucius as he circled through the air looking for a spot to land. The taxi could have run a couple of people over, and Nero wouldn’t have noticed as he was fully committed to not losing sight of Lucius. In his peripheral vision, Nero saw people jumping to the side as the taxi ripped through the city southward. When they came to the park district, Nero watched Lucius slowly descend onto the eastern end, and Nero tossed two copper coins into the driver’s hand before rushing off.
Parkgoers watched in horror as Nero ran toward the crippled Griffin. He lay on the ground gasping for air. His wings, face, and body were all in the correct shape, but the color was wrong. Everything was green, and his wings gave out as they fell to the ground. Nero slid next to Lucius and asked if he was okay. “They found us,” he said. His voice was scratchy and sounded like a human who didn’t have water for three days. “Fifty of our ships are gone. I don’t know how many they lost, but it was less, for sure.”
“Are you okay?!” Nero demanded. “You look like you are on the brink of death!”
“I am,” he said. “They had nets placed in front of the cannonballs on the ships. As soon as they saw me, they aimed upward, and as they shot the cannon, a net ripped through the air, expanding until it wrapped around the water and brought me down. I tried to get out, but before I could, they brought me aboard. About a dozen men died in the process, but they pulled out a glass bucket. It was Greenwood poison. They sent spies, and now they dragged me across the deck, cranked my mouth open with hooks larger than men, and drowned me in with twice the amount of poison my brother was killed by.” Lucius fell silent for a moment. Nero tried to get him talking for a moment before looking around the stunned onlookers. There was no movement or thought behind the people’s eyes. Only shock.
“Please!” Nero cried out. “He needs some fucking help!” The people still didn’t move. “You fuckers named a country after him, so get him some fucking help!” Finally, a couple of people started running to the nearest doctor’s office.
Nero turned back to Lucius and tried to get him talking again. “Come on, Lucius. You just have to hold out a little longer.”
“You’re a good man,” Lucius finally said. “But you are wrong. I am dead and I am only here to bring you the news. I don’t think the navy thinks they are going to Kato Kanali. They caught them on the shores of the Expert’s Commonwealth. They hadn’t turned east yet. Tell the president to continue the mission.” Nero didn’t want to, but he nodded. If this was the last wish of the last griffin, may it be honored.
“We’ll serve justice,” Nero said. Tears started to form. “We will save your image, the image of our brothers; what they fought for, and we shall serve justice; on behalf of democracy.”
“You are looking at the wrong country,” said Lucius. “The Lake Republic can do only so much across the water. The only threat comes when someone crosses it. If the nine beings are falling, so shall the countries that are built around them. You are worried about democracy, but you do not look inward to your kingdom. Serve justice on behalf of your people, not the people who consider you a negative influence.” A long groan came from Lucius’s throat. It was almost as horrifying as his screech.
“It’s probably best you don’t speak much anymore. I still want you to talk every couple of minutes to know you are alive but conserve your strength.”
“I never had any strength to conserve in the first place,” Lucius said. “I didn’t even have the strength to appoint any saints to my service. Talk to Iyo. Look to him for guidance as I tell you what I saw with the greenwood poison. It was Walik.” Even as he lay there, dying, he looked up to Nero for a reaction. The prince sat in silence, anxiously waiting for more. “He told me it was time, and I would join him in another realm. I’m sure he wanted me to work for him, but there shall be only one way to find out for the both of us and for me, that time will come much sooner than you. I am afraid of what realm he means to take over this time, but for this realm, I fear just as much. If the Lake Republic can kill me, imagine what the militaries and Zorokon can do in the east. If the Libo Sultanate ever decided to properly organize, so help everyone caught in between them and Teoland.” Lucius’s eyes were slowly shutting but were only held back by his desire to keep talking.
“Tell Iyo that he needs to consider his brother more of a threat. He threatens constantly and doesn’t follow up; he puppets a corner of the world, making every human worship him, but if he ever decides to make the entire world worship him, tell Iyo that he must prepare.”
“Please, don’t tell me that is what you actually think?” asked Nero. “Surely, it can’t be all that bad, right?”
“I tried,” Lucius said. “I tried in my last moments to help the world, like my brothers, but just like them, I paid the price.” The last griffin’s eyes now remained shut for long periods, and it became evident that he would die as the doctors rushed over in vain. “I tried, but by the time I realized that my time was running out, it had already gone by.” His eyes gracefully closed, and Nero sat there, sitting by his side as he heard the doctors rush over.
When they reached Lucius, they tried talking to him, but Nero informed them of the terrible reality they all lived in. “He’s dead; all of them are dead, just like the hydras before them; they shall now become a myth.”
Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Nero stood and stumbled over to an empty bench. Lucius lived his entire life in near solitude, and when he actually tried to do something, he paid the heaviest price. Nero wondered if the same would happen to him.
#
The funeral was scheduled a month from the day of his death, so each leader on Leozan could attend if they wanted to, and within a week they heard back from all of them. All of them accepted, but the Diarchs of Dicon requested that the funeral be delayed because of a schedule conflict with a military parade, but the president refused. The funeral would not be delayed further, so the risk of Lucius decaying would not be increased.
In the meantime, worse news arrived. On January 20th, news arrived that five days earlier the attack on Kato Kanali was a complete failure. Every single ship they sent was destroyed, and though they destroyed around an equal number, the question of the victor of the war was over. The Lake Republic had won, and Wagner offered conditional surrender to the Lake Republic. Nero was in the president’s office when he drew up the paper. Each letter was more painful than the last to write. Eventually, Vice-president McGrath had to finish the paper because Wagner could no longer bear it. Finally, he signed off on the document, and it was tied to a pigeon on went on its way to Papertown. If the Expert’s Commonwealth agreed to surrender with them, a conference would be set up to figure out the exact details of the surrender. “What are you going to do now?” Nero asked the president.
“Do what I was elected to do,” Wagner responded. “I am going to lead the country. I have three years’ worth of presidency left until re-election, and until then, I will try my best to restore the faith of the people.”
Nero finally received letters from Gala and Romulus while Maximus directed him to the president. Only the king would attend the event as the children were busy. In her letter, Gala said she asked to come to the funeral to see Nero, but their father refused to say that she had important work to do. Romulus was also too busy hunting down a People’s Lord leader named Noah Kien, or as Nero knew him: the scarred man. He completely understood why his siblings couldn’t come, as governing a country was more important than attending a funeral. Besides, it wasn’t like Lucius’s death was less tragic because a couple of royals didn’t show up.
In the time between Lucius’s death and his funeral, Wagner tried to improve the mood of the country by introducing reforms into Congress. He had no other choice as an internal poll showed that the president had a twenty-three percent approval rating. There were protests outside the capitol building following the news of the griffin’s death. They wanted Wagner to resign for losing a war, allowing a prophet to die, and not passing the laws that he promised to do, except for the alcohol tax, which proved decisive among the public.
Three bills were introduced in the week of Lucius’s death. The ban on bribery of public officials, the world’s first government pension, and the establishment of a government river transport service. Nero was hopeful that at least one would pass, but to the detriment of his popularity and the welfare of the people, Wagner refused to compromise. Nero tried helping, but the president wouldn’t hear it. Wagner became convinced that if he stood his ground, the people would take his side, and the citizens would demand their congressmen pass the bills, but by the time the funeral arrived, none of them even had support from thirty congressmen.
#
The day of the funeral came, and just like Titus’s funeral, it took place in a temple. Nero sat in the front row next to the aisle in the center. Lucius’s dead body lay preserved in glass in the front with the president and vice president sitting to its left. There was an empty chair further to their left for Foreign Minister Floyd, and to the right of Lucius’s sat two empty seats. One for Maximus and the other for the Diarch that showed up on behalf of Dicon: Charles Zalm. People slowly shuffled in, but whenever someone representing a government walked in, an announcer proudly informed everyone. First came Roman Floyd, Charles Zalm, and finally King Maximus Qar. The originator of the name, king of the Dymish and Borzor people, and servant to the reunification of the continent and Mydrazan. The long title now disgusted Nero. No man to ever possess that title ever ended up being a moral man. He proudly wore the Griffin Crown upon his head. Nero stared at his father as he walked past, but his father paid no attention to himself. Nero chuckled to himself and thought: Thank God, I don’t have to talk to him.
The ceremony was as uneventful as a funeral could be. Each of the leaders spoke their piece about Lucius and how he was an honorable being. What do they know about honor? Nero asked himself. All of these men failed Lucius, and now they pretend they valued him.
Nero felt something in him that he hadn’t felt in a long time. Rage. He had been to too many funerals in his lifetime. All of them added to his anger, his want for things to be right again, and his frustration at the “game” that made it so. He now realized that one cannot create a better world without paying a price, and one could only hope the price was smaller than the gain.
After the ceremony, Lucius wasn’t buried but rather brought to an undisclosed location so his feathers could be plucked and kept for safekeeping. Lucius would be buried letter out of the public eye so as not to taint the image of what a griffin is supposed to look like.
When everyone was back in their chambers for the night, Nero roamed the halls of the capitol, distracting himself from what happened earlier in the day. He criticized the interior design of the building to oblivion until he found no more problems. He then walked passed the congressional floor and found it unlocked with the doors open. It was past midnight, and he found maids cleaning off surfaces of the congressmen’s desk. The urge to step on the floor of Congress was too great. Though it was flawed, it was the closest thing in the world to the world Nero believed in.
He slowly approached and asked the maid if it was okay if he walked around there. The maid said okay as long as he didn’t put his feet wherever he wasn’t supposed to, and so Nero walked down the aisle and went up to the front row of desks. He took a seat in the front and tried to imagine himself as a congressman. Debating in front of the public and trying to democratically make their lives better. He knew that once his father died and went back to the Kingdom of Qar he would most likely never come close to sitting on the congressional floor again.
A voice emerged from behind him that was followed by the maid's voice. Nero looked behind him to see who it was, and to his amazement, it was Diarch Charles Zalm. He watched Charles as the Diarch made his way down to the front and took a seat next to him. He was a shorter man with dark curly hair. He wore a tightly fitted suit with a couple of medals over his right chest. He cracked his knuckles as he sat down. “So, can’t sleep either?” the diarch asked. He pulled out a small flask and offered it to Nero.
The prince shook his head. “I don’t drink…I don’t…”
“Call me by my title. What should I call you?”
“Nero,” responded the prince. “You don’t have to worry about my title.”
Diarch Zalm put his flask away and changed the subject, asking Nero why he was still in Godmouth. “I’m here until the war is over,” he responded.
“But the war is over. I have from good sources that he sent a letter of surrender to Papertown for confirmation before sending it to the Councilman across the sea,” Zalm commented.
Nero eyed the diarch and asked what source he could be getting this information from. President Cain, Vice-President McGrath, himself, and Foreign Minister Floyd should have been the only ones to have the surrender document before it flew off to Kato Kanali. “I can’t tell you where I get my information from, but I can assure you that whenever someone tells someone else, there is always a crack that the Dicon Diarchy can rip open and find out what’s underneath.”
Nero gave a pitiful laugh. “Though, for the record, I am not commenting on the foreign policy of the Griffin Republic.”
“And people don’t think to themselves: ‘What in the world is that scar on his face?’ Let’s not pretend that the president has taken you by his wing. You should consider yourself lucky as he either sees something in you or the more likely option, he is stupid enough to let a royal walk through the front door and negotiate bills on his behalf.”
“He does it the same reason you do,” Nero responded. The diarch smiled at Nero and asked him to clarify. “Don’t play stupid. You are directly responsible for the death of a griffin, and you sit here like you aren’t responsible for the greatest crimes a man can commit.”
“Seems like you are not in a good mood,” The diarch said.
“Please, spare me the nice guy shtick. Of course, I am not in a good mood. I just attended a funeral for a griffin who died in my arms. I heard its last words as his breath gave out. A glass bucket of greenwood poison was shoved down his throat, just like his brother. Where do you people get off? You are no different from that madman councilman. You are insane for even thinking about murdering Titus.”
“Woah, hold up,” Diarch Zalm said as he readjusted himself in his seat. “What evidence do you have that we poisoned Titus? Your father accused us of the same thing and look at him. Even someone ambitious as he had to back down.”
Nero did what he hadn’t done in so long for a human. Look into their eyes and speak to them. His voice became frustrated and vengeful. “I didn’t believe him at first, but after hearing from a very trusted source that I likewise won’t give the identity of, informed me of records of someone transporting greenwood extract across the border. Now, it isn’t enough to convict someone of a crime, but a question runs around in my mind. ‘Who else?’ No one else would gain from such action. Titus was sworn to protect the kingdom, and now with him out of the way you could encourage unrest in the country.” The diarch didn’t respond. “They killed my mother,” continued Nero. “They sent her head to us, but even then, I didn’t want war. Do you know why? Because I’m not a monster. What would a war bring? It wouldn’t bring Titus or my mom back. If I were in charge, I wouldn’t have forced millions of soldiers and civilians to choose a side, to die for their country; I would have treated it like it was a criminal investigation. You capture the person responsible for the crime, try them in a court, and they serve out the rest of their life in prison.”
“Is that what you think I deserve?” asked the diarch.
“You, William, and Hektor all deserve to rot away.” Nero’s eyes never held contact for so long before. If he was a less moral man, Nero would have killed him right there and let the diarch bleed out in the halls of democracy. “Why is it the people least deserving of power always obtain it?”
And with that question, Nero stood up and walked back up the aisle. However, before he could leave, the diarch said one last thing. “I am telling you this in complete confidence—”
“And why would you do that?” Nero asked, turning back around.
“Because no one would believe you even if you told them about this conversation. I will deny it ever happened.”
“Please, I wouldn’t want to admit your presence in such an honorable institution.”
Diarch Zalm cracked his knuckles before speaking. “I don’t know if this will be comforting to you, but I’ll tell you anyway. If you knew what the alternative was, you would have begged me for Titus’s death.”
“And my mother?” Nero asked.
The diarch hesitated. His eyes looked away, and he rubbed the back of his neck with his hand. “Your mother… You see—”
“I understand,” said Nero. “You thought we would be a more caring family. Thought we would value loved ones over power? I guess you didn’t spy on my father enough.”
“It wasn’t supposed to happen.” The diarch said. “I had no knowledge of the operation until it was too late.” He waited for an answer, but Nero stood still and stared at him. Nero couldn’t understand if the diarch was trying to be sympathetic or mocking him, so he decided to give a non-response. “Good night, Diarch Zalm. Tell your partner in crime that I’m sure we’ll meet later. I’m just not sure where we’ll meet,” Nero said before turning around and heading back to his chambers.