The king let out a great sigh and slumped in his chair even further. “What am I going to do, Terrence? Whatever shall I do?”

The priest’s eyes flickered in the direction of Helena before they focused on the other man, who still hasn’t noticed her. Somehow. “I do not know what your majesty speaks of, as such, I have very little advice to offer.”

“Ugh, don’t you start too. Your majesty this, your majesty that, even the queen sometimes forgets herself in private. I don’t need it from you as well right now. I came to a friend for advice, not to the High Priest for a sermon.” Reymund groaned, placed his elbows on his knees, and cupped his head in the palms of his hands.

As he started using the bottoms of his palms to shove his eyes deeper into the skull, the priest looked back at Helena, mouthed a silent go, and nodded in the direction of the door, braving a small shooing gesture as well.

She didn’t hesitate and silently stood up to hobble away, as slow and painful as it was, since she wasn’t healed completely yet. She got as far as attempting to close the doors after herself before being interrupted. But not by the king.

“Leave it open a crack and listen.”

Helena whirled around, spooked. Standing just inside the corridor, back to a wall, and with a sad frown on her face stood the queen.

“Your majesty, I would not presume to…” the younger woman began but stopped at a raised hand from the monarch.

"No need to explain, apologize, or any of that. Just. Listen."

Helena was momentarily at a loss for words, here she was, being ordered to eavesdrop on a conversation between probably the two most important people in the kingdom. By another influential person. She soundlessly worked her jaw before finally getting out just two words. “But… why?”

The queen’s expression did not change at all, but her voice seemed a little more… sad? Tired? A little angry? Helena couldn’t be sure, but it sounded like an equal mix of those.

“I’ll explain in a moment, now do as I say.” Her tone brokered no protest. Unless Helena wanted to disobey her better.

She did not, so she opened the door just a little, to let sounds escape the room.

“… oing to crap, Terry. The servants or the soldiers, I don’t know. But someone did.” Helena caught just the end of what the king was saying, but there were only so many things that this could be about. And if she was being made to listen in, she had her guess.

A short pause followed, filled only with clinking porcelain and the sloshing of something liquid, probably the High Priest’s ever-present tea.

Next to speak was said priest, his tone probing, testing the water for a reaction and answers. “And what did the individual divulge and to whom.”

Clang. A cup hit its saucer loudly and a chair’s legs scraped along the parquet floor as someone stood up in a hurry. Going by the voice that spoke next and moved around, it was the king who was restless.

“It doesn’t really matter who they told, it might have been an innocent remark to family or a stray word caught by a passerby. But eventually, it got to the wrong pair of ears. Wrong for us. What’s important, is that our neighbors know about our guests.”

Footsteps ceased to be heard with the end of the sentence. Their originator probably stopped to look at his counterpart.

“Which ones? And how did word reach them this fast?”

“Those that count. Kingdom of Liran, Guhes and Kit. They and the Poirrass Republic. I have been informed that envoys are on their way with something important to discuss. And magic, how else?” The king started to pace again, his tone filled with derision and disdain. He nearly spat the nations’ names.

“That’s not necessarily bad, is it not? There have been joint missives before.” The priest was the king’s opposite, calm and composed.

“Sure, sure. Like last time, ‘scaling down their support’ and ‘worrying about internal affairs’. Their people got rattled a little and they buckled when there was a teeny tiny leak in the Wall.” The man’s steps gained speed and his voice cadence. “Or the one before that, when they left us out to dry. And then…” He trailed off and stopped wearing a trail into the floor.

A second scraping of a chair sounded before either of the room’s occupants spoke.

“You know something more, don’t you, Rey?”

“I have it on good authority that they will try to blackmail me.” Defeat flooded out of the king’s mouth and Helena had to suppress a gasp, lest she reveal herself. She glanced back at the queen, who just shook her head and gestured for her to keep listening.

“What do they want?”

“The demons. Dead. Publicly. We will be accused of collusion with the enemy otherwise. And threatened with expulsion from the League.”

“They can’t possibly do that. We are the ones holding the wall. If they cut us off, we could…” The High Priest wasn’t able to finish his piece as he was spoken over.

This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

“That’s just it. We can’t! There is nothing we can do! We depend on their support, as meager as it has been lately. Abandoning our post is not an option. I will not doom my people for pettiness.”

“But they’d be signing their own death warrants if they do that.”

“Apparently, they do not care.”

“So, if you are right, what are you going to do?”

Another heavy sigh escaped the king’s mouth as he sat back down. "That I do not know. Either I do as they demand and lose a year's work, a lot of money spent, and who knows how much knowledge. Or I throw away guaranteed support in exchange for uncertain gains and exiling the whole realm from the human community.” A fist landed on a table with some oomph.

“So, what is it that we are going to be doing?”

“I fear that we have no choice.”

“Whose authority is it going to be sheltered by?” The High Priest asked without any hesitation or sounding upset.

“Oh, I think you misunderstand, my dear friend. There is just something I need your reassurance of before I make the final decision.”

A hand reached around Helena and closed the door. She looked around and the queen’s face was just a hairsbreadth away, studying her.

“That’s all I needed you to hear. I don’t want you to be influenced by my husband’s decisions.” The woman said as she took a few steps away and leaned back against the wall. “So, what would you advise your king, should you have found yourself in my place?”

Being asked something like what just left the queen’s mouth was not on Helena’s list of things probable to happen to her. “I beg your pardon?” she asked dumbly, eyes and jaws wide open.

The queen sighed before repeating herself. “You heard me the first time. There are people coming here, who will demand the death of our guests, or the kingdom will face consequences otherwise. Your take on this. Go.”

“Your majesty, with all due respect, I do not think I am the right person to express my opinion on the matter. I mean, I’m… I’m… just a…” Helena scrambled for something to say, but her brain kept short-circuiting at the absurdity of her being anywhere near a decision-making position for the realm, even if only as an advisor.

A hand was placed on her shoulder and the queen shook her slightly until Helena focused back on the monarch. "Who else is there to ask regarding the 'demons'? You are the single most knowledgeable person when it comes to them. You spent the most time with them, talked to them, and observed them the longest. We will be asked to choose between our neighboring countries and these people. Who else should be asked if they are worth it or not?"

“But…”

"No buts. Just think about it." The queen bore down on her with a steady gaze, searching for something in Helena's eyes.

“How… uhm… how much time do we have? Before the delegation gets here?”

“Two weeks up to a month, depending on whether they are on their way already or if the envoys have to meet up first.”

The priest rubbed her chin and thought about things, unexpected questions or not. "Can we even afford to lose the troops of our neighbors?"

Laughter was not what Helena expected to get in response. The queen wasn’t laughing at her or in her face. It was filled with too much misery for that. “What troops? Do you mean the soldiers that have been recalled back home two months ago? Or the mage corps that hasn’t been anywhere near the walls for half a year, at the least?”

It was Helena’s time to surprise the other woman with a sudden loud exclamation. “What?”

“Oh, dear, you haven’t heard, or noticed? We have been going at it alone for some time now.”

“But what about the League’s obligations?”

“Skirted around, excuses given, apologies received, only some materials given.”

Sure, not influencing me at all here.

Pacing seemed like a good idea and since the hand left her shoulders, Helena yielded to her needs for movement, only being able to limp be damned. “Two weeks… two weeks.”

Her thoughts turned every which way, thinking of what she knew, calculating, going over things.

“Two weeks… two weeks…“ I’m going to presume that there is the option to choose, otherwise, I wouldn't have been asked. It looks like what I took for given isn’t the case and we are being left to fend for ourselves. Not completely yet, but slowly getting there? So… do we just get there instantly or do we try to squeeze whatever we can in the time we are given?

She took a rather bad step and clutched her thigh as pain shot through it. She fingered the bandage wrapped around it, tracing her closing wound. Is there even much to think about in any case?

“I don’t think there’s much choice.” Helena finally said.

The queen eyed her closely and replied. “Oh? How so?”

“First, the Summoned will not go quietly to their own slaughter. They already proved capable of defending themselves, and that has been at their worst. They had some time already to get it together. I don’t think we’d get away with killing them without casualties. We’d have to trick them somehow, but even with how calm things have been for now, they don’t trust us. Not one bit. I don’t think we can afford any more dead on our hands.” She started pacing again after raising her finger.

She tugged on her middle finger as she continued counting off on her hand. “Second, they have already proven to have things to offer. Case in point, me and my first point. Their capabilities for harm and healing are incredible. Who knows what else they have to offer?

"Third, they already showed that they are willing to help in some way. Again, me being the proof. They didn’t have to help me get better, yet they did.”

Her queen watched her silently as she expressed her opinion. "And the last thing is that we simply can’t kill them, I think. What we did was bad enough. But whatever it was, the ritual was backed by the gods. Whatever favor of theirs we hold would probably go down the gutter if we killed off those that heeded their call, no matter how involuntarily. And if we are to go at it alone, either sooner or later, we can’t afford to lose the gods too.”

“Well said.” The monarch praised. “I expected as much. And that last concern of yours is why my husband is in that room right now. Well then, you better get back to it then.”

“Back to what?”

“To convincing our guests to part with some of their knowledge of course.” The queen’s voice was suddenly filled with unexpected cheerfulness. “You might only have two weeks to dig in their heads after all. Wouldn’t want to waste it for nothing. You might even be able to show our guests' usefulness if you do well.”

The switch from morose to happy was too sudden, the sad appearance too quickly shed.

I don’t know what’s happening, but I just might have my work cut out for me.

***

Their conversation turned to more mundane matters after Reymund got his answer from the high priest. Not much time has passed before the door opened and his wife joined them.

“Your majesty. May I offer you some tea?” Terrence asked as he greeted her.

“That sounds lovely.” She smiled at him before interlocking her arm with that of her husband.

He looked up at her to study her expression for a moment. “So?”

Chloe let slip another smile. “One down, a whole kingdom more to go.”

Rey returned her grin twofold. “Maybe just one, but definitely the most important one right now. In reality, though, it is two already.”

The high priest finished pouring a fresh cup which he pulled from his sleeves just like the rest of the tea set. “What am I missing here? One what down?”

He got a pair of laughing monarchs in reply.