Jackal Among Snakes

Argrave finally dared try his hand at walking once the prospect of lying in his bed began to bore him. With no books to study and only the company of his companions to keep his mind sharp, he eventually did wish to step outside and examine things.

Though he stood firm, Argrave still held onto Anneliese’s arm in case his legs gave way. “Difficult to believe I did this,” he noted, staring at the site of carnage. “Almost as difficult to believe you pulled off that plan of yours with only four knights at your command.”

“It was rather skillful, on both of our ends,” Anneliese nodded.

Argrave laughed at her unabashed confidence but did not contest the point. “I can’t wait to get back to the camp, see if things are working. The disease has been stayed, but it still persists in those that had it. There are ways to ward away the symptoms, regress the disease, but they’re few and far between. I’ll have to…” he stopped.

“What?” Anneliese pressed.

“I was going to say, ‘spread these methods in the southern territories.’” Argrave looked at the great stag’s corpse, where Silvic still knelt. “The fact that she’s still alive… I think Orion is malleable. I think that he… he might…”

“Be a better option than the rebels?” Anneliese finished.

Argrave sighed. “Didn’t say that. It would definitely be an easier time. The south is poised to have a massive disadvantage once winter ends and the war begins in earnest. Ending things smoothly and quickly will save the most lives. Working with Elenore is essential for my plans, but if I can include Orion in that equation? Teach him mercy, leniency, good rule, and basic morality? Steamroll the opposition, unite the continent against Gerechtigkeit?”

Anneliese rebutted neutrally, “But you would have to cooperate closely with his family. He loves Felipe, Induen, and all the others just as much as you. It is why he is as he is.”

Argrave rubbed his fingers together. “I know. Not to mention the ties I’d be severing—Mina, Nikoletta, Elias, and more. All of that, thrown at the foot of the Holy Fool in a desperate gamble that I can make him a good ruler. Frankly… not too fond of religion, holiness, all that. I guess it’s different, here. Gods are indisputably real. Some of them give genuine power—one of them does so right now,” Argrave rubbed at his chest. The magic debt he’d accrued was the largest yet, but with the near exponential growth brought about by his black blood, he couldn’t say it would take the longest amount of time to repay it.

“If you wish me to be honest…” Anneliese adjusted her arms, and Argrave, who’d been leaning on her, adjusted with the movement. “I view the gods like nobles or kings. They have their systems in place, and you might engage with them sometime to get what you want. Elsewise… let them be. Veid is no different—though do not speak a word of this to Galamon.”

Argrave nodded with her words, feeling them resonate somewhat. “Didn’t take you for a cynic, given how calm and kind you are to most anyone.”

“I try to show kindness to those I can relate to,” Anneliese refuted. “It is difficult to relate to a god.” She turned her head. “Silvic, perhaps, is the only one I’ve come near that point.”

“What do I do?” he asked her.

“You think about it,” she told him. “You’ve told me what must be done, and that does not change based on the side you support—we gain a reputation as minor heroes after halting the plague, we gain status by becoming High Wizards in the Order of the Gray Owl, and then we work at winning Elenore to our side. You have all this time to think, to discuss, to plan.”

Argrave rubbed at his face. His skin was not so smooth and unblemished, anymore—he had a scar just above his lip. “I promised Orion I’d teach him things.”

“Well…” she trailed off. “That is something to deal with. Postpone it, perhaps. Maintain good relations, until—”

A loud whistle cut through the air. Galamon had been watching the walls, waiting for signs of Orion’s return or approaching enemies. After sharing a brief glance, Anneliese and Argrave slowly made to where the whistle had come from. Galamon stepped down out of a tower that led up to the top of the wall, and they walked to him.

“Orion,” Galamon told them as they approached.

They needed to hear nothing further. Argrave walked to the gate with slow movements, whereupon Durran and the Waxknights joined up with them. The mist enshrouding the wetlands had grown lighter and lighter in the time that passed, yet it was still sufficient to shroud the form that walked towards them.

Orion emerged from the mists looking like some sort of berserker knight. He was covered in dirt, mud, and blood, and his typically braided hair was now a bushy obsidian mane that made the giant prince seem all the larger. Most of his armor had worn away, leaving him with few patches of metal atop his underclothes. Despite all of this… he still retained a strange dignity. He seemed more a conqueror than a savage.

Orion walked straight to Argrave and put his hand on his shoulder. The prince had always towered over him, but now more than ever, Argrave felt like a child before him. “Look at you,” he said. “You look half a corpse.”

“I’ll recover quickly,” Argrave assured him, hoping to escape whatever Orion might suggest of him in way of treatment.

“I am proud to call you brother,” he declared. “And I hope you are proud of me. The enemy is vanquished. As many as could be, at the very least. The armored centaur escaped my grasp once again, and not because of some lapse of judgement on my part as it had been last time. I believe the jester named him…”

“Matesh,” Argrave finished.

Orion nodded. “Correct. I considered pursuing, yet… he is faster than me. I do not know where he is headed.” Orion finally took his hand off Argrave’s shoulder. “You and I must visit uncle… or what remains of him… in his throne room soon, discuss what must be done.” Orion’s gray eyes finally moved past Argrave’s face, beyond into the palace. “But I still have yet to pass judgement.”

Orion pushed past all of them, walking towards Silvic with a determined gait. Argrave tried to move quickly to walk side by side with him, yet his legs very nearly failed him. Anneliese supported him and stopped him from falling, and then wordlessly helped him along.

“Orion, I—”

The prince raised one hand up as he walked. “I have thought much about this, Argrave. You will watch. I do not forget your words or your actions.”

Which ones? Argrave thought. I hope it’s not, ‘no compromise,’ he considered as he hurried to catch up, looking for an opportunity to interject.

Orion walked across the palace grounds, moving towards where Silvic still leaned against the corpse of the wetland spirit Rastzintin. The Plague Jester’s body rested off to the side, somehow spared from the ravages of decomposition as of now. The wooden wetland spirit, largely consumed by the waxpox, did not stir as Orion came to her.

The prince stood above her as she sat there, body leaned up against the dead white stag. The wooden spirit’s light had faded so much it appeared dim in the light of day. Orion appeared like some fell god of war come to judge Silvic, strands of his jet-black hair whipping about from a light breeze.

“Silvic. A long while ago, I asked you to embrace the gods of Vasquer as your own. The one you called child refused, and so I ended her. Yet now… I change my offer. The people here in these wetlands—they were wronged by our conquest. False followers of the faith came here, seeking not to spread the reach of the gods, but to expand their domains of power.”

Orion held his fist out and clenched it into a fist. “I will not ask the people here to worship Vasquer. You will take over as the shepherd of this land, leading it back into what it once was. You will teach the people of what once was here, and what was lost. Vasquer will cede this land to you, utterly… so long as you, alone, devote yourself to the pantheon. The swamp folk will be given this land, and they may worship you, follow your customs… so long as you worship my gods—our gods. The gods of Vasquer.”

Argrave caught up fully with his slow pace yet did not interject both out of a sense of shock and a ponderance for what Orion said. This was a generous concession, to be sure, and one he never thought Orion would be capable of making.

Silvic lifted her head from where it rested beside the corpse of the white stag Rastzintin. She turned her face to Orion, and though most of it had been consumed by the waxpox, the liquid light in her eyes still persisted.

“Do you know why I fought against the Plague Jester? Because it stepped beyond the bounds of what we were as protectors of the wetlands,” Silvic said. “She sought to wreak vengeance and misery upon all the lands of Vasquer in retaliation. I opposed this, and so I was stricken as you see now. And yet… I fought alongside her and Rastzintin, before all of this folly. I fought to drive Vasquer out of the wetlands. I sought independence just as they had.”

Orion lowered his clenched fist. “That can be forgiven,” he told her, further surprising Argrave.

“This plague was not the natural order of things,” Silvic said. “But you of Vasquer—you never had any claim to these wetlands. We have always been the people of this land ever since the dawn of time. Thousands of other spirits before me have tended to this land, protected its people. Your ancestors stormed in driven by greed and slaughtered my friends, ruined my children, and made this place but a genocidal footnote in Vasquer’s history. Now, you seek to give it back to us? It was never yours to give,” she said, voice echoing throughout the palace.

Orion placed his hand against his hip, jaw clenched tight in restraint.

“You act the merciful saint, but I do not trust you. You speak of never resting until any and all heretics are wiped out. To that I say this—I fought against the plague, oh yes, I did! But just as you killed my comrades, my lover, my children… I am glad your uncle has become as he is. I am glad your brother, Magnus, had that knife driven through his neck. Nothing brought me greater joy than looking upon his corpse, and—”

Orion’s boot slammed down upon her face. He stomped again and again, yelling and screaming in rage. Argrave stepped back fearfully, yet soon enough the rage turned to sorrow, and Orion stood there shouting defiantly at a corpse, tears streaming down his face.

He fell to his knees, crying into the cold, shattered granite pathway beneath him. No one seemed able to move besides Orion. He cried there for minutes, body shuddering as he slowly subsided into mute sobs. After what felt like time eternal, he stopped shaking. He finally lifted his body up straight and stared up at the sky above.

“Argrave,” Orion said, voice dead. “We must go see our uncle.”

The idea paralyzed him with fear after that vicious display of emotion. Argrave stayed silent for a few moments, then said, “I’m still quite weak. I’ll need to trouble you.”

Orion stood and walked towards him. Anneliese handed him off hesitantly. Ever so slowly, he and Argrave walked towards the distant main palace, where a wilted jungle of browning greenery and stone awaited them.