Steel and Sorrow: Rise of the Mercenary king - Chapter 883

Capítulo 883: Ticking clock(1)

Everywhere was warm , oppressively so , as if the walls themselves sweated gold from the paint.

Crimson banners hung from every archway, mosaics glittered under candlelight, and every step one took sank into silken rugs so soft they could make a man forget the roughness of the dirt. It was beauty smothered under its own perfume, a palace that dazzled the eyes to dull the mind.

It felt, Alpheo thought during this long stay, like being locked in a single splendid room while knowing that on the rest of the house lay nothing but filth and ruin.

It was nothing more than a state with marble skin and a carcass for a heart. A golden cage built to hide the stench of a dying empire , and yet didn’t that make him the fool even more for betting on it to live?

The mission to retrieve the Black Axes had already long begun.

Sir Dandol had sailed weeks prior, his fleet cutting eastward to gather the last of the reinforcements they were ever likely to see. It had been a month since their arrival in the Eternal City, and already the place had begun to work its poison.

The days had been too pleasant, too soft. Servants hovered like ghosts; feasts appeared at the smallest whim. The air was thick with perfumes, laughter, and the sweet, slow rot of decadence. Of them all, none took to it more eagerly than Egil, who, for most of the time, confined himself to his chambers and, by all accounts, was never alone there in bed.

To the court’s dismay, the Emperor himself had taken a liking to the foreign monarch. Each morning brought an invitation, a hunt, a ride, a quiet drink at dusk . The anxious stiffness that had clung to the Imperator had melted from his face, replaced by a lazy, careless ease that suited his youth a little too well.

More than once, the Emperor had been taken to see the legions drill. The fields outside the Eternal City rang with iron and shouted cadence six days out of seven.

Mesha was there each time, fascinated despite himself. He would walk beside Alpheo as the legions shifted and wheeled, their shields locking in unison like scales on some iron beast. The Emperor asked endless questions, about their training, their pay, their diet, and Alpheo, half amused and half proud, answered them all.

He was never against boasting of his proudest work after all.

To make the show livelier, Alpheo once had the his own hounds loosed upon the formation, the beasts barreling forward with padded poles held by their riders, mimicking a mounted rush. The soldiers held their ground, as shields absorbed the thuds of charging men and steed.

Mesha watched, spellbound. There was admiration in his gaze, yes , but beneath it, a quiet and bitter envy. His own soldiers could barely hold a line, could scarcely march in step without turning the parade ground into chaos. It had taken him a week to make them move as one. What he saw before him sas something his empire could no longer birth.

He had the wit to run the numbers in his head. The cost of such precision of feeding, paying, and training men like these, the endless rivers of grain, coin, and steel it would consume. When the sum came to him, it strangled whatever spark of hope he’d felt and felt any envy die out.

And yet, as he watched Alpheo’s troops move like a tide of bronze under the sun, Mesha also felt something else: gratitude. Gratitude that this young prince, this foreigner, had brought such men to stand beside him.

It was clear to all who watched that Mesha no longer saw Alpheo merely as an ally.

Really not that unwise, given that many wondered whether this foreigner was the only thing still keeping his empire from falling into the dust where all past empires eventually go.

———

Maids parted like silk curtains at the sight of the Imperator and his newest favorite, bowing low as the pair advanced through the marble corridor.

“I’m afraid I must disagree, Your Grace,” Alpheo said lightly, glancing sideways at the young Emperor with that half-smile that could disarm a crowd or that in some other cases start a duel. “I believe Zenomon couldn’t tell the difference between a clump of dirt and a pile of shit, even if he had a taste of both.”

Mesha’s brows arched, amused at words. “Paint me surprised then! I’d have thought a martial man like you would nod eagerly to his words. ‘Blood is the brick of civilization,’ was it not? I expected a soldier to find poetry in that.” His tone was light as his gaze drifted up toward the frescoes of his ancestors looming in imperial grandeur above them.

Perhaps wondering if he would be the last of them.

Alpheo chuckled. “That line sounds less like poetry and more like the boast of a man desperate to make the obvious sound profound.Anyone can point at a pond and call it an ocean, and yet a pond is a pond and an ocean and ocean.

He mistakes the noise of history for its meaning.” He paused, his eyes following the long red carpet unrolling before their steps. “A dog will never be a cloud, no matter how much piss runs down his leg.”

That earned a bark of laughter from Mesha which broke into wheezing. He clutched at his chest, wiping a string of mucus from his nose with all the grace of a drunk beggar.

“Apologies, Alpheo,” he said at last, still smiling but blushing red , “that was rather vulgar of me.”

“We’re well matched, then,” Alpheo replied easily. “I’m common-born, Your Grace vulgarity is my native tongue. One makes you feel dirty, the other makes you feel false. Between the two, I’ll take dirt. You should hear me speak with my captains you’d hear so much profanity you would need a priest to wash the room afterward. Habits die hard, eh?”

Mesha’s grin softened into something almost genuine as he scratched his cheek, clearly charmed by the man’s lack of stiffness. “I suppose they do,” he said, and after a moment’s silence, his tone grew curious again. “So then if you cast aside Zenomon’s grand words down… tell me, what would you name the true brick of civilization?”

Alpheo tilted his head slightly, the light catching the gold thread at his collar. “Only the thing that should ever hold men together,” he said, voice quiet but certain. “A social contract.”

Of course, Mesha did not understand a word of what Alpheo meant though, being emperor, he was far too proud to ask. Fortunately for him, Alpheo seemed to anticipate the confusion and carried on without waiting for a question.

“A society is nothing more than a grand contract,” Alpheo began, his tone measured, patient, as though explaining arithmetic to a stubborn student. “Every rung on the ladder gives up a piece of its comfort in exchange for the protection of the rest. The farmer yields his grain so his lord’s soldiers will guard his fields. The lords surrender a portion of their autonomy so their monarch can maintain order, wage war, and keep the wolves at bay. Every tier, from peasant to monarch, bargains something of itself to avoid a greater loss.”

He gestured idly at the walls around them, the mosaics of emperors past gleaming under torchlight. “Spilling blood is not the brick of civilization , it’s merely one of its many byproducts. Men didn’t band together because they sought glory or conquest, but because they were afraid. Afraid of hunger, of beasts, of cold, of one another. Fear made them gather; necessity made them stay. Individuals became herds, herds became people, and people became a state. We are, if anything, the children of fear and of the desperate longing for stability.

Our very existence come from that”

“That is nonsense!” Mesha snapped, turning sharply on his heel, the silk hem of his robe whispering across the floor. “Our stations are divinely ordained! The gods carved order into the world, Kings to rule, soldiers to fight, peasants to toil. To claim that our power springs from such… lowly origins is …!” He stopped as he realised how animated he had got

Alpheo only smiled faintly, unfazed he knew too well the current culture to know that was the wanted reaction for un unwanted truth. “I suppose it would seem so, to one who sits on the side of the throne rather than its shadow.”

Mesha froze, the boyish heat of his protest cooling into something quieter. His eyes narrowed, studying the man as though seeing him for the first time.

“If what you say is true,” he murmured at last, “then how do you explain your place here? You a man of common blood? Is that not proof of divine favor?”

“Perhaps,” Alpheo allowed with a slight shrug. “Or perhaps it’s proof that divinity is far less selective than we imagine. My men call me the Son of the War God, though I suspect that’s just their way of explaining the many victories they saw me achieve.Every man after all want to think that the gods are on his side…. If there’s a blessing in that, it’s not from the heavens. It’s from necessity.”

He paused, his gaze drifting to the high windows where sunlight poured through the lattice, painting the marble in bars of gold. “To every man, his truth,” he said softly. “But having lived in both worlds , the one of the throne and the one beneath it , I find the truth of men far more convincing than the truths of gods.One I have tasted on my skin, the other I was just told.”

Luckily, before their talk could stray from philosophy into religion , that minefield of polite heresies which Alpheo was made of, the walk reached its natural end. The long marble hallway opened to a pair of tall bronze doors embossed with hunting scenes: lions frozen mid-pounce, stags eternally fleeing. The guards stationed before them straightened instantly, lowering their halberds in salute.

Alpheo slowed and gave a respectful bow.”It seems we’ve reached your uncle’s chamber, Your Majesty. I’ll take my leave—”

He was already half-turned to go when Mesha’s voice cut through, bright and deliberate.”No. Come with me, Prince Alpheo.” The young emperor’s tone carried both warmth and quiet insistence. “You’ve earned more than the right to counsel. Besides,” he added with a faint smile, “my uncle values prudence and yours might balance his.”

Alpheo’s brow twitched upward, but he inclined his head, it would do him good to know things at the very moment. “As you wish, Your Majesty.”He followed as the guards swung open the heavy doors.

The first thing that jumped in Alpheo’s eyes about the room , was that it lacked the ornamental excess of the palace corridors , no mosaics or statues.

At the center sat Keval, the regent. Age had not softened him , his frame was lean, his hair streaked with silver despite from his knowledge being only in his late thirties. When his gaze lifted and found his nephew, a measure of relief flickered there , one swiftly shadowed by surprise at seeing who followed.

“Your Imperial Majesty,” Keval greeted formally, rising with stiff courtesy. Then his eyes shifted to Alpheo, and his expression cooled. “Prince of Yarzat.”The title was spoken with precision, but no affection.

Alpheo bowed low, every motion polite and exact. “Lord Regent.”

Keval’s attention returned to Mesha, his voice firm. “You did not inform me we would have… additional company for this council.”

Mesha waved a hand lightly, his tone disarming. “I thought it would do good to have Prince Alpheo with us. He’s borne the weight of this campaign as much as any of us, and I value his mind as much as his sword. It would be foolish to keep him uninformed.”

The older man’s jaw worked, his first instinct clearly to object , but years of statecraft and the knowledge that the his men made up more than one third of their army, stayed his opinions at his hands.

“As you wish, Majesty,” he said at last as he raised his gaze to the crux of the matter, which unfortunately was nothing short of disastrous.