Steel and Sorrow: Rise of the Mercenary king - Chapter 914

Capítulo 914: Muzzled dog

He was standing in a den of dogs.

Two weeks of false smiles and poisoned words had worn him down more than two years of war ever had. The whole march south had become a farce so elaborate that even the most shameless theater hourses that were sprouting in Yarzat would have blushed at the performance required of him.

“The Lord of Dubrina swears eternal loyalty to the Beholder of the Eternal City, Shepherd of the Faithful, Holder of the Purple.”

Another bow. Another trembling voice. Another oath.

Alpheo resisted the urge to spit in the dirt.Lies stacked upon lies. Promises made today only to be broken tomorrow. And these fools expected the gods to listen,expected the heavens to take their third oath seriously, when their first two had already turned to rot weeks ago?

Oaths lost weight when repeated.And one repeated thrice was barely even breath.

The first lord who had bent the knee to man Alpheo had sworn to kill with his own hands was droning on and on about loyalty, duty, faith, the usual decorative manure noble tongues produced when they feared for their lands. And now here stood the last of them, already sweating despite the slightly northern chill as he grovelled before his new master.

Alpheo let his gaze drift away from the spectacle. He had seen this scene play out half a dozen times already, each more pathetic than the last. Instead, he fixed his eyes on the yawning gates of Dubrina ahead, open, wide, inviting, as though the city itself were exhausted from pretending loyalty to a corpse wearing a crown.

He despised the men groveling before the usurper’s feet, but he could not deny the truth: their surrender was the better outcome. Far better than a siege, far better than the blood and time that would’ve been spent cracking this hard little northern nut.

Dubrina was the final barrier…the last city standing between their army and the Fingers.Between him… and the head he had dreamed of claiming.

With Dubrina bending the knee, the road to the Fingers lay open. The moment they marched, the noose would tighten. At long last, the chapter that had dragged on too long,costing too much blood, too much sanity, it was nearing its end.

The thought should have warmed him.Instead, he shivered.

Not from fear, but from the creeping cold of the north. Snow would soon enough be dusting the ground here, they were north enough for that. If Dubrina had resisted, they would have been forced to waste precious months establishing supply lines denying them ever the opportunity of giving the finger to Mavius, and making sure that the next years wouldn’t be spent saving his pig teammate

Half a month had passed since that day…and still the ache had not mended.He was tired.Tired in a way that sleep could not touch.

The charade had lasted too long, and every moment spent playing politician hollowed him further. But at least, at the very least, it was reaching its end. Dubrina, this final piece of the board had finally capitulated.

And its surrender was announced not by trumpets, not by proclamations, but by the thunder of fifteen thousand boots forcing their way inside its gates.

Alpheo breathed in the cold air, letting its bite center him.One more city behind them.One last fortress ahead.One last head to take.

“You’re making it too obvious,” Alpheo muttered, the words escaping with the casual sting of an afterthought as he nudged his horse forward.

Truly, the only thing missing was Asag spitting on the ground and calling the kneeling lord a dog. The man practically folded himself in half before the boy-king, his trembling voice promising loyalty he had already traded twice before. The sight soured Alpheo’s mouth too.

Beside him, Asag gave a visible shiver. “Doesn’t it bother you?” he asked, tone tight, almost pleading,like he needed Alpheo to validate the disgust gnawing at him.

It did.Of course it did.

But Alpheo kept his expression flat as winter stone.

“I was the one who proposed it to the boy,” he reminded him, voice clipped.

“Oh. Right.” Asag blinked as though genuinely startled. “You did.”

Alpheo felt irritation rise like heat under chainmail. Asag wasn’t stupid, merely honest enough to forget the politics behind things when speaking to him, or perhaps too straightforward to pretend otherwise. Alpheo knew exactly what needled him. After all, it pierced his own ribs just as deeply.

The betrayal of Dubrina’s lord and the other was the reason they were in this mess.The reason the Pretender had marched so far, so fast.The reason Egil…

Alpheo’s jaw tightened.

He, too, wanted nothing more than to see these weasels’ heads stacked like firewood. But vengeance was a luxury he could not afford,not anymore.

“You’re reading too much into this,” he said at last, choosing the only road left to them. “What would we gain? Waste precious days massacring these people when the real prize slipped away and came laughing back the year after?To see his army lay waste here and us marching off against him once more?Fuck that.I am here to end it all”

I won’t let my friend’s sacrifice mean so fucking little.

Asag swallowed hard. “Thanks the gods,” he muttered softly.

Thanks Egil, Alpheo almost said. A lump rose in his throat so suddenly he nearly choked on it. But he forced it down.

Instead, he nodded, voice steady. “What happens after we keep this place from collapsing is not our concern. We only need them stable enough not to drag us down. A weak neighbor is better than a strong one, ally or not.And now even if they survive they will to be too weak and dependent on us to be a threat”

He leaned over, gripping Asag’s shoulder, giving it a firm, grounding squeeze. He felt the tension there,anger, shame, resentment, all tangled like twisted roots.

“I know what you feel,” he said quietly. “I do too.”

The look in Asag’s eyes reflected every soldier who rode under Alpheo’s banner, every man who had swallowed his rage for the sake of strategy, every man who choked on a truth he could not speak. Some wounds had to remain buried for the war to move forward.

“But no matter how much it hurts,” Alpheo continued, not bearing to look in his friend’s eyes any longer, “we cannot look back. Only forward. When we take the Fingers…” His hand curled into a fist around the reins. “It will finally be over.”

Asag let out a brittle laugh. “You’re the one who’s spent the most time thinking about it, I’m sure.”

Alpheo’s horse halted mid-step. A faint tremor ran through him.

Had he?

“We’re marching against one of the most defensible places in the world,” Asag said, not noticing Alpheo’s pause. “Turogontoli isn’t even close. We’ll need something clever, something big, if we want to crack the Fingers open and hang the little bitch by her neck.”

He gave a wry grin, extending a hand to mirror Alpheo’s earlier gesture, patting his shoulder. “I’ve seen you spend countless nights awake in your tent. Figuring something out.”

Alpheo felt the words like a dagger plunging beneath his ribs.

Countless nights.But none spent planning.

None at all.

“Indeed,” he lied smoothly, though his voice lacked its usual iron.

For a long moment, Alpheo drifted somewhere far from the saddle. He was alone again, alone with the thoughts he feared more than any blade.

He didn’t even notice Asag speaking beside him.

It was only when he clasped his shoulder and gave him a small shake that his senses snapped back into place.

“Are they weaker?”

”What?”

“The Romelians,” Asag pressed. “Are they weaker than us?”

That forced Alpheo into actual thought. His fingers tightened around the reins as the question echoed through him. Was Yarzat weaker than the Empire? Of course it was. There was no pride,no delusion,strong enough to deny that simple truth.

Even now, after years of war and rebellion… the Empire could still raise twice the number of spears Yarzat could dream of.

No,” he said finally. “I suppose they wouldn’t be.”

Their horses clopped over the stones as they passed beneath the shadow of Dubrina’s gate, the guards bowing low enough to scrape their foreheads against the frost-bitten ground. The city was subdued, silent, beaten into a stillness that felt unnatural, as if every sound dared not disturb the shame weighing in the air.

And yet…

“Yet I wouldn’t trade places with them at any price.”

Asag gave him a startled look. “Why not? Isn’t an empire worth more than a princedom?”

Alpheo almost laughed. Almost. The sound died somewhere behind his teeth, replaced by something softer, more tired. For the first time that day, he smiled.

It felt strange on his face.

“No,” he said simply.

Asag frowned, waiting.

Alpheo rarely answered questions with more questions. He always thought it wasteful,cryptic nonsense for men who loved the sound of their own riddles. But this time, he couldn’t help himself. The words formed without his permission.

“Tell me,” he murmured, turning his gaze forward as they rode into the defeated city, “is a burning tree worth more than a young sapling?”