An Ending of Oaths - Chapter 8

Starhaven, Sidor

Edmund stormed down the hall, nearly barreling over the few servants that were too slow to get out of his way in time. Furious didn’t even begin to describe his mood. The full shock of the wyvern’s message crumpled in his left hand still hadn’t settled all the way yet.

It had been a physical blow to him, threatening to destroy so many of his carefully laid plans. He couldn’t fathom how this had even been possible. He’d had all of the players watched, carefully tracking their movements to ensure just this sort of thing didn’t happen.

And yet, here he was.

He only bothered to knock once on the King’s study before letting himself in. The guards standing on either side made no move to stop him. They could see the look on his face and knew that today was not the day to stand on decorum.

“Have you heard the news?” Edmund demanded as soon as he crossed the threshold, slamming the heavy door behind himself.

“You’re going to have to be more specific, Uncle,” Serwyn said, not bothering to look up from the tome laying in front of him.

Edmund knew it wasn’t the reports on tax revenues he’d asked his nephew to look over, assuming it was some tale of a glorious duel or knightly tournament. He knew that Serwyn had been collecting those and had been talking about planning some kind of tournament for his birthday in a few months.

Which was precisely why Edmund had sent over this year’s tax revenues, so his nephew would know just how deeply in debt the kingdom was becoming, and how little it could afford a large tournament.

“The peasant who led the recent revolt has been found dead. Murdered,” Edmund said, holding up the still-crumpled message.

This time Serwyn did look up, sliding the book away from him slightly. “Is that so? How... unfortunate.”

Edmund’s eyes narrowed as he looked at his nephew. There was something in his expression, in his tone.

“This is serious, Serwyn. This man has become incredibly popular among the peasantry and even some of the less loyal barons. His death could become a rallying point for further unrest. If this man becomes a martyr, it could undo all the progress we’ve made in quelling the rebellious attitudes that have not gone away just because the actual fighting has ended. The compromise we reached…”

“You worry too much, Uncle,” Serwyn interrupted, a smile spreading across his face.

“What have you done?”

Serwyn leaned back in his chair, not bothering to hide his satisfaction. “I took care of a problem we should have dealt with long ago, before the peasants managed to force this ridiculous compromise upon us.”

“How? How did you manage to orchestrate this?”

“I didn’t ‘orchestrate’ anything. I am the king. I gave an order to one of my loyal knights who understood the importance of doing his duty and carried out my instructions. Simple as that.”

In an instant, Edmund could see what had happened. Colm had informed him that he had pressing business out of the city and told Edmund that it would be some weeks. At the time, Edmund had been distracted by other things and hadn’t needed the cutthroat for anything, so he had dismissed him with leave.

He would have to have a talk with the man about loyalty and leaving out key details in conversations the next time he saw him.

“Colm,” Edmund said, putting the pieces together. “Why didn’t you inform me of your plans?”

Serwyn’s amusement vanished in a heartbeat, his chair skittering back and almost toppling over as he abruptly stood.

“You forget yourself, Uncle. I am king. You are not. I don’t need your permission to act.”

Edmund took a deep breath, forcing himself to remain calm.

“I apologize. I just need you to see that this could be an error. You’ve given new life to those still dissatisfied with the outcome of the rebellion. They now have a powerful symbol to rally against. It won’t take long for people to deduce who was behind this. They will blame the crown, knowing it was done on your orders – or mine. We were making progress. People were beginning to forget their grievances. All that headway is now lost.”

Serwyn waved his hand dismissively. “You underestimate me, Uncle. I’ve taken care of it.”

Edmund paused, a sense of dread settling in his stomach. “What do you mean, ‘taken care of it’?”

“In the message you are holding, does it mention finding a letter on his body?”

“I... did,” Edmund said cautiously. “Although the details are sparse. Only that a letter was found that was highly incriminating and a messenger is bringing it here. Why? What was in it?”

“I believe the people who found the body of this traitor found a letter on him from Baron Thurston. It seems the baron was not particularly pleased with his lackey for not completing the task he was paid for. He might have even accused him of breaking his word when he promised the baron that I would be dead by the end of the year. Although I’m sure it will have to be examined thoroughly, as this is the middle of an ongoing conversation between the two. I believe this might not be the first letter these two have exchanged.”

“I find it surprising that Baron Thurston put something so incriminating in writing, let alone send it to a peasant. That seems rather uncharacteristic of him,” Edmund said, and then paused, another thought hitting him. “How do you know about it already? I didn’t think Colm had returned to the capital yet.”

“I know because I wrote the letter, Uncle,” Serwyn said with a wolfish smile. “Wrote it and made sure it would be found on his body.”

Serwyn wasn’t half as clever as he thought he was. It did not take much of a leap to figure out why Serwyn would do such a thing.

“This is a dangerous game you are playing, Serwyn. The peasants may be fooled, but the barons? They’ll see through this charade, or at least enough of them will.”

“Let them,” Serwyn scoffed. “I will no longer allow the barons to dictate the path of our kingdom. This letter gives us the pretext we need to start dealing with the traitors once and for all.”

Serwyn thought he was very clever. It was written all on his face, a proud child looking to an elder for validation for what they had done.

“The last time the peasants revolted, the barons remained neutral. But this? This could push them into open rebellion.”

“Let them. If it brings all of the rats into the open, then it will have done all that I wanted and more.”

Edmund just stared at his nephew, mouth agape. He had bitten off more than he could chew, that was certain. Edmund could see there was no talking to him about this. He had been waiting patiently to show Edmund how smart he was and now that his plot was laid bare, he would dig his heels in.

This was going to destroy everything Edmund had worked toward. That much was certain.

***

Soriveau, Lynese

William stood by the wide window of the keep’s main study, staring down at the tidy streets of Soriveau below. The village’s ostentatious display of wealth seemed almost obscene compared to much of the rest of the country he’d seen. Even the ports of Talabot and Cestralion were more business than beauty.

This keep was a good example, with its large windows and finery, it was more a palace than a defensive structure, which is probably why it fell so easily.

Starhaven’s palace was fine, to be sure, but it was also practical. Both a defensive structure at the heart of the city, a last stronghold for the kingdom, and a practical one, dedicated to the running of a continent. Most days it was filled with petitioners from the city, both the highborns in the upper rings and the poor from the peasants’ quarter at the bottom. William had been raised as a noble, but he hadn’t been shielded from the existence of commoners. The people who lived here were insulated from the lowborn and probably had no knowledge that the poor who grew their crops and fought their wars existed.

It made him hate the Lynesians all the more. Their Viceroys and nobles, at least the ones he’d met and cowed, had been soft men. Men more focused on their own comforts and needs than the needs of their people.

That actually wasn’t completely fair, William thought. Not all the nobles had been so disconnected. He’d had several more conversations with the Princess Isolde and while they had all been contentious, given her need to turn every conversation into a battle of wills, they had also been enlightening. She cared for her people and listened to them. It set her apart from the other nobles in this ancient forsaken country.

William was starting to consider if he should see her again when the door opened behind him. He had guards on his door and assumed it was one of his aides, who he was expecting with updates from the previous night’s patrols.

“Your Highness,” the person said.

“Baron Pembroke!” William exclaimed, turning around, surprised to see the older man with him. “What are you doing here? I thought your men were still on the western plains clearing out those last few settlements along the line?”

“Guards, leave us,” Pembroke ordered to the two guards who’d come in with him.

Pembroke was one of the highest barons in the land and second only to William in command of the armies in Lynese. They didn’t have to be told twice, shutting the door behind them.

“What’s happened?” William asked, concerned at the Baron’s very serious tone.

“I received a wyvern from your uncle. One I felt needed to be delivered in person.”

William knew what that meant. Ever since the revelation that Aldric had supported and funded the peasants’ revolt, they hadn’t spoken about it much. Partly because Sidor was a long way away and William had enough to focus on here, in winning the war. But also because the topic felt dangerous. While his men were very supportive of him and his uncle, what Aldric had done was treason. Worse, it was treason against his own nephew.

William didn’t disagree with any of Aldric’s choices and saw the need to stop the rot that Serwyn was spreading in his homeland, but to talk about such things openly was a risk, even among his own men.

Pembroke had felt the same, so the subject had gone untended, something they knew under the surface but did not address openly. Which meant whatever his uncle had sent in that message was important enough for Pembroke to leave his men and ride all the way here to deliver in person.

“Tell me.”

“It appears the situation in Sidor is... escalating.”

“Escalating? The revolt is over. Serwyn repealed the laws that caused the revolt and they all went back to their farms and villages. How could it be escalating?”

“I warned you it wouldn’t end with the revolt. What we saw was merely a symptom of a deeper rot between the crown and the barons.”

“What do you mean?”

Pembroke didn’t speak for a minute, frowning and looking at the floor. He had seen this before. The Baron was a precise man and liked to have his thoughts in order, everything calculated, rather than speaking off the cuff.

“Your uncle Gavric was a good man,” Pembroke finally said when he looked up. “A just king, in his own way. But for the last fifteen years, he’s been taking more power from the Noble’s Council. At first, it was done with good reason. You were too young to remember the revolt in the Ice Lands, but when the barons there defied him, it was Gavric who kept the kingdom intact. And when those three barons from the western provinces were caught paying off Alchmaran raiders to attack their rivals...it was more of the same. Every time Gavric consolidated power in the crown, it was in response to a provocation and was reasonable in its own right. Together, however, it made for a troubling pattern.”

“How? You just said it was reasonable, and wouldn’t the Noble’s Council have to agree to some of those concessions?”

“Yes, and they did, but it was never without unease. Every concession they made felt like a tightening noose around their own necks. And as Gavric’s rule continued, there was a growing fear—an unspoken one—that he would not be king forever and when he was gone, his successor would use that power against them. The barons were concerned that it was too much power consolidated in one man’s hand.”

“A successor like my cousin.”

“Or your father,” Pembroke said. “The king’s name may be on the acts and decrees, none of the nobles are fooled. We all see your Duke Edmund’s hand in this. For years, Edmund argued with Gavric about the need to limit the nobles’ council’s authority. For his part, the king resisted that pressure because he could see there was a breaking point and knew it would damage the kingdom. Maybe irreparably. And now that he’s gone and Edmund holds Serwyn’s strings, it seems he may have been right. Edmund overreached. He grew too confident in his newfound authority and his hold over Serwyn. Those laws limiting peasant movement and increasing taxes beyond what the baronies could bear, that was the final straw.”

“So it only became a problem when the barons’ own tax revenues were affected?” William asked.

He wasn’t trying to paint the barons as money-hungry or in the wrong, but he felt Pembroke had a tendency to paint all of his peers with one brush. As the true preservers of Sidor, standard bearers for what was just and good. In William’s experience, most barons were like any other men. Flawed and primarily concerned with their own futures. Since their houses had to be maintained if they were going to administer the spread-out kingdom, that made sense to a point and, as long as they then cared for the futures of the people they ruled only, William accepted it as the way of the world.

Many, however, put the well-being of their people much lower than even that.

Pembroke gave William a look but did not directly argue the observation, instead saying, “The main effect was that it caused unrest among the peasants. Edmund wanted to weaken the nobles internally, and the best way was to have that unrest directed at the barons themselves, and not the king who passed the acts, which was why it was structured as it was. Truthfully, it was a clever move, in its way, but too blatant.”

“Which is why Aldric got involved,” William said, more as a statement than anything else.

“I think few realize how close we were to an all-out civil war. It would have torn the kingdom asunder, especially with so many of our fighting men here in Lynese. Worse, it would have destroyed most of the Barons who wanted to reverse the consolidation of power. They had given the most banners to the fighting here and were generally weakened, while those who supported Edmund had found reasons to keep more of their men home. Had it come to open fighting, it would have been a bloodbath.”

“I guess we were lucky the peasants chose that moment to revolt instead.”

“It wasn’t pure happenstance. Yes, there was unrest and some scattered villages stood up to their oppressors, with varying degrees of success, but it would have died where it was if left to its own devices. Aldric, however, saw it as a chance to keep Sidor from tearing itself apart. It was madness, really, using a revolt to keep the kingdom together, but it worked. All he had to do was keep their anger focused on the crown, and not the barons.”

“It worked.”

“More than any of us expected, Aldric included. I don’t think even he believed the peasants would have been able to fight to the very gates of Starhaven or have the presence of mind to push through this Council of Commoners. It isn’t exactly what we wanted when this started, but for a moment it looked like it was going to be enough to cool tempers enough to allow real negotiation between the crown and the nobles again. Unfortunately, that didn’t last.”

“What’s happened?”

“Thomas Fletcher, the woodcutter who led the peasant revolt, has been assassinated. Aldric’s letter contained little details, but he said there are some signs that perhaps some of the barons might be involved.”

“But that makes no sense. If they supported the revolt, even if not its conclusion, why would they want Fletcher dead? Especially now that everything’s been settled?”

“They wouldn’t, but I think we’re only meant to believe the barons were behind this. I’m almost certain it was ordered by your stepfather, and I think Aldric agrees with me, but he refrained from putting that into writing.”

“Are you sure?”

“As sure as we can be without concrete proof,” Pembroke replied. “The timing is too convenient, and it fits with Edmund’s pattern of manipulation.”

“Wouldn’t this just cause the peasants to rise up again?”

“I... don’t think so. If Edmund was foolish enough to put back the Edict of Travel and other laws, then yes, but he’s too smart for that. He knows he overplayed his hand, and will go at it a different way. Without that though, the masses are fickle. They want to live their lives in peace. They only rebelled the first time because they were being crushed under new taxes and restrictions. They won’t take up arms again for a dead woodcutter, no matter how much they respected him.”

“But my uncle thinks this will escalate, even if the peasants don’t revolt again? What does he think will happen?”

“Aldric believes Edmund will use this to escalate matters. He won’t be content with simply rescinding the concessions made during the peace talks. I think he’ll likely go after the barons directly now, since his anger toward the nobles has only grown as some of my fellow barons have thrown public support behind the commoners. Your uncle is less sure. Honestly, no one knows how this will settle. The peace was fragile enough, and this upsets everything.”

“What should we do?” William asked. “Should we return to Sidor?”

“No. That was actually the main reason for the Duke’s message. He wants us to stay here and remain focused on the war.”

“But if things are as bad as you say…”

“I know, but Aldric believes the best thing we can do is win this war and get our men home. That way, the barons will have their forces at hand should things... escalate further.”

“You think it might come to that? Open conflict between the crown and the barons?”

“I pray it doesn’t, but we must be prepared for all eventualities. For now, however, that isn’t our problem. We stay focused on our goal. Valemonde.”

William frowned. He wanted to go home. If Uncle Aldric was worried enough to send a preemptive message, then things were worse than he was saying. They didn’t need to end this war. They could just sue for peace now and go back.

But Aldric knew what he was doing. If he wanted William to win the war, William would do just that.

“It’s time we pushed harder. I want a march to Valemonde. Now.”

“Your Highness, I know you’re concerned, but we still have military reality to focus on. We should wait until the ground solidifies. The winter thaw makes the roads treacherous.”

William shook his head firmly. “No. We’ve waited long enough. The Lynesians have all but pulled back, leaving only token forces to block us. The time of waiting and maneuver is over. They have defenses around Valemonde, so we aren’t going to be able to just march in. I want to envelop it now and let the siege start. I know you want to close them off from the water, and we can, but I’m not waiting for it.”

Pembroke looked like he wanted to argue, but William stared him down, daring him to disagree. He was set, and he wasn’t going to bend.

Pembroke gave him a tight look, but only nodded. It was time to end this.