The second and third negotiations lasted slightly longer.

I stood in a corner in silence, observing my Queen with the straightest face I could have. My hands were itching to touch her, to hug her, and whisper how much I missed her. Yet, I couldn't.

There was a limit about how much craziness was acceptable.

She offered us so much money that anyone else would have accepted; she offered the use of the harbour. Even participation in the profits that came from it. Free use of the docks for ten years and regular offices and lodgings for our sailors.

She offered an alliance; she offered to resign.

«This Queen will live in exile for the rest of her life, but the throne will pass to the successor once this Queen is dead,» she declared.

No, I couldn't afford that!

Her exile would have been in Asteria, where were the people that already killed her once. Her successor was her brother, a fact that was particularly favourable for them. They would have waited for Ethiro to weaken, and they would have seized away Polis.

«We cannot accept that,» the generals repeated. «Surrender or war. We don't need money.»

«You will not be able to access the Royal Treasure without knowing the operation. This Queen is the only person knowing how to open it,» she lied.

Oh, I would have just pecked her frowning lips until she relaxed, entangling my fingers in her hair, stroking her back while promising that everything would have turned out just fine...

Yet, it was a lie. I didn't have any guarantee that my wicked plan could succeed.

The generals nodded to her and left. I followed them, realising that it was almost time. My Queen was starting to concede.

The next step would have been adding juicy offers and then taking them away, one after the other, in the following encounters.

«The Ethiro Empire offers citizenship for every person living in Polis who does not have a title. Amnesty for officers and military personnel. They will not be executed as long as they renounce their role. The royal family will be allowed to leave, and Polis will be annexed to the Empire as a part of territory like any other. There will not be mistreating policies or retaliation.»

«This Queen won't betray her city for the sake of her life,» she said.

Her eyes were tired, her shoulders a degree lower than usual. She listened to our offers, interested. Yet, she didn't have any means to enforce the treaty, so she refused and returned to her gate without looking back.

We had been talking for almost a year. Indirectly, since the general was my proxy and she only saw him while negotiating. I was just a step behind, pretending to be an ordinary aide.

It was the beginning of summer when we finally cut the water.

«Look for the springs in the mountains. Then, find a way to stop it from flowing down to the city,» I ordered. «Then, send an offer for unconditional surrender.»

«Do you think they will concede?»

«No, they'll refuse. But we now stand even lower with our offers than at the start. His majesty will be satisfied with the final treaty.»

«Are you really going to let them die of thirst?» the general asked, confused. «It's a whole city.»

«It won't be necessary,» I finished. «War is all about feigning order when you don't know what's happening and about pretending to have a plan when you have no clue about how to move.»

I shrugged, resuming my whole career in a couple of sentences.

«Youth...» the general murmured while walking away.

When the refusal for unconditional surrender was rejected, I started writing a treaty.

Freedom for common people in exchange for a few servants; access to every part of the city for the army in exchange for fairness and public security.

My Queen would have been brought to the capital, and I would have convinced her to give me a chance once there.

«A thousand servants is too much,» Theodora declared after reading the treaty. She left it on the table and stepped back. «A hundred is the most Polis can offer.»

«A hundred, younger than twenty-five,» the general replied. He wasn't even surprised anymore by my capability to predict the Queen's words. «We need some incentive to accept your surrender...»

«This Queen will write the draft of a treaty, next time,» she declared.

«We will not accept anything less than complete surrender,» the general reminded her. «Let's not waste our time.»

«Surrender isn't something Polis is used to offering.»

«If we don't reach an agreement during the next negotiations, we'll poison the water and let it reach the city,» he stated.

After days of thirst, soothed only by the few drops they could purify from the river, people wouldn't care about poison before drinking the fresh water from the springs. After all, they were all tired.

It was all a bluff. I wouldn't have let people in Polis die just because I wanted to bring my Queen away. Yet, she couldn't know it.

She didn't have a clue about my identity. She thought she was negotiating with the general. She couldn't guess my mind.

When her aide delivered the final draft of the treaty, a couple of days later, we finally achieved our goal.

«Polis and the surrounding territories will be under the Ethiro Empire's jurisdiction. The harbour will be managed by Ethiro completely, except for the contracts and conventions already in place. The merchants that have already signed or paid for their docks will be able to use the resources until the end of the contract. The dates will be updated, taking into account the years of war when they have not been accessed. The citizens without any title will become subjects of the Emperor of Ethiro and oblige to the same laws as the rest of the Empire, with the same duties and rights. No one will be sentenced to death for the events that happened during the war, especially soldiers and officers.»