Caudin was fuming. He sat at the head of the table, leaning his head into his fist, as the majority of the Principals made arguments against war. Against. After the Queen was almost killed, after their child, the heir to Arvonne, was killed. After the third attempt, known attempt, against his life.

No, too much money, they said. Too precarious a position. The monarchy hadn’t been officially established by the Noh Amairian Conclave, so it might backfire if other countries came to Sayen’s aid. They already had a plan in place and they should stick to that.

They, of course, couldn’t overrule him. If he chose to go to war, the country would go to war, with or without the approval of the Principals. And was he sorely tempted to force this edict down their throats. But, his training had kicked in, and he knew that telling the Principals to stuff their caution would lead to poor relations between the crown and its constituents. And while this might feel like it was worth it, he would pay for it in the long-run.

So, he gritted his teeth and bit his tongue and listened for what he could get from this. They condemned the actions and were willing to acknowledge behind closed doors that it was Sayen who was responsible for these attempts. They were concerned for his well-being and had commiserated the loss of their child and had asked how Anladet was doing. They suggested coming up with a backup plan, should another assassination work.

Schooling his tone and features, he interrupted that course. “So, We shall look weak.”

“Not weak, Sire, but calculating,” Triniste said. “It shows that we’re a country that understands its place and is seeking to work out our grievances through the proper channels.”

“Sounds like the equivalency of a farmer robbed thrice who finally goes to the sheriff, who never makes it in time to save him from the next pillage.”

“Sire, our country needs more time,” the older female Principal name Reldarin said. “If we had the immediate backing of the Southern Empire or if we were as strong as we were before the Coup, then this would be a different outcome. I’m sure we’d be clamoring to sign a war proclamation. Many of us are heartbroken and furious as to what’s happened. But, we’re also still wary and afraid of returning to where we once were.”

Her speech had calmed him to the point where he knew he wasn’t going to win today. “It seems that the majority do not wish for war and We wish to hear the will of the land as well as Our own. However, to take no action at this point is not acceptable. We will break for a half-hour recess while We hear solutions.”

Al would have figured this out. Damn him for leaving.

Caudin stayed in his chair, feeling the exhaustion of holding in simmering anger. He folded his hands in front of him and leaned back, looking at the table for a few moments. When he looked up, most of the Principals were gathered in groups around the room, but his small council was surrounding him. Jemerie leaned forward in the seat to his left. “Your Radiance, what will it take to satisfy you as well as the Council?”

He sighed, sitting up. “I want them to stop trying to kill me. I have far bigger things to worry about other than the Mielsa at this moment. Retaking it isn’t a priority and I haven’t made any move to. But, they keep trying.”

“I doubt a sternly worded letter would work in this case.”

“No, I very much doubt that as well.”

“Other than hoping Sayen will decide to wait and see, what can we do?”

“Return the favor? Send assassins to Corvreki Astel?” he joked.

“And I’m sure your uncle will take over with passion if your grandfather is killed.”

Caudin shrugged. “What else can I do? Sayen is in the stronger position. It seems that you will be looking for a new king in half a year’s time.”

“Let’s go for a walk,” Rogesh suddenly said. “I think you need some fresh air to clear out the cobwebs of despair.”

Jemerie gave Rogesh a wary look, but nodded. Caudin rose and he and Rogesh moved outside to a hallway outside the chambers. “It looks bleak,” the Principal said.

“She almost died and she still hasn’t awoken from her coma. Good on them, finding my weakest point and attacking it. Bravo.”

“They want you to declare war, my boy. They want the new, young, brash ruler to take mostly untrained troops and fight a war under a dubious cause.”

“I can prove it was the Network.”

“No, you can prove that a Sayenese man shot an arrow at you and that a Sayenese man tried to stab you. The weight of a nation takes a lot more than conjecture. We need a Sayenese duke charging at you with a lance to go to war, otherwise our attack will seem unmitigated.”

“The Principals realize that another Coup is just months, or weeks, away, yes? I will likely be dead by the next year’s end. And don’t say I’m being dramatic.”

“You are, but it’s a fair estimation.”

“And, so, we’ll just let Sayen take Arvonne this time?”

“Caudin…you over-extended yourself. You thought the Council would be as angry as you are over the death of your heir and the attempt on your and the Queen’s life. It’s not that we aren’t upset; I am personally furious that they’ve done this thrice and caused you so much pain. But, I am also a Principal, and I am old, so I have learned to temper my rage and think rationally when I have to. I have the shortest fuse in there! You can imagine where this vote is going to go.”

“So, what, we should let them kill me? Or should we do what Banisault suggested and give Sayen concessions if they stop trying? Hmm? ‘You can have the coast and parts of Temenrind just so long as you stop sending assassins, pretty please’?”

“Caudin, they won’t vote for war. You’ll have to swallow your pride on that today. However,” he said, giving him a look of importance, “there are a thousand other things you can do. You are the King. Send assassins after your grandfather. Kill his heir. Do whatever your vengeful heart commands, just don’t do it officially.”

He had been so focused on the light that he had forgotten about the dark. In a similar sense, they had recently condoned an extra-marital affair by offering a mistress, just as Rogesh was now slipping him this opening. He could do anything he wanted as Caudin, so long as he didn’t do it as the King.

“I see,” he said. “Please reconvene the Council.”

“Absolutely, Your Radiance.”

Caudin took a few moments to gather his thoughts. He’d plot later. For now, he just needed to appear like he didn’t get what he wanted.

The Council agreed to increase military spending and work on a contingency plan, should an assassination attempt be successful. He displayed the same simmering anger he’d had before speaking with Rogesh and ended the meeting with words of disappointment over their choice.

As soon as he was back at Dilvestrar, he visited his wife by her bedside, holding her hand as she continued to sleep. He had canceled all events and had ample time to be with her. Since she didn’t stir, he thought about what he wanted to do, what he could do to douse the fire of vengeance within.

He summoned Isken over. “I have a project for you to do. Would you like it?”

“Oh, I can say ‘no’ to the King in this country?” he asked.

“No, I suppose you can’t, but I’d rather know that you wanted to do this rather than be forced to do it.”

“I don’t know that the project is, so how can I say ‘yes’?”

“I would like you to train a hundred men in the art of pillaging.”

“’Pillaging’? What exactly do you mean?”

“Basic fighting techniques with two or three weapons, scare tactics, sneaking, arson.”

“Why? What do you wish to do?”

“In three month’s time I’d like to lead those men to Erifana and evict Sayen from the Mielsa Valley in the most brutal way possible.”

“Oh, well then, my answer is ‘yes’, Your Radiance. You should have led with that.”

* * *

Caudin spent the rest of the day taking notes on what exactly he would need from and for this squad. For them money, weapons, provisions. From them, well, anything he desired. In this case, all he wanted was revenge. And not just for his wife and child, not just for the two other attempts, but for his people, for his family, and for every single second in those eighteen years of his life.

He happened to look up and saw that Anla was blinking. “Ainle?” he asked, grabbing her hand.

“Ainler?”

He kissed her hand. “I love you. I’m so happy you woke up. Do you remember anything?”

Her eyebrows furrowed. “Hot.”

“We were in front of the fire, talking. I was drinking wine and you had a chocolate. It had henchin bark in it, a deadly poison. You were very sick, but Alistad managed to counteract the toxin.”

She slowly lifted her hand to her stomach.

“The baby didn’t make it.”

She swallowed hard, her eyes twinkling with tears. She nodded. “I’m sorry…”

“Don’t. Absolutely none of it was your fault. The only person to blame is my grand-, is the King of Sayen.”

“We’ll be more careful. We’ll hire a taster and I’ll start vetting the staff.”

Caudin nodded, distracted.

“What is it?” she asked.

“Nothing.” He picked up the bell on her nightstand and rang it. To the valet that entered, he said, “Tell Priestess Alistad and the Duke of Eri Ranvel that the Queen is awake.”

Garlin made it to her chambers before Alistad did, hugging his sister tightly. “She’s still in recovery, Your Grace,” Caudin said with faux sternness.

“I’m sorry,” he said, pulling back. “I was worried about her.”

“As you rightly should have been. It was a near thing.”

Anla pulled him back and rocked him. “It’s okay. Even if I had died, you’d still have a home here.”

“You’re my brother now, for better or worse,” Caudin said. “You will always have a home here.”

But when he lifted his head again, his lashes were wet and he hastily wiped his nose. Caudin thought that, much like his sister, he tended to measure homes less in bricks and more in embraces.

Garlin kept her company by showing her the things people had sent, including a bouquet of wildflowers and a card from the orphanage, when Alistad arrived and began her check-in. It was the perfect time for Caudin to slip away and find Isken, who had been sent out on a few errands.

“I found my friend,” Isken said, walking next to Caudin. “Kavrin Aldlismon. He’s the one you want to talk to.”

“Can you arrange for tonight, say Kabidon’s bell?”

“Very likely. He was eager to meet with you.”

“Likewise. I hope his appetite is as strong as my own.”

He thought maybe he had competition when he got a good look at him across from a tavern table in Aubrige. Kavrin looked to have a lot of northern blood in him, with his pale skin and shockingly red hair and beard. He was polite and sane, so long as one didn’t discuss Sayen.

At first, his jaw clenched and he whispered nothing sweet about the country. Later, as his tab increased, he was more liberal with his swears. Eventually his story came out.

“My family had lived for four generations in Chremant-asvil when a blight of them came from up north. ‘Our land now’, they said. ‘Says who?’ we asked. ‘Says the men with the swords,’ they answered. They gave us three days to pack up and leave, though not everything. Not our crops, not our equipment, and not…not our women. They left most of the married ones alone, but not me. No, they took my beautiful, young wife and three of my cousins, the eldest only fourteen.

“And what could I do? No one could fight. There were too many of them. Do you think I didn’t want to fight?”

“You lived for this one,” Caudin interrupted.

“What is ‘this one’? What have you invited me here for? Not that I am upset by free beer and chicken.”

“I’m told you are a man who knows a lot of other men. You must know a few who would be willing to spend a few months training to go on an excursion.”

“To where?” he asked, pausing mid chew.

“Erifana.”

“Erifana,” he said, musing as he put his chicken down. “Erifana is that port town in Sayen-occupied Mielsa.”

“It is.”

“There’s a lot of Sayenese there.”

“There are.”

“’twould be a shame if it caught fire and all those ships were destroyed.”

“Terrible shame.”

Kavrin gave a wolfish grin that he dropped after a moment. “I have one problem.”

“You don’t know anyone?”

“Oh, I know plenty of like-minded individuals, more than enough who wouldn’t mind taking an excursion. I don’t, however, like taking orders from a man whose face I’ve never seen.”

“Understandable,” Caudin said, tipping his hood back a little to show his eyes. “You wouldn’t be taking orders from me, but from Isken. I am just an overseer. I provide the purse and an instructive word, but I will be working from the shadows.”

“How do I know this isn’t a trap?”

Caudin paused at this. “Distrust is a healthy thing with strangers.”

“I give you the names of men who have reason to hate Sayen, then they start going ‘missing’. It would be an easy way for Sayen to remove obstacles. They’ve already tried to get the King five times now.”

“Five?” he asked, surprised. “I’d only heard of three.”

“Five,” he assured, counting each off on a finger. “One and two were in Temenrinde, a rock slide and an arrow. Three was an assassin on the way to a meeting. Four was an assassin in the palace. Five was the poison that got the poor Queen. It was my friends that got the assassin on the road. He was too obvious, bragged too much.”

“I see,” Caudin said, stunned. “Well, I cannot show my face. I cannot tell you who sponsors you. I will ask that you trust him,” he gestured to Isken, “since he trusts me.”

“Do you?” Kavrin asked.

“He saved my life,” Isken said. “I saved his, twice. I make sure he’s around the return the last favor.”

“You’ve always been a difficult man to know, Isken. How do you two know each other?”

“We’ve known each other for many years now,” Caudin said. “Friends in unlikely circumstances.”

Kavrin tipped back his mug and finished his drink. “So, let me ask you why you want to do it. Other than the pay, I’m assuming.”

“Because I’ve had a hard life and I can trace all my tragedies to Sayen.”

The burly man considered this for a minute. “How many men do you need?”

“Close to but under ten dozen.”

“Women?”

“I have no objections, if they want revenge as much as anyone else.”

“Give me one week.”

* * *

As Caudin looked at the group in the old Dablen Market, he was happy to see he wasn’t starved for applicants. There were closer to two hundred men, and women, talking and joking in the building’s courtyard where animal auctions, and the occasional performance, used to happen. He stood watching them, waiting for them to quiet.

“My name is Quin Sesault,” he said once he had most of their attention. “This is Isken Fren and most of you know Kavrin Aldlismon. Tonight we gather because we all share one thing in common: we are all patriots. Right now part of our lands are in the grip of another king, another people who are not us.

“I have been commissioned to remedy that situation. I need a solid team of people who will work for me. Therefore, I must ask this crowd to close their eyes. Everyone. Right now.”

There were a few laughs and looks, but most people did as he asked. “I will explain what will be demanded of you. At any point, if you think this is not for you, I want you to leave. And anyone here who opens their eyes when we are done and sees a friend missing should thank them for not wasting our time.

“I will not pay you. You will earn no money from this. You must buy your own weapons, sacrifice your own time, and go without many comforts. Eyes stay closed!”

He waited as at least two dozen grumbling men shuffled out, some shooting him glares.

“You will spend one year doing all the training I ask of you. If I see you staggering in your training, I will ask you to leave.”

A few more left at this, though far fewer than the first group and some with disappointed looks.

“We will be conducting our missions with a strict code of ethics. No raping, no stealing, no killing.”

“No killing?” someone asked. “You do realize at least half the people here have sworn public oaths to destroy Sayen by any means necessary.”

“Just the same, I will not train you to make decisions on behalf of my benefactor only to have you turn into wild dogs and ruin our objective.”

Surprisingly, no one left after that explanation. He was still left with about 160 people.

“I would like anyone with an ailment of some sort to step towards me. While I will find a use for you in our cause, I want to know how many fighting men, and women, we have.”

Only about ten moved, most with missing body parts that would make fighting incredibly difficult. 150 soldiers, then.

“All right, you may open your eyes. I only have a hundred swords and sixty other weapons, so I need you to carefully choose amongst you who will wield what.”

“I thought you said we had to buy our own weapons,” a man called out.

“Oh, I lied.” A few people turned their heads sharply to his. “I plan on paying for as much as I can. Weapons, armor, horses, meals, and compensation for the time you spend training and traveling. You’ll get your first stipend in two weeks’ time.”

There was pleased murmuring and even laughter that rang through the crowd. “So, why did you lie to those other guys?” a woman asked.

“The ones that left? Because I don’t want brigands. I don’t want thugs or sell-swords or bandits. I want a family. I want us to support one another. They weren’t our family,” he said, gesturing to the door. “They left when they realized they couldn’t show up and collect coin for scraping by. They left when things got tough. They had no passion. We don’t need to mix with people who don’t understand that we will do whatever it takes for revenge.”

There were some cheers at that. “Do we get to kill the Sayenese, then?”

“I said I didn’t want wild dogs. Listen to me carefully: if you stayed because you want to kill the Sayenese, then leave because my sisters and my brothers don’t kill innocents. The Mielsa was settled twenty years ago by thousands forced there by their government. Some are children who’ve lived their entire lives there, never knowing what their parents did. Some are Arvonnese women forced into marriage. Can you tell the difference between the innocent and the guilty by torches at night?” He paused, letting them think. “We will have targets, people we know deserve our steel. But promise me now that you will not thirst for the blood of those who had no hand in your misery.”

“Aye!” a man shouted weakly.

“That’s not good enough! I want your oath that you will not belly yourselves to the level of Sayen! My family is better than that!”

“Aye!” came a stronger shout from half.

“Good!” he said, chuckling. “Because when you kill wantonly, you will be killed. And if we all die in our first mission, then we won’t get to soak the shores of the Mielsa in the blood of those who deserve it. So, now tell me, who wants to rise above the wild dogs and become not just men, but angels of revenge?”

“Aye!” the market crowd thundered.

“Then I’ll see you tomorrow night.”

“I see why they made you King,” Isken murmured as the people shuffled out of the market. A few stopped and shook his hand, introducing themselves quickly before leaving. Kavrin left with a group he knew well. The building was almost empty when they headed for the door.

“Wait!” a man called. “I won’t tell them anything!” Isken and Caudin turned and saw a man climb down from a stall, laughing. “I finally understand! And no one could pry it from me! They could pull all my teeth and every one of my nails and I’d still laugh in their faces.”

He stood before them, a scrawny man of middling years made older by too much sun. It took Caudin a moment to recognize him. He almost swore out loud, but remembered who he was pretending to be. “Can I help you?”

“I asked myself who knew I was marooned with the to’ken and who would invite me, personally, to return to Arvonne? A very short list. Perhaps someone got wind of my story from a passing vessel and told the right person. It didn’t matter, the Prince had returned and I was overjoyed. I had hoped beyond hope that one of our princes were still alive and my wish came true. I’ve seen the King many times, in parades and walking to his carriage from an event. He looked a little familiar, but it didn’t matter, because I was in my country again.

“And tonight I saw you cloaked and swathed in a scarf, hidden like that trirec, and it all made sense.”

Caudin put on an air of boredom. “Sounds like a lot of conjecture. Who am I supposed to be?”

Stevrin whispered, “You were that trirec, Raulin Kemor. You are…I will not say it aloud.”

“I am Quin Sesault. Believe what you want, but do not ruin my chance for revenge.”

“Oh, no, Sir. No, no indeed. I would never ruin this for you. You will find me here tomorrow, and the next day, as long as you need me. I just wanted to thank you, for my invitation back and for this one. You’ve reminded me of why I am alive, again. And I apologize for using your brother’s name.”

He left the two men standing there before Caudin took off in a huff. “This is a bad omen,” Isken said.

“It means nothing. He’s not a snitch. In fact, he’s insanely devoted to the Arvonnese royal family. I believe him when he said he’d withstand torture to keep that secret.”

“Perhaps I should ask, once more, if we want to proceed. This is new territory for us, despite our background.”

“I want this.”

“I know. But, you said it would be highly unlikely that you’d be recognized. What if…?”

“I know the ‘what ifs’. We will be fine.”

As they took a convoluted path back to Dilvestrar, Isken murmured, “Bad omen indeed.”