There wasn’t a long wait, the cries grew ever more faint as the minutes ticked past, the ranks filled the courtyard, and only the sharpest of eyes caught the changes in the dark, as banners of Yanmelu descended, and banners of Yanlim went up in their place at various points of the city and along the walls.

By the time the last banner around the city was being replaced, someone was emerging from the shattered door, “The Lady Aiwenor and her party are asked to join the Prince in his throne room.”

The cheers of the warriors outside threatened to break the stone of the palace, as Nua, Kaiji, and her twenty-five made their way within.

The torches had been lit in anticipation, but the bodies had not yet been removed. Some, it was clear, had died fleeing, stabbed in the back, others lay crumpled and pale on the stone, clutching belly wounds that they had failed to keep shut. Others had died more uncertain deaths, Nua stepped over a young man whose brains were leaking from his ears, his tongue hung out of his open mouth and his empty eyes stared up at her accusingly. The smear on the stone was proof enough that he’d died by striking it with his head, but in a fight or in a flight, she would never know.

None were too young to die, but gradually the numbers of dead began to fade until they reached deep within the interior, where another shattered and splintered double door waited. Parts of it hung on damaged hinges, while the other was flung inward and broken at the low center.

Within, a handful of lightly armored soldiers armed with spears, javelins, and swords, flanked the throne. On the throne sat General Yanlim. Blood soaked most of his armor and clothing, nearby, his cousin Yanmelu hung his head and shook with fear, rage, or both, still in his nightclothes, a yellow stain across the front at the waist.

Behind him, three young men held spears to various points of his back or neck, ready to run him through.

“Lady Aiwenor…” Yanlim began in his command voice, then stopped himself and stood up, “No… sister.” He said, and stepped from his throne to approach her with open arms. He embraced her warmly, and if she was a little slow about it, she did her best to cover for that by squeezing a little tighter around his broad body.

His very fuzzy, bushy beard, tickled a bit when he spoke, and Nua tried not to laugh given his sincere words. “Sister, you have done a great service for me today, one I will not forget, you made an impossible promise, and then made it possible.” He stepped back and clutched her hands.

“Prince Yanlim will not forget this night.” Prince Yanlim said in a pronounced and noble voice, his cousin clearly did not appreciate it.

“I’m the Prince you damn traitor! I’m the Prince!” He half bellowed, half shrieked and struggled from his knees.

Yanlim whirled on his cousin, “You lost that right when you tried to have me poisoned!”

“I never tried to have you poisoned! You’re my cousin! I was angry with you after you hit me! But I was going to let you out after a few more days! Who told you it was poisoned…?!” Yanlim demanded and ground his teeth, his beady eyes glared up at his cousin, and Yanlim was quick to reply.

“The boy who brought me the tea!” Yanlim snapped back.

“I wasn’t sending you any tea while you were confined, idiot! The only ones who…” Yanmelu froze and all the blood drained from his face, and as if it carried it all with him, he lowered his head as well.

“By the stars…” Yanlim whispered.

“The ministers! My damn ministers acted without my approval! It has to be! Bring them here and wring the truth from their tongues!” Yanmelu roared and struggled as anger burst forth again.

“They’re all dead.” Yanlim replied with a shake of his head, “They were all on the list to die, so there is no way any are left by now.”

“Damn you! Damn you, Yanlim! You sold out your cousin! Betrayed your city! Betrayed your family?! All over a gash you screwed once, and some minister’s lies!” Yanmelu flung himself back, briefly knocking the spears aside, long enough for him to rise and make as if to charge at his cousin. With his hands bound at the small of his back, unarmed, he could do nothing, but that did not stop his rage from propelling him forward.

Nor did it armor him against the response, and three spearheads exploded out the front of his body as they were forced cleanly through his back. He stopped dead, hung up on the protruding steel heads and stared down at the holes in his body.

His beady eyes went wide while he looked down at them, and the spears were yanked back, drawing gurgles in place of screams, blood dripped front and back from his body down to the ground below, with droplets falling from the shaft and tips of the warriors spears.

He staggered forward a step or two. “Cousin… Yanlim… hurts… it hurts…” He gurgled, then fell to his knees, shattering them against the stone, but already feeling nothing. Yanmelu fell on his left side, his head striking the stone as blood pumped out of both ends of his body and pooled around him.

A few moments later, Prince Yanmelu was gone.

“Do you think he was telling the truth about the poison?” Nua asked as Yanlim crouched by the body and with trembling fingers, closed his cousin’s empty eyes.

“I don’t know… maybe. I wouldn’t put it past him, or the late ministers. But now… now everyone who could have done it is dead and I…” Yanlim looked from the body to the throne.

“The Prince is dead. Long live the Prince.” Nua said and put a hand on his shoulder. “I won’t advise you to believe or disbelieve his words. Since there is no knowing the truth, all I can tell you is to accept what allows you best to live as you are now.” Nua said as sympathetically as she could manage. Her slender fingers squeezed his shoulder, and he slowly stood up.

“What will you do with him?” Nua glanced down at the corpse.

“He was still my cousin, and the Prince. I’ll give him a proper funeral.” Yanlim replied, his eyes going from the body of his cousin, to the mercenary commander, and back again. “You have no objection to that, do you?”

“No, brother. No. A grave insult was done to my house, and an injury done to my property. Both of those are now avenged.” She looked over the slender body, far from attractive in life, he was no better in death. “My faith tells us that hatred should die with the dead. I have not always lived up to that belief, but I am trying. I make no claim on anything of his for any harm that was done to my treasures or my name.”

Prince Yanlim let that sink in, around the pair, warriors gathered and captives taken from within the palace were dragged into the throne room for judgement. “I expected a slave trader to demand his household servants, or his children or, harem, or wives. That is how it is normally done when a dynasty falls.”

Nua shook her head, “They were his family, he was your family, that makes them your family. We shed blood together, we took a blood oath together, that makes you family. The House of Aiwenor takes its vows as seriously as it does its revenge. I won’t tell you what to do with them, I haven’t got that right, brother. When Sado fell in my power, Prince Rasgen asked that I treat him well, if you want them slapped in collars, again I have no right to stop you. I will even accept them as gifts, and will promise that they will be well treated. But if you want my advice…?”

“I admit, I’m interested in what my sister has to say.” Yanlim said, glancing from where Nua stood, to where various members of Yanmelu’s household knelt, wept, and begged.

The sound of rustling cloth and weeping cries made Nua’s ears twitch, and words stuck in her throat for seconds on end. “If they’re a true threat, you should dispose of them. My heart tells me that they are your family and you must love them, but do you clutch a snake to the breast, knowing it will bite you? If they are not a threat, then…” Nua glanced away from the desperate women clutching at their children and took her eyes to her oath brother. “In Shog’nai I am told that they can deprive people of their names and heritages, stripping them from the ranks and depriving them of citizenship. Is that the case here?”

Yanlim shook his head, “We have nothing like that.”

“Do you want to kill your cousin’s children, wives, and household?” Nua asked him with a frank and brazen stare.

“My conflict was with my cousin. That is all.” Yanlim crossed his arms as if daring her to argue the point.

She didn’t contest it.

“You are now the Prince, you can create that system if you want. If you want that done, and exile them, give them a handful of coins to live simple lives, as an act of compassion for the House of Yan, I will permit them to live in some of my villages as free peasants. They can take new names and start new lives free of the taint of their defeated patriarch.” Nua spread out her hands in front of her like she was offering an embrace to the thickly bearded Prince. “What do you say, Prince of Hanak’sen?” Nua asked.

The unlooked for deliverance had wide and fearful eyes lighting up with hope, bright colored nightclothes crinkled further as women tightened their embrace on their young. Shaking bodies slick with sweat and reeking fear looked from one conqueror to the other as their fates were decided and an unexpected advocate offered a path to survival.

“The free servants are dismissed from their posts and free to pursue work elsewhere with payment for services rendered. They did nothing but their work. Changing a bed for my cousin is hardly deserving of death.” Prince Yanlim decreed, and the sawing of ropes was followed by snaps as bonds were loosed. Cries of relief came from the dozen or so who slowly rose to their feet.

“As to the slaves…” Yanlim extended a hand toward Nua, “They are my gift to the one who helped bring me victory. Take them as a token of my thanks. Though I would ask that you not sacrifice them to your death god. They did nothing to deserve to die like that.”

Nua’s laugh briefly drowned out the cries of relief followed by alarm from those in silver and iron collars that were dragged within the stone throne room.

Her laughter must have seemed more grim than she meant it to be, ‘Or perhaps it’s all the blood on me.’ She caught a reflection in a mirror that showed her bloody cloak, boots, and streaks of red on her face. So she explained, “We don’t practice the sacrifice of the living. My faith tells us that life is precious because it is so brief, so scarce. There is always time for death later. Your gifts will serve my household. As long as they behave, I’ve no reason to hurt them.”

“I had some… reservations, hearing of your differing faith, but that is something of a relief to hear.” Yanlim answered.

“As to my cousin’s harem, those who have born children to him, and the children themselves, are to be erased from all records, and those will also be given to my ally as a gift. Any who are free are deprived of that freedom, any who are not, will remain without it. Though knowing Yanmelu, there isn’t a one without a collar of silver to be had.” He said with sarcasm thick on his voice before it became morose as he hit on the death of his cousin again.

“With no record of their having been and no legitimacy anyway, they pose no threat if I send them away. Ten thousand women may claim to have birthed a child to Yanmelu, and not one of them will be believed.” Yanlim pronounced the sentence, and tears of both relief and fear flowed at once.

“Now…” Yanlim closed his eyes and turned to his soldiers. “Dispose of the rest… but make it as painless as you can.”

Brief shrieks of agony were paired with the sickening slick sound of metal tearing open flesh as spears ran through backs and chests to pierce and destroy beating hearts, and those who crouched and hoped, slumped to the stone, some still clutching tight to a loved one that they hoped might survive. Blood spread out over wounds and fearful trembling turned into deathrattles before the once living had gone entirely limp.

Nua kept her stoic expression. ‘You tried to offer an alternative. Maybe if you’d just said they should be offered to you as payment for his misdeeds… or maybe not. That might have ended up damaging your relationship with the new Prince.’ What caught Nua’s attention most about her contemplation was how impersonal it truly felt, she understood what she saw and what happened and what might have prevented it, but no part of her felt the anguish she expected she might. Instead, it felt as significant to see the fallen dead eyes of a boy who did not understand his own demise, as it felt to see a painting fallen off a wall with the subject staring up. The mother who held him and was fallen forward in her last futile act to protect him, was as significant to her as a chair toppled over.

“Will you stay and celebrate our victory, Duchessa Aiwenor?” Yanlim asked while his warriors began to gather bodies, picking them up at shoulders and feet, and taking them away from the Prince’s sight.

“It would be my honor, but I have promises to keep, and people to bring home again. The city is yours as I promised. I will leave Onimeus behind as my representative here to celebrate your victory, and he will oversee the purchase of your share of Komestran land and slaves, but there is one more small thing. The peasants I took from your villages and made to work for me, they were starving. I used some of my own supplies to feed them, and promised that when the city fell they would receive supplies from here to help them.” Nua bowed her head in apology, “I ask that you keep that promise, the victory could not have happened were it not for their strong backs.”

“It will be done.” Prince Yanlim replied, “My sister’s word is mine. I will also see that you’re provisioned with whatever you used to provide for my people, as well as some extra for some good soldiers who fought like demons to give me what I now possess, and send a rider to your city to alert them of your victory, your homecoming, and my personal thanks to the Prince for once again bringing a great aid to me in my time of need.”

“Thank you, brother.” Nua answered him with a polite and pleasant smile.

“There is one more thing though… Diana?” Yanlim said and his entire demeanor changed, he leaned forward on his throne and put his hands together.

“She arrived safely, told me everything. You treated her well.” Nua managed to give him a more ribald, sly look, “Very well, from what she said when she spoke of you.”

Yanlim flushed like a schoolboy whose crush was revealed.

Nua took the opportunity to cut the matter off before he could pursue any awkward questions, “I should be going, it is a long way home still, for all of us.” She answered and an eager rumble came from the thickly armored Komestran behemoths at her back. “But… we’ll have to resume trade talks soon, oh and you’ll want to fix what I did to the river as soon as possible.”

“What you… what did you do to the river?!” Yanlim exclaimed.

“Lowered its level, that’s all, diverted it… there may be some damages where it ran to, but nothing that can’t be fixed once you’ve filled in the channels I dug. See for yourself when I’m gone, I wish you the best of luck, Prince Yanlim of Hanak’sen. We will meet again soon, brother.” She said and approached the throne and thrust out her right hand.

He clasped it blood to blood again before his court. When the moment was passed, Nua turned about and headed for the exit. “Breakers, we are leaving. We have a home to get to.”

Heavy booted feet were joined by tugged ropes and the patterning of their shoeless prizes being mercilessly taken from their home and forced to stagger after their captors.

When the court was empty of the dead and the allies, Prince Yanlim sat on his throne and looked around at all he possessed. One of his officers, the first to give his pledge, moved into position standing at his right hand as though it were made for him. “My Prince, when you allied yourself with that one, you made either the best decision for this city, or the worst, and I don’t know which it is.”

“Who does?” Yanlim said as he looked at the bloodstains left behind by the bodies of his cousin’s family. “If any Prince ever knew what would become of their decisions, then they would have the power of a god at their disposal. Still, this was the only call I could make, and all it cost was food, some slaves, some coins, and some strips of land we couldn’t really use anyway. In exchange for the throne of a Prince? I call that a bargain.”

“Time will tell, my Prince, time will tell.” His officer replied, and they began bantering over the needs of the city and seeing to final matters brought to them by their ally to get her what was promised before she left.

‘Now I’ve won the city, time for the hard part… ruling it.’ Yanlim thought as one decision after another was put to him.