“The Northeast boils like an ocean an hour before a storm,” Evrart said. “Publicly the lords there decry Hermant; privately many still wish he had succeeded in his ill-fated play for the throne. They will look for any excuse they can to remove you and promote Princess Adela and whatever Northeastern lordling they feel they can readily manipulate to the throne. Her cousin Theo, probably. Which, of course, will send Lord M’Tongliss and the rest of Terinto into instant rebellion for breaking the Empress’s promise to marry Darien to Adela. I say ‘rebellion’ but the Terintans are too smart to move against you openly. That doesn’t mean they won’t make your life exceedingly difficult.”
Evrart picked up a pebble and scratched a circle on the flagstone in front of him, then another circle below it. Mace supposed the first circle represented the Northeast and the second Terinto. Terinto was officially part of the Capital Lands but was culturally and politically distinct. In the same way, the Northeast was officially part of the East, but practically, its lords were rich enough and influential enough that they held more clout than the rest of the Eastern lords combined.
“The Northeast may have a sparse population,” Evrart went on, “but the mineral wealth of the entire Empire comes from the Zaris Mountains. Their lords have long had more influence than they deserve, and they will want to hold onto that – or increase it, if they can.” He scratched another circle on the stone, a bigger one. “The West still clamors for more power, but they will rest content so long as you hold the throne –”
“And bow to their wishes.”
“Yes,” Evrart conceded, glancing up. “As long as they have a Westerner with a crown who bows to their wishes. You are not so ignorant of politics as you like to pretend.” Evrart drew a third circle between the circle for the West and the other two. “The lords of the Capital Lands are generally loyal to whomever holds the throne, because chaos in Port Lorsin inevitably impacts them first and hardest. But do they particularly want to lose an entire generation of young men, who could become tax-paying citizens one day, to a war a thousand miles away? Or empty their coffers even more than they already have for that same war? Of course not,” Evrart said, answering his own rhetorical questions. He drew a final circle above the one representing the West and put his pebble down. “The Central Steppes have neither the population of the Capital Lands, the natural resources of the West, nor the riches of the Northeast. But their support of the war, or lack thereof, cannot be discounted. If the Steppe lords had supported the West during its rebellion rather than the crown, then the capital of this Empire today might well be Mereck.”
Evrart sat back, leaning against the rear of the cell wall and crossing his arms against his chest. The man was born to be an advisor; Mace hadn’t seen this much energy in Evrart since he’d been imprisoned months earlier.
“So the War in the East is over, and the Empire has lost,” Mace said grimly. “Which means the Empire’s lands between Birsid and the Sunrise Mountains are also lost.” Tasia would have hated to hear Evrart say those words, but it was time to let go of what Tasia would have loved or hated. She didn’t have to hold the Empire together anymore; Mace did. “There remains one very serious problem, though. The whole reason for Tasia’s offensive in the first place.”
“The Shadowlands.”
Mace nodded. “Yet your Brotherhood no longer seems intent on keeping shadows in the Shadowlands. And with no Imperial presence in the East, what stops this so-called ‘deathless king’ in Persopos from consuming the rest of the Empire?”
“It is not my Brotherhood,” Evrart said, bitterness coating his every word. “Not anymore.”
“You said that the undatai would take years to regain its full strength and attack the Capital Lands again directly, like it did during the Battle of Port Lorsin. How much longer do we have before that happens?”
Evrart shrugged. “It is as I already told the Empress and Joslyn – I’m not sure. Years. More than two years, less than ten.”
“That’s quite a range, Evrart.”
“I have no better guesses. There were scholars within the Brotherhood who studied the undatai, who would know more than I do. But they are either dead, imprisoned, or… fighting for the undatai itself now.”
“I will get you out of here – soon,” Mace said once more. “You and all the other Brothers who were innocent. We need you now more than ever.”
“You cannot set me and the others free any more than you can send more soldiers to the East,” Evrart retorted. “Certainly not now. But perhaps not ever.”
They regarded each other silently for a minute, Evrart still leaning against the wall at the cell’s rear, Mace against the bars at its front. They were both imprisoned, in a way. Evrart by these walls and iron bars, Mace by the ring of gold upon his head.
“So,” Mace said at last. “My fate is to be remembered as the coward Emperor who allowed blameless subjects to remain imprisoned and lost three quarters of an entire realm to mountain tribesmen, all because it was politically expedient. All because I am too much the tool of others to do what I know to be right. Will I also be doomed to be the Emperor who allowed the entire continent to be overrun by shadows?”
“Years, your Majesty. You still have years – at least two of them,” Evrart said. “You have time to prevent this slow moving catastrophe before it strikes. For now, the shadows are contained to the East. And we have the rune-marked blades. As for me, I still live. And I will still give you the best advice I can. So do not lose hope quite yet.”
Mace drew in a deep breath. Evrart was right. Now was the time to be steady, not the time to lose his head.
“Two hours ago,” he told the scruffy Brother, “I was comfortably sleeping, having a silly dream about the palace kitchens running out of pastries. Now my wife is dead, a war is lost, and an evil I barely understand threatens the three realms that remain in this Empire.” He barked out a laugh, then shook his head. “I wish the lords of this land could remember that most of this city, along with all of Terinto, was possessed by shadows not even a year ago. But their memories are both short and selfish.”
Mace could see it all so clearly, this game of Castles and Knights playing out around him. Except instead of two players, there were dozens, each maneuvering the pieces they controlled for a better position on the board. This was why Mace hated politics, why he would have been happier living out his years in Gifford, solving disputes between cotton farmers and brokering trade deals with Adessians.
Adessians. That gave Mace an idea.
“Have you ever traveled to the Adessian Islands?” he asked Evrart suddenly.
“No. I’ve never left the continent, actually.”
“There are two islands, both of them not so far from the Gifford Peninsula, whose people hate each other. They’ve warred for centuries. One of the islands, Essa’tre, grew tired of enduring raids from their neighbors, and they built a wall around the entire island to keep their enemies out.” Mace pulled up a mental image of the Empire, of the winding border between the Capital Lands and the East formed by the Snake River. “A wall, Brother Evrart. We can build a wall, from Birsid in the south, up the Snake River, all the way to the Yellow Plateau in the north.”
Evrart eyed him skeptically. “That would be quite an undertaking.”
“Yes,” Mace agreed. “It would take years to complete. More than two but less than ten.”
“The Empire would not be able to defend a wall of that length.”
“But you see, we wouldn’t need to defend the entire wall. At least not all the time. We only need enough men to guard the watchtowers, to give us warning if enemies approach.” Mace began to pace within the small cell. “No matter how the tribesmen’s population swells, they will never be able to attack the entire wall at once. It won’t stop them, but a wall that size will slow them down enough that we will be able to push them back wherever and whenever they attempt a breach. And with rune-marked blades, like you said, even if they are shadow-infected, they will not be able to spread their darkness to the rest of the Empire.” He paused, glancing at Evrart, and found that the Brother was slowly nodding.
“My Wise Man taught me that sometimes amputation of a gangrenous limb is the only way to protect the rest of the body from suffering the same infection,” Mace said. “We may have to amputate the East, but at least we can cauterize the wound.” Mace looked up, glancing from his advisor to his personal guard. They had both known Tasia, had been close to Tasia, in a way that he never had been. “The Empress gave her life to protect this Empire. I will honor her sacrifice by making sure it was not in vain.”
The three men exchanged glances.
Mace had always thought of Imperial history as something that happened in books and stories, something created by men and women nearly mythical in stature. The chieftain Dorsan, who led the ancestors of the Empire south from the Unknown Lands. King Hallon I, who ended the Grandsons’ War and united Dorsan’s warring descendants. Empress Adela, the queen whose political savvy prevented wars instead of starting them, and made the Empire the most powerful force in the known world.
But now Mace had the distinct feeling that this moment was another one of those critical junctures in Imperial history. And history was being made not on a battlefield or a council room, not by men and women of mythical stature, but in a stinking dungeon cell by a disgraced, imprisoned advisor and a man who had never wanted to be Emperor in the first place. Mace saw it clearly – and not with arrogance or self-righteousness, just mildly amused surprise. He was about to change the course of Imperial history.
“I will not allow her sacrifice to be in vain,” Mace repeated.
“I know you won’t, Majesty,” Evrart said.
There was nothing left to say. Mace nodded to the man in the cell and turned to leave.
“Let’s go, Grizzle,” he said. “We have a council meeting to get to and a game of Castles and Knights to win.”