Steel and Sorrow: Rise of the Mercenary king-Chapter 1017: From the dirt(1)

A multitude of people each with his own story crossed the road of the capital of Yarzat. A woman navigated the throng, her basket brimming with the yeasty perfume of fresh bread; beside her, a carpenter shouldered massive planks of oak, oblivious to the wake of indignation he left behind as passersby ducked to avoid a splintered concussion.

Children, barefoot and feral with joy, wove through the legs of their elders, their wooden sticks transformed by imagination into the legendary blades of heroes.

Amidst the human current, maniples of city guards drifted like slow-moving sharks, their idle gazes scanning for the flash of a cutpurse’s knife, though their mere presence usually sufficed to keep the peace.

They favored the cool embrace of the shadows cast by the towering, two-story edifices. Above the cobblestones, the city’s architecture reached for the sky with a bizarre, vertical ambition. Massive wooden placards stood perched atop the roofs, dominated by vivid miniatures, pictograms of wheatsheafs, hammers, or foaming mugs, designed to guide the illiterate through the commercial labyrinth.

"The most singular and queer of sight," a voice mused from the interior of a rolling carriage.

Merelao leaned his head out of the window, his golden locks cascading behind him like autumnal leaves caught in a sudden gale. His sapphire eyes drank in the city’s frantic pulse.

"This city appears so fervently alive, yet possesses a clarity I find... unsettling," he hummed, his voice a melodic baritone. " I even spy the barbs of the Azanians, astride those shaggy, diminutive steeds of theirs. Perhaps I should acquire one for my own stables." He entertained a fleeting image of himself astride such a furry beast before dismissing it with a refined shudder. "No, it would be a mortifying sight. Perhaps as a curiosity for the menagerie, but never for the saddle."

Suddenly, Merelao sat bolt upright, his nostrils flaring as he sampled the air. Varo, his companion, tensed immediately, his hand twitching toward a concealed blade.

"Do you perceive that, Varo?"

The older man inhaled deeply, his eagle-like nose twitching in a desperate search for a threat. "I perceive nothing, my lord."

"Precisely," Merelao replied, reclining back into the velvet cushions, his chin resting elegantly upon the pale palm of his hand. "A multitude of this magnitude, and yet the air is devoid of the stench of ordure. How peculiar. It would seem our ’Peasant Prince’ has deigned to embellish his dominion for the nose.He has clearly pilfered a page from the Romelian scrolls of old.Well you won’t find me complaining on not sniffing any stench...."

He leaned out once more as the carriage passed beneath the soaring arch of a massive aqueduct, its stonework rising like a mountain between men.

"Would you not agree, this to be a hive and actually worthy as a seat of true power? My nostrils still recoil at the memory of the foul miasma of Vinnacovi, though a dozen winters have passed since I graced its streets. How uncouth of us to lack both sewer and aqueduct. One would hardly imagine a stinking peasant capable of keeping his house cleaner than our own. If his streets are pure and ours are putrid, who then is the true base one?"

He gestured vaguely at the passing buildings. "You would scarcely believe a common-born mind directed this, were it not for the conspicuous absence of any meaningful art or sculpture. It is a city of function, yet the sheer order of it..."

"My lord, I beg of you!" Varo hissed, reaching out to grasp Merelao’s shoulder with a trembling hand. "We move under the shroud of secrecy. Do you not fear being recognized by your very voice?"

Had any other man dared to lay a hand upon the royal silk of his tunic, Merelao would likely have torn the offending fingers away with his own teeth. But he merely looked at the hand, then at Varo, with a gaze of bored neutrality.

Merelao looked at the older man, his lip curling into a delicate, razor-thin sneer. "It is already demeaning enough that I must scurry through these streets like a common rat in a barn, feasting on all the cheese in secret.... And what, precisely, am I to fear? That gluttonous lard-bucket I call an uncle? I could roast a prize sow, and it would still possess more dignity and less grease than that bloated cow."

He shifted his weight, the fine silk of his tunic whispering against the leather of the seat. "To be asked to arrive in shadow, it is deplorable! By all rights of blood, I should be preceded by a phalanx of heralds, their voices raw from shouting my titles until every ear in this city bleeds. Instead, I am forced to shroud my light, as if I lived in terror of lesser men, all to facilitate a meeting with... him." He exhaled sharply, a sound like a hiss of steam.

Varo remained silent for a long moment, the rhythm of the carriage wheels against the cobblestones the only sound between them.

"My lord," Varo began, his voice cracking with a desperation he could no longer mask, "are you certain of the precipice upon which you stand? There is no bridge back once we cast ourselves off. There will be no peace with your uncle the moment your foot touches the pavement outside this carriage. The Prince of Yarzat is a man whose lungs are already filling with the water of his own grave. What possible advantage can a drowning man offer us, save to pull us down with him?"

The older man leaned forward, his hands clasped so tightly his knuckles resembled bleached bone. "If you pursue this, a confrontation with your uncles becomes not just likely, but inevitable. You are choosing a war we cannot win."

"Varo," Merelao said softly. He finally turned his gaze away from the passing houses, his sapphire eyes locking onto the older man’s face with an unnerving, glassy stillness. "Do you fear death, my old friend?You fear the ultimate dark?"

"I fear yours, my lord."

The silence stretched, heavy and suffocating. Merelao eventually gave a short, dry scoff. "You worry needlessly."

"I believe I worry with perfect clarity!" Varo countered, gesturing wildly toward the window. "The world knows the tally. Your uncle has secured the iron fist of Habadia. Yarzat is a cornered beast; they can offer no succor when they are already fending off the vultures circling their own walls. This city, this peace... it is all destined to fall. I propose we cut our losses. We are outnumbered, outmatched, and out of time. There is no accord that can be done between them and us."

Merelao looked at him, and for a fleeting second, Varo feared the golden youth would strike him. Instead, Merelao let out a long, weary sigh and asked a question that seemed to come from another lifetime.

"Do you remember when my father died? Or rather... the moment the news reached me?"

Varo’s expression softened into a mask of grief. "I could never forget it."

"Nor I. I was in the high garden, playing at war with Latio. We were scouring the green fields of my youth, hearts light, thinking the world was a playground built for our amusement. And then, there you were. You crossed that grass like a funeral shroud, bringing all the darkness of the world in your wake." Merelao turned back to the light, his profile sharp against the window. "You hadn’t even bothered to cleanse the gore from your armor. You had ridden from the frontier like a madman to snatch me from the capital before the wolves could close in. I shall never be able to repay the debt I owe my father for having a friend such as you."

He paused, his voice dropping to a whisper. "Do you remember when you bent your knee that day? I was standing there with a stick in my hand, still thinking it a sword. Latio was confused, looking from you to his own father. You reported the tragedy, the circumstances of the ’accident.’ And then, by some whim of the gods, I looked at my uncle."

Merelao turned back to Varo, his eyes narrowing into cold, blue slits. "You were bowing, your head tucked low, so you did not see. But I saw. I saw it clearer than the midday sun. There was no grief in his gaze, Varo. There was relief. A hideous, blooming relief of hearing of his blood’s demise...."

A dark, visceral heat began to radiate from Merelao. His usually calm and noble voices melting away to reveal the heat of his soul.

"There can be no peace between us.We are lion and men to each other.There is only the grave, and which of us fills it first. I knew it then, and I stand by it now. Tell me, old friend... don’t be a prude. You’ve thought it too. Was it truly a stray arrow that found my father’s throat, or was it one launched by a snake in the grass?Similar to the one that got to me?"

"My lord..." Varo whispered, horrified.

"Don’t look so shocked. You did well to seize the regency and spirit me away before that fat fuck could make my inheritance his own." Merelao’s lip curled, a sneer of pure loathing distorting his handsome features. "When I finally wrap my hands around his throat, I will not be content with his life alone. I want to see the light leave those eyes, those eyes that looked so unbothered, so relieved, to hear of his brother’s slaughter. I will carve that relief out of him, piece by greasy piece, and gorge myself of them in front of him. So yes Varo. I believe an accord could truly be reached with the Peasant Prince of Yarzat."