Chapter 335: Midnight Mystery

Darion made the arrangements. He assigned Edric Vorne to guard Seren’s door, trusting the commander to protect her without needing constant supervision.

For himself, Darion kept Ghet Ulg. He didn’t want to sleep completely unguarded inside an enemy palace.

Even though Vrethka had surrendered, he wasn’t naive enough to assume there were no problems left. If a rogue warrior decided to try and assassinate him in the night, Ghet Ulg would crush them before they even got close.

The image of the massive, terrifying undead silently standing guard outside his room reinforced how strange Darion’s new life had become.

Before going to sleep, Darion sat on the edge of his bed and thought about the morning. There were so many things to do tomorrow that the thought alone felt stressful.

Tomorrow he needed to address the Vrethkan warriors. He needed to explain the new order, establish his authority, prevent unrest, figure out how to organize the surviving army, deal with Harrowhold, eventually bring Garren here, and begin properly governing Vrethka.

The list was enormous.

Darion tried to prepare a speech. He sat down and started mentally constructing what he was going to say tomorrow. He thought of possible openings. Maybe something authoritative. Maybe something inspiring. Maybe something threatening.

But nothing sounded right. Darion realized something mildly embarrassing: he didn’t actually prepare speeches. He was the kind of person who walked into a situation and figured out what to say when he was standing there. He had been doing that since arriving in this world. Most of his biggest decisions happened because he was forced to react immediately.

He considered trying to prepare something anyway, but eventually gave up. "I’ll figure it out tomorrow." He didn’t need to solve everything tonight.

Darion finally lay down. The palace was strangely quiet. Of course it would. There were no screams, or clashing steel, or sounds of a dying army. Just the soft crackle of a dying fire in the hearth and the heavy silence of the palace.

Ghet Ulg remained nearby, standing like a statue in the shadows near the door. His silent presence was the only thing making the vast, unfamiliar room feel safe.

Darion closed his eyes. He expected his mind to finally shut down after everything that happened. He was physically and mentally exhausted. His body ached from the fighting, and his brain was fried from the endless tactical decisions.

Instead, one strange thought entered his mind: Dross.

Not Dross the warrior. Not Dross the chief who ordered an attack on Percvale and plotted to neutralize him.

But Dross the man who actually lived in this palace.

Darion remembered walking through the palace earlier. The place felt strangely empty. There were rooms, guards, and warriors everywhere. It was a fortress built for a military commander. But there were almost no obvious signs of a family. No children’s toys, no soft furnishings, no personal touches of a wife or a partner.

Darion started wondering about Dross’s personal life.

In this region, powerful rulers commonly have multiple wives. Kings, chiefs, and wealthy nobles often have large families. Some have several wives and numerous children. Sons are especially valuable because they continue the family bloodline and can eventually inherit power. Darion had seen this kind of thing elsewhere during his time in Valvanos. It was a staple of how these societies maintained their ruling class.

But Dross didn’t seem to fit the pattern.

Dross wasn’t exactly young. He wasn’t a fresh-faced warrior who had just taken power. He was a man who had lived through many wars. He had scars, experience, authority, and age. He had ruled Vrethka long enough to build this palace and stockpile enough resources to challenge entire kingdoms.

So why hadn’t Darion seen evidence of a family? Where were Dross’s wives? Where were his children? Did he have sons? If he did, where were they? Were they out in the city, hiding? Had they been sent away because of the coming war?

Darion wondered if the palace had simply been separated from the family quarters. Maybe Dross kept his family somewhere else. Maybe they weren’t in the palace tonight. There were several reasonable explanations. Darion didn’t actually have enough information to know.

Then he considered Vrethka’s culture. Almost everything about Vrethka seemed centered around warfare. Warriors trained constantly. The settlement was heavily defended. Supplies were stockpiled for war. Territory and military strength seemed to matter enormously.

Maybe the men here simply devoted their lives to fighting and expanding Vrethka. But Darion immediately noticed a flaw in that theory. There were women and children living in Vrethka. He had seen them in the streets. So the society clearly had families. People weren’t simply warriors living in some giant military camp. There were homes, children, and families who had been living here for generations.

Darion’s thoughts became increasingly random in his exhausted state. Maybe the warriors simply marry and have children before returning to war. Maybe maintaining the bloodline is considered a duty. Maybe having children is one of the few things expected of men before they dedicate themselves completely to warfare.

Maybe Dross had children somewhere else. Maybe he had lost them in previous wars. Maybe he never wanted a family. Maybe Vrethka has completely different customs surrounding marriage and inheritance that Darion didn’t understand yet.

Darion realized he was asking questions he had absolutely no way of answering tonight. He mentally told himself that he was supposed to be sleeping, not conducting a midnight investigation into the dead chief’s marriage history.

He already had enough problems waiting for him tomorrow. He didn’t need to add "finding Dross’s potential heirs" to the list in the middle of the night.

’Welp. So many questions,’ Darion thought.

He decided he would figure it out eventually. Or perhaps he wouldn’t. Either way, it wasn’t something he needed to solve tonight. The politics of Vrethka could wait until the sun was up.

He took one final breath. The exhaustion finally won. Darion closed his eyes and fell asleep.