Chapter 33: The Scale of Blood and Gold

Gray smoke drifted up from the stone fireplace. Black ash fragments from the burned parchment floated, piercing the hot air.

The temperature inside the private study boiled. A dozen dried pine logs shattered, devoured by orange flames. This heat was a luxury tearing the conscience in the middle of a severely starving world.

Varan stood petrified. Sweat dripped heavily from his temples. The salty fluid soaked his layered expensive silk collar. The fat in his gut and neck rejected this heat, creating a torturous tightness behind his expensive clothes. Yet, he refused to kill the fireplace. He hated Oesteria's freezing winter air outside the window far more.

His breaths came in rough gasps. His stocky chest heaved, kicking the silk piles. His exhales sounded destructive.

Prince Luka lives.

The charcoal scratches from his spy had perished into dust. Yet that bloody message carved eternal inside his brain tissues. The boy did not die during the coup night. The Eisenhart throne heir managed to crawl out of hell. And his highest horror, the prince now led a pack of mercenary killer dogs. The Hollow Syndicate had risen and moved toward his border.

Varan's right index fingernail shifted, scratching the surface of the large ruby stone ring on his thumb and twirling the red gem over and over in a constant rhythm. A filthy gesture responding to a threat and a golden opportunity at once.

Scrape. Scrape. Scrape.

His cunning brain spun wildly, calculating the profit-loss scale of human lives.

Varan stepped away from the skin-stinging fireplace. He slammed his stocky body onto the red velvet chair. The teakwood beneath him creaked loud enduring the weight.

His political logic unraveled the red thread. If Luka led the mercenary assassin syndicate, it meant Silas had fallen. Silas was no ordinary human. The former syndicate leader was an Echo Ruler. A defective monster tearing necks lacking mercy for a sack of gold coins. Conquering that slaughtering group could not be done with royal diplomatic speeches. Luka must bring fangs. The prince must have mutated into a far more feral predator.

Varan poured red wine from a crystal decanter. His jewel-ring-filled hand trembled faint. Thick red fluid spilled soaking the mahogany wooden desk. He ignored it. He gulped the wine straight from his silver glass. The acidic taste burned his esophagus.

Two paths opened before him tonight.

First, he could send a thousand armored troops to intercept the prince at the border. Decapitate that blonde head. Bring it to the capital and throw it beneath King Ulric's feet. That steel-armored tyrant would surely pay him with piles of gold and no-man's-land territories.

Varan clicked his tongue. His shoe tip shifted the mahogany wooden chair leg, discarding that repulsive option outright.

Handing Luka to Ulric would only shorten the dog chain on his neck. He would keep crawling as a wheat supplier. His stocky chest rumbled every time the memory of Edward's insult in the palace bureaucracy room crossed his mind.

Second option. Cooperation.

Varan twirled his silver glass in a sluggish rhythm. His eyes stared at the reflection of his stocky face on the wine surface.

Luka came toward his territory not lacking a reason. The boy needed full stomachs to feed hundreds of his executioners. Luka needed his abundant wheat granaries. And in exchange? Varan could demand everything. If the Prince truly intended to collapse the capital walls, Varan would position himself as the main supporter. A bloodshed donor.

If Luka won, Varan would hold control over the Eisenhart Kingdom's treasury.

Varan crushed his silver glass until it dented.

Pure greed took over his remaining sanity. This alliance promised profits too massive to pass.

But Varan was no stupid noble. He knew The Hollow Syndicate's reputation. He knew how mercenary assassins worked. They were double-edged daggers. If Luka was weak, the syndicate would eat the boy from the inside. If Luka was too feral, the prince could decapitate Varan's neck lacking any gap for negotiation.

He had to test the prince's fangs. He had to see for himself how far Luka's noble foundation had rotted and been replaced by pure savagery. He had to weigh the lethal capacity of the predator entering his castle territory.

"Eric!"

Varan's shout echoed loud. His voice vibrated the stained glass windows in his study.

The teakwood double doors creaked opening rough.

A man stepped inside. His clothes too neat. Layered silk with glaring gold thread embroidery. An attire far too excessive for a freezing winter night. Eric. A knight and sycophant noble always tailing behind Varan.

The man charged in through small steps. Stopping exactly two meters from the desk, he bowed his head extremely deep, hiding the asymmetrical pull of his lips like a true sycophant.

"You summoned me, Lord Varan?" Eric's voice was smooth. Laden with sycophancy.

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"We will have a special guest tonight." Varan placed his dented silver glass onto the desk. His thumb returned to twirling the ruby ring in a rapid motion. "Very special. Someone who just crawled rising from the ashes of his past."

Eric frowned faint. "A guest? The temperature outside is extremely cold, My Lord. No noble carriage possesses the guts to cross the Oesterian border tonight."

"He uses no carriage." Varan grinned filthy. His molars ground. "He brings killer wolves from the mountains. Prepare a welcoming room in the front hall."

Eric fell rigid silent. His brain processed the words killer from the mountains. Eric's Adam's apple bobbed rough, swallowing saliva that suddenly tasted like sand.

"Tighten our soldier guards?" Eric asked in doubt.

"No." Varan struck his mahogany wooden desk.

Crash.

Fine dust scattered into the air. "Pull back all lowly armored soldiers from the main corridor. Extinguish most of the fireplaces and oil lamps. Let our front hall be pitch black."

Eric's face turned deathly pale. His eyes darted wildly, sweeping the room. "Dark? My Lord, if they are truly mercenary assassins... leaving the hall without illumination equals offering our necks."

"Just follow my orders!" Varan snapped. The veins on his stocky neck bulged hard. He clicked his tongue arrogantly, demeaning his subordinate's worries. "This guest claims himself capable of subjugating the monsters on that mountain. I want to see if he is truly an apex predator king, or just a lucky puppy. The dark will test their instincts."

Eric bowed in broken motions. "As you command."

The sycophant man twisted his body, preparing to step out of the room while pressing his chest.

"One more thing."

Eric's steps halted. His boots shifted faint.

Varan leaned his body forward. The fireplace light illuminated half his face. Displaying filthy greed no longer covered by a noble mask.

"Summon Albert," Varan commanded. His voice grew heavy. "Tell him to stand by behind the hall's main pillar. I need his eyes to skin every movement of our guest."

Eric nodded rigid. He knew Albert. The knight with an overly symmetrical face and pale brown eyes always moving observing every corner. The internal spy. The man who always tapped his thumb against his index finger in a rhythmic motion while counting threat numbers and calculating enemy weaknesses.

"And summon Adler."

That second name stopped the blood flow in Eric's veins.

Adler. The wall of flesh. Varan's most lethal personal protector.

"Adler... will stand behind you, My Lord?" Eric confirmed the instruction. His voice trembled.

Varan smiled wide. Satisfaction flooded his chest. "Adler will stand in the middle of the hall's darkness. With you. Bring your greatsword, Eric. And let Adler bring his giant warhammer."

Eric's breaths hunted. His luxurious silk clothes instantly felt strangling his neck.

Eric knew who Adler was. A giant whose shoulders could block Varan's study double door frame. A bald, flat-nosed man breathing heavy resembling a broken chimney, standing petrified awaiting slaughter commands.

A man caring not for political intrigue and only obeying killing commands in a blind rampage. Pairing himself with that slaughtering giant inside a dark room to welcome an assassin group... this was an invitation to death.

"Lord Varan..." Eric swallowed dryly. "Is this... an ambush?"

"This is a blood-filtering sieve." Varan leaned his stocky back against the red velvet chair. His hand waved dismissive. "If our guest dies by the swing of Adler's hammer, then he is mere scrap trash. I will chop his head and send it to Ulric. But if he can pass you two lacking death..."

The ruby ring on Varan's thumb scraped loud against his index fingernail. A reason-breaking rhythmic sound.

"...then I will prepare the best wine from my cellar to celebrate our new alliance."

Eric possessed no gap to argue. Challenging Varan's command inside this room equaled cutting his own tongue. The overdressed knight bowed his head extremely low. The cynical smile he usually flaunted vanished lacking a trace.

"I understand, My Lord."

Eric turned. His small steps now messy, striking the limestone floor in a panic rhythm ruining his silk's elegance. The teakwood double doors creaked shutting tight. Leaving Varan alone inside the boiling room.

Varan rose from his chair. His gut protruded, burdening his steps.

Sweat soaked his entire back. He walked toward a long table in the corner of the room. His thick hands pulled a gold-plated wooden box. Opening it rough. Inside, lay a short sword with a gemstone-studded hilt. A weapon he never used on the battlefield. Merely a noble social status display.

He slipped the sword behind his silk belt. Preparing a final safety net for his own neck.

Far outside, Oesteria's snowstorm roared feral. The wind crushed the remnants of dead pine branches in the castle courtyard.

Varan walked approaching the giant stained glass window. Light from The Red Ring tried piercing in. The rusted copper light illuminated his stocky face, turning his facial features to resemble a demon grinning cunning. His eyes stared at the filthy snow expanse at his castle border.

Prince Luka.

That name echoed bouncing off his skull walls. If the rumor from his spy was true. If the Eisenhart throne heir came bringing poisonous fangs from The Hollow Syndicate. Then tonight would become the turning point of this bloody kingdom's history.

Varan crushed the edge of the window frame. His nails scratched the teakwood layer.

He cared not for lost justice. He cared not for the fate of commoners huddling and freezing while eating tree roots at the ditch edge. He cared only for gold circulation, territorial expansion, and apex dominance over his political enemies. If Luka could collapse the capital walls, Varan would ensure he stood right behind the boy. Holding the monster's dog chain. Controlling the marble throne from behind the shadow screen.

The chessboard was set upon the slaughter table.

Eric stepped fast in the castle's limestone corridor. Cold sweat ruined his makeup. The man traced the corridor toward the elite forces barracks. His neck veins throbbed in horror. He had to summon Adler. The brainless giant who would turn the front hall into a sea of blood tonight. He also had to summon Albert, the pale-eyed observer—three elite knights to welcome the arrival of the dead prince.

Chess pieces locked in their respective positions. Bait spread upon a venom-smeared silver plate. Varan waited inside the gloom of his hot castle, preparing to watch a blood show that would determine the wind's direction in the war. Death, or a dirty kingdom-shattering alliance.