Chapter 1361: New beginnnings(5)

He was opening up well enough, Alpheo realized. The moment Enkilae’s mouth had opened to spill those bitter, biting words about Egil, the man seemed to have entirely forgotten the suffocating terror he had felt when he thought he was merely speaking to a King.

The only king in the South.

Seems scorn is the sovereign cure for all fear, Alpheo thought.

Yet the King deeply misliked the words he was hearing. Just as he was rapidly starting to mislike the man sitting across from him. This shepherd was not like Egil. Not one bloody bit.

Where Egil had been bold to the point of madness, Enkilae cowered. Where Egil had been loud, fierce, and crackling with dark humor, his brother was a quiet barely present man, that would just speak barely above a whisper if not pushed. They were akin to one another only in the way a vibrant, golden butterfly was to a dark, creeping roach.

"Is that any way to speak of dead kin?" Alpheo asked, his voice dropping into a quiet tone that still echoed softly along the cold stone walls of the chamber.

"I thought very little of that goat, truth be told," Enkilae admitted, entirely unbothered or perhaps not seeing the King’s darkening mood. "I had far bigger worries to tend to during my thirty long years in bondage. To know that my brother used his last breathing moments on this earth to weep over that... well, I know not what to think. I would rather not think of it at all, really."

He glanced up at the monarch, the chest beneath his fine new wool tunic puffing out as he let out a long, weary sigh.

"Perhaps I should warm myself in knowing he regretted it," Enkilae muttered softly. "Perhaps, had the world been kinder, we might have loved one another in our gray years as we did when we were both children.

But regretting a deed does not brush off its consequences. Evil, even when wept over, is still evil at the end of the day. Perhaps he wished for my forgiveness before the dark took him? I would not know. He is dead. And I never spared half a thought for his soul."

Enkilae ran a calloused hand through his clean blonde hair, looking down at his scarred palms. "I hold no anger for him anymore, at the very least. I hope he finds his peace on the heaven of your gods if he converted, or I hope he rides the great Stallion on the vast plain.

I hope he rides and rides under a sun that never sets, and may his stallion never thirst or grow tired. There will be many among my kind who will think of him kindly and name their sons after him. One man, be it one more or one less, won’t make a bloody difference, I think. Much less over an old goat that wasn’t even worth its meat."

The ex-slave paused, a faint, bittersweet glint coming into his pale eyes. "And yet... it was that very goat that ultimately delivered me and my people out of the dark. So Egil will have my quiet gratitude for that. If nothing else."

To sit here and listen to the final, agonizing moments of his greatest friend being mocked and reduced to a bitter childhood farce... Alpheo felt his fists clench until his knuckles popped. But the anger died in his throat as quickly as it had flared. No, he thought, swallowing the rage down. I do not have the right to cast judgment here.Who am I to do that?

Whatever way this man chose to perceive his dead brother’s final words was his prerogative alone. It was a blood feud written in the dirt thirty years ago, long before Alpheo had ever laid eyes on either of them.

"I hope in time you will come to recollect yourself, Enkilae," the King said, his tone a cold mix of lingering expectation and final dismissal.

I have done my part, Egil, Alpheo thought silently, his dark eyes drifting toward the high, arched window where the last crimson embers of daylight were swallowing the horizon. Your message was delivered. Your tribe is safe.

The King wondered if Egil’s ghost were standing right there in the shadows of the solar, gazing down at his actions, judging him. Did he glower at the bitter scorn he was receiving from his own flesh and blood? Or was he laughing in the dark, glad that his absurd, frantic message had somehow gotten through the fog? Glad that his survivors were finally out of the pens, with the hope that in a decade’s time, when someone uttered the name Uruthai, people wouldn’t answer with a puzzled, ignorant squint?

In his younger, wilder days, Alpheo would have laughed himself hoarse for even entertaining such superstitious nonsense. But not tnow. Tonight, sitting in the cold silence beside a ghost’s living double, he had long started to fear that there truly was something waiting on the other side.

"Might I ask what will come of my tribe’s kin?"

The King hardly paused before replying. "All that I have promised will come to fruit. I have already decided on the lands where your people will settle. It is fine, rich territory, vast swaths of sweet grass perfect for herding sheep, goats, and horses. The soil is fertile, too, should your people care to turn the earth. You will be protected by my legions, and in time, you will find honor in your service to Yarzat."

The King spoke the grand words smoothly enough, though his mind was miles away, wandering in the bloody mud of a four-year-old memory. What a bitter waste, Alpheo thought, a cold tightness in his chest. For Egil’s very last breath on this earth to have been spent on this man.

At long last, Alpheo raised his dark eyes, pinning Enkilae where he sat.

"The Uthahia are reborn today," the King declared, his voice leaving no room for argument. "And a reborn people will need a leader."

A sudden flick of emotion finally crossed Enkilae’s pale blue eyes, a faint, startled spark as the weight of his tribe’s dark dawn settled upon him.

"We... we will see to choosing one in due time, I suppose," the ex-slave muttered carefully.

"No," Alpheo cut in sharply. "You will do it now. You shall take command of them. You will be their chief, their lord, and their voice before my throne."

A look of sheer, unvarnished perplexity washed over Enkilae’s face. "What?"

"You must be hard of hearing, " the King growled. He wanted the man out as soon as possible. He was not his friend. "You shall become their leader. On that point, I will not budge a single inch."

"Your Ma—" Enkilae caught himself, throat working as he swallowed his panic. "They will never accept me! I...am a nobody."

"They will accept you," Alpheo countered flatly. "Those among your people who even remember the old ways are precious few. You carry the blood of their mew greatest hero. You hold the full, absolute backing of the crown. I would be thoroughly surprised if there is a single soul out in that camp foolish enough to raise his voice and say you should not be at their head."

"B-but... I don’t know the first thing about ruling!" Enkilae stammered, his posture shrinking back into the high carved chair. "I know nothing of lords or laws! I was a bloody shepherd!"

"Then you will learn," Alpheo commanded, his tone smooth as polished iron. "I will send my own counselors to guide your hand, to help you rebuild what was torn down. It will not be difficult. My realm is peaceful, and the roads are thoroughly cleansed of banditry."

In the heartlands of Yarzat, at least. In Oizen things were still under work.Though they were making progress.

The King paused, his dark eyes scanning the reluctant chief. "Egil always spoke of how brilliantly you could ride as a boy, how you fought from the saddle and bred the finest stock in the north. You and your tribe will be gifted fifty prime horses straight from the royal stables. Every one of them of pure, noble blood.

You will teach your young people how to ride again. I will send a few of Egil’s old veterans to aid you, though I suspect the eldest among your survivors still remember the feel of reins. Every five years, my treasury will take a toll from you in horses. And when your numbers have grown, you will be called to ride alongside us , and we shall take our tax in men too. You shall receive glory, protection, honor, and silver for your service."

Enkilae sat frozen for a long, agonizing beat. Slowly, his head bowed down, his stooped shoulders sinking lower as he recognized the invisible iron cage settling over his life once more. There was no arguing, that he knew.

"I... I will obey, Your Grace," he whispered, letting out a hollow, exhausted sigh.

He gripped his knees, his voice trembling as he prepared to stand. "Will you require anything further of me tonight?"

Alpheo didn’t look at him. He simply stared into the dark, shadow-draped corner of the solar, raising a single hand to wave toward the heavy oak doors.

"Go," the King murmured softly. "You will remain my honored guest for as long as you wish. I would be glad if you stayed for my coronation, after that, you may return to your people. Eat your fill, sleep on your soft mattress, and try not to think about goats. Whatever your people need, do not hesitate to come before my court. By your brother’s sacred memory, you shall receive it."

Though clearly, you have no stomach for the man he became, Alpheo added in the quiet gloom of his own mind. He was worth ten of the man sitting across him.

Enkilae rose slowly from his seat, his joints popping. "I thank you for all the kindness you have shown. I and my people shall remain loyal to you and your line." He took a heavy step toward the door, pausing at the threshold. "We will not forget what was done for us here."

"You have a nephew, you know," the King said casually at last, his gaze drifting away from the doorway and back out toward the high, arched window.

Enkilae stopped dead in his tracks, his hand hovering inches from the iron latch.

"He... Egil had a son?"

One hundred and one, people took themselves to laugh, the King thought dryly. But he guarded his tongue, offering only a single, solemn nod. "A boy. This will be his fifth winter , now."

The staggering revelation brought surprisingly little warmth or wonder to Enkilae’s weathered face, only a quiet, detached stillness.

"I see," Enkilae said softly, his voice barely audible above the whistling evening wind outside. "I am glad my father’s line will be passed on. But... I have no wish to know the boy. And I doubt he would care to meet a ghost like me, either. If he ever seeks me out, I would gladly speak with him, if only because he carries my blood. Though I am hardly worth his time. He must be someone grand and important, considering how deeply the King loved his father."

"That is your prerogative, as well," Alpheo said, a trace of cold irony lacing his words. Scorn the boy too, if it pleases your bitter heart. "Though I thought you might have wished to know his name, at the very least."

Enkilae offered a faint, tired bow. "If it pleases Your Grace..."

No, it does not, Alpheo thought, a knot of raw, dark emotion tightening in his throat. But he gave the man the truth all the same.

"His name," the King whispered into the twilight raging outside the windows, "is Urul Enkilae. Son of lord Egil of the same house"

A waste of a name, if anyone bothered to ask him.