Chapter 778: Flower of peace(2)
Zayneth’s gaze swept across the figures gathered near the prince, lingering on the faces of his closest advisors.
Most of them had followed the so-called Peasant Prince since his days as a mercenary, and their loyalty clearly ran deeper than any gold-lined offer could hope to match.
Trying to turn one of them against him would be as fruitless as trying to make a cock lay an egg.
Still, what struck Zayneth most wasn’t their loyalty, as much as their diversity.
The first to draw his attention was the towering figure of a man standing to the prince’s right, broad as an ox and dark-skinned, his arms folded and his eyes calm, unreadable, a mountain of a man. Next to him stood a sharp-faced man with slightly slanted eyes and pale golden hair, an unusual combination that whispered of far western blood, that of the equestrian tribes far west from even the Sultan of Azania.
Foreigners. Not just in race, but in bearing, in rhythm,and apparently some even in their traditions, which they kept even after becoming Southern nobles.
It was rare to see such a mix of nationalities in the inner circle of a southern prince. Normally, those positions were jealously guarded by local lords, passed down like heirlooms . But of course, Alpheo was not born into such a web. The eccentricity of the men around him merely mirrored the unconventional path of the man they followed.
At last, Zayneth’s eyes moved past the orbiting figures to the man at their center.
The star himself.
Alpheo sat in a posture neither rigid nor careless just still, as if motion had no business interrupting his thoughts. His hair was jet black, combed neatly back to reveal a broad forehead and strong cheekbones, the strands gathered behind his ears and trailing just to the nape of his neck. There was no crown, no embroidered finery, no ceremonial flourish.
Just his completely back armor, which he still kept even when meeting a foreign envoy....
His expression was unreadable, not blank but quietly alert. He didn’t fidget, didn’t tap his fingers, didn’t blink more than he needed to. His dark eyes held no immediate aggression, but neither did they extend any warmth.
Zaynet simply watched until he had seen enough. Then, as if brushing aside a delay he would no longer entertain, he spoke first
"I greet His Grace,"he said, offering a formal bow, low and measured. If he was to play the envoy, then he would do so properly, regardless of what he thought of the host.
"I bid you welcome to my camp and offer you hospitality, should you desire it," Alpheo replied, his tone as curt and neutral as the one that had addressed him.
"I have no need of it," Zayneth answered at once. "I have come to deliver words to you, Your Grace. I shall depart as I have arrived. Though, for the sake of truth and propriety, I must inform you of the great inhospitality I was shown by some of your men upon my approach to your camp."
In response Alpheo merely let his eyes drift for a moment to the man before him. The envoy had gone straight to business, without so much as a token courtesy regarding the recent battle. Not a word of acknowledgment for the victory. That, in itself, spoke volumes.
So it’s as I thought, Alpheo mused. The Habadian prince sends his man not as a neutral observer, but as a servant with a cause. And that cause wears the colors of Oizen.
Still, the envoy had done his part. And now it was his turn to answer.
"I express sympathy for your discomfort," Alpheo began, his voice polite but not apologetic. "It seems I must remind my men again how to properly receive guests, particularly ones who arrive without warning, bearing no truce banners."
He let the words settle before continuing, his tone measured but unmistakably edged.
"Of course, they act in my interest, and that interest, as you can imagine, lies in keeping me breathing. I’ve been the target of blades more than once during my campaigns, and so my officers err, if perhaps clumsily, on the side of caution. I hope you can understand their concern."
Not a single sorry passed his lips. Zayneth noted it, of course. It was hard not to. But rather than dwell on it, he chose to move forward. With deliberate slowness, he reached into the satchel at his side and withdrew a sealed letter, getting into the business he was sent to .
The wax bore the crest of House Habadia, clean and untouched.
He extended it forward with both hands, a gesture as much ritual as it was diplomatic.
Zayneth held the letter in his hands for a moment longer than was necessary, his fingers brushing against the smooth wax seal as his gaze briefly drifted past all of them.
The he cleared his throat slightly and straightened his spine as he prepared to deliver his long reharsed words.
"My liege," he began, his voice neither stiff nor sentimental, "has no love for the war that has gripped the South for near half a decade, which stopped many merchants from passing through safely in such a time of war. He has fought in it, bled in it, and lost much to it and gained much just like you.
But unlike many who profit from its continuation, he sees no future in this endless dying.
He believes that there must be a moment where the sword is lowered, not out of weakness, but wisdom. A thought that, mind you Your Grace, is not alone in my liege’s head but found common minds about many other...’’
The threat could not have been said louder as with that, he stepped forward and passed the letter, not directly to the prince, but to one of the guards stationed nearby. The man accepted it without a word and quickly crossed the space between them, delivering the message to the prince.
As Alpheo broke the seal and unfolded the parchment, his eyes were drawn not to the body of the message, but to the six wax-stamped signatures at the bottom, each one pressed with the weight of a principality, each one more damning than the last.
Kakunia. Shaarjan. Ezvania. Reshania. Oizen.And, of course, Habadia.
Six sovereigns, standing in accord. Six rulers who now spoke with a single voice, apparently against him.
His heart sank like iron into water. The room dimmed around the edges of his vision as a creeping dread took root in his gut. For all his suspicions, for all his caution, this was worse than he had imagined.
He was becoming Napoleon...
Only after registering the weight of the names did he force himself to read the words written above.
To His Grace, Prince Alpheo,Consort of Her Grace Jasmine Veloni-isha.
We, sovereigns of the South, write not in threat, but in hope. We believe the time has come for war to yield to reason.
For peace to settle where fire has long raged. In this spirit, we petition Your Grace expressing our utmost interest, to broke peace once again.
As such we, Strongly Compel your Grace, to agree to a truce of no less than one month, so hostilities can be halted to finally tend at the preparations for negotiations in earnest. We believe peace may only be just if it is crafted with the counsel and consent of all those who have known its absence.
Let neighbors cease hostilities, so that neighbors may yet remain.
The language was polished, but that did not make it any less damning.
Alpheo could see past the varnish. He read the threat lying between every line. This wasn’t a plea for peace. It was a leash. An attempt to bind his momentum, to cut his advance with words before steel could finish the work.
He had barely lifted his eyes from the page when the envoy spoke, too soon, too ready.
Whether Zayneth interrupted because he didn’t care to wait or because he wanted to savor the prince’s growing fury, Alpheo couldn’t say. But the smirk tugging at the edge of the envoy’s lips gave the answer away more clearly than any word might have.
"It is a rare thing, Your Grace," Zayneth said, voice smooth with veiled satisfaction, "to see so many banners woven together by something other than war. Perhaps peace is the last cause that can still unite this broken South."
He tilted his head slightly, his gaze fixed upon the prince’s expression.
Alpheo did everything in his power to still his expression, to keep the fury simmering behind his eyes from boiling over. But the faint, triumphant curl on the envoy’s lips told him all he needed to know.
He had failed.
Something in his face had betrayed him. A twitch of the brow. A shift of the jaw. Whatever it was, Zayneth had seen it, and the bastard was smiling like a man who had just loosed a chain from a cage.
And why shouldn’t he?
This letter, this wretched scroll dressed in silk and diplomacy, was nothing short of a noose and leash.
Alpheo’s hands remained still, but in his mind he saw the parchment crumpled in his fist and thrown to the dirt. He had thought, mistakenly, that time was his ally. That he would break the city’s will at his pace.
But now?
That arrogant bastard in Habadia had never truly sat idle. He hadn’t waited; he had worked.
And now, just like that, Alpheo had been made into a mirror of the very thing he worried to become, a Napoleon crowned in the eyes of his enemies, the threat that brought the squabblings princes in the south together.
He didn’t need a battlefield to see it . Right here, inside this tent, a new coalition was already stirring to life against him.
It wasn’t war yet.
But the wind was shifting. And he could already feel its cold breath at his back.
He had become the very fate he dreaded to be.