Steel and Sorrow: Rise of the Mercenary king-Chapter 954: Barred roads(4)

"Well, I knew this was coming. The true heart of today is upon us now. I believe you will, unfortunately, not receive an answer for every one of your doubts. Normally, I would refuse to speak at all;you know the pride of a vanquished foe, yes?" Willios said, his voice dropping an octave as he did so.

He let out a long, weary sigh, the sound of a man who had carried a mountain for too long. "But I have been shown kindness and nobility by your party,more than I have received in these last weeks from my own fellows. In light of all of this, I will try my best."

Hearing that, Alpheo straightened himself in his seat. He sent a silent word of thanks to Edric for the advice on decorum and delivered the first question that had been gnawing at his mind since the gate fell.

"In the first weeks of the siege, there was a stiffness to your resistance that nearly made me believe I would fail in capturing that castle. There were more men on the walls, more steel covering the breaches. Yet, those numbers decreased significantly by the dawn of the final assault. What happened?"

Willios raised a high brow at that, genuine shock flickering across his features. "We were under the absolute impression you had spies inside, Your Grace. Was that not the case? We had reports of men scaling the walls in the dead of night. I presumed some would have been left behind to observe us. We searched for them long and hard..."

Alpheo felt a small, cold shiver pass through his spine. He remembered Marcus informing him that one in their infiltration team had been captured during the sabotage of the granaries. Looking at the Marshal’s confused face, the truth became clear: the man they had caught had truly not talked.

"After the sabotage, we had all of them evacuate," Alpheo answered dryly, his voice tight with a sudden, renewed respect for the dead man.

"Oh, yes. I remember that. You misled us quite well," Willios said, sipping from his cup to let the bitter memory of being led on their nose , wash away.

"Returning to the question?" a voice asked, harsh and vibrating with impatience.

It belonged to Rykyo. The new Legate of the Hounds was leaning forward, his hands clenched into fists, his patience for noble pleasantries having reached its absolute limit.

"Oh, yes, of course. My apologies." Willios said in an even tone, though the way he gripped the stem of his cup revealed he was anything but calm. "It isn’t really a secret I am willing to keep. I am sure you would get your answer out of any man you captured alive today. All that happened, really, was the same of a tavern opened during a holy day. It simply emptied out..."

When seeing the expression on his captor’s face, he decided to continue with some more details.

"Five days ago, my liege deserted the field and left me in absolute charge of the army," he began, a ghost of a smile touching his lips before it died a cold death. "I was given a pretty title and told to keep the sands from slipping through my fingers. As you can already imagine, it didn’t go well. Not even a day after Mavius fled, the first lord demanded I open the gates so he could return to his fief. I refused. I informed him of my new powers, my mandate to hold this line at all costs."

Willios shook his head, the memory clearly bitter. "He laughed in my face. I ordered him kept under house arrest; I could not allow a single crack in the dam, or I wouldn’t have been able to stop the flow. In the end, I suppose that lord got the last laugh. Within hours, the other lords moved their personal retinues into my keep. They came without greeting or explanations and then they demanded the lord be freed and the gates be opened so they could vanish into the night."

He fought back the urge to spit on the silk rug beneath his feet. "Telling them that I was their Marshal had the same effect as it did with the first. They laughed. And then, they promptly left. They took their thousands, their fresh horses, and their full bellies, leaving me alone to hold the crumbling walls of what was once my fief." He raised his hand in mock salute ’’Glory to the Eagle , I suppose..."

Willios gestured vaguely toward the ruins outside. "The only thing standing between your legions and the rest of my liege’s dominion was me, supported by barely a thousand and a half of tired, demoralized, and wounded men. And, finally, a castle on the absolute verge of collapse. As we can all see, it didn’t last long."

He raised his cup in a toast that carried the weight of a funeral dirge. "Still, my congratulations for the subjagator. Glory to the victor and the conqueror of The Fingers."

Alpheo mirrored the action, draining his own cup to the dregs. The wine felt like lead in his stomach, still he filled another. "Where did the army retreat to, then? Where is the rally point?How many men do they still have?"

Willios gave him a long shake of his head. "Do you not understand yet?There is no longer an army" Willios replied, blinking in disillusionment at the ground. "Each lord fled to his own fief, scurrying like rats to their holes, leaving me to hold the wall alone. I would say the cause ceased to exist the moment my liege deserted the field. An army without a heart is just a collection of future corpses.Surprised it took one day for us to drag through the mud."

"So you held the wall alone for four days against my entire host?" Alpheo asked, more than a bit impressed. He looked at the man with a new lens; it wasn’t just bravery, it was a suicidal level of devotion to a dead end. He reminded him of Asag at Aracina.

"Did I have any other choice?" Willios asked, his voice cracking with a sudden, raw edge.

"You could have surrendered," Alpheo offered quietly.

"I suppose my pride got in the way of that. That, and my duty, even as misplaced as it was in the laps of men I dedicated it to." Willios looked at his empty cup, his voice sounding hollow and infinitely tired. "We fought everywhere. We threw every stone, every life, and every drop of oil we had at you. It didn’t work in the end. The Fingers is yours, Your Grace, and now I am laid before you as your prize."

He looked up, his eyes meeting Alpheo’s with a terrifyingly calm clarity. "Is there anything else I may do for you, or is it time for the steel? I have heard of the heads of my subordinates, the way they were displayed. I am not so dull as to think my end would be any different. Still, I thank you for the company; it was simply delightful to have someone to whom I could vent my frustration. A cordial, civil conversation is a luxury... even if the tongues involved belong to my enemies."

Alpheo found himself admiring the man, a sentiment that further cemented the decision he had reached. He realized that in a sea of dirt and shifting sands, Willios was a rough diamond, perhaps the only one left in this gods-forsaken province.

"That may not be the case," Alpheo said, his voice dropping into a low, persuasive register. He was offering Willios a way out that didn’t entail a shallow grave in the mud. "We have been enemies, yes. And you have been a traitor to the crown."

Willios exhaled sharply through his nose, but he made no attempt to protest the label. He knew the laws of the Empire; he had chosen the losing side of a gamble for the throne.

"But look at the reality of your loyalty," Alpheo continued, leaning in until the flickering candlelight played across his sharp features. "You have been shown only contempt by your fellow lords and your liege. While you showed bravery, cowardice was the only cloth they wore. You have sacrificed everything for them and yet what do you have to show for it? You are alone in the hands of the enemy, fully aware that you were nothing but a scapegoat. You were thrown to the wolves simply so the pack could slow us down while they gnawed on your bones."

Willios didn’t move to refute the claim. He wasn’t foolish enough to ignore the stench of his own betrayal. He just wished, with a sudden, hollow ache, that there was more wine left in the bottle. 𝕗𝐫𝚎𝗲𝘄𝐞𝕓𝐧𝕠𝘃𝕖𝐥.𝐜𝚘𝚖

"Of course, strategically, it made sense," Alpheo mused. "Sacrifice the rearguard to save the core. The man behind me?" He gestured with a thumb toward Asag, who stood like a silent sentinel in the corner. "He held the city of Aracina against a foe with three times his number for an entire month. He was alone, cut off, with no way to contact me."

Alpheo paused, letting the weight of the comparison sink in. "The difference between you and him, Willios, was that I did not desert my friend. I crossed the sea, I smashed the might of the army outside those walls, I claimed the head of the prince who besieged him, and I relieved him. Even then, the mere situation I had put him in was enough for guilt to gnaw at me. I couldn’t help but think I had deserted him, even though I had moved heaven and earth to reach him."

He let the silence stretch, a heavy, suffocating thing. "Do you think your liege feels a single heartbeat of regret when he hears the news of your capture? Or does he simply pour another glass of wine and thank the gods he has a fool like you to buy him five more days of flight?"

Willios didn’t say anything, but the muscle in his jaw jumped. He knew the answer; it was a cold stone in his gut he had been trying to ignore since the first gate was breached.

"While I am thankful for my treatment," the Marshal said, his voice trembling slightly with suppressed emotion, "I find the circumstances of my abandonment a sour subject for wine talk. I would prefer if the true matter of this conversation were brought to light."

He wanted a clean answer, a soldier’s answer. And Alpheo gave it to him, sharp and absolute.

"I want you to serve me."