Chapter 301

The Queen of Frost was seated across from her counterpart, the Golden Queen Renner. Of all the nobles Neia met, this was the only one to raise the hairs on the back of her neck. There was nothing concrete about it, the Golden Queen always wore the most serene and sweet expression on her face, and she was always polite. But even now, sitting opposite the woman and listening to her speak, Neia felt like a serpent was winding its way about her body. 'I could easily kill her, and yet I can't help but feel like she's looking to devour me.' Neia thought, as her counterpart went on about establishing trade networks that would span the 'western passage' and link the Holy Kingdom, Demalbion, the Dark Dwarves, the Dark Elves, and Re-Estize all together at a single location.

Neia, predictably, proposed a city location in her territory to act as the central meeting place of the various nations, while Renner proposed a site farther north in Re-Estize.

With no obvious resolution available, they tabled the matter and the Queen of Frost poured wine for herself and slid the bottle slowly across the table to her opposite number.

"Why did you ask that we meet without servants?" Queen Renner finally asked as she poured her own goblet with some annoyance obvious on her face in the form of a small frown.

"Are you having trouble lifting that bottle, Queen of Gold?" Neia asked with a playful teasing smile that bared just a hint of her vicious fangs.

"Not at all, Queen of Frost, not at all. I'm just not used to doing common work for myself." Renner retorted.

"I understand, not all of us were born with power handed to us, some of us… we had to come by it by other means… If you really need a servant, I'm sure you have someone you can trust to be discreet, who you will take responsibility for if it comes to it." Neia answered and glanced at the door, inviting Renner to summon one.

Renner settled her temper. 'Of all the royalty I've encountered, this one is the most frustrating! The peasant woman from Re-Estize is easy to predict, all goodness and concern. Her husband, all academic. The Holy Queen, so devoted to the growth of her nation, but no real head for violence… but this one…' Renner grated naturally against her, from a notable if not wealthy noble house, the common squire turned Queen was a mix of absolute barbarism, bad manners with no real deference toward protocol… and a sharp but direct manner that made her both predictable… usually, and uncontrollable. 'Worse, she has no direct obedient loyalty to the same master that the rest of us do… not yet.'

In short, the crude dragonid could not be reigned in readily.

"It's fine, whatever you wanted to discuss privately, it must be important if you expressly asked that we meet without servants. So, what is it?" Renner asked, choosing to be direct at last.

It was the right choice, Neia raised her goblet, as did Renner, and the dragonid said, "To the safety of our sister monarch."

"May she be found alive and well." Renner responded, and they drank the rich dark wine until all of each goblet was left empty.

"Now down to business," Neia said and straightened up, her wings spread wide apart, giving an almost demonic air to the dragonid, she then answered the Queen of Re-Estize by saying, "the old religion is a problem, and it has to go."

Renner pulled her hand away from the goblet to ensure that she didn't knock it aside when she was jerked upright in shock. "The faith of the six… of the four… you're serious?"

Neia gave an emphatic nod. "I am. I grew up in that faith, I know what it says, and they will not change. Not the worst elements of it, even if they abandon the practices, the seeds of conflict will always be in the pages of that damnable book. One day they will sprout into weeds that will choke the peaceful fields we hope to cultivate and harvest."

"You're saying that because- " Renner started to say, and stopped when the narrow, violent eyes, the full force of the dragonid's nature was turned on the Golden Queen.

"Because they call me an animal, yes. Because they call my subjects animals to be butchered or enslaved and worked to death. Yes, that is why I say it. Am I wrong?" Neia asked, and the dread look was gone, the 'I will murder you here and now' eyes were turned away from their piercing state and she held her hand out across the table. Renner slid the bottle across to her again, and Neia refilled her goblet before sliding it back.

"No… no, you're not." Renner answered, but the question came to mind that had to be asked, "Why come to me first? Why not Calca, you two seemed to get along well. Why not Enri and N'firea? Why not the Allfather?"

"Calca will have the hardest time making any changes, she relied on the purity movement to help cleanse the corruption of her Kingdom, which is made up of mostly young priests. Challenging the temples is hard, and despite the progress we've made, humans and demihumans are slow to cross the bridge to one another. She's out." Neia shook her head.

"The Allfather has no temples to the six or the four, and has many nonhuman subjects, but he is away right now anyway. The Wolf King and Queen are reactive, not proactive. Decisive, but they aren't the sort to take to change unless others do too, besides, they were raised with the faith. I don't know how they'll respond. But you?" Neia asked rhetorically and took a long draught, she smirked at the blank faced golden Queen. "You're about as faithful as I am when it comes to the six." She snorted with derision, "You have no faith."

Renner looked down into her wine and, taking up a crust of toast, she stirred it slowly around and watched the ripples move against the sides of the silver cup. "That's quite an… accusation." She said.

Neia's smirk went nowhere. "That's why I asked for just the two of us to meet. Let's be plain with each other, my country is surrounded on all sides. You're to the north east, the dark elves and dark dwarves are to the east, the Slane Theocracy is to the southeast and the Holy Kingdom to the southwest… what isn't already the Allfather's, is in his path, and given what happened with Baharuth, that seems like a bad place to be. He'll set his eyes on my country, and I can't stop him, and the truth is, I don't think I want to."

Renner felt her dismay compound itself as the Dragonid confessed what the Re-Estize monarch knew only a few considered. "He'll make a good emperor, that much is clear, and I plan to offer up my Kingdom as a province formally when we reach Arwintar, at the same time, an empire will need an official religion, and it can't be the faith of the six. A new religion is needed, something to focus the faith of every people, which won't set mine, or the other nation's nonhumans on edge." Neia gave her answer and for a long moment, Renner sat in silent contemplation.

"This will raise the ire of the Slane Theocracy." Renner remarked.

"So will the existence of my Kingdom. They're sitting back, waiting for Demalbion to just 'collapse' thinking that I'll be challenged and killed, and for the demihuman tribes to tear each other apart again. But that won't happen, it was possible… once, but not anymore. They've felt the power of unity and won't forget it again." Neia promised and drained her goblet just as Renner began to drink from her own again.

"I'm going to offer my Kingdom in private, and in public I'm going to propose Emperor Worship as the new religion." Neia said it matter of factly, and Renner stiffened.

'Did this blunt instrument come up with… by the purest and most absurd path possible… the same idea I did for uniting the various kingdoms…?!' Renner turned introspective, looking down at her empty goblet, unsure of whether to worry that she was slipping, or be even more impressed that the Allfather or the Allmother or Lord Demiurge might have planned things out to such an extent.

"If you do that, you will be a target, sooner or later they will send someone to kill you." Renner pointed out, and begrudgingly she acknowledged the courage of her counterpart when the Dragonid closed her wings around herself and nodded with the serenity of the damned.

"I know. It's possible that I'll die, that they'll send a champion I can't defeat, but if they do and I've died a martyr to my population's wellbeing? They will rally behind the Allfather, and with his power to back them crush the Theocracy. I will be avenged, and all my people will be safe. Do you know the motto of the Rangers of the Wildlands?" Neia asked in a small voice.

"No… no I don't, I don't know what those are." Renner answered, her mind clamping down like the jaws of a hungry beast on its prey, when presented with the chance for new knowledge, no matter how obscure.

"Those are the ones appointed to hunting the old wilderness near the border with what used to be the Abellion Hills. It was a suicide mission, but a vital one. Anyone appointed to that was responsible for searching large scale threats, putting down minor ones, assisting the lost, all kinds of things. But the demihumans got in often enough, not to mention the local monsters, not many survived. At least not more than a few weeks anyway. The motto because of that was, 'One soldier dies, one nation lives.' Even now, I still think that way." Neia said with grim determination on her face.

"So, I'll make the proposal publicly, if the other monarchs accept it privately, I will bear the brunt of their ire, the brunt of their conspiracies. They will have a much harder time reaching me than they will you. Will you support me, or will you not?" Neia demanded an answer, and the Golden Queen did not delay in her response.

"I support you. The faith in the six served its purpose, if it is one thing the present day now shows to us, it's that their usefulness has passed." Renner stood, albeit somewhat shakily, to her feet and extended her delicate hand to the dragonid.

Neia stood in turn and took it, exercising care to not cut the Golden Queen's hand with her talons. "Good. I'm glad we can agree… but before you go, I'd suggest sitting for a little while till the effects of the wine wear off. The Golden Queen shouldn't be seen staggering back to her room now, should she?"

She then gave a hearty laugh when Renner slurred out a somewhat drunkenly…

"Shnoway."