War

Atkins sat upon a wide oak chair, not quite a throne but large enough to remind every man present where authority lay. His fingers drummed on the armrest, each tap echoing like the tolling of a distant bell.

The few men who returned from Blacklake knelt before him, trembling, still reeking of the slaughter they had failed to stop.

Atkins did not raise his voice. He did not move more than a breath. "You lost the grain, and Usher is dead. Give me a reason to spare your lives."

The men trembled, keeping their heads bowed low enough to hide their fear.

A single look at his captains told him everything. He smelled it on them — the stink of failure, the sour tang of fear and excuses. His eyes shifted from one bruised face to another: battered helms, bloodstained cloaks, torn surcoats. They had returned not as conquerors but as wounded dogs.

He rose. The scrape of wood against stone made the men flinch. He stepped forward, boots clicking on the cold floor, stopping inches from the youngest of them.

Atkins spoke, his voice was soft and calm. "How many did we lose?"

The man swallowed, eyes flicking to the others for help. "S-Sire, we... estimate thirty dead, another dozen scattered, maybe more fled into the woods."

Silence. 

Atkins narrowed his brow and murmured. "Ten years, that brute named Usher served me. For ten years, he kept the village heads in line, broke the backs of raiders, and collected my dues without fail. Now he rots in some peasant's wheat field."

None dared speak. 

He clenched his jaw so hard it creaked.

Atkins turned to his steward, a thin man with ink-stained fingers clutching a ledger to his chest. "How much coin lost?"

The steward cleared his throat, voice trembling. "Sire, the tolls from the southern villages have stopped entirely. The trade routes we controlled now flow through Headow under Talvace protection. Our grain caravans have been harried — two granaries burned, no doubt by those loyal to this… this Prince."

"Enough!" His voice thundered through the hall, reverberating against stone like a drum of war. He whirled on his captains, eyes glittering with a hunger that could devour mountains. "They think I am some toothless hound that they can steal my villages, my tribute, my fear, and I will bark behind these walls?"

He stepped forward. "No more. If Talvace wants war, we give him war. If his dogs want to fight, they will die in their kennels."

He declared to the steward. "Summon every levy and knight still breathing, every squire who can hold a spear. I want the fields south of Blacklake flooded with steel."

The steward bowed, ink quill already scratching across the parchment. 

Atkins stalked to a nearby table, and he slammed his fist on the mark for Headow. "One by one, they will fall. I will burn their granaries and piss on their embers. This 'Prince' will kneel before I gut him on the old battlements."

He stepped back from the map, his breath slow now, controlled. He raised a hand, gesturing for the steward. "Prepare two ravens. To Prince Ramsey, we will send troops to aid us. The other to the Blackthorn mercenaries in Braywall, offer them double the previous price."

Atkins carried both birds to the window, cracked open the shutters, and let them fly into the silver moonlight. Their wings beat once, twice — then they vanished over the distant fields, beyond the smoke rising from Blacklake's defiant fires.

He watched the horizon, his eyes cold as river stone.

The steward scurried off. The other men watched the baron in silence, reading the glint in his eyes and the certainty that there would be no more half measures. 

Atkins turned back to the window one last time. The dawn had risen fully now, spilling its chill light over the land that was his to rule or ruin. 

His lip curled. The silver hawk would fall. He would pluck its feathers one by one until the boy who dared call himself a prince bled out his last drop of hope in the mud.

And when the peasants looked back at the blackened fields and the burned wagons, they would remember what it cost to defy Baron Atkins.

The dawn sun spilled pale gold through the stained glass windows of the Talvace manor, washing the marble hallways in color. 

Steven stood at the head of the long oak table, one hand braced on its scarred surface. Before him lay the parchment, unrolled and pinned with a dagger for all to read.

The significance was plain as blood on snow. A knight butchered on soil, a line crossed that no amount of bribes or sweet words could unspill.

Jeremy stood beside him, arms folded, eyes flicking between the letter and Steven's face. "Atkins won't sleep on this," he said quietly. "He'll lash out like a cornered boar."

Steven's jaw flexed. "Let him. I'd rather know where his tusks are pointed than be stabbed in the dark."

From the shadows, Clinton emerged, his cloak stained from travel. He dropped to one knee before Steven, bowing his head.

"My prince," he said. "Blacklake stands with you — for now. But the cost was high."

Steven motioned for him to rise. "How many dead?"

"Too many villagers," Clinton said bluntly.

Steven nodded and gestured for the lean merchant master to step forward. 

Frost bowed. "My lord, the trade routes are stable for now. But if Atkins moves his men to block the roads—"

Steven cut him off. "He won't block them outright. He tries to bleed us quietly and probably harass caravans and burn storehouses."

He turned to Clinton. "How many men did you leave in Blacklake?"

"Thirty, plus the village watch," Clinton said. "It won't be enough if Atkins comes with a hundred."

Jeremy tapped the map spread across the table. "If Atkins moves on Blacklake, he can attack Norhedge and Rockhill next. The pattern is clear: control the grain, starve Headow."

Steven narrowed his eyes. "Dispatch some soldiers to those regions."

Hours later, as shadows lengthened across the courtyard, a raven arrived with a silver ring tied to its leg. A signet from Baron Atkins himself.

Steven slit the seal, reading the letter in silence.

The words were poison wrapped in velvet: "Prince Steven, your dogs spill blood in my fields. Hand over the perpetrators and withdraw your men. I demand ten thousand gold coins as compensation."

Clinton let out a single bark of laughter. "Look at that. He dares to ask for such a ridiculous amount when his knight killed an unarmed farmer first."

Twyford stepped forward, voice like a blade scraping stone. "We should have sent him the skull of Usher."

Steven stared at the parchment a heartbeat longer, then tossed it into the hearth. "Let him come," he murmured.

Long after the council had broken up, Steven stood alone at the high window. Below, the courtyard was alive with movement: the new recruits drilling by torchlight and a caravan loaded with tools.

Rosina drifted in behind him. "You cannot sleep tonight?"

He did not turn, but his posture answered the question.

She stepped beside him. In the stormlight, her eyes gleamed. "You have come this far, and almost everyone here believes in you. Do not doubt that."

Steven curved his mouth into a grim smile. "Belief is like a granary. Easy to build. Easier to burn."

She laid a hand on his arm. "Then build it step by step, and it will be indestructible."

Steven tightened his jaw, a silent promise in the storm. "I cannot lose this war. It is time to borrow something from my world that will increase the chances of victory."

---

Smoke curled from the stone chimneys, rising into a sky stained the color of rust. 

The distant thunder of hooves echoed like a war drum against the hills. 

Baron Atkins stood on the southern balcony of his keep, his eyes narrowed on the far road, lips pressed into a line.

His lands were no longer quiet.

Below him, the training fields swarmed with motion—blacksmiths hammering at armor, servants hauling crates of rations, and conscripts forming ragged lines under barking sergeants. 

That bastard prince had returned.

Steven Talvace—no longer some quiet shadow in the capital but a banner-raising fool with dangerous dreams. 

The boy had revived House Talvace from ash and now dared to encroach on his territory.

A servant approached, bowing low. "My lord, the local levies have arrived. Two thousand strong, just as promised."

Baron Atkins turned, raising a brow. "Peasants, farmhands, and woodcutters?"

"They are eager, my lord," the man replied. "They heard of the massive rewards."

Atkins gave a grim chuckle. "They fight because they love the coin."

He swept down the stairway with his fur-lined cloak flowing behind him, boots thudding with purpose. He stepped into the courtyard to an uneven mass of farmers holding spears like unfamiliar tools.

He studied them. Men with dirt under their nails, callused hands.

"Listen well," he said, his voice cutting through the wind like steel. "A threat has risen gradually and taken away our possession. He will ride into your villages and demand your grain. He will raise taxes to build walls and beautiful castles. Is that the world you want?"

The men growled. 

Some shook their heads. 

Others raised their fists.

"No," Atkins continued, "You fight for your land, your kin, and your freedom. The snake called Talvace will be cut before it coils!"

A roar answered him, ragged and insincere.