Chapter 200: Rumors

Book 4, Chapter 41 - Rumors

Kalin gathered pages of parchment into a neat stack before tucking them away into his drawers. It was a thinner pile this time around, reports brief and limited to the small but significant happenings of his lands and its surrounds. Warmer weather had come. Farmers had sown the first of the season's crops. And Metsiphon remained vigilant against criminal bodies and corruption seeking to find its way into administrative levels.

All was stable save for a single matter that was not so easily resolved —not with Tara incapacitated.

Trillian intruders still sought to preach within Metsiphon's walls. The people were not left wanting —Kalin did his utmost to ensure that. A kempt populous had lesser reason to want an outside saviour, were less likely to fall prey to the allure of faiths and gods. But even then, removing Trillians who sought out busy thoroughfares to preach in caused public disturbance. Doubts were whispered when night fell and taverns glowed bright. Kalin knew these tactics well. Among his studies in his days of youth were dry as sand textbooks on militarisms, revolutions, and all manner of related things. Information he'd absorbed out of duty, but never truly been enthusiastic about learning, unlike Elizia.

Elizia… Flames keep her from harm.

Kalin took to examining the grounds of the garrison from his window. The sun was high, just past noon by its position. About time to make the rounds and praise hard working soldiers maintaining the fort before breaking for a light meal. A meal to be shared alone.

Kalin smoothed out the wrinkles of his coat as best he could before leaving behind his office. His legs groaned as he broke out the stiffness bound into their joints from hours spent sitting in a chair. Always the Trillians these days. Their tactics were too similar to ones used in revolutions. Doubts, rumors, whispers were the openings that begun the downfall of a city that might otherwise be at peace. First came preachers who spoke of justice, the afterlife, and the benevolent Goddess —these were the sowers. The city guard were swift to arrest them. But when night fell, more discreet agents of the emboldened faith uttered their lies to the working man relieving themselves at a tavern. They uttered spells of malcontent and doubt, and if left unchecked, the shadow would spread as it would deepen.

Kalin was forced to relegate a number of his spies to his own city to frequent establishments and pick up on rumormongers. He was too busy at the fortress, and without Tara roaming the city to aid the people here and there, the dominant words people spoke of these days were not praise for their beloved duchess, but the declining state of the kingdom, rising prices of goods, and the Trillian faith. Supressing these rumors were growing harder and harder by the day.

The dagger cutting deepest into Kalin's heart was his utter failure to protect the last home Sar'tara had left. She lay still in Metsiphon, succumbing to the poison in her veins as the days withered by, unknowing of the turmoil Xenaria suffered from, unaware of how near the downfall of Metsiphon itself happened to be.

Kalin nodded to the guards watching the fortress' many corridors as he passed them by. A lesser leader, would at this point, mobilize his arms to raid taverns and the like to root out rumormongers. They'd make an example of those speaking ill of the city and well of the Trillians, hoping this would quiet the rumors for good. But Kalin's many dusted textbooks told him that doing this would give the opposite result.

Yet for all that caution, the thought remained appealing. Kalin ground his teeth as he offered tight-lipped smiles and nods to his men. He so desired to use violence against those that would dare threaten Sar'tara's home. He didn't want them rooted out, he wanted them smothered to oblivion. He wanted them so fearful that they would never dream of approaching Metsiphon with their nefarious plots again.

A lesser leader… What was he but one cut from that cloth? He who'd let the Papillion burn, he who'd near failed in defending Arcaeus Peak, he who'd let the queen get assassinated and given control of the kingdom to those who'd seek to rob the liberties of the people with their lies… Some bastion of Xenaria I turned out to be.

Following many flights of stairs downward, Kalin stepped out into the open air of the garrison's grounds. He calmed himself with multiple deep breaths. Each new ail made everything seem worse than it was. But things were not quite so dire. The eastern front had been quiet for some months. Tarmia still sent its dead-eyed child soldiers, but the efforts were half-hearted. House Serene's forces had their orders to capture the children if possible. Sometimes they succeeded, other times the child soldiers took their own lives. The fact weighed on Kalin's mind, but he'd read so many of these reports that he felt himself become numbed to the tragedy that occurred. He was certain his men felt similar.

A numbness akin to mindless beasts than the humans we should be.

But the lowered threat of invasion allowed Kalin to put more focus on the turmoil of his own kingdom. Further, his spies had reported multiple small uprisings within the Empire's newly conquered territories, along with rebellious factions denouncing their new emperor who'd had the throne for little more than a year. Time was all that remained to Kalin now. Time in which he could do nothing but await his daughter's return with, hopefully, good news, as well as Lord Calthus' return with Queen Emeria in tow. If the young queen could be saved, then mayhap the realm would rally its banners against the would be Trillian usurpers.

Much to think about, and much positives to be gained… But for all of it, Kalin was most looking forward to leaving Arcaeus Peak for some months and returning home. Returning to Sar'tara. It'd been too long since last he'd seen her face. He was loath to gaze upon the black lines of the Decade's Curse crawling along her skin, reminding him again just how near she was to death, but the sight of her soft, sleeping face gave him comfort. It gave him courage enough to continue struggling for the kingdom's sake. For her sake, and for their beloved daughter as well. Memory of her smile and mirthful laughter had all but been taken from him in the years without her. Kalin felt hope slip away, but still he held on to that final thread, that perhaps one day, she would triumph, and wake from her deep slumber.