Book 5: Chapter 4

Book 5: Chapter 4

It wasn’t much longer until what was left of the invading army marched away from Avalon. The now-independent factions moved away in drips and drabs, some of them banding together for protection as they left, but most watched everyone else warily and moved separately, timing it so that no one left in close succession to each other. The force that had agreed to continue following the Crusader General left last, still a modestly unified force. Stonegnawer led them all home, he himself carrying the terms that Kay had given to the rest of the Itarian Crusade’s leadership. They’d trimmed Kay’s original demands in some places and twisted them to look better in certain lights in others, but overall, it remained close enough to the original. Stonegnawer still wasn’t convinced that the demands would be followed, but other options were at least the bare minimum of what Kay would accept.

While the army left, not everyone from the army went with them. Stonegnawer had dragged off his orcish subordinate Vexler, muttering about reeducation at least one time when he’d had to literally drag him away, and his other direct subordinate, High Crusader Hearthbreaker, remained behind. Officially, she and the other soldiers of the Crusade were hostages to ensure that the Crusade kept to at least one of the demands Kay had for them. While Kay understood the practicality of the practice, he didn’t plan on doing anything to them. He would certainly restrict their movements and deny the manpower to the Crusade if they balked, but he wasn’t going to hurt them. Stonegnawer seemed to understand that without anything being said and seemed at peace with it all.

Commander Ravenhome, or just Edric as Kay had gotten to know the man a little better, had also left, taking Alice with him. While other members of the Order had been left behind as well, Edric had insisted his daughter come home with him to see her mother and siblings. While the feeling of the instinctive tether between him and Alice thinning as she got further and further away wasn’t a pleasant one, it didn’t hurt either, and overall, Kay was not only fine with her going but actively encouraged it. Her getting to go home and see her family served multiple purposes for Kay. As a young man who’d lost his family and then his close friends, who were his brothers in all but blood, he knew how much it would mean to both Alice and her family to see each other again, and he couldn’t bring himself to encourage any other course of action.

The practical King he was becoming with a people to protect and the interests of a nation to push forward also got something out of it. The smaller and less influential impact of Alice going home was that she was a strong supporter of Kay’s terms to the Shatterplate Order and would campaign for the Order to move to Avalon without him having to do anything. Her being the daughter of the Order’s Commander and founder and a popular member of the Order herself made her opinion impactful enough to hopefully sway other members.

The other, significantly more influential impact would be Alice’s existence as a vampire becoming more well-known. While the various species of people on Torotia had many things that set them apart from humans, whether that meant local Torotian humans or humans from Earth, there were many things Kay found were the same across species, things he chalked up to the shared trait of sapience. One of the larger shared traits was the instinctive fear of the unknown. What could be explained or identified became immediately less terrifying than an unknown threat. Having Alice go home would slowly increase the amount of experience the world had with Vampires outside of Avalon. They were a completely new species, one derived from vampyr, at least to the perception of anyone from Torotia; trying to explain that technically vampires had come first and the first vampire to arrive in Torotia had become corrupted into the first vampyr would be too much to get through. By letting people actively see that vampires were just people with different traits, just like so many other people of this world, it make vampires into a known quantity and lessen how much people were automatically scared of them.

Zeia had remained behind as part of the Order’s contingent of “hostages,” as well as a man named Leon, who was one of Edric’s direct subordinates. Alice had given instructions to Zeia and the other members of her hunting team to “start setting the groundwork for the Order to move here,” while Edric had just told Leon to watch over the other members and see what he could learn about Avalon. During the farewell Kay had witnessed between those leaving and those left behind, Kay had witnessed Leon apologizing to Alice for something at least seven to ten times, while Zeia had sent every moment Leon was in her field of view sending him the most vicious glares. Kay was both interested in seeing what would happen while they lived in his city and mildly worried.

Those weren’t the only people who had remained behind. Murunel’s cousin and his wife had stayed as well, although Kay hadn’t seen any of the three of them since he’d woken up. Apparently, they’d flown off into the untamed areas of Avalon’s territory after getting permission from Amanda while Kay was still in a coma and hadn’t returned. Murunel had made sure her relatives promised to behave, and they’d returned one time to check in before Kay had gotten back to consciousness. They seemed to be fine, although he was curious to know what was going on with them.

The last group to remain behind were prisoners, specifically, the Legion from the Shattered Clans. Their leader had categorically refused any and all terms of surrender and had repeatedly demanded that Kay kill them all to the last. Not that the battle continued even though Avalon’s military would surely crush them if they fought unsupported, but that Kay personally executed all of them one by one, starting with the lowest-ranking soldier and ending with the general who was making those demands. It was one of the strangest and most frustrating conversations he had ever had, and by the end of it, Kay was sure that he was going to have to have them all killed, even if he wasn’t going to do it all himself or in the manner the general had demanded. However, Ahthia asked him to hold off on killing them.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

The labyrinthine explanation of the Shattered Clans political system, who the Elders were, what the Elders did, who was in charge of what, which clan among the Clans was important, and why Kay should care about any of it flew over his head only a few minutes in. What he did eventually understand after Ahthia simplified her explanation was that there was a good chance they could get what they wanted out of the Clans, including an agreement to leave Avalon alone and stop bitching at them about people migrating out of the Clans, if they kept the soldiers alive and did what Kay wasn’t interested in doing, keeping them prisoner and demanding a ransom. In this specific case, since the ransom would be everything Kay wanted out of the Clans anyway, plus the costs of keeping their soldiers alive and in decent conditions while a messenger was sent and a reply was brought back, he decided to go for it. In addition, the thing with the general demanding he execute all of them screamed “make us into martyrs so more of our people come to kill you!” to Kay, and that seemed like a terrible decision to go with.

“I still don’t get it.”

“Look, it’s a-“

“Nope.” She held a hand up to cut him off, “I don’t want to try and have children’s stories from Earth explained to me again. I’m just going to believe you and take the win.”

Kay stared into the shiny surface and smiled, imagining the look on Cindy’s face when he presented it to her.

“It’s good that this is taking your mind off of how stressful this whole thing is. I know you’re not looking forward to all the speeches and grandstanding for and from the guests.”

He dropped the gift into it’s case and shot Isla an exasperated glare. “You just ruined it.”

“Did I?” She asked with a cheeky grin, “How sad.”

“Why do all of my best people give me such snark?” He demanded to the air.

She flew up to his face and patted his cheek like an older woman complimenting her grandson, “Because you enjoy it.” Laughing heartily, she flew out of the office and vanished.