by A. C. Cobble
It was his father’s new model for expanding the empire, and it made Oliver sick, knowing that it was going to work. It made him sick, but he would do his part, for his family, for the Crown.
He turned to find Captain Ainsley watching him.
“Seen enough, m’lord?” she asked.
“More than enough,” he responded. “Take us back down the coast. We’ll observe the progress on the new rail line, and then we’ll head for home.”
Ainsley nodded, and the men began adjusting the sails.
“Everything worth having comes at a cost,” claimed the king.
“But for what purpose?” questioned Oliver. “A larger empire, more territory to rule?”
Edward laughed. “Yes, more territory to rule. For the Crown, for you and your brothers, for their children and yours should you get around to having them. That is why our ancestors did it, Oliver. They consolidated Enhover not for themselves, but for future generations. I’ve expanded our empire not for myself, but for you, and those who come after.”
“And if we don’t want it?” asked Oliver. “Franklin is content underneath the luminous glow of the Church’s circle. Philip marches only where you tell him, and John doesn’t even want to be in Southundon! He maneuvered himself out of power’s path, or else he would be serving as prime minister instead of me.”
A twinkle in his eye, his father said, “There was a time when I did not want power, either. A time when I thought of tending to my family and watching them grow. We knew little of the colonies when I was just a few years younger than you. We knew little of the heights that were possible. I pursued simple goals, as you do now. I wanted to marry, and I did. I wanted to excel at my studies, and I did. I wanted to prepare myself to take over the throne, and I did. They were simple things, mostly things that had been done before by many people. There came a time, though, when I realized there was more that I could achieve. Through Northundon, the Coldlands, and the United Territories, I saw the opportunity was far larger than I ever imagined. I could not turn away from it. It could be done, so I felt it must be.”
Oliver stalked back and forth, uncomfortable with the idea of this new conquest, this war born of greed and lust. He was honest enough, though, to see that his father was right. It was the way it had always been. Enhover expanded, the Crown’s grip upon the world grew, and it was paid for in blood. Even before their family’s rule, in other empires, it had always been that way.
His father, evidently guessing at his thoughts, asked, “Oliver, if the Wellesleys disappeared from the world’s politics, what do you think would happen?”
He frowned at his father.
“You do not like what we do,” said the king, “What do you propose instead? You think me an awful person, carving pieces of this world out for you and your brothers. You think it selfish that we live in this palace and decide the fates of all.”
“All is a bit of a stretch,” muttered Oliver.
“In time, maybe it won’t be,” remarked the king.
Oliver grunted.
“With power, you can steer humanity the way you want them to go,” continued the king. “You can decide right and wrong, the waft and the weave of how men and women live their lives. Who better than you, Oliver? Who better than our family, the Crown? That is why I do what I do. I cannot think of anyone better than I — better than us — to lead. Can you?”
“I don’t think all of the people we rule would agree,” said Oliver.
The king waved his hand dismissively. “I’m not asking them. I’m asking you. Who better than the Crown to lead this world? Tell me a name, Oliver.”
Oliver raised his hand to his head then quickly forced it down.
“You cannot tell me a name because there is no name,” declared the king. “The Church, the Congress of Lords, the Company, you know as well as I that they only think of themselves. The governments of Finavia, the Southlands? One has their nose so high in the air that they’re probably not even aware there are common people fouling their landscapes. The other is worse than the pirates that they allow to flock in their harbors. It is us, the Wellesleys, who brought modern technology, law, and commerce to many of these places. It is us who have secured peaceful futures for the children. Do you know how many have died in the United Territories due to war this last decade, Oliver?”
He winced. He knew the number his father was looking for but had trouble saying it.
“None, my boy, none,” crowed King Edward. “You were never a student of history, but surely you recall the bloody past of that continent. A decade without war may very well be unique. Since someone figured out how to sharpen a stick, Rhensar, Finavia, and Ivalla have been stabbing each other with them. We have eliminated war for millions of people! Yes, the cost was high. People died to make it so, but what they purchased with their lives was a better future for others.”
“Death for less death,” muttered Oliver, shaking his head.
“We’ve made those places better,” argued the king. “Choose any measure you like and tell me the world is not better off due to our rule. We will bring the same order to the Darklands. Conquest is for us, yes, but also for them. Everything I do, I do for the Crown and the empire. I’ve done so much… You will never know how far I’ve gone so that you and your brothers can have this, so that everyone can have this.”
Oliver glanced at his father. The old man was staring down at his hands.
“Father, you do not have to do this,” said Oliver. “Everything that has been set in motion can be stopped or even redirected to another purpose. We can find use for the Coldlands’ timber outside of ships of war. If we encourage the Company to further explore the Westlands, we may need every piece of wood we can get our hands on. We can still expand the footprint of Enhover without undue bloodshed.”
The king shook his head. “No, my boy, it is too late for that. This empire is like one of those giant freighters the Company employs at sea. We are capable of much but slow to turn. We’ve set a course for the Darklands, and that is where we shall sail.”
“You keep saying we, but you are the king!” barked Oliver.
Smirking, his father looked up at him. “Yes, I am.”
“Then it’s not too late to change your mind.”
King Edward stood, stretching. “It is. We’ve walked too far to turn around now, my boy. Go on, then. I’ve said my piece, and you’ve said yours. I have much to do this evening, and I am sure you do as well.”
Oliver turned to leave.
“Oliver,” said the king, stopping him before the door. “If you think of someone who’d rule better than you or your brothers, let me know, will you? Someone you’d trust more than yourself, ey? Do you think there is anyone like that? Because if there is not, then you’ve a burden, Oliver. You’ve a burden to the Crown, to Enhover, and to all of the lands that fall beneath the keel of our airships. You’re responsible for those people, just as I am. If you cannot think of another who can bring them a better life, then do not lecture me about the course I’ve chosen. You’ve a burden, Oliver. You owe them your leadership.”
Oliver left.
The Priestess XVII
“Why?” she asked.
King Edward stepped from around the screen where he’d been bathing. He wore baggy, silk trousers, and his chest was bare. His skin was dusted with a scattering of silver hairs and stretched taut over a muscled but thin frame. He looked to be in good shape, even if he’d been a fraction of his age.
He tugged on a silk dressing shirt and told her, “I find I sleep better in silk. It’s smooth against the skin, soothing. You should try it.”
She replied. “I’ve been told that before.”
“No tattoos,” he said, opening his shirt again as if to show her his chest and then closing it and wrapping a tie around his waist. “Is that why you pushed past my servants to intrude on my bath, you expected to see some?”
“What did you buy with such a sacrifice?” asked Sam. “Enhover was a powerful na
tion, and you were on the cusp of becoming its king. You had a wife, a family, and an empire. What was it you sought?”
“Wine?” asked the king, moving to a table at the side of the room. His silk trousers whispered, the only sound in the room other than the crackling fire. His bare feet padded noiselessly across the carpeted floor.
He moved confidently, gracefully. He was lean muscle and bone. It was as if his body spent no energy maintaining strength it did not need or putting on fat that it did not want. He looked incredibly healthy for his age, remarkably spry. How had she not noticed that before? How had no one noticed it?
He poured her a glass and left it on the table then turned to face her. “Perhaps you’ll want it later.”
“Why did you do it?”
“Everything comes at a cost,” he answered, raising his wine to his lips before continuing, “Enhover was a powerful nation, I suppose, but not so powerful as you may think. We were locked into maritime skirmishes with Finavia, and they were slowly and certainly taking over the Vendatt Islands. We had the nascent airships, but they’d yet to be tested in battle. At the time, they were no deterrent, just a curiosity. The Church’s grubby hands had been pushed into half the peer’s pockets and their whispers into the hearts of the commons. The cardinal and the bishops commanded a respect that the Crown had not enjoyed for a generation. And there was the Company. The Company had revenues that challenged our own with none of the Crown’s responsibilities. Those merchant princes, kings in their own mind, they would have ruled us, both my family and the empire. They would have ruled us and would have sold us the moment it suited them. They care for nothing but lining their own coffers with sparkling silver.”
The king began to pace, agitated, but not angry.
“We were rotting from within, and it was just a matter of time until Enhover crumbled. Would the Church undermine the authority of the government? Would Finavia defeat us on the field of battle? Or my greatest worry, would the Company undermine Crown authority to the point we were nothing but empty puppets? We needed strength, Samantha. The kings of our empire are the rock that the Crown sits upon. If we are not strong, if I am not strong, then all will fall.”
Sam shifted, her hands gripping her kris daggers, but the king made no move to lunge for a weapon, no move to call for his guards, no move to perform some ritual. No, it seemed he wanted to speak to her, to tell her why.
She had to know. It was burning inside of her, the desire to find the bottom of the mystery, to find out why this had all begun. It had driven her to take the foolish risk of speaking to the man before she pounced, allowing him that moment of time to prepare a defense. But he wasn’t. He was talking. It made her palms sweat as she wondered if he was telling the truth, afraid that he was.
“If I’d done nothing, if I’d continued the path of our predecessors, Enhover would be a failing state,” claimed the king. “In my lifetime, in that of my children, we could have fallen. All empires fall, eventually, but that does not mean I want it during my time upon the throne or during that of my children. When an empire falls, there is suffering, girl, like our people have not experienced for hundreds of years. Everything the Crown has achieved would be gone.”
Sam stepped closer, trying to get within range to strike when the time came.
“You’ve heard that, yes, all empires fall?” he asked her.
She nodded.
“It is true,” he said. “Every empire that has straddled the lines of nations has fallen. Every one but one. Enhover. It alone has not fallen. We are the latest, one could argue, but I aim for us to be the greatest. I aim to hold this nation together for centuries, millennia.”
She shifted forward again, pretending she was walking toward the wine, trying to get close enough to the king she could pounce.
He laughed, watching her slink closer. “Do you think I’m a good king? Are the people of Enhover well cared for?”
She paused, frowning.
“I had a similar discussion with my son, Oliver, earlier today,” remarked King Edward. “He’s unhappy with my plans for the Darklands. He does not yet understand. I asked him, and I will ask you as well, who better than I to rule Enhover? Who better than I to rule everywhere? It is a serious question.”
“I—” she began then snapped her mouth shut. What was the man playing at?
“There’s no nation more prosperous than ours,” continued the king. “There is none more peaceful. I’ve stopped the ceaseless border wars in the United Territories. We’ve halved the incidences of piracy in the waters off the Southlands. In the tropics, people have access to medicines and opportunities they never knew existed. Technology is flourishing. The world is effectively shrinking. My finance minister tells me that under my reign, it’s quite possible that economic activity across the globe may double. Double! Fewer people die as children than before I sat upon the throne, did you know that? It is true.”
She blinked.
“More prosperity for the empire means less need to work,” he said, raising a finger. “Less work for the youngest of our citizens means more time in the schools, less time in the fields. Along with improved nutrition, access to medicines, it’s led to longer, safer lives. With the technologies I am sponsoring, that will continue. Thanks to the might of my military, we’re ending the small, bitter conflicts that kill so many and serve so little purpose.”
Sam shifted uncomfortably.
“That is why I did it, my girl,” said King Edward. “I did it so I could save our empire, so I could save the world. A terrible cost of lives, yes, but wasn’t it worth it? You wondered what terrible things a sorcerer would do with the power gained from Northundon, but look. The fruits of that sacrifice are all around us.”
She didn’t answer. She couldn’t answer. She could only listen.
“Oliver said exactly the same thing,” mentioned the king, a wry smirk on his lips. “If you think my son Philip will serve the empire more aptly than I, then strike your blow. If you think Oliver would be best seated upon the throne, then you have much work to do. He has three older brothers and a number of nieces and nephews.” The king took a step forward. “And if you fancy someone other than a Wellesley should wear the crown or that this empire be shattered upon the blade of your dagger, first do everyone the courtesy of thinking hard about what that future may look like. If my line dies, there will be no peaceful transfer of power. There will be war. There will be blood. What happened in Northundon twenty years ago will look like nothing compared to the carnage the fall of the Wellesleys will bring. Every two-shilling peer in the Congress of Lords will be mustering men, marching to battle. Pierre de Bussy will raise his banner in Finavia, but Rhensar and Ivalla will die before they bend a knee to that man. The Church, the Company, they’ll let the others bleed then put their boots upon the throats of the survivors. Is that the future you want to see?”
The king strode across the room, turning his back to her, and looked into his fire.
Sam was speechless, unable to comprehend what the man was telling her. He showed no fear, which would worry her except he clearly wanted her to believe him. He wanted to explain himself because he wanted to recruit her to his cause. Since she’d known him, since they’d first met, he’d been trying to recruit her. The assignments with Oliver, the leeway they’d been granted to pursue sorcerers, the subtle pushes and hints, the help, the access to Lilibet’s trove, it had all been an effort to draw her down, for her to follow the dark path behind him. The king wanted her as his apprentice.
Was that such a bad thing?
“Have some wine, girl,” advised King Edward.
“The notes in the Coldlands and… and in Goldthwaite’s room,” stammered Sam. “It was you!”
King Edward turned to her, the fireplace casting his shape in a dark silhouette. “Yes, it was.”
“Why?”
She had to hear it from his lips. She had to hear it before she could believe it.
“Amongst my sons, Philip and John have no
aptitude for sorcery,” explained King Edward. “They don’t have the drive, the passion to walk the dark path. Franklin, perhaps he could, but he’s consumed by the Church, unable to see past his ecumenical fervor. They may be capable rulers one day, but my sons cannot bear the true weight of my mantle.”
“And Oliver?” asked Sam.
“He is the balance,” said the king.
She frowned at him.
“He’s a druid,” continued Edward. “His affinity is with life, with the spirits of this world, not of the other. His power is the answer to my own strength, the world swinging back to the middle. He has potential to be a great man but not a great sorcerer. I thought once… but no. His path is clear, and it is not mine.”
“You will kill him?”
“Of course not!” exclaimed the king. “I could have killed him a thousand times if that was my desire. No, I want Oliver to live, to support the Crown and our empire. He is like me and the opposite of me. He is the one who will expand our boundaries, draw new lines upon our maps. He is the one who will grow our empire, because when it stops growing, when we no longer find new territories to consume, we will consume ourselves. That is the day the empire will crumble, no matter what I do.”
“But—”
“Oliver is a druid,” interjected the king. “He expands and he grows. It is his nature. If he, and you and I, serve the Crown as I envision, our collapse is far off. Hundreds, thousands of years from now, if we manage it correctly. If you, I, and Oliver manage it correctly.”
“Me?” exclaimed Sam, staggering back from the king.
“Do you want to know what is at the end of the dark path?” asked the king. “I can show you.”
“I don’t understand,” she mumbled.
“You’re worried I am going to ask you to kill Oliver,” said the king. “I told you, I want him to live, to share in the burden of supporting the Crown. The price I ask is not for you to kill him, but for you to convince him.”
