Chapter 22

“Are you truly serious?” Gosrick asked.

A full day had passed since the mage had struck Lucien across the head with a heavy silver cup, yet the question still seemed to hang in the chamber with palpable weight.

Of all the retainers in Lucien’s service, Gosrick had stood beside him the longest. A blood relative and former tutor, he had painstakingly corrected Lucien’s most abrasive childhood habits before becoming the first knight ever to swear him fealty. Nor was his usefulness confined to the battlefield. His keen intellect had made him an exceptional strategist and one of Lucien’s most trusted advisors.

Naturally, such a pedigree placed him among the three most influential men in the chamber. Even so, Gosrick rarely voiced open disagreement with his liege, and he almost never questioned Lucien’s intentions to his face.

Lucien regarded the older knight with mild amusement. “Say what you came to say.”

“Trusting a mage just enough to resolve an existing problem is one thing.” Gosrick shifted his weight, his armor clinking softly with the movement. “Deliberately employing one in an entirely new undertaking is something else. The risks are not remotely comparable.”

“That is true,” Lucien conceded with disarming ease as he leaned back in his chair. “But when did I ever claim to trust that bastard? I merely said I intended to make use of him.”

A deep furrow appeared between Gosrick’s brows at the riddle-like response.

Lucien tapped his fingers against the table. “Think back to Alkita.”

The abrupt change of subject drew an identical scowl from every man in the room, as though they had rehearsed the reaction in advance. No doubt the same memory had flashed through all their minds.

Ah, that fucking place.

One of the Eastern Seven Stars, Alkita had demanded four brutal years of Lucien’s life to reclaim. It had been the first battlefield where his forces encountered a true mage, and the campaign swiftly became the filthiest, most agonizingly prolonged, and devastatingly costly conflict they had ever endured.

Grafen, the occupying kingdom, remained half buried in the barbaric shadows of the Mythic Age. To describe the realm generously, it was antiquated. To speak plainly, it was utterly uncivilized. Mage blood had flowed through its royal house from the dynasty’s inception, and the family had earned infamy for preserving that volatile lineage through endless cycles of incestuous marriage.

The Lord of Alkita, who controlled the most strategically vital territory among the Eastern Seven Stars, belonged to a cadet branch of Grafen’s twisted royal family. As a fully realized mage, he had made Lucien’s life extraordinarily fucking difficult.

“Remember that Alkita possessed only one mage at the time,” Lucien said, his voice falling dangerously quiet.

A heavy silence answered him.

“And still,” he continued, allowing the gravity of the memory to settle over the room, “that one bastard was enough to accomplish all of that.”

Alkita alone had consumed nearly an entire year of their four-year crusade. After the lord was finally captured and subjected to a grisly execution, the soldiers gradually grew accustomed to the horrors of confronting magic, allowing the campaigns that followed to proceed with comparative ease. Even so, nothing could erase the brutal lesson Alkita had burned into their memories.

“Consider our history.” A predatory gleam sharpened Lucien’s blue-gray eyes. “We have spent years developing ways to slaughter mages or neutralize their unnatural arts, yet not once have we considered leashing one to our side.”

The very notion sounded absurd.

Securing a mage’s allegiance required far more than effort or wealth.

Ancient adages claimed that whoever possessed a mage stood one step closer to the throne, but such romantic fantasies belonged to the Mythic Age. More pragmatic men understood those sayings not as promises of royal supremacy, but as warnings of how viciously mages excluded outsiders to protect their own kind.

Weariness settled into the lines of Gosrick’s face as he raised one skeptical eyebrow. His liege had always possessed a dangerous appetite for wagers, but this reckless proposition bordered on outright madness.

“Looking at the matter from the opposite direction, Your Highness,” Mailot interjected, stepping into the silence, “would a mage actually agree to cooperate with us?”

Lucien tilted his head and studied the advisor as though dissecting whatever motive lay beneath the question.

“Consider the reality of his situation,” Mailot continued, undeterred by the scrutiny. “Our introduction was hardly favorable.”

“Our first impression?” Lucien echoed, feigning ignorance.

“We abducted him from his life, tortured him, threatened his existence, and beat him.”

Gosrick cleared his throat in a meager attempt at defense. “Strictly speaking, the torture was primarily theatrical.”

Mailot rolled his eyes toward the vaulted ceiling, making it perfectly clear that theatricality was not the point.

“Furthermore, we must account for those rather unsavory incidents.” Mailot paused to cough into his fist. “Does his sudden willingness to cooperate not strike you as profoundly suspicious? Any rational man would remain intensely wary. At the very least, were I in his position, I would absolutely refuse to aid the lunatic who assaulted me.”

A quiet, melodic laugh slipped from Lucien’s throat. “What in the world are you rambling about?”

A genuine smile lingered on his lips, though his brows drew together in a display of performative confusion.

First impressions? What absolute rubbish. Why are my most brilliant tacticians suddenly behaving like simpletons?

“The man likes me,” Lucien declared, as though establishing an immutable law of nature. “Does he not?”

A suffocating silence blanketed the chamber. Lucien swept his piercing blue-gray gaze across his loyal vassals and watched every man struggle to form a coherent response.

“Why would he refuse to cooperate?” Lucien leaned forward, compelling their attention. “You made the observation yourselves. That bastard has developed a distinct fondness for me.”

Although Lucien drove the point home with force, his audience remained paralyzed. Gosrick had indeed muttered something to that effect several days earlier, but no one had expected their liege to wield the remark so literally.

For years, these hardened men had devoted their lives to navigating ruthless politics, securing legitimacy, calculating interests, collecting debts, and extracting blood compensation. An emotion as sentimental, hopelessly imprecise, disgustingly soft, and frankly pure as genuine affection existed entirely beyond their cynical expertise.

The sheer unfamiliarity of the concept left their strategic minds briefly adrift in uncharted waters.

“Need I remind you that he is the assailant in this dynamic, not me?” Lucien clicked his tongue in mild reproach, effortlessly reversing the direction of the argument. Despite the severity of the accusation, his voice retained a remarkable buoyancy. “As for our so-called first impressions, the mage would have formed his long before he ever crossed our path.”

The revelation surprised no one. Izeland practically crawled with sycophants who adored Lucien, or rather, who worshipped the fictional creature known as Sir Lucien. That impeccably courteous, flawlessly composed persona was a carefully forged mask, fashioned through elaborate political schemes and staggering quantities of gold. Its sole purpose was to secure Lucien’s precarious foothold in Osterbrache despite the curse of his Carlot origins.

“The Lucien who violently assaulted that bastard is the one with something wrong up here.” He raised a slender finger and tapped his temple with mocking grace. “I am perfectly capable of imitating normal behavior, provided the sun remains in the sky.”

It was an undeniable truth. The mage liked him. The man possessed enough affection to hurl a jagged stone at a stranger’s skull merely because that stranger had spoken rudely to Lucien.

Naturally, the pathetic fellow had frantically insisted that he never meant for the violence to occur, but Lucien dismissed the desperate excuse. The precise language he had used to pressure the mage into wielding magic had been chosen with meticulous care.

The same captive who had tearfully whined about his inability to perform had reacted instantly to one surgical word.

Disappointment.

At the very least, it proved the mage cared enough to dread failing him.

Playing the immaculate hypocrite in order to ensnare a target’s devotion had long been one of Lucien’s deadliest specialties. Even if the arcane practitioner eventually revealed himself as an enemy spy, Lucien possessed enough charisma to drown the man so thoroughly in misplaced affection that betraying his original master would ultimately feel like a moral obligation.

“Tell me, gentlemen.” Lucien’s voice sank into a hypnotic cadence. “Is that not an avenue worth exploring?”

The proposal was followed by an eternity of oppressive silence.

Mailot finally broke it with a ragged exhale. “For the moment, yes, I understand your reasoning. We have historically ignored the possibility, but setting aside the risks, successfully converting a mage to our banner would give us a significantly valuable asset.”

His voice faltered around the modifier. Lucien swallowed a dark chuckle, perfectly aware of why Mailot had sought refuge in such a cautious understatement. He shifted his attention and fixed Gosrick with an icy stare.

The seasoned knight deliberately looked away, swallowing whatever arguments remained. Lucien had explicitly granted his inner circle the absolute right to challenge his strategies and voice dissent. By abandoning that privilege now, Gosrick silently conceded that he had no logical foundation left upon which to object.

“Understand that I am not suggesting we trust the creature blindly,” Lucien added, speaking with slow deliberation as he dispensed the meager reassurance he deemed necessary. “Allow me to make that boundary perfectly clear.”

The declaration hardly needed to be spoken. The mage might harbor an attachment to Lucien, but assuming that affection flowed in both directions would be preposterous.

“Continue the investigation without restraint,” Lucien commanded, immediately turning to logistics. “Has the operative we sent east returned to the compound?”

“The scout dispatched to Allohen infiltrated successfully and has returned,” Mailot confirmed with a crisp nod. “However, we are still awaiting the secondary report. The moment the final details arrive, I will synthesize the intelligence and present a comprehensive briefing.”

“Complete the synthesis within two days. If the outstanding report has not arrived by then, submit the incomplete findings.”

Driven by exhausted habit, Lucien dragged a hand through his hair before massaging the bridge of his nose. The captive mage was merely one burning ember in a vast forest fire of immediate crises.

“Moving on. How many reliable eyes and ears do we currently maintain inside the East Wing?”

The violent shift in tactical focus sent Mailot scrambling. His hands rifled frantically through the mountain of encoded documents scattered across the broad mahogany table.

Since entering Osterbrache’s political ecosystem, their most laborious and agonizing undertaking had been the placement of invisible informants throughout the castle’s labyrinthine corridors. There was nothing romantic or grand about espionage. It was a basic requirement for survival among those who dared carve out even a modest sliver of influence within the royal court. At this very moment, several undetected foreign spies were undoubtedly monitoring the chamber, clinging to the shadows like parasites.

“Bastian’s paranoid chamberlain conducted a ruthless purge precisely two months ago. Consequently, I do not believe their internal security network has fully recovered.” A rare tremor entered Mailot’s otherwise professional voice. “If you can specify which restricted section requires observation, I will arrange the necessary logistical adjustments.”

Cultivating a functional spy network composed of both premium assets worth preserving and disposable pawns destined for slaughter consumed an astronomical amount of time and gold. Fortunately, the prosperous territory of Carlot had granted Lucien immense personal wealth. Tragically, time remained the one resource his fortune could never purchase.

“Target their internal family affairs.”