39. Rholker
Two Weeks After Melisa’s Last Message to the Enduares
The smell of smoke draws High King Rholker to the throne room. He hurries because it is an unexpected scent. The consort statues were not meant to be lit until tomorrow.
Just as he clears the room, he sees Lord Fektir bring his spear down with a meaty thunk. A dozen giants surround him, four holding torches between the ceremonial pews.
Rholker rushes forward to see them staring down at several bloody corpses. Rholker gags, holding his sleeve over his mouth, and pushes forward.
“What’s this?” Rholker demands, looking at the black cloaks stained with putrid blood the color of tar.
One of the soldier’s spears nudges a severed head to the side, revealing a pale strip of flesh with black tattoos.
Another warrior holds a torch and a bottle of flame oil.
Rholker’s skin grows cold. “You slaughtered the Six?” he asks, visibly panicking.
Lord Fektir raises his chin. “Two of them. I caught them snooping around the royal decorations.”
“Bullshit. They called me here to meet.” Rholker withdraws a sword from his belt, but his hand shakes, causing the light to dance across the blade. The giant king hasn’t shown this level of weakness in a long time… not since his brother was alive.
“Did you at least kill their leader Dahlia?”
Fektir purses his lips. “She wasn’t here when we arrived.”
“Fuck!” Rholker roars. “You have no idea what you’ve done. They’ll come for me, for you—they’ll burn our city to the ground.”
The guards stare at him, torches flickering and glinting on the drenched floor. The smell continues to permeate the king’s nose.
“You are thinking like a small man. We’ll kill her when she arrives. If they are all dead, they won’t hurt a single giant in Zlosa,” Fektir says, drawing his hands behind his back.
Rholker shakes his head, still staring at the mangled bodies on the ground. “Damn you Fektir. The terms of our agreement were being met. We signed the treaty with Arion. The witches were helping me—I promised them protection while they were here.”
“What a foolish thing to do for an enemy,” Fektir snarls. “You think that just because the results are pleasing that I can turn a blind eye to your methods? I won’t have your weak spirit taint who we are.”
The lord’s spear tip is pointed toward Rholker, who then withdraws his own weapon.
“You know you can’t kill me,” he says darkly. “And I don’t give a shit if Aska is primed for breeding. You will never force me to sire a child with your bitch daughter.”
Fektir smiles darkly. “I was right about you. You’re riddled with weakness and indecision. That’s why you didn’t finish killing off the slaves like I told you.”
“Thousands are dead, and you are complaining we didn’t finish the whole stock? We can’t grow without workers.” Rholker holds the blade higher, leveling it with Fektir’s throat. “If you have something to say, spit it out, old man.”
Fektir grins. “Nandi’s son. You told us all that you had gotten rid of him, and let us all assume the worst.”
Rholker’s shock is as palpable as the falling snow outside the windows. He had sent the boy far away, to be murdered when he was a man old enough to hold his own blade. It had been a show of weakness, but there was something fundamentally wrong to the king about killing a child. He’d felt it ever since Erdaraj had brought Mikal to be executed at barely a week out of the womb.
“You don’t know what you speak of,” Rholker says.
Fektir steps forward, the disgusting squelch of blood underneath his boot breaking the silence.
“I didn’t realize just how much progress you’d made on the mines, Rholker. I will say, you surprised me with the idea of keeping a child locked away in a manor. No one would’ve ever found him.”
Sweat beads on Rholker’s brow, decidedly signaling that he’d heard enough. Drawing back his blade, he lets it crash into Fektir’s spear. The wooden shaft of the spear splits in half.
Fektir laughs while throwing the pieces of wood into the pews and grabbing an ax from a fallen warrior.
“There we are. I’ve always wanted to witness your battle capability!” he bellows. The force behind his first swing sings in the air.
Rholker ducks, then snarls, “I’m going to kill you. Guards!”
Not a single warrior moves.
“Do as you wish to me, but I’ve already told the other lords. They’re preparing to retrieve Nandi’s son, the true heir, as we speak,” Fektir says, grinning.
Rholker yells and tries to charge. The guards who ignored the king’s call shove Rholker back, hard. He slides through the fetid blood, leaving a foul streak across the ground. And his head crashes into one of the benches with a loud crack.
His eyes cloud over, and black edges his vision.
Screams of grown men fill his ears.
Seconds later, his vision clears, and a small tattooed hand reaches out toward him, pulling him to his feet with dark magic.
Dahlia stands there, murderous and alone.
Behind her, Fektir is nothing more than pulp, blood, and silver fabric. The guards are slightly better off. Most of their body parts can at least be identified.
“My sssisters are dead,” Dahlia says, her snake swirling around her neck.
It pauses, looking at Rholker, and bares its teeth.
Rholker swallows. The demonstration of power laying on the ground behind the womens’ forms is warning enough. He holds up his hand.
“It was not by me, I?—”
“You have broken your deal, Giant King,” she continues.
Rholker swallows, panting.
“They broke your deal, and I’m trying to help you get revenge,” he says, desperate. “They are going to the mines, where my brother’s son is being raised. If they find him, then I will no longer have a right to the throne.”
Dahlia looks down at him, hood down with her black pupils swallowing every inch of white. She looks at him like this information was worth less than dirt.
“If you want my armies and the souls of my slaves, then you have to prevent him from becoming king,” Rholker says. “If you kill me, you will not find a willing participant among the other lords in my court.”
Dahlia stares for a few more moments and then says, “Very well. This is your last chance.”