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Chapter 43
🕑 Added 2018-09-03 22:04:57 +0000 UTC Haidar Batra reclined against the back of a plush sofa in his private chambers, enjoying his time in the company of his four young grandchildren. Shrieks and cries sprang up all around him as the little tykes ran about causing chaos wherever they went, but Haidar only smiled. It was nice to be around people who didn’t want much more than love from him for a change. It was a shame the times when he could drop all the pretense of being the Emperor and just be a loving grandfather were so rare. That was why he’d taken steps to protect these rare moments, issuing a decree to all who lived and worked in the palace that interrupting his time with his grandchildren was a crime with a penalty of death.“Granpa! Up!” Callasta, his second-youngest grandchild at a mere three years old, stood by his feet, her adorable little arms raised up towards him as she implored him to lift her onto the empty cushion beside him. A precocious child who seemed a bit more developed than other three-year-olds, Callasta had formed a sort of fascination with her grandfather recently, and loved to be with him. It made the old man smile.
“No, Callasta, climb up yourself,” he said, patting the cushion with his hand. “It is important to not become reliant on others. You will become weak.”
Callasta eyed the the seat in front of her, unsure. As the sofa was a little higher than most, and the girl was rather short for a child her age, the top of the cushion came up to just around her shoulders. Hesitantly, she put her arms up onto the cushion, grabbing the fabric in her tiny fingers, and hopped. It wasn’t enough. Teetering on the edge, the fabric slipped out from between her fingers and she fell back, landing heavily on her butt.
Haidar leaned forward as he saw tears begin to form on the corners of her eyes. He reached out a hand and lifted her back onto her feet. “No crying over failure. Try again. You can do this.”
The tiny girl reached out to the sofa again.
“Ready? Jump!” Haidar cheered.
The girl gave another hop, this one a little higher than the last. This time it proved to be enough. She was able to get enough of her torso onto the cushion that she could bring a knee up, and then she was on. Callasta smiled a brilliant smile as Haidar patted her head.
“Well done!” he praised. “A Batra never bows to a challenge, no matter how small!”
“Granpa, book?” the little imp asked, giving him a sweet little hug as she looked up imploringly. Haidar’s heart melted at the sight. How could he resist such a cute face?
When Callasta said “book”, she didn’t mean just any book. She meant The Compass, the massive collection of knowledge, advice, and guidance written to keep each ruler of Ubrus from going astray. Each ruler’s final act, before passing control of Ubrus to their eldest child, was to add their own words to the end of the book, each generation improving and enhancing the tome’s greatness. Haidar’s hand caressed the book’s soft leather cover, generating a series of soft clinks from the chains that connected the book to his body. Ubran tradition and law required each new ruler, Emperor or Empress, to have the book chained to their bodies so that they would never be without its wisdom. The process of embedding the metal chains into the rib bone caused enormous pain, but temporary discomfort was a small price to pay for the power of an Emperor.
The Compass contained many of the Empire’s greatest secrets, and so only the current ruler was allowed to read it. Any other person would be put to death for reading even a single sentence. Callasta, however, was too young to read; she just liked to look at the drawings. Haidar decided that meant he could overlook the transgression, at least for another year.
Reaching for the book, he lifted it from the side table standing to his right and placed it on his lap, opening it to a page written by a Empress Kitahun two-hundred and fifty years ago. Callasta oohed at the detailed drawing of a gorgeous woman in an exquisitely ornate dress surrounded by kneeling tribespeople, a depiction of the Empress’s conquest of the tribes of the Trinta forests to the southwest. The child snuggled up against his side as he turned the page.
Suddenly a commotion caught his ears. Something was going on outside his chambers. He should hear voices and panicked shouting. Was somebody shouting “Emperor!”? A dark scowl came over his face. Even after his decree, somebody dared to interrupt his precious family time? A fool would die tonight.
Closing the book, he tucked it under his shoulder and stood up. “I have to take care of something, sweetie. Go play with your brothers while I’m gone.” Turning away from the unhappy grandchild, he left the room, a cloud of anger hanging over him.
In the adjacent room stood Taras, Haidar’s most trusted bodyguard. Though blind, the man was arguably the mightiest warrior in the nation, a Weaver of incredible ability. His hearing was unmatched, to the point that he could use sound to “see” his environment better than any man with working eyes. It was that hearing that allowed Haidar his moments of privacy with his children and grandchildren. Any assassin would be detected before they could even get within a hundred paces of his room.
Taras fell in behind his Emperor as Haidar marched across the room and flung open the doors on the other side. There he saw four guards wrestling with a seemingly crazed man who was trying his best to get through them. The man had the dress of a guard as well, though he saw no weapon on him. Something about the man seemed slightly familiar, but Haidar couldn’t place it.
“Release him and let him through,” Haidar commanded. His guards obeyed without a word, letting the man go. The man rushed towards him and Haidar held out an arm to block Taras from interfering. This was something he wanted to do personally. As the guard approached, Haidar began to Observe. The guard staggered as a sudden force, oppressive and unrelenting, pressed down upon him.
“Kneel before your Emperor,” Haidar snarled as he increased the pressure. Unable to stay on his feet, the man obeyed whether he wanted to or not and fell onto his hands and knees. The Emperor smiled slightly as he watched the man struggle and pant from the exertion needed just to keep from being pressed prone to the floor. Anybody foolish or stupid enough to flaunt his rule would not just die, they would suffer first.
“You know the rules, do you not, guardsman?” he asked, his words dripping with scorn. “You know that I am not to be disturbed. I was very clear.”
“The... ruins...” the man gasped out. “The ruins... are alive!”
Haidar blinked, his mind thrown into disarray from the guard’s words. He recognized the guard now. He was one of only two guards in the entire palace who knew of the existence of the ruins, though he did not know the significance of them. Many years ago, at the beginning of his rule, Haidar had given this man and his counterpart orders to check the ruins every few hours every day, day or night, and report to him no matter the circumstances in the case that something inside of the ruins changed.
The pressure on the man disappeared. “Repeat yourself,” he commanded, his brain whirling a thousand rotations a second.
The man coughed, keeping on his hands and knees. Even though the weight bearing down on him was gone, the man smartly did not dare to look up. “The ruins have come alive. As soon as I saw it I rushed to report to you as ordered.”
“You have done well. You are dismissed,” Haidar said. The man turned away, still on his hands and knees, before rising unsteadily to his feet and staggering off. Haidar ignored him, his mind too busy grappling with the meaning of the man’s words.
To think that the promised time had come. The time for conquest, when the armies of Ubrus would sweep over the world, as unstoppable as the tide. Every Emperor, deep in their heart, hoped that the fated time, the time spoken of in the First Emperor’s writings, would be during their reign. Haidar had been no exception, dreaming of glory and greatness, but the ruins had remained silent all these years. With his time as an emperor soon to come to an end, he had come to terms with the fact that his time was not the destined time. He’d made peace with his disappointment. But it seemed that such thoughts were premature.
There was so much to do. So much to prepare. But first...
“Taras, come,” Haidar said as he strode down the hallway. “Let us see what he spoke of with our own eyes.”
Still, as he marched through his palace, something was bothering him, poking at the back of his mind. What was it? Ah, yes.
“I want that man dead by sunrise,” he told Taras. His decrees were law, and if the law was not respected, then what stood between them and chaos?
* * *
Emperor Batra sat in a chair and stared deep into fire and thought. The study was silent, save for the crackling of the burning logs in the fireplace. Things were not exactly going according to plan.
A knock on the door broke his concentration. “Enter,” he commanded. He didn’t need to ask who it was. He’d given the guards instructions to only allow one person through.
The door opened and through it walked Mohor D’nar, Haidar’s most trusted advisor and closest... acquaintance. Not friend, no matter how much he might wish it sometimes. Emperors could never have friends. A friend was an equal.
Mohor bowed to him, his normally smiling face stern. The man had been enjoying a well-earned respite from his duties, and he knew that the Emperor would not call him to the palace during his time off for no reason. Haidar gestured towards a nearby chair and Mohor sat, no instructions required. Their relationship went back decades, back to their childhoods. At this point, neither needed to vocalize such mundane thoughts to the other to be understood.
“It’s quite warm in here,” Mohor observed as he took his seat. Normally a citizen would wait for the Emperor to speak before daring to open their own mouth, but the two had dropped most of the formalities years ago, at least when they were alone. It slowed things down too much otherwise.
“Watching the fire helps me think, as you well know,” Haidar replied.
“And what is His Imperial Majesty pondering tonight?” Mohor inquired. “What is so important that it made you call me back from Ritalun as soon as I had arrived?”
Haidar filled his advisor in on all happenings of the day, as well as the immense portent of Gabriela’s arrival. The man listened quietly through the whole explanation, his eyes closed the entire time as he was wont to do.
“You are putting a lot of faith in old words,” Mohor said once his Emperor had finished. “You have complete confidence in the First’s Prophecy?”
“I do. His other warnings and knowledge all proved true in some way over the years, and yet this was the one thing he made sure to stress as the most paramount of his words. If he says this is the time to strike, then there is no doubt.”
“And the woman. She sounds rather... unimpressive? Are you certain that she will be able to fulfill her part of the prophecy?”
“Her fingers went through his shoulders like he was made of dough, Mohor! And I would wager that she wasn’t even using her full strength! You know that is above even the best Feelers that we have. She’s raw, yes, and it looks like she’d never swung a sword in her life, but with enough polish she can serve as the Champion that we need.”
“Yes, but I was not referring to her talents as much as her will. I, of course, have not actually met the woman, but by your description I cannot help but wonder if she will be able to perform her role properly given her differing priorities.”
“That is the reason you are here tonight. I have been puzzling over that very problem for hours now.”
“Hmmmm...” the advisor closed his eyes in thought for a moment. “Have you considered just lying to her? Telling her that you know of a way to send her back?”
“Of course. But that would only serve to turn her against me, as she would likely see it as me holding her back from her family.”
“No, no... you’re thinking about it wrong. It can’t be a transaction, where you say ‘help me conquer the lands and then I’ll let you go home’. You have to twist it so that her desire to leave melds with your desire for conquest.”
“You’ve always been the better schemer,” Haidar admitted. “What do you propose?”
“You need to do two things. First, you must demonstrate to her that you know how to send her back home. Then you must structure it in a way where you cannot do so unless the entire world is under your rule.” Mohor scratched his chin, deep in thought. “I think I have an idea, but I need to see the ruins first before I can say for sure.”
“Very well, let us go,” the Emperor replied with a grin.
Quickly the two of them made their way down to the room deep in the bowels of the palace. Haidar couldn’t help but notice that the room was lit, however dimly, by a series of crystals lining the tops of the walls. Those crystals had never glowed once in his entire life until yesterday. The sight just served to reinforce his belief in the magnitude of the prophecy.
“What are these?” Mohor asked, pointing at three crystalline objects encased in metal, each sitting atop a metal device of some sort.
“We don’t know. They’ve always just been there, like all the rest of the things here.”
“May I touch them?”
“Go ahead.”
“Interesting,” Mohor mumbled as he picked one of the objects up and looked it over before placing it back onto the device. “Yes, this I can work with. I will need a few days, most likely, as well as the greatest illusionist in the Empire and your best artisans, but this can most definitely work.”
* * *
“Not good enough!” Mohor’s voice echoed up the stairwell. “You can’t just have the coin vanish. That makes it feel immaterial! There must be some sort of phenomenon, something to catch the eye so that she knows that something is happening. Perhaps a light? Yes, let us try that. Start again from the top!”
Emperor Haidar Batra finished descending the steps into the ruins and was greeted with the sight of an energetic Mohor D’nar and several highly irritated other people, including Ezika Qenot, the best illusionist in the Imperial capital. The aggravation on Ezika’s face vanished the moment that he spotted the Haidar, which is turn tipped off Mohor to Haidar’s arrival.
“Ah, Your Eminence!” Mohor said with a smile and a large, formal bow, one mimicked by the others in the room. “For what do we have the honor of your presence?”
“How is everything coming along?” Haidar inquired. He turned to the others. “You are all dismissed for the time being. I wish to speak with Advisor D’nar alone.”
With another set of low bows, the rest of the people in the room made haste to remove themselves from the chamber.
“Pretty well,” the advisor replied once the room had emptied. “The craftsmen are making great progress. Four of the copies are already finished and several more should be complete by tomorrow. As for the actual ‘presentation’, I am working out the final details, as you may have heard. It’s the small things that can make or break something like this, after all. It must be perfect.”
“Do you really believe that she will fall for this?”
“I do. She is desperate and will likely latch onto any hope we give her of a way home, be it real or fake. The trick will be in maintaining the ruse until we’ve gotten everything we need from her. After that, she can be disposed of before she becomes a danger. After all, no matter how strong she may be, a sword through the heart will kill anyone.”
“Excellent. How much longer do you need?”
“I think we will be ready for the demonstration some time tomorrow.”
“Well done, Mohor,” Emperor Batra said with a grin. “You continue to impress me even after all these years.”
“Ah, actually, there is one thing I would like to discuss.”
“What is it?”
“I believe that, for this to have its greatest chance of working, your participation is required.”
* * *
The large room bustled with activity as the brightest minds in the Empire worked to keep it all running smoothly. This room, a wide chamber with several desks lining each wall and a massive table in the center, was the brain of the country, the counterpart to the throne room, the country’s beating heart. It was the throne room where the Emperor took audiences, made proclamations, and performed all the public-facing aspects of governance. It was this room, however, where people had to figure out how to make those proclamations into reality. Here was where the real act of governance occurred.
Haidar spent a good number of hours in this room nearly every day, usually through the early afternoon. There was always something that needed his approval or judgment. The last few days, however, had been different. He’d spent his time with Mohor, working on the advisor’s scheme, especially after the devious bastard had roped him into participating in the actual ruse itself. The actual show had gone down the day before, and now all Haidar could do was wait for his answer. Until then, he busied himself in the act of actually running the Empire.
The wait turned out to be remarkably short. As the sun approached the center of the sky, a request came from the otherworlder to speak with him. Instructing a page outside to guide her to a nearby conference room, he finished up his current business and went to meet her, Taras following silently behind as always.
“Champion Carreno, I must say that you look quite lively today,” Emperor Batra remarked as he entered the room to find the small woman and the Batranala he’d assigned to assist her. His compliment held no falsehoods; he’d been able to spot the difference in her eyes immediately. Before, she’d constantly cast about despairing glances like a banchet cub trapped in a nest of venomous striped moutiars, desperately, endlessly searching for a way to escape a situation that threatened to swallow her whole. Now there was steel in her gaze, the kind only found in those who knew where they needed to go and were determined to do so at all costs. Haidar held back a smile, so as not to tip his hand. He’d known as soon as he’d seen her eyes that she’d decided to accept his “proposal”.
“Thank you,” Champion Carreno replied, giving him an awkward, clumsy bow. “I’ve come to give you my answer.”
“Most excellent,” Haidar replied. “What have you decided?”
“I will help you, on one condition,” the woman said. “You say that you know the location of the relic in the hands of the... uh... that other country?”
“The Droajan Confederation of States? I know that they have one. As for its exact location, we believe they are holding it in the treasure vault of the Istrouburn, the House that currently dominates their petty power struggles. This information came from a source that my people believe to be truthful, but I cannot guarantee that it is there.”
The woman bit her lip in worried thought. “I want to see it. Conquer that country on your own. If you’re as mighty as you claim to be, you should be able to do it without me, right?”
Haidar scoffed. “Were we even a third of our current might, the Droajans would still stand no chance. They are too disorganized, too focused on undermining each other to ever put up a coherent defense. The only reason they are not already part of the Empire is that I felt their petty squabbles would be too much of a hassle to deal with.”
This was, of course, a lie. While it was true that the Droajans Confederation existed only due to his own benevolence, he had avoided taking over that sad collection of city-states only due to advice written in The Compass that Haidar had found to be sage. Emperor Perntir, perhaps the most accomplished military Emperor of the last thousand years, had written of his preference for keeping around weak states to serve as practice for his armies before the Empire invaded a tougher opponent. He argued that it allowed him to knock the rust off his veterans, give new soldiers a taste of true combat without exposing them to too much danger, and test new weapons and tactics.
During his invasion of Ofrax, Haidar had wished for a “practice” state. While the country had folded soon enough, the price, both in lives and funds, had been far higher than it should have been given that the entirety of Ofrax’s royal family and most of its military leadership had died just hours before the invasion. And so Haidar had decided to leave the Droajans to their own devices for a few decades at least, so that they could serve as a suitable training exercise for his armies should the Champion ever arrive during his reign. He’d never actually expected the decision to bear fruit, but life always seemed to surprise.
“I want to walk into that vault and see the relic the minute that you take over, when you open it for the first time,” Gabriela repeated. “Show me that it’s the truth and I will help you with everything I have.”
“A reasonable request,” Haidar responded. “What you ask will be arranged. If I may suggest, there will be a period of time before the Droajans fall. I think your time during that span would be best spent training. If you would like, I can task our greatest sword instructor to teach you the art of combat so that you will be ready to fight when the time comes. The better you are, the sooner we will be able to return to your home.”
“Sure,” the woman agreed.
“Excellent. Chitra will be able to handle the arrangements. Is there anything else?”
“Uh, no, that’s all I think.”
“Well then, I must be going. There is suddenly a lot of work to be done.”
“Ah-!” Gabriela called out just before he left the room. “Um... thank you for helping me. I know you didn’t need to care.”
Haidar turned around to face her, his face earnest. “Do you know why the Empire makes it its mission to expand? Why we wish to conquer the world? It is because the people of my country live the best lives of any people in the realm. They have the most food, the least disease. They are happy and healthy because the Empire makes it so. Over the course of generations, Ubrus has consumed many nations, absorbed a myriad of tribes, and none of those peoples would want to leave our rule now because their lives are better than they were before they were a part of the Empire. Even Ofrax, which fell to my armies just some years ago, is better off now than it was under the thumb of its old royals. I would bet my life that, given the choice to stay in the Empire or gain their independence back, the people of Ofrax would choose to stay. Because we care. So of course I would care when presented with your dilemma. It’s my job. It’s what I do.” He gave her a reassuring smile and left the room.
Heading back, Haidar found Mohor waiting just around the corner. Without a word, he waived for his advisor to follow and proceeded into a nearby empty conference room, shutting the door once he, his advisor, and Taras were inside.
“She’s smarter than you took her for,” Haidar said with a glare. “She wants proof.”
“Oh?” his advisor asked, a sly smile on his face. “Please explain, Your Eminence.”
Once explanation later, that grin was still on Mohor’s face. “This is wonderful to hear. Everything is proceeding as I had hoped.”
“You expected this from her?”
“Of course! What sort of person would just agree to something like that without some sort of test? This proves she is no idiot, at least.” His smile widened. “Everything up to now has merely been to set the table for the main course. We’ve already managed to set in her mind that these relics are what we claim them to be and that if there is a relic in that vault then everything else must be true. That’s half the battle right there. Now all we have to do is get one of the fake relics into their vault, something that the Emperor’s Shadow should be able to accomplish in a matter of days, and she’s ours. She’ll believe it all.”
“Sometimes I think you would make a better Emperor than I,” Haidar joked, his spirits lifted by his advisor’s argument.
“You do yourself a disservice. I may be good at many things, but I would never be able to organize and manage this vast nation of ours like you do. That, and your robes would looks terrible on me. Purple looks just ghastly on my skin.”
Re-entering the large administrative chamber, Haidar pulled a nearby Batranala aside. “I want you to find every general in the capital and have them report to me in the war room within three hours. If they question you, tell them that the invasion of the Droajan Confederation of States begins in twenty days.” The gorgeous woman bowed and set off, conscripting pages, servants, and anybody else beneath her station for the search as she left.
Emperor Haidar Batra smiled a fierce smile as he thought about the days ahead. As it often did, his eyes and thoughts went back to The Compass, the large and thick tome that could never leave his side. He hated that accursed book. Hated it with a fiery passion. Yes, there was some truth to the public reason for its existence, but Haidar knew the real purpose of the blasted thing. It was a giant dick-measuring contest, a tool to knock the current ruler down several pegs.
The First Emperor hadn’t established the rule that succeeding rulers had to be bound to The Compass so that each Emperor or Empress would have access to his wisdom. He’d created the rule so that each person to follow in his footsteps had to carry around with them a constant reminder of his greatness. And the rest had followed suit. Each and every entry, while their words and authors were different, all spoke the same message: “You are nothing compared to me. You will never come close to the feats that I have accomplished. I am the greatest ruler Ubrus has ever known and will ever know. Despair, for you shall forever be in my shadow.”
Haidar could still remember the rage that had ignited inside of him when he’d first read The Compass after his father’s abdication. Growing up, he’d believed the tales of the First Emperor’s wisdom. He’d bought in to the myth that the massive volume served to advise each Emperor, to steer them down the proper path. But as he’d turned page after page, reading the writings of pompous fools blinded by their own egos, he’d come to see it for what it really was. It was a challenge. And a Batra never bowed to a challenge, no matter how large.
