It Comes Down to Loss
Anguis Trigon, Final Phase
Wordcount: 2558
The sitting room was bathed in the warm glow from the fireplace. Walls of coral but a floor of hardwood, it was adorned with unusual furniture from the surface kingdoms, sofas, chaises, tall chairs with upholstery decorated in scenes of the seasons. Near the fireplace, just close enough to hear the occasional cracks as bits of sea-coal broke apart, a small round table of wood with a marble top stood between two chairs, one featuring the vivid greens of spring and the other adorned in autumn's colors of orange and yellow. The table held an ornate chess set, with armies of blue and red upon a checkered field of white and black.
The player in the autumn chair, commanding the red army, was the Emperor himself, Thadal et Neptunum. Eyes of electric blue watched the board with interest, chin resting atop his fist. He was wearing a shirt of bright red slashed to show a hidden layer of violet, and pants with an even brighter shade of purple.
Opposite him, the young prince Caput stared in consternation at the pieces. He was dressed simply, in black pants with a ruffled white shirt. He and his father were both barefoot, and the boy's toenails scratched irritably at the wood's veneer while he thought. Their complexion, Thadal's fuchsia to Caput's pale pink, seemed far apart but Caput shared the intense, electric blue eyes with his father.
Finally, he reached down, moving a blue pawn forward. Immediately, Thadal moved a bishop to take the piece and declared, "You lose."
"This is unfair!" Caput complained, not for the first time.
"It's not meant to be fair," Thadal pointed out.
"Not just unfair, it's impossible! I even asked mom and my teachers! They agree it's impossible to win against a competent opponent without sacrificing a single piece!"
"Even teachers don't know everything. Imagine each one of these pieces is someone you know. Your brother and sisters, your mother, your historian, me... and even yourself. Which one would you choose to sacrifice?"
Caput huffed and sat down, staring at the pieces and running through strategies in his head. He had tried dozens. "I would risk myself, if I could. Or my math teacher."
Thadal had a hearty laugh at that. "I suppose that's an option! Even he has kids, though. Grandchildren, too." His voice turned solemn as he continued, "You're going to be a leader, Caput, a commander. If you throw your own life away, who will be left to guide everyone else?"
"The rules are unfair. It's unrealistic. I can't beat you without losing something."
"But you have to try. Every velen will be looking to you for leadership, and you're responsible for them all. A great admiral can't start his strategies planning to offer up the men and women valiantly obeying his orders." Thadal smiled and leaned back in his chair. "Set the board, let's try one more. One day you'll be the best of the best. I know you can do it."
Caput sighed and reset the board, and then he set his sights on the red king.
Dark vermilion skin with scarlet scales, cut through with thin white stripes, King Napeg faced Caput from the center of the square. From where his tail rested on the ground, Caput's head reached only to the king's shoulders. One eye had a scar through it, covered in a milky film but glowing red. The other eye had a white sclera with red ribbons forming an X, converging on his black slit pupil. His nose was nearly flat, two nostrils set into a blunt snout, and his lips were sealed. Atop Napeg's head there was a many-pronged crown of iron, covered in red rust, and set with a solid crystal of cinnabar. The king held no weapon and bore no armor, but a nearby attendant held two spears, one noticeably ornate.
They stood in the eye of the storm, in the town square of Flumen Petram's government district, with the mayor's house, a courthouse, and the guard depot among many other vital buildings. Though the eye provided a break in the clouds, the sky was heading toward dusk, and what light filtered down was deep red and purple. The sandstone walls on all the buildings had been damaged, statues and flags defaced. The fountain in the center had been toppled, leaving a stagnant pool. Four palm trees, one at each corner, had been burnt to cinders.
The ophidians of the Clan of Red Waters filled most of the square but kept their distance from its center. They watched hungrily, eagerly, gnashing teeth and shaking weapons. The younger ones were being physically restrained by the elder warriors. Several elite warriors stood next to the king, some with red teeth, and not far away there was a group of shamans, adorned in crystals of cinnabar and robes, if they could be called that, of black rope. One of them would be Drars Naea, though Caput couldn't tell which.
Prince Caput stood at the head of nearly one hundred brave men and women who had accompanied him through the city and into the heart of enemy territory. As they formed up behind him, ophidians converged to close them in from behind. They now stood surrounded. Their biggest hope, Caput knew, lay in the onyx statue of Serpens. It was twice his height, set upon a rolling pedestal, depicting a shapely velen woman pouring waters from a jug. Her face was missing, no flaw but a sign of deference to the Arbiter. Most importantly, the relic carried Her blessing, one with a very real power and purpose.
"Gwnuhiwnd deo!" Caput declared one more time, in Himai, holding up his thin sword, still in its sheath. He stood no more than fifteen meters from the king, close enough for an easy throw of a spear. Caput had some of the best armor available, plates of hardened mother-of-pearl, but at this range, he was definitely at risk.
The king smiled, baring crimson teeth. Such teeth were dyed by chewing the scales of a particular serpent deep in the Tenebrae, and no one, even royalty, was allowed to undergo the rite without slaying the serpent in single combat. If there was any doubt after seeing the ophidian's scars, the red teeth cemented the fact that this was a warrior king. "Safe harbor," Napeg repeated back to him in the common tongue, harsh but recognizable. Upon Caput's surprised look, the king's smile widened. "I learn surface speech. While waiting." There was an ominous edge to the claim, and Caput shuddered to think of how he had learned. Many of Flumen Petram's citizens had been evacuated, but not all of them.
Willing his face to calm, to hide his feelings, the prince declared, "I am Caput et Neptunum, First Tiae of the Empire of Pelagia, Tofradeity of her military."
"Am Hawluod Napeg, of Marth Trei Neodrwg and the Hawluodeursu Listoss." The king gestured to the statue, his one eye boring into Caput. "You seek surrender, little prince?"
"I seek peace," Caput called back. "Nwei hawod. Too much blood has been spilled, velen and n- ophidian."
"Denied," Napeg declared, drawing a whooping chant from the ophidian forces. "Trwtyhiap doi belongs to Pelagia. Diaip will belong to Listoss. When Pelagia attacked, this was to be your fate. No matter the years. No matter the pain. Blood-debt paid will be!" The king lifted a hand with all four fingers extended, and both thumbs curled in. At the signal the group of shamans went into a quick chant.
First came a smell, the cloying salt scent of the deepest ocean and with it something else, sharp like ammonia. After that, the sound, clicking and clacking, a rumbling like a growl, a deep and deafening whistle completely unlike the wicker worms that sent a shiver through everyone.
Then, they could see it.
A colossal decapod filled the square, twice the size of the wicker worms. Its eyes, aglow with green bioluminescence, bulged from its armored carapace. The body was dark navy, fading to a dim emerald, with parts of its underbelly shining with more bioluminescence. It had massive legs, taller than most of the surrounding buildings and ending in sharp points. Half a dozen antennae of different lengths whipped around in the air and its head jerked sharply side to side, with its jaws hanging wide to reveal hundreds of sword-like teeth.
"Even the Imber kneels, serves!" Napeg declared. The creature may as well have been a dragon, just as large, just as legendary, from fairy tales told to velen children. Like the wicker worms, an imber was among the deadly sons of Cete, a class including some of the deadliest eldritch monstrosities that haunted the corrupted waters beyond the Copiae Ocean.
For such a creature to be under their command was....
"Blood be repaid," Napeg declared, the smile fading as his face settled into stony resolution. "Gotyhair!"
"Hawod!" Caput shouted in a commanding tone, with such surety that all of the ophidians hesitated, clutching their weapons and looking to the king. The imber clack-hissed and clattered forward, but nothing more. "Safe harbor has been declared and accepted!" he continued, first in common for the surfacers and then again in Himai for the assembled ophidians who likely hadn't learned the surface tongue. "Feialoi Serpens hi tuaswaeaneuneu.."
It was a bluff. The Vis would certainly not approve, but that was not the same as saying she would take away the blessing. The surrounding naga forces slithered and hissed uncertainly.
Napeg retorted by pointing at the sword gripped in Caput's hand. "Sword never offered to Serpens. Safe harbor is invalid!" As proof of peaceful intentions, the ones seeking safe harbor would have to consign blooded weapons -- those which had harmed the other party -- to the bottom of the ocean. Napeg was counting on the fact that there was no ocean nearby to drop the sword into.
"This sword is unblooded," the prince declared. The blood of wicker worms didn't count. His sword had never touched an ophidian. The king seemed uncertain, so Caput pressed ahead, turning to the men and women behind him. "Bring it forward." Two velen began pushing the statue forward. All eyes followed the onyx.
In Himai, Caput called out, "This statue and its blessing were wrongly taken by the Empire of Pelagia, on order of Emperor Thadal et Neptunum! As his eldest son, I now seek to right this wrong! The statue is hereby returned to the Kingdom of Listoss and the people of the Clan of Red Waters! So, too, are the sister statues returned to the Clan of Green Waters and the Clan of Dark Waters! May the Blessings of our Lady, the Arbiter, fall upon you once more!"
Slipping into common to show that his words were aimed at King Napeg, Caput continued, "Place your hand upon it and know that it is true."
The one-eyed king frowned but slithered forward, hissing at the velen who had brought the statue forward to drive them away. From behind, one of the shamans came forward as well, and Caput marked this one as Naea. Together, the two placed hands upon the statue.
Suspicion and barely bottled rage turned to surprise and, ever so gradually, to bliss. The shaman sighed out and her entire body seemed to grow slack. Napeg remained strong and upright, but when he opened his eye, there was a measure of respect.
The hatred was not gone, but the call for blood was, perhaps, quieter.
Now that they were closer, Caput stepped forward and held out his sheathed sword on his open palms, speaking quietly in Himai. "I know that returning the statue to its rightful owners does not, by itself, atone for the crime. For sixteen years, we have hurt each other, and for five hundred, we have been apart. Such wounds do not heal easily. If you still desire bloodshed, we will fight, and many will die.
"Even if that should happen, this sword must never taste blood. This sword, passed to me from my mother, represents an ancient bond. From before the Cataclysm, before we were separate. It was a gift from the King of Littoril, before it was known as Listoss. I now return it to you.
"In the name of this bond once shared, I propose that no more blood be shed this day. From there, the Empire of Pelagia can begin to redress the many wrongs. We do not need to chip away at each other's strength. Instead, we may all grow stronger together."
King Napeg listened, though he did not seem pleased. When Caput finished talking, the king snatched the sword from his hands and looked closely at it. It was old but impeccably maintained, the sheath make of sharkskin and silver, the hilt of wrapped wire. There was a thin crossguard, and the blade was an epee, a weapon of nobility and not warfare. In the pommel and on the crossguard, the ancient family arms of the royal line of Littoril were engraved. Very few such artifacts existed in the Copiae Ocean.
Napeg sheathed the blade after looking at it and handed it back to Naea, who confirmed that it had not been blooded. The king slithered closer, looming over Caput, but the prince stood firmly. "You march into enemy territory with your head held high, you stand tall in the face of the imber, and you have the gall to bid for peace when you should offer surrender. Only a prince, but you have the audacity of a king!
"And the forthrightness of a soldier.
"Very well, prince. This day, and this day alone, the Clan of Red Waters will draw no more blood." Napeg flashed his red teeth and hissed. "But anything more than that depends on what you do from this moment forward!"
Caput relaxed only slightly. "Then I propose we meet in the Basal Lake, two weeks from today. That will allow you to return the statue to its people. I must issue commands for a ceasefire to all corners of the ocean."
The king laughed, recognizing the request for the ophidian forces to withdraw. "So be it. If you fail to show, or if your words are in any way false, we will meet again in your city of Pelagia. There will be no safe harbor. You will meet the wroth of the imber."
With a few sharp orders, the wall of ophidians that had closed in behind them all split apart. Caput barked orders of his own, and the contingent began marching back through the city.
The prince was the last one to turn to leave, maintaining eye contact with the warrior king until the last moment.
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