Chapter 10: 10. Was it worth it?

One week after the battle of Liden forest, the city of Alba was filled with black flags. The celebratory mood that accompanied announcement from the government of the Sacred empire of Grien that the war with vampires is finally ending, was now nowhere to be found. In its place the capital city of Alba was filled with grief as thousands of young man and woman returned back home in coffins.

Among these thousands of coffins, one was special at first glance. The one in question was placed on top of a horse drawn cart like the others, but unlike those this one was accompanied by a group composed of older man in bright red uniform with swords on their hips. It was easy to identify who they were by a metal insignia in shape of a Pegasus on their hats; An Ittenian royal army…or what remained of it.

The soldiers marched alongside of the cart with a serious expression as the onlookers paid the respect to the deceased. The coffin was covered with a flag with green and yellow stripes with a Pegasus in the middle. The portrait with a name plate next to the coffin revealed the identity of the deceased, Julian Beleng an late hero from Itten that stopped the war.

As the procession went through the city, leadership of the empire was starting a meeting in a palace in the center of the city, not too far from the procession.

 “I believe everyone is present, right?”

In a spacious room of the palace several men were sated at the table.  These men were the political representatives of the empire. With a light nod everyone present confirmed that no one was missing.

“In that case, we shall now commence on this peace deal proposal that arrived yesterday evening.”

“If I may be frank this offer seems rather generous, considering the overall war situation.”

One of the men raised his hand and offered his opinion on the matter to which several others nodded. However, chubby man raised his hand and spoke his mind as well.

“I agree that the proposal send by the vampires is rather generous but…isn’t that thanks to the valor displayed by our forces and the hero in the Liden forest?”

“Right? I heart that the hero fought with the queen till bitter end. Maybe that is why is the proposal so generous?”

Most of the man present seemed to agree with this opinion after all that was what the survivors claimed and it was undeniable truth that after the battle were vampires open to negotiations for the first time in 25 years.

“If I may? Why exactly was this youngster nominated as the hero? Who chose him?”

 The man in the room looked at the middle-aged men with a scar on his face with visible confusion. The question of how Julian Beleng became the hero was the least important question they needed to deal with.

“I was the one who did.”

To everyone’s surprise a men dressed in a white garb with red eagle on it, typical clothes of the members of a sacred order of lez. Spoken up.

“You brother Aneros? What made you consider such young men for the role? As far as I am aware he had no previous commanding experiences.”

Rest of the representatives started to get interested as well, it was a god question why somebody without any experiences was tasked with such an important role to fulfil. Thankfully the outcome was positive.

“I based my decision mainly on young Beleng being originally from Itten and the seal that as I believe you all are aware of, was planted on his back by an Ittenian mages to make him humanity’s hope against vampires.”

Aneros spoke as he scanned faces of the others with his eyes. Just as he said they have been aware of the seal after all Aneros was the one who told them. But there was another question remaining unanswered.

“Brother Aneros, I have been wondering for a while now but where did you got such information?”

“…I have my sources.”

Aneros however refused to answerer and after a bit of unsuccessful attempts at making him talk they dropped the subject entirely and returned to the main reason their gathered. The proposal send by the vampires.

…

“The council accepted so…. The war finally ended, huh?”

But at what cost…Aneros stood on the balcony staring at the procession in the distance as he lighted a cigarette and took a puff. Why did I even listen to her?

“Feeling regretful?”

A cheery voice of a young woman from behind startled him, when he turned around behind him stood a cloaked figure. The one responsible for his decision.

 “About Beleng? Yea I do, it feels like I actually betrayed my homeland by sending him there.”

Aneros wasn’t the type of person to gamble with lives, the fact that he sent so many in to battle they had no way of wining pained him. But the figure in front of him had never gave him bad advice so if she said that sending Beleng as a hero to fight the queen was going to end the war, he trusted her.

“Isn’t it a little too late for that now? After all you already helped me a lot, I am sure my superiors are going to be pleased.”

Superiors? Aneros was taken aback what superiors was she talking about? As far as he knows her superiors should be dead. After all, Itten had felt over twenty...

“By the way do you like that special eastern tobacco I got for you?”

Aneros could feel his chest hurt as she spoke. A magic poisoning?! He was starting to lose all strength in his limbs as he collapsed on to the ground. When he attempted to stand up, he realized just how little energy he suddenly had.

“Why…? The empire…and Itten are allies…then why…?”

He asked barely staying conscious. It didn't make sense she was from Ittenian information agency, they were supposed to be allies fighting against common enemy. As Aneros glanced at the cloaked woman he could swear that he saw her grining.

“Sorry but I have no desire to help humans survive. If it wouldn’t be important for my mission, I wouldn’t be here at all.”

Aneros was confused why would she betray her kind like this. But then something moved behind the woman, a wolf tail. But even if she wasn’t human, she still should have her duty towards her king and country, it wasn’t that unusual to see non humans serve in Ittenian army. It was a multi-ethnic nation after all. The woman didn’t seem interested in hiding herself in front of Aneros anymore and her cloak ended opened, reveling dark face covered with burn marks.

The woman was dressed strangely, Aneros could say that what she was wearing was a uniform of sort but he had no idea who it belonged to. The uniform she wore was in deep shade of grey combined with black leather boots, definitely not a combination he recognized.

“Don’t take it personally, after all both of us merely serve their respective motherlands.”

She said with an apologetic smile as she pulled out a dagger decorated by an engraving of wolf on the handle, with her gloved hand. And raised it above collapsed Aneros with a grin on her dark face. Aneros attempted to evade but didn’t manage to and the dagger pierced his chest like it was nothing.

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“If we would meet under different circumstances then we may even be comrades. May you find peace in your next life. Ave imperatrix.”

The woman said with a solemn voice as if she was praying. While removing her dagger from the Aneros’s corpse and piercing it with a sword he had on him. Her word being the last farewell to Aneros as she disappeared in to the night.

…

“So, your government is pulling out of the war?”

“…yes, that bitc- I mean the queen offered relatively nice treaty considering the results of the war.”

In a garden of an elven royal palace two young women dressed in black mourning clothes, drank tea as they talked.

“Nice treaty? Forgive me but…aren’t you supposed to let vampires keep most of the kingdom of Itten?”

One of the women was visibly displeased as she spoke. She was Olia Visele an elven princess who recently lost her fiancée to the vampires.

“I said relatively, didn’t I? Besides they don’t want us to pay any insane sum nor do they demand of us to submit to their rule. Plus, they willing to give us the Asom fortress as well as the Mui city.”

The second women spoke with a sigh. She was Ele Beleng, a part of diplomatic envoy from The Empire of Grien to their elven allies to negotiate end of war as well as further cooperation between these two nations.

“But even so, Julian was killed by the queen! How can you accept it so calmly!?”

Elven princess Olia questioned Ele, after all Ele’s younger brother was the one killed by the queen of vampires then why was she being so calm about it? Olia was truly baffled by it.

“If I could get a revenge on the queen then I would do it, Julian was my dear brother after all. But I am not going to destroy peace that he sacrificed himself for. I am not going to let his death be in vain.”

Ele had a determined expression as she stared in the distance. Before heaving a sigh and taking a sip of the tea.

“Though it would be nice if they would send his body back home for funeral…mourning above empty coffin is just…”

“…Maybe I should ask mother to make it a part of negotiations? After all who knows what those barbarians do with him.”

Both women sighed, they know they would be asking for impossible but it was still something worth trying.

“That would be nice actually. Our government is in disarray because of the elder Aneros’s suicide, so they have other matters to attend than retrieving my brother’s body”

Ele smiled at the Olia’s proposal, she considered traveling to the vampire capital and negotiate herself but she realized that she would most likely have to talk with the queen of vampires personally. And there was no way that she would be able to keep her calm in front of the person responsible for her brother’s death.

“In that case I will pass it to my mother latter. But I am curious why would this Anerose’s suicide be such a big deal?”

Olia nodded to Ele’s words before asking why would death of one man cause such problem. It wasn’t like the emperor himself had died after all. The man that has died was just a minor figure as far as Olia or other elves were concerned.

“He was leader of the sacred order of lez. That makes him quite important, besides he was one of those who supported the peace treaty. So, others are on edge that he might have been murdered in order to stop the treaty.”

“That actually sound more possible than suicide honestly. Was there even a reason to consider suicide an option?”

Olia asked as she took a bite of a sweets that had been brought by a maid. Ele meanwhile poured herself another cup of tea before speaking up.

“Weapon that was used to kill him had been his own, without any other fingerprints other than his. And as for the reason…it seemed that elder Aneros was feeling guilty over Liden…. At least I got that impression when he come to inform our family personally about Julian…”

Ele took a sip of the hot tea before continuing.

“And besides there is essentially no one who would desire the war to continue. And those that wish so are delusional imbeciles that counts merely in hundreds.”

Ele delivered her words with disgust in her voice. No matter how much she hated vampires, she would rather shake hand with one rather than one of these war crazies trying to devoid her little brother’s death of all meaning. Olia looked at Ele’s face that was filled with suppressed anger.

“…I see, that’s relief. I mean that they lack power to do anything. Thought I wonder what made vampires to start negotiating in the first place?”

“So even elves know nothing? And here I thought that you may have infiltrated them…”

Ele let out a sight, if even elves had no information, then was there anyone who had them?

“We did infiltrate them even though it wasn’t easy but…. Not even vampires seem to know why, their nobles are just complaining that the queen is doing whatever she wants again.”

Olia said with a sigh, no one in the entire word seemed to have slightest clue what was exactly going on. No one except the vampire queen.

“What about the palace? Would it be possible to infiltrate it?”

Ele said hopefully, the security of the vampire royal palace was famously extremely low during the war. The queen was apparently never worried about her safety. But Olia shook her head.

“We tried but… the security of the palace got better after Liden. They doubled…maybe even tripled number of guards patrolling the premise, as well as the capital itself. Furthermore, even the black guard battalion got more active. So almost all of our agents in the palace were caught.”

Both women sighed the situation becoming hopeless. With the security of the capital tightening and the infamous blackguard battalion with their fanatical loyalty and magic abilities, being extra cautious. There was seemingly nothing they could do, at least not at the moment.

“I see… in any case I just hope that my brother’s death wasn’t for nothing.”

Olia nodded with an empathic smile. They continued to chat for a bit more before separating for the rest of the day.

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