Herald of Steel

Chapter 1608: The Poisoneer (Part-1)

Pasha Farzah squinted his eyes in caution hearing Alexander’s request, and proceeded to give the young lord a long, testing look, “What are you planning, brat?”

“Hehehe..” Alexander only gave a small, cunning chuckle, patting the frowning elder on the shoulder, “Do not worry. I will find a way to convince His Majesty. You start calling the levies. Quickly!”

“….” The elderly lord only deepened his frown at the reply, clearly not pleased. “*Sigh*! Fine!” But then, in a manner quite uncharacteristic of him, Pasha Farzah suddenly nodded and accepted Alexander’s suggestion as it was.

The ease with which this was done caught even Alexander a bit off guard.

However he did not express that surprise externally as presumably pleased with the result, Pasha Farzah at once turned on his heel and bidding him the most bare of farewell, stormed out just like he had come- with the speed of a whirlwind.

Honestly, the ending was a bit anticlimactic for Alexander.

….

“Greetings! Your Majesty! Esteemed lords and ladies of the court!” Ths chapter is updated by novel✶fire.net

As requested by Alexander, Pasha Farzah was able to quickly convince Ptolomy to gather the court. And soon even the main ’culprit’ stood in front of all.

Indeed, Alexander was being treated as a criminal by them as proven by how his greeting, as cordial as it was, received little warmth- the moment he spoke up, hostile looks from all directions, issued by all the factions began to skewer him.

“Alexander! Why are you standing in front of ’us’?” Ptolomy similarly was cold and detached, as he had not forgotten the kind of things this former slave had whispered into his ears as they were leaving the crime scene.

Somehow just looking at Alexander made the man’s heart start to burn and roast.

Thus Alexander was indeed right to say that without his legion stationed right outside the walls, his situation would have been very precarious.

In fact, even with such a huge force, there were a few calls within Ptolomy’s groups to hang the man, all consequences be damned and if not for the Queen Mother subtly influencing the trackable and vain Ptolomy, someone might have already done something very foolish.

Alexander pretended not to know any of this, and with a warm smile, directly met Ptolomy’s gaze and chimed in a fresh, crispy tone,

“Your Majesty, I have noticed the unknown poisoner who attacked me and Lord Assad has managed to spread much panic among the nobles. And taking advantage of this, some ill forces have started to spread the rumour that I had somehow had something to do with it!” At this point, he lifted his arms to directly point to Amenheraft’s faction, “Your Majesty! I demand justice for this slander! They are ruining my name despite there being no proof!”

“What!”

“Alexander! You…!”

“Liar! Cheat!”

“Brat! Wait till I cut off….”

The sudden and out of the blue accusation threw the relatively quiet part of the court into a stupendous uproar as the nobles felt their eyes almost blaze with utmost fury.

Here, they were struggling and even mourning the state of their leader when suddenly the main suspect not only comes to admit his guilt but rather accuses them of actually doing it?

For the nobles loyal to Amenheraft, this heinous act was impossible to even contemplate.

Thus when the finger was pointed at them, how could any one of them have stayed silent?

Some of the more hot blooded ones were so enraged that they even wanted to break the lines and tackle Alexander to the floor before beating him to a pulp.

“Silence!” Order was only restored by this uncharacteristic shout from Ptolomy, as he then instantly turned to immediately glare at Alexander, “Explain!”

The attitude somewhat soothed Amenheraft’s faction, as clearly Ptolomy was showing no favoritism for the offending man.

While the Zanzan lord was half impressed by the king’s display- this was probably the first time he had seen the plump man show any real sign of lordship.

So facing the man with the flushed cheeks and narrowed angry eyes, Alexander respectively pointed out,

“It is very easy Your Highness. Originally, that meeting was supposed to be between only Lord Assazd and me. We were supposed to discuss how to resolve the differences that I pointed out between the royal family and the broader nobility.”

“But then His Grace Amenheraft suddenly chose to accompany us at the last moment. This was very strange. Why did he choose such a time? Why not wait? Why did he not inform us sooner? Well, I was also unable to think of a reason before. But now I understand… it was so that he could poison us both!”

“Lies!”

“Nothing of such happened!”

“You were the ones who invited His Majesty.”

“Slave scume! You think the Esteemed Crown Prince would stoop to poison!”

No sooner had Alexander said this, another chorus erupted from the court and this time, the shouts were even louder. This was because many of what Alexander said was provably false, while others were mere wild conjectures created from one’s imagination.

However just due to the way Alexander said it, and the way the court reacted suddenly gave this air a great deal of weight.

It was quite a mysterious phenomenon but the gist of it was that no one person directly contested Alexander. Rather a mishmash of nobles all screamed whatever they wanted, often carrying various profanities.

This was not the way to hold dialogue; thus to many, the more Amenheraft’s men denied ever doing such a lowly act, the more suspicious they began to seem.

Layer on top of that they were in a civil war and there was already bad blood between the two, and all Alexander needed to do was give Lord Assazd’s men a suspect that sounded plausible on paper and they would do the rest by themselves.

“Silence!” Order was only restored in court upon another of Ptolomy’s maddening like bark.

And Alexander immediately took advantage of the following lull to spew out more of his poisonous rhetoric,

“Fortunatley, I had the grace of the Father granted to me Your Majesty. Thus the poisoner got confused when handling the cups and gave me the ’wrong’ glass. While the former crown prince fell into his own trap! Truly a just end!”

“..*Crack*..”

Witnessing the sagely visage that Alexander had put on by the end, many in court nearly broke their tooth- such was their raw anger!

“Hehe… Indeed, it is very true of what they say- Lord Alexander is a formidable orator!” Until finally, a single voice emerged from Amenheraft’s side.

Gruff and a bit croaking, it belonged to none other than the elderly Pasha Vivian, who revealed himself to the front of the crowd with slightly unsteady steps and a mocking sneer in his face, “We have heard a lot from your mouth. But all I would like to ask- what is your proof…that you slander our lord in such a heinous way?”

“That is quite funny. Because you never asked for proof when you were slandering me!” Alexander instantly shot the words straight back into the man’s mouth as they came.

“Snort!” To which the old man slightly shivered, brushing his hands imperiously, “You are a mere slave! How dare you compare yourself to the divine lineage? Is this what Your Majesty has become of you and the divine bloodline?”

Pasha Vivizan made the comment not to Alexander but directly with Ptolomy.

And this single act instantly proved how shrewd the old lord was. He had clearly noticed the fault between the two through their prior interaction and capitalized on it the moment he got the chance. He knew how to spot weaknesses that well.

While the dumb Ptolomy fell into the pit hook, line and sinker.

Urged by his will to depend and uplift his family, the plump man made a grave nod and acted just as his enemy wanted,

“Indeed! My brother is too noble to ever even think of such a thing! And Alexander was the sole survivor there. The three maids were also all from his side. So where is this ’poisonner’ he speaks of? Where could such a person come from? If it was not him?”

Ptolomy was further motivated to say this after what Alexander had said to him before, right now he was basically half mad for revenge. Hence when he saw Pasha Vivizan represent him with an open goal post, the foolish man took the shot without a second’s thought.

And although he did not quite understand it right now, the result of this was that he permanently ripped any chance of a truce with Alexander. What Ptolomy just said was not just throwing one under the bus- it was a betrayal similar to what they had done to Ceaser- a slaughter in the most sacred of the empire.

Hence Alexander was left with not even the slightest shred of doubt about the other’s feelings towards him.

’Darn it! If only I could convince Seelima and Farzah!’ Alexander swore so inside- meaning he wanted to kill Ptolomy- and he wanted to do it now.

“Your Majesty! You should not let the followers of the rebel prince sway you.” However since he lacked the political capital to carry out such an assassination right now, Alexander could only try his best with his tongue,

“If I was truly the poisoner, it makes no sense for me to kill Lord Assazd. And more glaring than that, it hear Lord Shahel was killed using the same poison… while I was sleeping in my room.”