Chapter 2: THE WARLORD COLLECTS A DEBT

RAIGORO’S POV

On the morning Daric entered Valence to deliver Blackharrow’s claim on Selena, Raigoro Kael stood inside the ruins of the Third Watchtower.

The tower had lost its roof and most of its eastern wall. Burned stone covered the courtyard among broken shields and blackened bones, while snow settled into the gaps as quickly as Blackharrow’s men could clear them.

Engineers were already examining what remained of the ward supports. Quartermasters counted weapons that could still be salvaged, healers moved among the wounded, and two clerks worked through the names of the dead before the weather could hide anything else.

A glint beneath the ash caught Raigoro’s attention.

He uncovered a cloak clasp marked with a hawk.

Captain Toren had worn it for nineteen years.

Raigoro closed his hand around the metal. Toren had commanded the Third Watch, but long before that, he had taught Raigoro how to hold a sword, judge a frightened horse, and recognize when a nobleman intended to lie before opening his mouth.

Toren’s family would receive the clasp. Blackharrow would keep his name on the memorial wall.

Neither was what Raigoro had promised them when he sent Toren to the Third Watch.

A clerk approached with the casualty ledger.

"Forty-eight confirmed, Your Grace. Two more died during evacuation. Seven remain unaccounted for."

Raigoro took the ledger and read the final page himself.

"Death grants begin today. Toren’s household receives the captain’s pension and winter allotment. Confirm the same support for every dependent on this list."

"The treasury office has already released the first payments."

"Verify them anyway."

"Yes, Your Grace."

Raigoro returned the ledger just as Daric came through the ruined gate.

"We found the final supply chamber."

The chamber lay beneath what remained of the tower. Raigoro followed him down a flight of stone steps until they reached a warped wooden door, which Daric opened with one kick.

The room beyond was nearly bare.

Wooden racks lined the walls, each marked for supplies that never came.

VALENCE GRAIN.

VALENCE MEDICINE.

VALENCE WARD MATERIALS.

No grain sacks filled the shelves. No medicine chests stood beneath their markings, and the racks reserved for wardstone and repair components held nothing but dust.

Three folded documents remained on a desk.

Each carried King Odran’s seal.

Raigoro opened the first. The requested grain would be considered after the harvest.

The second blamed poor roads for delayed medicine and ward materials.

The third promised soldiers once the Southern council completed another review.

Daric looked around the empty chamber. "The roads were clear."

"I know."

"The harvest filled their ports."

"I know."

"They never intended to send anyone."

Raigoro folded the letters along their original lines.

The Third Watch had sent six formal requests for treaty support. Valence had answered three, and every answer had found a different way to postpone help until it no longer mattered.

Blackharrow had covered what shortages it could from its own warehouses and neighboring markets. Blackharrow could buy grain, medicine, steel, horses, and labor.

What he could not purchase after the attack were the soldiers promised to Toren before the fighting began, the engineers who should have reinforced the failing ward, or the hours lost while Southern access remained delayed.

Daric placed another document on the desk.

"This arrived from our embassy."

Raigoro broke the seal.

The report described foreign princes, hunting parties, musicians, imported wine, and jewels commissioned for Princess Selena Valence. King Odran was holding an alliance banquet, and the listed cost of the celebration made every excuse in the letters more insulting.

Daric read over his shoulder.

"Perhaps their roads are only passable when carrying roses."

Raigoro set the report beside Odran’s correspondence. Above them, recovery teams were still carrying bodies from the snow.

Odran had pleaded strained harvests and soldiers needed elsewhere while delaying engineers, military passage, and ward support. Blackharrow had continued guarding the same kingdoms whose princes were now drinking at his tables.

Raigoro crossed to the far wall, where a map of the Ashen Gate had survived the attack.

Three black marks showed where corrupted creatures had crossed weakened sections of the northern ward during the past month.

The marks were moving south.

"How long before the main ward fails?" he asked.

"Our ward keepers cannot agree."

"How long does the most frightened one give us?"

"Six months."

"And the most proud?"

"Two years."

Raigoro planned for six months.

The covenant had been created for exactly this danger. Valence owed food, medicine, engineers, soldiers, ward support, and emergency access. Blackharrow held the Ashen Gate and maintained the dragon defenses protecting the southern realms.

No ruler had invoked the marriage clause in generations, but Blackharrow had continued fighting without it.

Valence had learned to mistake that continued protection for permission to neglect everything it owed in return.

Daric came to stand beside him.

"Odran will not honor the covenant."

"He may refuse."

"He will refuse."

Raigoro took the old treaty seal from its leather case.

"If he refuses before witnesses, every kingdom protected by this pass will know who broke the alliance."

Daric studied the seal. "And if he offers gold?"

"He can pay whatever gold the treaty requires. Gold does not replace men or ward support."

"Soldiers?"

"We take every soldier owed to us."

"A different bride?"

"No."

That answer made Daric pause.

Raigoro placed the seal on the desk beside Odran’s letters.

"Odran gathered suitors for Selena from across the Five Crowns while Toren waited for reinforcements Odran had already promised."

"You intend to claim the princess."

"I intend to invoke the covenant."

"For revenge."

Raigoro looked past him at the empty shelves.

"Revenge would be burning his banquet hall."

He placed Odran’s letters over the casualty list.

"This is collection."

Daric unfolded the covenant. Age had faded the ink, but the relevant words remained clear.

The First Princess of the Southern Crown.

"Selena is Odran’s heir," Daric said. "He will contest every word."

"Then he can do it before the kingdoms whose borders we defend."

"He may threaten war."

"He has no army prepared for the Ashen Gate."

"He may appeal to the other rulers."

"They have graves in our mountains too."

Daric picked up the treaty seal.

"You want me to deliver it."

"The banquet gives us the witnesses we need."

"You want me to interrupt it."

"I want every prince in that hall to hear which kingdom paid for the road that carried him there."

A healer had already wrapped Daric’s arm, but fresh blood was beginning to show through the cloth.

"I should change my cloak."

"No."

Daric glanced down at the stain.

Raigoro turned toward the stairs.

"Let them see where you came from."

Using the relay horses maintained along the treaty road, Daric reached Valence before evening.

Raigoro remained at the Third Watchtower. He helped carry the last bodies from the eastern room, inspected claw marks along the broken gate, reviewed damaged ward markers with the engineers, and listened while survivors described creatures attacking in groups too disciplined for wild beasts.

Then he waited for Odran to begin bargaining.

The Southern answer arrived near dawn.

Daric returned with twelve Northern riders after changing horses at every treaty post, his boots still carrying ash and road mud from the journey.

He entered the command tent and set a sealed document before Raigoro.

"He accepted."

Raigoro left it untouched.

"Accepted what?"

"The marriage demand."

"No conditions?"

"None written."

"No request for delay?"

"No."

"No proposal to restore the treaty support first?"

"Nothing."

Only then did Raigoro break the seal.

King Odran’s acceptance required half a page. Princess Selena would enter the Blood-and-Flame Covenant, and the wedding could take place as soon as the Grand Duke reached Valence.

Odran had delayed soldiers, engineers, medicine, and ward support for months, yet before sunrise, he had surrendered the daughter he had spent years presenting as the future of his kingdom.

Raigoro read the acceptance again.

Odran had fought Blackharrow over grain, engineers, roads, soldiers, and ward materials. Yet he had surrendered Selena before dawn.

Why?

Raigoro folded the page. Whatever Odran expected to gain from this marriage, Raigoro intended to find it before the king could use it.

"Prepare the escort."

Daric remained beside the table.

"You believe him?"

Raigoro folded the acceptance and placed it over the Third Watch casualty list.

"No."

He fastened his sword belt.

"That is why I am going myself."