Bad to the throne, p.4
Bad to the Throne, page 4
part #15 of The Good Guys Series
He had the room across from mine on the rather rickety second floor.
“I thought it might be best to leave with you, your grace,” he said. “I doubt we will have a pleasant night here.”
“How about we switch rooms?” I asked, picking up what he was asking.
“I would appreciate that,” he said with a bow of his head, crossing into my room without saying nothing else.
And I went into his, pulling a sword out of my bag and sitting down on the floor, waiting to see who was going to be stupid first.
9
Somewhere in the middle of the night, probably around the time the innkeep had passed out from sipping deeply on his own supply, someone tried to break down the door.
I had been reading a book I’d found in the bag, an absolutely scintillating treatise on the proper breeds of cattle for various climates and biomes, when there was a massive thud against the door.
I tossed the book aside and stood up, stretching my body a little as I tried to determine what to do.
Slicing down the door could work.
But was extreme violence the answer here?
“Just burn it all down,” whispered a voice from the other side, slurring their words.
Great.
Maybe I didn’t need the sword. I dropped it and let it stick in the wood floor.
I kicked the door as hard as I could, and it flew off its hinges, smashing into the group beyond.
I charged forward, dropping my shoulder and slamming into the door, squishing more than a few members of the crowd against the far wall.
“Yarblefalrge!” someone screamed.
I grabbed the door and snapped it in two, throwing both pieces behind me and glaring at the drunks.
There was immediate silence in the hallway.
Drunken farmers stood in pairs all the way down the stairs. A quick count put them at least twelve. Three had been smushed via the door (and myself) and were in various states of disrepair. Not at all conscious, but seeming mostly alive.
“You broke the door,” I said, pointing at the ruins of the door.
That caused a bit of confusion.
“But you–” the lead drunk stammered.
I held up a hand.
“I don’t think so,” I snapped. “You’re drunk and I don’t think you know what the hell you’re doing, do you?”
“Um? No?”
“We’re killing the snake thing!” someone called out.
“Do I look like a snake thing?” I called back.
“I can’t see you!”
“He’s not a snake,” a different drunk called out.
“He’s got the snake?”
“Tell him to kill the snake!”
“I’m not—” I started, but I was being shouted over.
“No, he’s not the snake. He’s someone else.”
“Who?”
“What?”
“Someone needs to get these asshats off the floor,” I yelled out. “And probably to a healer.”
“I’m fine,” said the idiot right in front of me, who had not been clobbered by the door, or myself.
“Leave the snake alone,” I snapped. “Anyone who tries otherwise has to go through me.”
“Is he big?” someone who couldn’t see me called out.
“Eh,” someone else replied.
“I’ll take him,” a particularly enthusiastic drunk shouted, and started forcing his way through the rest of the louts to get to the front.
Which she did.
She was tiny.
Five feet nothing, and her clothes likely weighed more than she did.
She wobbled like a weeble as she started looking down at my feet and then took a long time to work her way up me until she was staring nearly vertically to look up at my face.
“Fuck,” she breathed.
“You’re gonna take on me?” I asked.
“Nope,” she said, shaking her head. “Him.”
She pointed at one of the drunks, and then grabbed the man’s arm and hauled him away.
It took a goodly amount of time before the crowd dispersed, but eventually I was left in the hallway by myself with the remains of the door behind me.
The door to my original room opened a little, and Vengai peeked out.
“Bit loud out here,” he said. “Care to keep it down?”
I smiled.
He smiled.
Then he shut the door in my face, and, I suppose, went to bed.
10
The innkeep was still passed out when we trooped down the stairs the next morning. His wife was in the middle of cleaning the mess of the night while grousing at her unconscious husband.
She glared at us.
“You do this?” she gestured at everything.
“No ma’am,” I said. “Don’t drink.”
She frowned.
“Heard there was a fight here last night. Sent three men to healers.”
“There were some people who got into a bit of a kerfuffle and broke a door.”
“Heard it was some big fellow who broke the door and broke their skulls.”
“Must have been someone else. We were sleeping, right?”
“And what are those?”
She pointed at the goblins.
“Are those goblins?”
“Of course not,” I snapped. “What do you take me for? Good day, madam.”
I stomped out of the inn before she could question us further, and we strolled along our way a little quicker than I think anyone expected we would.
11
Days two and three went largely the same as day one, although with more and more chatter happening in the group. It was just like being with a group of friends — except for me. I was still very much seen as a duke, so whenever I spoke, people became polite, or, in the case of Albrecht, almost pointedly disrespectful. It seemed like something had happened to him after I managed to win Rumib Pass. Maybe it was something to do with being right. That he’d wanted to retreat, and I’d pulled off the impossible victory. Was he salty over things?
There was nothing, in particular, I could do about that though.
I managed to get a little conversation out of Vengai, trying to understand more about kobolds.
Vengai represented the Mountain Kingdom, and they held the area under the mountains directly north of Glaton.
The guy didn’t actually warm up to me until, I think, he realized I wasn’t asking for specifics about his place so much as just trying to understand more about kobolds in general.
“I’ve heard talk about the old ways,” I asked. “Could you tell me more about what the old ways were?”
He thought for a moment. “The old ways are somewhat misnamed,” Vengai began. “I will do my best to explain, but please understand that I am by no means an expert on kobolds. My skills lie in interacting with others, not necessarily in the biology or history of my people.”
“Got it.”
“Kobolds believe the gods created them to service dragons, who in turn were created to protect this planet, this world. And perhaps there is some truth to that.”
“Big job for the little guys.”
“You may say that because, when left to their own devices, or shall I say when left to our own devices, things can become a bit…chaotic.”
I laughed, thinking of all the circular conversations I’d had with Baltu.
“But when kobolds have a guiding hand in what they do, they see huge progression. They are more than capable of following orders. You see my form as it is now, and you may wonder how it is that I still call myself a kobold. And that is the other unique thing about our species. I do not believe it was until our interaction with other species, other cultures, that we embraced the concept of the Choice. Prior to that, everything was through evolutions. Kobolds have many evolutions that they can unlock and progress through. As you can see, I have progressed from the kobold, to the naga, to the naga nanata.”
“Oh, so you can evolve past a single point?”
“We can. It is a shame that kobolds have never been eager to record their history. Much of it is lost. Whatever great kobold civilizations may have existed, there is no record of. But it is assumed that at some point, perhaps during one of the many dragon wars, kobolds and dragons got separated, and it was no longer common to find dragons who employed kobolds.”
“Seems like a big schism to not have details about.”
“Basically, all we know of the old traditions has come from searching the histories of other cultures for mentions of ourselves. Now, I presume what you really want to know about when you ask of the old ways are the evolutions.”
“Well, I wanted to know about the old ways that pertain to the evolutions.”
“They do. There is no guided notion of how to unlock an evolution, and in truth it does not seem that there is any one definitive means. What works for one kobold to become a naga does not necessarily work for another. Similarly, there are no guaranteed means to become a Kohemoth, or a Swolebold, or a Narfon. But there is a collected sense of what any of these paths would mean, and the old ways were an attempt to promote evolution. There were certain elements that were, shall we say, encouraged certain behaviors, and there were — well, I would hesitate to call them punishments, so much as a means to present alternative pathways as less pleasant. If you did not seek an evolution, there was a general belief that you were not worthy of receiving the full benefit of being in whatever clutch or grouping you had found yourself within.”
“What would they do to you?”
“Well, for example, if you were a kobold who was happy being a kobold, you would not receive full rations. You would only get enough to keep you from starving. That’s, of course, in times of rationing. If the clutch is particularly flush with food, it is generally given to everyone.”
“Okay, so…”
“The key is that you are at the bottom of the pecking order, so to say,” he began.“In addition, it was the determination of each individual ruler which evolutions their kingdom or under-mountain would seek. They would be the one who would look at the kobolds and determine what evolutions would be best for both the individual and the kingdom as a whole.”
“Did that actually work?”
“It presented its own challenges. You might have a ruler who is not particularly wise, or has beliefs that don’t necessarily align with reality. Or you might have a ruler who is willing to do anything to achieve their goals, including things that are not necessarily the best for individual kobolds. It was very common to move through the gloom and wage a war solely to gain XP and grind toward potential evolutions.”
“How many forms of evolutions are there?”
“It is not known. And even what we do know is something of a kobold secret. Some of our forms are... some of our evolutions are particularly useful, and therefore better kept close to the vest. If you Glatonese become true allies, perhaps we will share that.”
“Well, what if just Coggeshall became a true ally?”
“That is your land, is it?”
“That’s right.”
“Our ruler has mentioned that there is a somewhat unique relationship between kobolds and yourself. That you accepted the men when they had nowhere else to go, when they were left behind.”
“Also correct.”
“But that presents you in both a good and a bad light. For the reason they were left behind is they were not considered worthy by their ruler, who sought to join my liege.”
“So on the one hand, while I am sure there will be a certain amount of... benevolence that you are so kind to kobolds, what we left behind was little more than trash.”
“Wow — that’s pretty harsh, Vengai.”
“It is just our way. Kobolds should desire to be more. Those who don’t... well, we tend to wish them well. But they are not of ours. We don’t see them as true kobolds any longer if they have no wish to evolve. No wish to make kobold better.”
“I mean, I guess.”
“Perhaps that is an unpleasant means of viewing it. But kobolds have been on our back feet for a long time. We have fought for little more than the chance to survive, dealing with a position of... poverty. And we are forced to make difficult decisions like who is allowed to eat, or who must sacrifice themselves so that others may live. But things are changing. We are finding success. And while we would welcome all kobolds who come to join us, we are not going to reach out and try to force those who have no motivation to better themselves. Not yet, at least. I would like to believe that day will come. But that day is not today.”
“Fair enough.”
“So, Duke of Coggeshall, my orders are to nurture and grow a relationship with Glaton, the Empire. And while I gladly consider you, Montana, a friend, I cannot make any promises as to how my liege lord will view you, the duke, in the future.”
I gave him a nod. It was a lot to think about.
For one thing, I wouldn’t exactly say the kobolds I had saved from the goblin invasion were unmotivated. They were just the ones ordered to remain behind. Their “queen” deemed them unworthy and then ran off to join this other liege lord when greener pastures presented themselves eastward.
But that clearly wasn’t the story the queen had told the ruler. I wasn’t about to get into the weeds with Vengai over that. I still had to travel with the guy for a while, and I still wanted to be friends with his ruler. Even though we were very far apart, we did kind of share a mountain.
“In any case, I would love to know more about evolutions, and kobolds in general.” I said. “If you’d like to tell me.”
“I will think on it,” Vengai said. “It is a topic that I believe most kobolds are both desirous of speaking on, and yet, eager to hold secret.”
12
On the afternoon of the third day, we made it to our destination.
Romainmont was a town. I’ll say that much for it. It actually had a few houses, so it was more of a place than most of the spots we’d come to along that non-royal road. And it had a small Caravaners’ Guild outpost, two competing taverns, a general store, and something that, despite appearances, totally wasn’t a brothel. I know because there was a sign outside saying, ‘Not a Borthel,’ which I took to be a typo. Or I guess a misspelling, since there was no typing involved.
There looked to have been walls around the town at some point, but it seemed like people had taken to pulling stones off the walls to build their homes and businesses, so now they were left with a thick stone fence. More of a suggestion off stopping an invasion than anything that could actually repel an army. Or an irritated group of beavers. A few guards lounged around near the spot where the ‘fence’ met the wall. They had armor near them, in a stack next to a barrel filled with spears. Clearly not expecting trouble.
If only Coggeshall was a place like that… I could dream.
By the time the sun was setting, we’d gotten rooms in the inn, The Rusty Weasel. Which made it sound like something else entirely than the pleasant inn it was. And because it was a reasonably large place, we had four rooms. I got one, Vengai and Albrecht each got one, and then Phillipe and the goblins got the last one. Which basically meant Philippe had a room to himself, because the goblins invariably wound up sleeping on top of me.
Being that we still had to wait for dinner to be cooked, I took some time to myself, laying down on the bed, staring at the ceiling, and pretending to relax.
There was a knock on my door.
Albrecht came in before I could answer.
“I came to speak with you,” he said.
“Not to cuddle?”
He frowned. Apparently, the man didn’t like jokes. Or being touched.
“Before we get to that,” I said, “you know, whatever you wanted to talk about — I want to know if you’re irritated with me.”
“Your grace?”
“I mean, you’re kind of a jerk now, when you used to be all nice and respectful before. So I’m just worried that I pissed you off, maybe because I was right and you were wrong and–”
“Ah, right. No, your grace, I would be a rather poor advisor if I were to get emotional over our mutual rights and wrongs. I most certainly underestimated you, and I appreciate learning your capabilities.”
“So, what changed then?”
“I thought you might respond better to a more forceful approach. Someone who treats you as an equal, or even a lesser.”
“So it was a mind game?”
“Of sorts. But I was not seeing success with it, so I was going to change modalities again.”
“Why not be honest and be yourself?”
“Because myself might not be what is most useful in this situation.”
“That’s crazy talk. Just be yourself.”
He took a breath, and, in my mind at least, promptly ignored what I’d just said.
“I have spoken with his highness. He has requested that you remain in place here until he sends for you.”
“Oh.”
“I take it that means you will ignore him?”
“Well, I don’t particularly enjoy being sent for.”
“If it is the phrasing that bothers you, that was certainly not the intent of his highness. He merely wished you to wait until what he has put in place has been accomplished.”
“It’s not that. I just don’t want to wait. I’m tired of waiting. Both in terms of being here and being away from Coggeshall. I’m not doing anything–”
“Need I remind you that you have managed to almost single-handedly halt an invasion?”
“I don’t need a reminder. But I would prefer to–”
“If you return to the capital too early, this entire sojourn would be in vain.”
I put my hands behind my head and looked back at the ceiling, doing my best to calm down. I wasn’t mad at Albrecht, just at the stupid politics of the realm. There was no use to all the nonsense we were going through as Senators. It was just stupid.
“I take it you are considering the prince’s ask?”
“We’re not moving, are we?”
