The flashbacks (parts in italics have mentions of violence
Anlai had decided that it was not possible for him to hate a man more than he hated the pretentious Emperor sitting before him.
He reclined in his chair lazily, rocking back in it, feet resting on the table, muddying the no doubt important papers. Tipping his head back, he stared determinedly at the ceiling, purposely looking anywhere but at the Emperor.
Just looking at him filled him with such rage that he found it hard to think straight. But, after many long years after he had sacrificed his freedom for the rebellion, he had gotten rather good at acting like he was the perfectly obedient soldier that he was expected to be.
He had also managed to drum up quite the reputation for being more than slightly aggressive and tended to do whatever the hell he wanted whenever he wanted. His certain disregard for authority was so useful for masking his true intentions that nobody ever bothered to ask where he went when he disappeared for weeks at a time.
"Am I boring you, General?" the Emperor's voice rang clearly across the room, causing everybody in it to still and hold their breath in a collective silence.
Anlai dropped back to earth with a sigh. "Yes," he said simply.
The room had become so silent that he feared that his words had caused the spontaneous combustion of the council members. The Emperor had ordered the death of other men for saying things less rude in his presence.
It stayed that way for a few more seconds before the Emperor laughed, the sound doing a better job of scaring him than his harsh words.
Uncertainly, the other occupants of the room began to laugh, the sound so timid that it was comical.
Concealing his smirk, he stared unabashedly back at the Emperor.
His clothes consisted of a fine coat-embroidered with so many jewels and swirling patterns it was almost gaudy-a sword with the hilt so ladened with jewels Anlai debated whether it was real or if it was there for the show. It must have been incredibly heavy and wouldn't have too much use, but Anlai knew that the Emperor would have been more than capable of using it to gut more than a few men.
The Emperor's rise to power was littered with more than a few bodies, and rumours of his battle prowess were still whispered around the campfires of the wretched army encampments that he supposedly controlled.
The Emperor still insisted on wearing a variation of the traditional uniform for the army.
Why he did it, Anlai wasn't sure. The Emperor hadn't been seen fighting on an active battlefield since before the siege. The Emperor didn't need to prove how strong he was when even the strongest in the court were too afraid of him to ever dare to try to overthrow him.
And that was exactly what he was trying to do, combining his efforts with the rebellion. Gods, help us all.
There were rumours circulating the court about the way that the Emperor ruled - all baseless fear and no actions of strength. If there was one thing that the Cardovins valued, it was their strength, and if their leader was seemingly so very, very weak, then something would have to be done.
"You're lucky that I need you, General," the Emperor said.
"I know," he replied jauntily, not really caring that he was one slip of the tongue away from pushing the Emperor so far that he would earn a one-way ticket to the dungeons to await his execution.
"Shall we move onto something more exciting, then? We can't have the famed General of the Army being bored, now can we?" His words were smooth and too silky to mask the underlying threat. I might tolerate your dissent for now, but if you continue to step out of line like this, well, I will have to step in.
YOU ARE READING
The Gathering of the Hunt
Fantezie"No," she whispered. "No." The silence that followed was all consuming, the steady trickle of blood from the cooling corpse that lay on the floor echoing loudly through the cave. Their words echoed through he head; do not forget us, child of the as...
