The palace in Ironford was a nice place, Gaius had to admit, especially since he was a prisoner. Despite this, he was afforded all the care and comfort he could ask for; the only thing he couldn’t do was leave. If he wanted something to eat, it would be brought to him. If he wanted something to read, again, a palace servant would fetch it.

Following his surrender, Gaius found himself relaxing far more than he ever thought he would. He never really realized just how heavy the weight of serving under Prince Octavius had been, even when he had been reassigned as a rank-and-file bureaucrat following his knighting.

‘Damn fine situation I’ve been in if being a prisoner is a more relaxing position…’ Gaius couldn’t help but think to himself on several occasions.

As a prisoner of Marquis Herrenia and Prince August, the only source of stress that Gaius had was that after being processed, not a single person had come to interrogate him. The important people had, for a week following his surrender, left him alone.

This couldn’t last, he knew that. Someone would have to come, it was only a matter of time. He wondered who it would be when the time came.

He had a sinking feeling that he knew who it was going to be already.

---

“Me?” Leon asked, his face contorting in confusion.

“Yes,” Minerva matter-of-factly replied.

“Why?” Leon inquired.

“Because you know Gaius Tullius. You went to the Knight Academy with him, you have a history with him. Not to mention I believe that your knight, Dame Valeria, even grew up close enough to him to have been childhood friends.” As she gave this order, Minerva passed Leon a slip of paper with the Royal seal upon it, which would give him access to the palace wing where the prisoners were being held.

Standing nearby, Valeria cringed a bit and said, “I wouldn’t go that far, we were friendly, we weren’t friends…”

“Regardless, the two of you have the most rapport with him. If he says anything about Octavius’ plans, then it’ll be to the two of you.”

“I’m not so sure about that…” Leon said as his history with Gaius replayed itself in his mind. “He and I have never seen eye-to-eye… and that would be to put it mildly. He had a couple of my friends beaten in the streets of the capital before.”

“Then play the bad guy to Valeria’s good. Just go talk to him, if you don’t get anything out of him then I’ll send in someone else.”

Understanding that this was the last Minerva was going to say on the matter, Leon sighed and led Valeria out of Minerva’s temporary office in the Ironford Palace.

It had been a few days since the Consul of the Central Territories inexplicably pulled both the 1st and 4th Legions back from the pass. Roland stayed behind to watch the pass just in case they came back, while Minerva, Brimstone, and all of their retainers returned to Ironford with August and Marquis Herrenia. If Octavius wasn’t going to pressure them by leaving Legions on their front doorstep, then they were going to make full use of it. Over the next few days, hundreds of letters were sent and a few comm stone calls were placed, pulling half a dozen Legions and ensuring that Constantine at the Bull’s Horns was still supporting them.

Minerva, in particular, threw herself into this organization, letting August take control of the internal affairs. She figured out the logistics of keeping the Legions moving toward Ironford and how many they could reasonably pull without damaging the internal security of the Eastern Territories while August shored up his alliances with the eastern Lords and made overtures with the northern Lords—the Northern Territories were, even after all of this, still filled with landed nobles who hadn’t declared for either August or Octavius, and even the Consul of the North had yet to weigh in.

Out of everyone, it was the Consul of the North who everyone in the Kingdom had their eye upon. He controlled a dozen Legions, a staggering amount of force that could swing the balance of power back in August’s direction, balancing out Octavius’ control of the Western, Southern, and Central Territories.

But Leon wasn’t tracking all of that too closely. He mostly trained with Valeria and Alix while Minerva, with a relatively shrewd understanding of where Leon’s skills lay, gave him some time off. Most of the work now was logistics, diplomacy, and paperwork, none of which Leon was particularly talented at.

Work doesn’t stay away forever, though, and now Leon found himself and Valeria outside of Gaius’ quarters. Most of the Lords and high-ranking knights that had been taken prisoner were kept in the same wing of the palace, within which were about a hundred guards keeping an eye on the doors and making sure no one was going anywhere. Leon simply nodded to the guards on either side of Gaius’ door and showed them his pass. They opened the door and the two strode in without hesitation.

They found Gaius quietly meditating on the floor in front of a small window, through which passed a pleasant breeze. He didn’t look up from his meditations, but he said, “Finally come to talk a bit, have we?”

“We have,” Leon answered. “We’d like to know what Octavius is planning and… well, anything and everything that you can tell us about the composition of his faction.”

Gaius looked over his shoulder with an almost dismissive smile. For a moment, his expression was one of condescension, of the expected defiance that any noble ought to make in the face of his captors.

And then he saw that Valeria was here too and he froze in place, the smile on his face vanishing like it had never been there at all. He stared at her for several long, silent seconds, and then he turned back around.

Leon gave Valeria an odd look, but she shrugged in response. He wasn’t about to go asking her about Gaius’ strange behavior while Gaius was still in the room, though, as even he knew that while he was there to ask questions, it was best not to act completely ignorant.

He waited for almost half a minute while Gaius composed himself. The young third-tier nobleman was partially obscured by the light flooding in through his window, so Leon couldn’t see his expression, but he was a patient man and he could wait for Gaius to turn back around. Well, he could wait a while, but he wouldn’t stand there like a hapless goon for hours while Gaius ignored him if the nobleman wanted to play games with him.

Fortunately, Leon didn’t have to wait long before Gaius rose from the carpet and turned back to face them, a jovial and welcoming smile gracing his classically handsome features.

“My Lady, if I had known you were going to come here, I might’ve… well, I don’t know what I could’ve done—I am a prisoner here, after all—but I would’ve made better preparations…”

“It’s fine,” Valeria stoically replied.

“… Right,” Gaius replied, clearly a little put off by the curtness of Valeria’s response.

“To get back to our questions…” Leon said, drawing attention back to himself.

“Yes, please give voice to them,” Gaius said as walked over to a small table set up in his room, to which he waved Leon and Valeria to join him at.

“As I said, we want to know everything about Octavius’ faction. Who are the strongest people in it? Who are the weakest? Who might be willing to defect? Has anyone stepped up to bankroll their armies without eastern silver?”

Gaius listened to Leon’s questions without interruption, and when Leon was finished, the nobleman sat there, silently staring at Leon and Valeria. To Leon, it seemed almost like he was going to have to ask again, and much more forcefully, but Valeria spoke up first.

“You’re not acting like I expected you would, Gaius,” she whispered, taking both of the other men completely by surprise.

“Huh?” Gaius muttered in confusion, a sentiment that was reflected in Leon’s brief questioning glance at Valeria.

“I just… thought you’d be more… I don’t know… arrogant?” she continued. “If this had happened to you five years ago, I think you would’ve been screaming and demanding that we release you with an official apology. Or something like that. You’re acting too calm… and too resigned.”

Something in Gaius seemed to crack so visibly that even Leon noticed it. The nobleman’s face fell, the smile collapsing in upon itself until only a shell of a man remained. Even his posture shifted, going from straight and proper to so slumped down that Leon almost thought he was looking at a different man. The difference was like day and night.

“… It’s been a long few years,” Gaius croaked, his voice raspy as if he could barely form the words. He then took a deep breath as if to steady himself, and then said, “I know my duty, and I can’t say anything. My personal feelings don’t matter.”

“So you’re just doing all of this out of obligation?” Valeria asked. “You don’t believe in Octavius’ cause?”

Leon frowned slightly when Valeria said this, but he said nothing.

“If you knew what I know about that man…” Gaius muttered before quickly cutting himself off.

“And what do you know about that man?” Valeria pressed on. She leaned in slightly, entreating Gaius to speak by staring at him directly in the eye. “What you say now can save a lot of lives, Gaius. None of us want this to go on, and if you know something that can help us bring this war to a close, then I would like to hear it…”

Gaius stared back at Valeria, an expression on his face that Leon couldn’t quite read. It seemed both desperate and defiant, and if Leon had to make a guess, he’d say that Gaius’ sense of duty and what he wanted to do were pulling him in two different directions.

Deciding to speak up, Leon said, “If you tell us what you know, we can see that you’re released without ransom. Hells, if you want to, you can even turn to our side…”

Gaius glared at Leon as if he were interrupting something private between himself and Valeria, but he didn’t refrain from responding, though he did turn back to Valeria before speaking.

“I never wanted any of this. I was made Prince Octavius’ squire because he specifically asked for me. It was a way of taking me as a hostage to ensure my family’s support without directly taking me hostage.”

Valeria’s eyes widened slightly, but she kept her composure. Leon, meanwhile, had no discernible reaction, though he was quite intrigued already.

“In Prince Octavius’ service, I found out what kind of a man he is. Selfish. Arrogant. Unconcerned with the opinions of those he believes to be beneath him. The well-being of the people of this Kingdom means nothing to him. He surrounds himself with the nobility in order to feel better about the fact that His Majesty was forcing him to share power with his younger brother, which gave him an enormous chip on his shoulder. Since August’s mother is a commoner and Octavius’ mother is the daughter of one of the most powerful nobles in the Kingdom, he leaned hard into his noble identity to separate himself from his brother.”

At this point, Leon cocked an eyebrow in curiosity. He wasn’t sure what the tactical or strategic uses for this information could be, but he didn’t interrupt.

“Most of the nobles who support him, however, have somewhat more… practical reasons for following him. He’s essentially promised certain privileges and favors to nearly all those who have pledged their support to him. Or at least, the most influential of his supporters. Count Whitefield, for instance, was promised to have all Legion elements within his lands removed.”

“All of them?” Leon asked incredulously. Fort 127 was in Whitefield’s County, and if that place was abandoned by the Legion, there would be little to stop any future Valeman raids into the Kingdom from that particular pass into the Northern Vales.

“All of them,” Gaius confirmed. “He made many promises to other nobles, too, such as promising to end the investigations into Duke Decimius’ alleged illegal activities.”

“So, most of these people are only following him for the practical benefits that he promised them?” Valeria asked.

“Yes, or they’re following Octavius because one of these influential people are following him,” Gaius said. “With the Count of Tarsus dead, I’m sure Octavius’ position in the Central Territories has been greatly weakened.”

“Would you have any insights as to how to exploit these promises or that weakness?” Leon asked.

“None at the moment,” Gaius admitted. “Hells, most of them were made years ago, and I’m sure that Prince Octavius has made good on most of them by now. I wouldn’t really know at this point, I was transferred to a meaningless post in his personal retinue after being knighted and have barely even seen the Prince at all in the past year.”

Gaius’ voice took on a bitter and resentful tone as he said this, which Leon could completely understand.

In fact, to an extent, he couldn’t help but feel that Gaius’ journey was something of a dark reflection of his in its own way. They were both taken in by Princes because of their families, but whereas Leon was mentored by the bold, idealistic, and honest Trajan, Gaius was given to the deceitful and insecure Octavius. And now, because of these two Princes, Leon and Gaius had gone to war.

Leon, Valeria, and Gaius spoke for about half an hour, with Gaius telling them all about his time in Octavius’ service, from the allowances the Prince gave for Earthshaker’s depravities to the nuances that Gaius could remember about Octavius’ relationships with the nobles that supported him. It wasn’t much if Leon were to be honest, but he was sure that August would be interested in it anyway. That Octavius was letting Earthshaker rape common girls alone was something that Leon was sure the Prince would want to know about.

“Is that it?” Leon asked as he put away the paper he’d written everything down upon.

“That’s all I can remember right now,” Gaius said.

“Very well. We may return, but I think we’ve got everything we need,” Leon replied, not feeling the need to keep Gaius sweating. He’d been defiant when Leon had first walked in, but after Valeria prodded him a bit, he’d been quite forthcoming with what had been asked of him.

Leon and Valeria both stood up to leave, but Gaius, it seemed, wasn’t quite finished.

“Val, could you wait a moment?” Gaius asked.

Valeria paused and looked to Leon, who in turn glanced at both of the other two. He saw some hurt in Gaius’ eyes when Valeria didn’t immediately agree and instead looked to him, but he saw nothing in Valeria except some mild curiosity.

“We can stay a moment,” Leon said, not particularly inclined to leave his knight alone with Gaius, even if she was Valeria Isynos.

Gaius frowned a bit, but he simply took a deep breath, made eye contact with Valeria—who had turned back around to wait for him to speak—and said, “I’m sorry. I was always too pushy when we were younger, and I know that I was annoying. For all that, I apologize.”

Valeria blinked in surprise, was silent for a long few seconds, and then said, “These few years really have been tough, haven’t they?”

“I’ve had to endure much that my conscience tortures me over even to this day,” Gaius whispered. “If you could do me a favor, instead of sending my ransom request to Octavius, could you send it to my family in Lentia? Just in case it wasn’t already…”

“… Of course,” Valeria replied.

“Thank you,” Gaius responded as he slumped back in his chair. Leon could tell that the past half hour, and the apology just now, had been draining for him, and even with their rocky history, he couldn’t help but feel some sympathy for the young defeated man before him.

More than that, hearing of Gaius’ situation had given him quite a few things to mull over about his situation.

But there was nothing more for either Leon or Valeria to say. They had their information, and it was time to go. They left Gaius, letting him get some much-needed rest.