Spacious and not lacking in grandeur the halls of the imperial throne room was a silverine venue of splendor with black marble pillars and floors with red banners and a matching long carpet stretching its length.
Here is where the lords one and all from the willful and borderline traitorous northerners to the more pliable and amicable southerners.
Self serving fools one and all. This was the thought of Emperor Hortensius Domitus, who viewed his court as a house cards. Only the cards were liable to stab each other as they toppled over. At least those of the south had sense enough to behave.
He hated them all. Threats, violence, consorting. A number of his daughters had been taken from him by way of poison or other vile means.
Eventually he stopped marrying them off disowning them and sending them to convents for their own safety.
His sons too had been murdered or coincidentally killed in battle with wounds in their backs or mysteriously dying in their cribs as infants.
The closest thing he had had to a still living son was Elwin a war orphan he had fostered and the commander of the black guards first company.
He placed a hand on his left arm remembering the wound that child soldier had managed to give him while defending his little friend so many years ago.
He pretended to smooth the fabric of the cape which hung from his shoulder so as to not let any emotion show before any onlookers his wrinkled face stalwart.
Elwin, oh Elwin why did you run to your death boy, was it to atone for allowing Decitus to die?
If it were possible I would have adopted you officially, I couldn't have made you my heir but a title and a father, I wish I could have given you that. Alas it was a mere passing wish of a man foolishly indulging in the luxury of sentiment.
There was still a bastard child but he was born in secret and liable still to be found and strangled by this den of snakes.
He reached his chambers walking past the attendants who had opened the doors for him and after untying the sword from his hip, slumped into a chair with a manner unbecoming of an emperor, his old bones aching. "Eighty-six. Sixty-six miserable years…" he said aloud mind drifting for a moment to his older sister, and then to his niece.
Perhaps he could allow her to become empress once his miserable flame sputtered out. That black scaled abomination would be a perfect parting gift to the wretched nobles.
"You look in dire straits Hortensius." A black haired man said, causing the old man to sigh. "You look like you fuck boys Rakon." "Oh how irksome." Rakon replied mockingly. "You'll have to do better than that to make me kill you bastard flower of Amaeus."
He took a seat across from Hortensius a wry grin on his handsome face, smoothing his dark hair surmising him slyly. "How faired court?" "Pigs, sisters and me. Those lords are always trying to fuck one of them."
Drinking wine and screwing girls was what he wished he could have spent this life doing. He had drunk much wine and screwed many girls but he wished greatly to have drank even more wine and screwed even more girls.
It was not to be, because his older brother in all his glory rode to his death leaving him the carousing bastard born of a northern wilding to assume the role of emperor.
Unwilling to submit to an impure pedigree of royalty and barbarian the northern lords turned, sparking the short lived campaign to placate the traitors by force.
Thus he began a six year march to bring the lords to heel and consolidate the empire once more. Until the undead crisis arose.
As if hell had opened up. That's what a messenger had said, that the dead stopped being dead, that which shouldn't move, moved.
He then watched that man slit his own throat the horror of what he'd seen apparent in his dying eyes that this was not the ramblings of a mad man like many including himself initially thought.
But a horrid reality of nightmares having been brought to life. The situation escalated over the course of a few years, several towns both fortified and otherwise as well as a number of settlements leading to the current political climate wherein he had to show deference to the northern lords to keep the empire from falling to the undead menace.
Twenty-percent of the empire was lost and the bordering regions became highly dangerous constantly at risk of attack. On top of famines, and disease, brought from an influx of refugees fleeing north. It had all been on him to deal with, which he did to the best of his ability in spite of his precarious position on the throne.
Not like it mattered anymore. He'd be dead himself soon, his miserable life would finally end and it'd be everyone else's problem to deal with.
He wasn't worried about coming back, he planned on being cremated, his ashes scattered to the winds to rob his enemies the pleasure of pissing on his grave.
"You seem dreadfully tired. Have you decided on an heir yet?" Hortensius was tired, especially tired of Rakon. In all the time he'd known him he'd been as much a source of stress as he had help, asking questions that were like digging into open sores or helping behind the scenes to make both a friend and a foe have an unfortunate accident.
He wasn't always like that but when your wife gets murdered in a power struggle it tends to twist you in a terrible way.
"I have not. I haven't any children or grandchildren capable of assuming the throne." He lied, as well as omitting his niece Rika and for good reason. If he even joked about naming her as heir then Rakon would murder him on the spot. Certainly he craved death but in the way one craves sleep, he wasn't senseless enough to run to it.
"Well how about the young lord Arlyle?" Rakon suggested playing with his hair "A fine name, strong, bold and idiotic. A fine name indeed if you wanted a civil war to break out." "He's a perfect fit for emperor then."
Hortensius leaned onto his hand. "Is he now?" Rakon just stared, clearly enjoying the headache he was causing.
"Why must you be so difficult? What purpose does it serve for you to do all this? If you wanted this country to burn it would burn. There's not a being in existence that could stop you."
Rakon rose trailing over to the balcony to peer down at the imperial capital below his gaze casting over the shingled roofs to the insurmountable walls, sweeping over the slums and squares, from the criminals in their alleys to the nobles in their carriages.
"Because I hate people. Human beings are nothing but trash. Reprehensible immoral vile pieces of dung. Thievery, murder, rape, humans do all these things but the worst of it is when they turn a blind eye to it when they simply ignore the suffering around them. Passivity is one of the worst sins so they say. And In all my time I've only ever met one human worth a damn and well..."
Rakon turned smiling but there was darkness in his eyes, a bubbling pit of bile and wrath that only hell could ever hope to spew up the lack of anger in his voice making it all the more chilling. "You're fully aware of what happened." "You were good once, and what she would want for you doesn't count for anything?"
He returned his gaze to the city below. "Yes I was good once, but what the dead want doesn't matter. The only thing I wish for now is for humanity to sit in a cesspool of its own suffering."
A long silence followed the only sound being the whistle of wind. There was nothing he could do, nothing he could say that would ever mend the man before him's heart. "Well. It's time for me to return to my duties as emperor." With effort Hortensius rose, smoothing out his red robe and mantle, fixing the sword at his hip. "I wish you well Rakon."
The dark haired man did not turn to face him. "Likewise Hortensius. Likewise."