Chapter 2: A Barbarian Takes Residence

By the time the assembly was dismissed, Silverhall no longer resembled the disciplined heart of an empire. It resembled a jeweled hive someone had struck with a spear.

Nobles flooded the corridors in clusters, whispering so violently that whispers became almost indistinguishable from shrieks. Diplomats abandoned dignity in favor of immediate correspondence, demanding ink, parchment, and the fastest riders available to send news back to their sovereigns that the Beast Emperor of the Black Dominion had either suffered a catastrophic break from reason or had initiated the strangest diplomatic maneuver in continental history. Servants carrying tea trays were stopped every few steps by frantic ladies desperate to confirm whether they had truly seen a northern emperor kneel at the foot of Halrem Vaelith’s throne.

With every retelling, the story became more absurd. Some claimed Draevor had proposed marriage in the middle of the council chamber, while others insisted he had offered Halrem an empire through conquest. One elderly baroness went so far as to swear she had witnessed divine revelation in his eyes and loudly declared the entire incident to be fate itself.

The palace physicians were dragged into three separate arguments regarding whether sudden insanity could indeed be caused by prolonged horseback travel in cold climates.

At the center of all this imperial hysteria, Halrem Vaelith was profoundly uninterested.

She walked away from the Grand Meridian Chamber without haste, attendants gathering around her like orderly birds while the entire court split apart to make room. Her expression suggested not outrage, not embarrassment, not even astonishment, but the refined displeasure of a woman whose morning had been interrupted by a highly theatrical inconvenience.

Chancellor Edrin nearly ran to keep pace beside her.

“Your Majesty,” he said, lowering his voice while still sounding dangerously close to panic, “with deepest respect, we cannot simply proceed as though that did not happen.”

Halrem continued down the corridor. “Why not?”

Edrin stared at her profile in disbelief. “Because the northern emperor knelt before you in front of seventeen ambassadors.”

“Yes. I was present.”

“He made an openly suggestive declaration.”

“I was also present for that.”

“Then surely Your Majesty understands the diplomatic implications.”

Halrem accepted a pair of gloves from one attendant and slid them over her fingers with maddening calm. “I understand that a large armored man from the north appears to be mentally unstable.”

“Your Majesty, this is not a jest.”

“It is certainly not diplomacy either.”

Edrin looked ready to strike his own forehead against a column.

They turned into Halrem’s private western corridor, where fewer servants were permitted and the palace noise dimmed beneath carved stone arches. Even here, however, gossip moved faster than reason. Two maids carrying linens saw the imperial party and immediately lowered themselves into bows so abrupt that one dropped half her folded sheets.

Halrem did not break stride.

“Has he been given guest quarters?” she asked.

Edrin blinked. “Who?”

She stopped walking.

Very slowly, Halrem turned her head and looked at him.

There were many ways Halrem Vaelith could express displeasure, but silence accompanied by that particular gaze was among the most devastating. Edrin straightened instantly.

“The northern emperor,” she said. “Unless Silverhall intends to leave him standing in the courtyard like an oversized gargoyle.”

“Yes, of course, Your Majesty. The Obsidian Wing has been prepared.”

“Good.”

Edrin hesitated, then ventured, “Should additional guards be posted?”

Halrem resumed walking. “Why? Do you think he will begin gnawing on the palace furniture?”

“Your Majesty…”

She sighed, long and faintly bored. “Chancellor, if Draevor Kaine had arrived with hostile intent, we would not be discussing kneeling incidents. We would be discussing casualties. Whatever spectacle occurred in that chamber, it was not military aggression. It was something much more irritating.”

Edrin did not ask what that was because he suspected the answer would worsen his health.

When Halrem finally reached her private solar, she dismissed everyone except her two closest attendants, Selene and Maris, both of whom had served her long enough to understand when silence was wiser than conversation.

The doors closed behind them, and quiet settled through the room.

Halrem crossed toward the table, removed her diadem, and set it down with deliberate precision.

Then she said, “Well.”

Selene and Maris exchanged a look.

Neither volunteered.

Halrem sat beside the tall western window where morning light spilled over stacks of physician texts, rolled maps, and opened case files. Her medical instruments lay neatly arranged from the studies she had intended to continue before being dragged into imperial absurdity.

She picked up a silver scalpel, inspected the edge, and spoke as if discussing weather.

“Has the court decided whether he is barbaric, deranged, or merely dramatic?”

Maris, the braver of the two, answered carefully. “At present, Your Majesty, opinion seems divided.”

“Cowards. They should commit to one.”

Selene set tea at Halrem’s side. “Your Majesty appeared… calm.”

Halrem gave her a flat look. “Would hysteria have improved the occasion?”

“No, Your Majesty.”

“Precisely.”

She set down the scalpel.

Only then did the faintest crease appear between her brows.

It was not the kneeling itself that irritated her. Men had performed idiotic gestures for women in power before. Courtiers composed bad poetry. Princes sent pearls. Dukes made speeches about beauty and destiny whenever they wished to disguise ambition beneath romance.

This had not felt like that.

Draevor Kaine had not knelt like a polished suitor offering rehearsed charm. He had knelt like a conqueror claiming territory already destined to become his.

The memory made Halrem’s jaw tighten.

What unsettled her most was the absence of mockery in his eyes. Mockery would have been easy to dismiss. Madness too.

But his gaze had been disturbingly direct, as though he had arrived in Silverhall expecting political negotiation and found himself genuinely distracted by her existence instead.

How deeply inconvenient.

“How long is his diplomatic residence?” Halrem asked.

Selene glanced at the itinerary scroll. “Officially, three days, Your Majesty.”

Halrem relaxed slightly. “Excellent. The empire can survive three days of northern theatrics.”

A knock sounded at the solar door.

Maris moved to answer.

A palace messenger bowed low upon entry. “Your Imperial Majesty, a formal request has just been delivered from Emperor Draevor Kaine.”

Halrem extended one hand, and the sealed parchment was immediately placed into her fingers. She broke the black wax seal bearing the northern wolf insignia before unfolding the letter.

The message was brief.

Her eyes moved across the lines once, then a second time.

Selene watched carefully from nearby and felt unease settle in her stomach when Halrem’s expression did not change at all.

That was never reassuring.

“What is it, Your Majesty?” Maris asked.

Halrem handed the parchment over.

Selene leaned in to read.

By decree of Emperor Draevor Kaine of the Black Dominion, diplomatic departure is to be postponed indefinitely under the interest of strengthening inter-imperial understanding and fostering prolonged strategic familiarity between our courts.

Selene slowly lowered the parchment while Maris stared beside her in stunned silence, and both attendants turned toward Halrem at once. For a brief moment the room remained perfectly still before Halrem finally leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes.

“Three days,” she said softly. “I had almost developed optimism.”

Neither attendant dared breathe.

Halrem opened her eyes again, and there was now a cold glint of annoyance sharp enough to peel paint from palace walls.

“He is not leaving,” she said.

“No, Your Majesty.”

“He intends to stay.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

Halrem rose.

She walked to the window, gazing out over the white palace courtyards where servants looked no bigger than moving pins beneath the imperial terraces.

Somewhere in that vast estate, the northern emperor was being escorted to guest quarters as though he were an honored visitor and not a freshly delivered imperial headache.

Halrem folded her hands behind her back.

“What precisely,” she asked with dangerous calm, “does one do with a barbarian who has mistaken an empire for his personal hunting ground?”

No one answered.

Because no one in Silverhall had the slightest idea.

And elsewhere in the palace, in the Obsidian Wing prepared for northern residence, Emperor Draevor Kaine stood before the tall black windows of his chamber while one of his generals waited several feet behind him in rigid confusion.

The general had been silent for nearly ten minutes before finally gathering enough courage to speak.

“Your Majesty.”

Draevor did not turn.

“Yes?”

“With respect… what exactly are we doing?”

Draevor looked out toward the silver towers of Halrem’s palace, and for the first time since entering Silverhall, something almost resembling amusement touched the corner of his mouth.

“Remaining,” he said.

The general swallowed. “For diplomatic purposes?”

Draevor’s storm-gray eyes rested on the highest western balcony where he had been told the empress kept her private study.

“No,” he answered.

His voice was calm, certain, and utterly unconcerned by the fact that he had just overturned the political balance of three kingdoms.

“For far more interesting reasons.”