Chương 128: 02. Southern Wall 2

I raised my hand first, signaling the unit to hold at the outer edge of crossbow range. In this kind of situation, half a step too eager was an invitation to get pinned to the ground. Figures on Typhon Fortress's wall shifted immediately—several crossbow angles dropped fractionally, not yet trained on our chests, but the message was unambiguous: come closer and they would genuinely release. Julian said quietly: "They're wound tighter than their own bowstrings. Don't give them a reason to let go."

"I can see that." I kept my eyes on the wall and slowly moved both hands away from my reins, making it visible that I wasn't reaching for steel.

"If I couldn't read that by now, I wouldn't have made it here." Jessi, off my left rear, kept her voice low.

"Young master, don't move forward yet. Let them hear you out first."

"That's exactly what I intend to do."

"I mean—don't use that face you make when you're losing patience. The one that makes you look like you've come to collect a debt." I turned my head slightly.

"What exactly is your general impression of me?"

"Someone who accidentally pisses people off on a regular basis, but who everyone still ends up needing to clean things up."

"That assessment is disturbingly accurate and entirely unwelcome." Alvira added from the other side, without inflection:"She was being restrained this time." I decided not to engage with either of them and called toward the wall:"I am Imperial Envoy Cedric Rosa, dispatched south under authority of His Majesty Valerian III. Inform the garrison commander of Typhon Fortress and Margrave Frank immediately. I require entry." A beat of silence on the wall.

Then a sharp voice returned: "Why does the envoy travel without his main column? Where is your banner escort? Where are your documents?" Not a stupid question. If I were garrison here, with the south having just exploded, and a light cavalry unit came cutting in from the old military road claiming to be an Imperial envoy without full ceremonial escort—that wouldn't look like good news from any angle. Before I could respond, Julian stepped his horse half a length forward and raised his captain's warrant.

"Captain of the Guard Julian Eberhart, present. The main column is behind us, proceeding south on official schedule. The Envoy rode ahead to prevent this border from making a catastrophic misjudgment before anyone with authority arrived. If you still have functioning minds up there, you should understand that the single worst thing you can do right now is keep the man the Empire sent specifically to stabilize this situation standing outside your gate."

Someone on the wall immediately shouted back: "Don't try to rank us into submission! The south is on fire and debris is landing outside our walls—how do we know you're not scouting for someone else?" The moment those words landed, tension across the wall visibly tightened another degree. And yet—I felt a fraction of relief. They're still shouting. That means they're angry, not broken.

A wall full of panicking soldiers who'd lost the ability to reason would be far more dangerous than furious ones still capable of demanding answers. I reached out and touched Julian's arm—gently, enough to stop him—then nudged my horse forward half a step, stopping before he could object.

"I know what you're afraid of." I raised my voice, keeping it measured rather than loud.

"You're afraid the fire in the south wasn't an accident. You're afraid that after Black Dragon Pass burned, the next piece lands inside Typhon Fortress's walls. You're also afraid that if Margrave Frank moves first in his fury, then regardless of what actually happened in the south, the Empire will be left swallowing an internal conflict it lit itself." No one on the wall interrupted. I could tell they were listening, so I continued.

"So you have two options. First: keep those crossbows trained on me, leave me and my people standing outside, wait for Margrave Frank's fury to burn even hotter—while making sure everyone in Typhon Fortress knows that when the Imperial envoy reached your gate, you were too afraid to open it." I paused, watching the tense faces along the battlements.

"Second: send someone down immediately to verify my seal, documents, and identity. If I'm an impostor, arrest me on the spot. If I'm legitimate, open the gate and let me in—so you don't have to explain to your superiors later why you personally kept the man sent to share your burden standing outside the walls." Wind cut across the battlements, snapping the banners hard. After I finished, silence held for a moment.

In that quiet, only the sound of horses breathing and leather shifting—as though even the fortress walls were holding their breath, waiting for an answer. Behind me, Jessi muttered under her breath.

"I knew it. You're doing it again." I didn't look back.

"Doing what?"

"Walking onto the blade's edge and describing it like you're just taking a slightly longer step." Alvira said flatly, "At least this time he calculated before stepping."

"Doesn't make it any less infuriating to watch."

"On that point, I won't argue." The corner of my mouth twitched. If these two could redirect even half their collective irritation toward our actual enemies, my life expectancy would improve considerably. The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation. Several breaths passed before a different voice called from the wall—older, steadier than the earlier shouts.

"Those below—present your seal and transit documents. Three may approach. The rest hold position." Julian turned to me immediately.

"I'll accompany you."

"And I," Matthews said. Jessi spoke almost simultaneously: "I'm also—""No." I cut her off. Her eyes narrowed instantly.

"Young master."

"Three people." I looked directly at her.

"You and Alvira stay here. If someone on that wall has an accident with their trigger finger, or if things go wrong the moment the gate opens, you're both better positioned to respond than I am." She was visibly unhappy, but this time didn't explode immediately. Because she could hear it—I wasn't brushing her off with the usual you'll be safer back here excuse. I was assigning tactical positions. Alvira glanced at me and spoke first.

"Go." Her tone was perfectly level.

"If the conversation deteriorates to the point where even you run out of rebuttals, I'll consider going in to collect your remains."

"What a remarkably original form of encouragement."

"I've always been sincere." Jessi made a cold sound but didn't argue further. Instead, she reached out and refastened the front clasp of my cloak—fingers pressing with slightly more force than necessary, as if confirming I was still solid, still present, not already halfway folded into whatever disaster lay ahead.

"Young master."

"What?"

"If the people inside start performing for their own audience, don't play along too long." She held my gaze, eyes sharp and cold as winter glass.

"You came to hold the line. Not to serve as their stress valve." I looked at her and nodded once.

"Understood." Then Julian, Matthews, and I rode forward. We kept our pace deliberately slow, letting everyone on the wall track every movement. When we reached the outer slope, the main gate stayed shut. Instead, a small iron-barred cage descended from the side—two fully armored guards inside, looking as though they'd rather risk diplomatic insult than allow unknowns near the gate mechanism. One held a spear.

The other carried a wooden verification tray, expression wound so tight that any sudden movement would probably result in the entire tray being introduced to my face at speed. I handed over the seal and documents. He checked the seal first, then broke the transit document's wax binding with painstaking care. I didn't rush him. Rushing at this point would only look like guilt. When he reached the final page, his expression shifted slightly. He turned and called up to the wall in rapid sentences.

After a brief exchange above, that steadier voice descended again.

"Envoy's identity confirmed." The words had barely landed when another voice cut across—sharp-edged, like something singed by flame.

"Confirmed identity changes nothing! Lord Frank's standing orders: until the southern situation is resolved, no one from the capital enters freely! For all we know, you're here to smooth things over with pretty words for people who've never left their warm halls!" Julian's expression went cold instantly. My internal response was considerably less composed. Here's our complication. That voice didn't belong to an ordinary gate soldier.

Someone willing to override a confirmed identity check was either very brave or very well-positioned—almost certainly Frank's man, and not a low-ranking one. I looked up toward the right section of the battlements. There: an officer in a dark short cloak, roughly forty, high cheekbones, eyes carrying the particular fury of someone who hadn't slept properly in days. Ash still clung to his armor that he hadn't bothered to brush clean. This wasn't a man worked into anger by gate duty.

This was someone who'd been burning since the south started burning, waiting for somewhere to put it. He stared down at me as if trying to extract evidence from my face of whether the capital was worth his accumulated contempt.

"Capital sent you fast enough." A cold sound that barely qualified as laughter.

"What's the matter—finally remembered the south isn't just a line on a map?" I held his gaze and didn't immediately fire back. This kind of man: direct confrontation only gives him permission to escalate. You don't suppress him by being louder. You make him understand that turning this into a fight costs him more than it costs me.

"Not as early as I'd have preferred," I said, keeping my voice even.

"But considerably more useful than someone planning to set the entire border on fire first and then asking the capital why it didn't arrive sooner." The officer's face darkened.

"What did you just say?"

"I said"—I looked up at him, each word placed with deliberate clarity—"that if Margrave Frank wants an envoy who can help hold Typhon Fortress together, I am standing right here. If what he wants instead is a blade to swing his anger with, I can turn around immediately and let him explain to His Majesty personally why he chose to gamble with tens of thousands of lives on this border before the Empire established what actually happened at Black Dragon Pass." Dead silence on the wall.

Even the soldiers who'd been holding crossbows taut seemed to have had the breath knocked out of them. Julian exhaled very quietly beside me—the sound of a man confirming I hadn't arrived intending to beg my way through the gate. Matthews remained exactly as he'd been: upright, hand near his sword, not contributing a word, steady enough to be reassuring. The officer stared at me with the expression of someone who wanted to remove a layer of my face. Several long seconds passed before he spoke through his teeth.

"You'd better actually be capable of backing those words."

"Whether I'm capable isn't something you can determine by shouting at me from a wall." I said.

"Open the gate. Take me to Frank." This time, no one on the wall offered immediate counter-argument. After a weighted pause, the sound of heavy bolts being drawn came from within—low and grinding, like a creature that had been clenching its jaw for hours finally, with extreme reluctance, allowing its grip to loosen by the smallest fraction. Typhon Fortress's outer gate began to open. What appeared first wasn't a welcome.

It was a line of spear-bearing guards, splitting left and right to form a corridor exactly wide enough for three horses. Every face in that corridor wore the expression of men who weren't receiving an Imperial envoy so much as watching a problem walk directly into their field of vision. I didn't immediately urge my horse forward. First, I took a moment to assess.

Behind the wall: stone shot and arrow crates in fresh positions, fire basins and water buckets along the inner wall's base—clearly never taken down from the previous night. Further up the slope, a unit of armored soldiers was moving at a jog toward the battlements, pace suggesting they expected something else to come down from the south at any moment. The entire fortress had the look of something with a hand around its throat—still breathing, but not easily. This wasn't standard combat readiness.

This was a place on the edge of losing its composure entirely. I collected my assessment and rode through the gate. Passing that line of spear-bearers, I caught low muttering and felt the particular quality of stare that mixed hostility with calculation—the kind that takes every accumulated grievance against sluggish capital response times and places the entire account on the most convenient available representative. Which, at this moment, was me. Reasonable enough.

A middle-aged officer in a deep crimson-trimmed short cloak waited beyond the gate, face harder than the stonework behind him. He offered no full salute—just a brief, minimal inclination of the head, communicating he was performing the required minimum and found even that excessive.

"Special Envoy." His voice was flat.

"Margrave Frank is waiting in the inner keep's council chamber." He said waiting. His tone communicated something closer to: he is in there waiting to see what excuse the capital has sent to insult his intelligence this time. I dismounted and passed the reins to Matthews. The moment my boots hit the ground, I felt the accumulated protest of a full day's brutal riding move through my legs. This was not, however, an appropriate moment to negotiate with my own skeleton. Julian fell in beside me, voice dropping.

"The anger in this place runs deeper than I anticipated."

"You're saying that like you're surprised by other people's temper."

"I'm describing current conditions." Alvira and Jessi were admitted shortly after. Jessi's first action upon dismounting was a rapid structural assessment of my person—confirming all components present—before her expression relaxed marginally, though her tone didn't follow.

"Young master. You said something that made people want to hit you just now, didn't you."

"I made every effort to keep it within listenable parameters."

"So yes."

"Your faith in me is genuinely moving." She gave me a look that communicated volumes, then said quietly: "As long as you're still in one piece." Alvira glanced once toward the inner keep and said, without particular inflection: "Save the sparring. The gate's open, but the hard part hasn't started." I was aware. Frank hadn't appeared yet and Typhon Fortress already looked like this. When we actually met, I doubted his opening move would be offering tea.

I looked toward the inner keep's half-open stone door—firelight flickering inside, figures moving back and forth, and underneath the pervasive smell of ash and char, something else: a pressure low and dense and impossible to fully contain. The fire in the south had been baking this fortress to the point of fracture. And I was walking inside it, with the primary objective of ensuring the Empire didn't detonate itself first.