General Branzin was stiff as a board, even with Margrin doing his best to draw him out. Obviously, he preferred the company of soldiers over royalty.
May decided to cut to the chase, “General Branzin, you may try to relax, we are all of us soldiers here."
“Apologies, Your Majesty, I'm decidedly out of my element. My rank can't hide that I'm nothing but an old grunt at the heart of it.”
He spoke with a voice used to giving orders loudly. Uncomfortably loud for our small rooms, but we wouldn't admonish him. That was a fine quality for what we needed.
May continued, “As I was saying, General, we are all soldiers at this table, but you do something we can't do well as soldiers, you lead. And right now, in the absence of Field Marshal Everyón, you're the best leader we have. I'm promoting you to the rank of Field Marshal, Field Marshal Branzin."
The man was gobsmacked.
May was incredulous, “Did you really not see that coming, Sir?"
He blushed, this rough and tumble veteran blushed, "No, Your Majesty. I did not. Thank you!”
"It also comes with a title, Field Marshal, you are hereby also to be referred to as Baron of the Approaches. That's the ten miles of Forest Road leading up to the Silver Gate and the land to either side of it for a mile, 12,800 acres. Basically worthless, but you must now be addressed as ‘My Lord.’”
“I truly don't know what to say, Your Majesty. It's the highest honor I could hope for. élois be praised."
“I must make a request of you though, Sir. I want you to take the Everyón boy under your wing and groom him for your job. You won't be replaced for at least a hundred years, so don't worry about that. Just make him as good as you.”
"Absolutely, Your Majesty!”
"And now for you, Mister Ephysieryón."
"Me? What about me?"
“I hereby appoint you to be my Secretary of State and Ambassador at Large for the Hard Coast, and bestow upon you the title Knight of the Realm. No land for you yet, but behave yourself and we may revisit that situation.”
“Ah! Thank you, Your Majesties! I'm terribly honored."
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"And Count Pelisir, Sir, I'm adding to your duties the role of Supreme Commander of the Armies of the Northern Taliswood. Field Marshal Branzin is ultimately answerable to you as are any other forces brought under your command for situations like this most recent.
Count Pelisir, you are also at the helm should I or Prince Tendil not be here. That means tomorrow. We go to Yis-Gláz in the morning to try to figure out this Carca situation. I trust I leave it in capable hands, but I'm a spell away if I'm needed.”
"You needn't worry, Your Majesty."
“I know, and it's a great comfort, My Lord.”
“I've already promoted Janiver, so she gets the night off.”
"Prince Tendil?”
" Yes, thank you, Your Majesty. This is for the table. We fear that there are more powerful forces at play regarding the situation with Carca. So far, two entities have marked themselves for investigation. One is the Black King. Two is the Dark Elves who I just found out about today. We feel they are key to our understanding of the crisis, and I feel comfortable in calling it that. There are divine and infernal forces at play that may be well beyond our capabilities to influence. That won't stop us from trying. We've shown what fight we have in the Taliswood, so now they're on alert. We won't disappoint them.”
"Here, here!” shouted a slightly tipsy Margin. "By the gods, Your Majesty, you speak better than I do!”
Count Pelisir was the first to speak up, “You all probably know more about the Black King than anyone here. The Dark Elves I can help you with. They have been here almost as long as we have. They started to go evil several millennia ago and were cursed by élois so that they have to hide from the sun. They live underground in the extreme North of the Taliswood. They very rarely come out.
I'm sure even your limited research tells of how they abandoned the Taliswood to become servants of the Black King. They're one of the more inherently beautiful subspecies. Their skin is ink black, amber eyes, white hair, but the sun burns them like fire. No one knows why they turned evil. Their life expectancy peaks at around 500 years.
They used to involve themselves in the amber trade, but there aren't enough of them left in these woods to make a competitive go of it.”
“And that just tied itself together all nice and neat, didn't it?" I asked rhetorically.
Field Marshal Branzin was slower on the uptake, "What did I miss?"
“I think we've all missed something, Lord Branzin.” Margrin said with a confused look on his face.
Nobody was bringing it all together.
"The Dark Elves obviously knew the power of the Inclusions long before anybody else. At least by 700 years. My theory is that Syndial came to the Dark Elves thinking they'd make good minions for whatever plans he was brewing. So, he came to the Taliswood to recruit them.
There's no telling how long they'd known about the inclusions; but Syndial found out through them and that paved the way for his ultimate plan of achieving godhood.”
"But why settle on the Dark Elves in the first place,” asked May, “across a desert and half a continent away?”
If the idea wasn't his, then we have an open slot for another puzzle piece.”
"Nicely done, My Queen.”
Then I noticed her facial expression, “We're crossing the Waste for Kruklig, aren't we?"
Putting her hand against my cheek, she said “No, My Darling, of course not."
I breathed a sigh of relief.
“It will just be you and Margrin."
I groaned. Margin chose just then to start paying attention.
“Wait, where am I going?"
I hated to say it out loud, but “We're going to the Waste, Sir!" as jovially as I could make it. “
"Yes, you two will depart Yis-Gláz three days hence, most of the way by across the Waste. You'll meet with the Sand Elves outside of Kruklig and formulate your full plan.”