A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor

"Generous," Skullic said quietly. "Or so it shall seem."

'True enough,' Oliver thought. None could accuse the High King of having a personal bias, when rewards like that were given. Blackwell could give gold, but only the High King could offer such an amount of land so freely. He supposed those were the differences between the awards ceremonies of a General, and those of a High King.

The nobles of the crowd cheered it, as though they were the ones receiving the reward. It was hope, after all, hope that one day – however unrealistic it might be – if they themselves served significantly enough on the battlefield, they would be entitled to the same such rewards.

In a single stroke of the High King's pen, the power of the Blackwell House – which would have been crushed, should he have failed – was doubled, or perhaps even tripled. It was fair to say, that as far as Lords of the Stormfront went, now Lord Blackwell likely stood very near the pinnacle of their power, if not at the very top.

Oliver wished he could have seen the expressions of the various high standing men as those rewards were given. He could only see the nobles of the crowd near him. He wondered what the look on the face of the Emerson Silver King was, as he was forced to partition his land away to one of his Lords. Was he glad to have it off his hands, being the troublesome set of territory that it was?

Or was he bitter, at being forced to give away what was his, by an edict of the High King?

And Blackwell's reaction? Did he smile? Or was his look servere? How did he present himself to the High King, after feeling the sharp guillotine that the man had put above his head for so many months? He must have known that, if things had gone differently, the man would have taken far more pleasure in stripping him of everything that he owned.

At the very least, he could well imagine the reactions of one man, in the form of Karstly. Somehow, being the creature that he was, he seemed likely to be able to swim freely, no matter the tense waters of the situation.

Oliver could imagine him smiling, and offering his uninhibited congratulations to Blackwell, as if etiquette were a thing that he set, rather than a thing that he would have to be worried about breaking.

And then there came the time for that very man himself to see himself rewarded.

"Commanding General Blackwell puts forth his General Karstly for the position of highest honour on this campaign. He has stated to me, in his reports, that without the efforts of Karstly, the victory that he achieved would have been impossible. And naturally, we as the Stormfront celebrate, to see another General rise up in power as Karstly has.

He secured the heads of two Verna Generals, and made great strategic contributions in our efforts, and so the crown of the High King assures you he shall be rewarded."

Oliver noted a small pattern in the High King's speech – the vagueness with which he had mentioned the deeds of both Blackwell and Karstly. It seemed as if he was intimately familiar with the details of the campaign, from the way he phrased what he said – intimate enough that he seemed to expect those he was addressing to be of the same level of knowledge.

But Oliver wondered if he had not shortened it for the opposite reason. That he hadn't cared to know more than was necessary.

The thought was irritating enough to consider, but he wouldn't put it past the man. He fulfilled his duties as High King well enough that the masses of noblemen gathered clearly could not see a problem with it, but the pettiness that the goblin-like creature that sat the throne was capable of was not something Oliver would dare to underestimate again.

"Residing in the territory of the Silver Queen Asabel Pendragon, it has been decided that General Karstly will be given lands in the new world that we have conquered. The city of Qizi, and all its surrounding lands, now belong to him. They will be his to protect, and see prosper, in all the times henceforth. That alone would have been a reward fitting for the deeds that Karstly had accomplished.

Another country, and another ruler, might have thought so. But we men of the Stormfront think differently. Deeds accomplished by the swords are the highest of deeds. And so where one city would suffice for others, we give two. Qizi and Shaofun, of the newly conquered Verna lands, they belong to you now, General Karstly," the High King said.

Now there was a stir. The fact of Qizi would have been stirring enough, but Shaofun as well… It almost seemed greedy. Where one Lord had been elevated to an extreme, now another one followed close after. If one were to look merely on the territory that they controlled, now Lord Karstly quite well rivalled Lord Blackwell.

Perhaps, if one expected the city's economic value to be as good as they had been before they had been annexed, it could be said that Lord Karstly's positioning even exceeded that of Blackwell.

Of course, there was a fly in the ointment. The High King would not give away so freely that which he thought to be valuable. If Qizi and Shaofun were at their best, then the taxes generated by them would have been the stuff of legends. However, Oliver knew that in the wake of the annexing, more than half their populations had fled to what still remained as Verna territory.

The only men and women that remained were those that could not afford to move.

The ownership of Qizi and Shaofun was more likely to be a job than it was a reward. They were situated dangerously close to enemy territory.

Someone had to take up that burden though. Though the High King had done it for his own benefit, Oliver couldn't help but think that there was a degree of justice in what was happening. Karstly had been a large part of the reason that the Verna were now so irate with anger, and now he was being forced to deal with them firsthand.

He would have to go a good few years of handling rebellions and the like, all while shoring up his defences, knowing that when their treaty ended, the Verna would certainly come charging in to attack them, even if they didn't do it before then.