A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor

A noise at the door, and one of the Minister's retainers came in, urgently. He did a little half-jog, seeming about to run down the walkway, but he managed to talk himself back down to a swift walk. He reached the stairs, and took them two at a time, approaching Minister Tavar, and whispering in his ear.

Tavar listened, and nodded, once, then twice. He cleared his throat when the messenger was done, aware that all the eyes in the room were on him, for now there had been nothing going on for almost fifteen minutes – they were all eager for this to be done with. Eager to hear the results.

"The Lords return," Tavar declared. They reentered at his announcement, Idris and Blackthorn confidently leading them. Blackthorn seemed to be considerably more comfortable now that he could confidently walk alongside Idris, in the knowledge that the two of them were closer than allies – they were comrades in arms, servants of the same Princess.

They did not filter back to their benches, but they were brought all the way towards the bottom of the Minister's stares, where the witnesses had stood before.

"I believe I am allowed to watch now that the voting has already been decided, no?" Asabel asked in a clear voice from the door. Tavar did not seem surprised by their reemergence.

"By all means, Princess. You may stand beside me, if you wish," Tavar said.

"You're very kind, General Tavar, but I will remain at the back with everyone else, I have disturbed these proceedings enough for today," Princess Asabel said.

Tavar nodded his appreciation, turning to another one of his attendants, who had arrived just behind the stream of Lords. "The votes have all been cast?" Tavar asked.

"They have, my Lord," the man said, bowing lightly, before hopping up the steps to be beside the side of his master. He handed him a black leather bag. It looked to be a coin pouch, but from the reverent way that Tavar was holding it, it was likely something considerably more important.

As Tavar weighed the pouch in his hand, and silently judged the Lords that stood in front of him, the guardsmen produced a large dark wood table that they carried between the four of them up the steps. Once it was there, they sat it in the centre, and the same attendant who had given Tavar the coin pouch set down a tally counter – a wooden frame with two wooden poles for counters to slide onto.

'Seriously?' Oliver almost said it aloud. He couldn't believe that the same voting mechanism that he'd used in his village was being used in a Minister's courtroom. Back in the village, each man would have a stone that he'd carefully twist a drill through, so that it would fit the tally counter.

He would make sure that the stone was recognizable as his – some would even put careful detail into the carving of their stones. And then they'd cast them, whenever an official vote was held. Often, though, those votes were only held among the important families. Rarely, if ever, did they ask every man in the village for it.

When Tavar took the first smooth stone from the pouch, it seemed as though the same was going on here, though these stones were of black marble – at least that first one was – smoothed and polished and looking fine and fit for purpose, richly decorated with a rim of gold around the bottom and the top.
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"A black stone," Tavar announced. "Against the notion that Oliver Patrick acted in a criminal capacity."

With those words, he gently slid it onto the right side of the wooden tally. It made a soft click as it hit the bottom. Again it surprised Oliver that it was so simple. He expected the Lords to be forced to state their vote aloud, in front of the room full of people. What other purpose could there be in them standing there? But it seemed to be contrary to that notion.

It seemed to be that they'd cast their votes outside, and just slid their counters in that coin pouch.

"For," Tavar said, producing a white stone this time. He slid it straight onto the opposite side, and it landed with a click. Oliver hadn't expected to feel quite so wounded at that, since he knew how many enemies he had… yet it hurt all the same.

Asabel and Hod were staring at the tally with as much ferocity as Oliver, if not more. When the next stone was white, he could practically see their eyes flash.

"For," Tavar said again, sliding the white tally on. Lazarus and Jolamire shared a look. It would have been a stretch to call it a happy look, but it was definitely not a displeased one… if a little tense.

"For," Tavar said again, plucking yet another white from the coin bag. Now Oliver's fist was clenched. That… Wouldn't genuinely be the way it would go, would it? He'd mentioned it to himself before, that it was indeed a strong possibility that he would have been executed. He'd dealt with that fact calmly, but only because he hadn't truly believed it.

"For," Tavar said again, mercilessly. He was like an executioner. He was the executioner. He was the very man swinging a sword at Oliver's neck, mercilessly. So it had failed then. The votes were of course decided by majority decision, but if it was already four votes to one, the game was practically up.

The effort of Asabel and the efforts of Hod, they'd all been for naught. It was cruel, but it was reality.

"For," Tavar said again. The strike of the hammer. Relentless. Everso relentless. Like digging a hole outside of Solgrim. All those holes that they'd dug, looking for the start of the ore vein that the prospectors had promised.

It was Ferdinand that had set them that fruitless task, wasn't it? To think that the very same Ferdinand was Lord Blackwell's son… The world had seemed smaller then. Oliver hadn't met him yet. The very man everyone had seen as a God in the village, and now it seemed he likely never would.