A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor

"Will you die as well, brother?" Dominus asked quietly, turning his back on him.

"I will not," Arthur said.

"...You have always kept your word."

"I endeavour to."

"Then I can trust you to win?" Dominus said. "Will you turn the High King's strategy on its head?"

"I will."

'In honour of Persephone,' Arthur finished in his head. 'I will exact a vengeance through an avenue open only to me. The High King gives me this option – he allows me it, an opportunity to strike his cheek, whilst still maintaining the peace of the realm. I do not have your resilience, Arthur. I can not forgive him for tearing the two of you apart.'

"You have the strongest sword that I know of," Dominus said. "You will be able to see it done. I ought to come with you."

"You cannot," Arthur said. "I forbid it. You know very well why. This is the task I was given. As the Pendragon King, it is my duty. You stay here, Dominus, and you spend some time with Persephone for me."

Again, he'd finished it in his head. 'How do you not see already, brother, that you have grown stronger than me? You are not the lowly knight that you were when first we met. You too stand at the Fifth Boundary, and look, you hardly seem to know your own strength. I am not so far above you.'

In his grief, Dominus held himself more sternly than usual. His arguments were even weaker than they normally might be. There did not seem hardly more than the smallest hint of worry for him – the only other emotion was an overflowing of belief. A belief so strong that Arthur could feel it. It made him want to shake his head. 'I am not nearly so great, my friend. Not nearly. I am undeserving of the faith that you have in me.'

Even in being unworthy, when Arthur did slide his hand down to the sword at his belt, gripping the familiar hilt of that ancient blade, passed down between the Pendragon Kings, he did so with the determination of a man that had entirely the will to win.

Indeed, the Pandora Goblin was a monster beyond all monsters. Its face was a gruesome thing, almost childlike, if not for the malicious look in its giant eyes, and the pointed nature of its teeth. Its cracked green skin bespoke of all the time it had spent under the desert sun, surviving as it had for thousands of years, trapped endlessly within the same few hundred miles. Circling and circling, look for any that would dare to cross paths with it. It was a monster created by Pandora to be all but undefeatable. To be a cruel trick. To have the greatest of all promises hidden within its chest, but to have it eternally out of reach.

If Arthur were a more religious man, he might have declared that she had only created such a creature out of direct insult to Claudia, and the progress that she governed over. To mock those heights that men achieved. To have it be there, so tantalisingly close, yet for it to be so forever out of reach.

Arthur gave the order, for that was his duty. Arthur stood tall, on the back of his horse, with his crown on his head, above his armour, for that too was his duty. He rode down the length of men, and raised his sword to evoke their cheers. Their morale was high, they delighted in their service to him. That, however, Arthur felt guilt for. He was unworthy of the mantle of hero. Unworthy of the ease with which he evoked loyalty from all. All seemed to see in him something other than what he was. A grandness that he was incapable of. Even strangers seemed practically blinded by him. At times, it made Arthur wonder if he ought to look over his shoulder, and see another man standing there.

A burden is what it was, but it was a burden that he was duty bound to uphold. He took that strength of heart from Dominus. The man knew discipline like no one else. He knew honour like no one else. Quietly, did Arthur make him his teacher in those matters. His was a blessing that many would have killed to have – the blessing of his birth, as the inheritor of a crown, and future High King of the Stormfront, and too the blessing of his sword.

But that sword was not a skill he could claim for himself. It was a skill that nature seemed to make for him by its own accord. He never tried to exert himself in it, he hardly trained, he only did the bare minimum so that he might uphold his duty. Yet whenever he did swing that blade, it was as if the Gods themselves held it by their fingertips, and guided it towards the flesh of his foes. Whenever he felt that righteous indignation swell up in him, and he saw corruption that bordered upon evil, he would swing upon his enemies, without mercy. That emotion, and that strength that came with it, that even Claudia approved of, for the extra might she lent when he felt it – that, she said, was what made him a hero.

So now, why was it that the same hero stood alone?

He'd given the order to charge, knowing that those men would go to their deaths. And now that was where they lay. They had not even been allowed the privilege of nearing the creature. It had struck them down as if from a different realm. Before they knew what it was that had happened, great vines had struck up out of the earth to seize them. Goblins had erupted from the sand, and nearby boulders had been set to melting, giving rise to Hobgoblin and all sorts of other creatures.

For the ten thousand men that Arthur had brought with him, in an instant, the Pandora Goblin had ten thousand of its own. A snap of its fingers, as if it were a God itself. It did so slobbering at the mouth, like it were an invalid – but those eyes held a gruesome intelligence. A terrifying cruelty. Its only want was to see them all suffer.