Chapter Text
Stead gazed out across the ocean to the castle standing across the distance. Sometimes when he had trouble dealing with being the leader of the Redcloaks and all that entailed, he found himself wanting to climb up far far away from all the issues and worries and problems, and simply reach a point where all he had to do was feel the thin air in his lungs.
He felt closest to Zenum up on the roof of the Redcloak’s headquarters. He could have made a roof access up on the highest tower but where was the challenge in that?
Not that the copper roof tiles were that much of a challenge. Zenum had been a markhor, a type of mountain goat that was found near the northern mountains where he had grown up in Amaya.
When he was younger he had been a bit of a crybaby, always scared of the precarious mountain passes and rocky cliffs. Prone to running off at the slightest bit of danger.
Naturally, this had not endeared him to the kids of his village. He would gaze at the markhor that dotted the mountain edges he was too scared to climb near and wished he could be so unafraid. They never doubted that they weren’t going to fall off.
No one took their stuff and left it on a precipice high above and laughed as they struggled not to cry.
So when the Conquerers had come along with a replacement to Nectar that would guarantee a spirit animal, fourteen year old bitter, fearful Stead wasted no time bonding with a markhor.
He really had loved that mountain goat. Unfortunately, it took too long to realize that the feeling was probably not reciprocated. By that time, all that was left of Zenum was his eyes and small corkscrew horns easily hid by his cloak.
That, and a sense of balance which seemed to defy the natural order.
So whenever the burdens of an entire order of people, most of whom where not even adults, felt like it would suffocate him, Stead escaped out of the window of his office and climbed to the highest surface he could find and did what Shadow called “brooding” but Stead preferred to think of as introspection.
Things, unsurprisingly, were not going smoothly. The issue being the fact that now with the Greencloaks having shaken off most of the fear and hatred of the world, the problem had arisen with what to do with the Redcloaks.
The Redcloaks didn’t have a problem.
It was the Greencloaks who thought it was an issue.
They didn’t like the fact that an organisation was running around that no one could keep track of and was filled with people who had been on the wrong side of the war and helped in the destruction of Erdas
Other than themselves, of course.
The governments didn’t recognise the Redcloaks as an organisation either but personally that’s how they wanted it. After the Zongese princess tried to take over the world and was stopped by the Heros of Erdas, the governments were playing it safe by not rocking the boat with anything ending in “—cloaks” and were focusing on rebuilding after the world nearly ended for the third time in a row.
But now the Greencloaks had healed from their wounds enough to go poking their nose into the Redcloaks’ business. And this matter was quickly shaping up to be a very messy affair.
Oh how Stead *hated* politics.
The Greencloaks didn’t want past Conquerors roaming around without strict supervision, preferably in the form of a leash that was under the Greencloaks’ control.
(They didn’t say that of course but they didn’t have to— the impression was prevalent in every Redcloaks’ mind)
They had responded to the first letter with a polite “thanks but no thanks”. The Greencloaks in a show of extreme generosity offered to take in the Redcloaks so that they could learn how to help Erdas recover without worrying about politics or their past.
”Let bygones be bygones” Olvan had said, smiling grandfatherly at Stead.
Shadow had to step in and grab Stead before he could do something stupid, like punch the leader of the Greencloaks in the face.
Safe to say, the Redcloaks did not like that proposal. Their response was that they already had a group like that, it was called the Redcloaks and they would like it to stay that way.
The Greencloaks asked who exactly had started their group and if they could remind them what that person’s role was in the Second Devourers War? Such a person might not have truly had their best interests at heart, or at the very least, had conflicting feelings which shouldn’t be allowed to hurt this new partnership.
This time Shadow was the one who had made a lunge at the bearded man and even got one in before the other Greencloaks pulled her off him.
“It didn’t even hurt him, the bastard” She had muttered furiously as Howl bandaged her injured hand.
So the negotiations were going bad.
And who was left holding the “responsible one” cap?
Stead that’s who.
At times like this he missed King so much it felt like there was a hole in his heart. King would have known what to do. He wouldn’t be risking the safety and protection of the Redcloaks under his wing.
Did Stead mention how much he hated politics?
The sun’s rays hit the tiles he was sitting on and the Torch’s roof glowed in the evening sun. Somehow the name Worthy had given it stuck, much to Stead’s chagrin. He thought back to the letter sitting in his office. Well, to be honest, his office was simply his room with a desk placed in it so that Stead could work at all possible times. They had planned to set up a proper office but it kept getting pushed back down the priority list everyday so the makeshift office it was for the time being.
The Greencloaks must have realized that this was going nowhere fast because the next letter they sent was a lot more formal regarding the place and negotiation demands. It also had more veiled threats in it.
Trickster, who had been a member of one of the noble families close to the Queen of Eura, had been brought to read between the lines of the letter when it had arrived and had promptly turned scarlet.
“Ugh” he muttered, tossing the letter back in Stead’s desk like it was a poisonous spider. “This is one of the most vile pieces of court politics I’ve ever seen and it isn’t even a letter from home” He looks up at Stead grimly.
“Someone on the negotiation team definitely has worked in the courts and is, I hate to admit it, very good at it”
Stead thought over the matter carefully.
“Okay” he said quietly “okay”
“What if you take Shadow’s place during the next meeting? She’s already been barred from the negotiation table and it would help to have someone who’s more in tune with what to look out for”
Trickster was quiet for a moment with only the slightest twitch of his tail betraying his feelings on the matter. He’s hard to read on a good day but bring his past into the mix….
”Worthy’s not back?”
“ Got a letter from Dawson yesterday. Apparently it’s going to take longer than we thought this time”
“Typical” Trickster muttered bitterly “It would be too easy if we had someone who’s had half a chance of the Greencloaks actually listening to them”
Stead cracks a wry smile “Since when have the Redcloaks ever chosen the easy path?”
“It would be nice to at least have the option to” Trickster sighed but picked up a pen to start making notes
Rollan was feeling the worst sense of de-ja-vu he had ever felt in a while. The “I’ve-been-here-before-and-it-wasn’t-for-a-fun-party” sort of de-ja-vu.
A week ago he and Essix had been chilling in Amaya, trying to soak in the last few days of travelling with his mother in a crazy mother-son bonding trip. They had spent some weeks travelling across the continent and Rollan had marvelled at how different travelling was when you weren’t on a time crunch to save the world from questionable apes, evil parasites or on the run for your life while also being on a glorified treasure hunt.
That content feeling banished by the time he finished reading the letter that Olvan had sent via the world’s surliest carrier hawk. The gist of it was that Olvan would be extremely grateful if Rollan could meet up with him and a Greencloak congregation at the coast of Amaya near Bravel port to help them in a negotiation meeting.
No swear, just a causal thing.
who were they negotiating with? Oh you know, the Redcloaks. No biggie!
Its not like Rollan was going to *refuse*
He’d like to think he had matured these past adventures to be more responsible. But there was a small part of him that’s petulantly asking “Do I have to?”
Look- It’s just that Rollan’s already done the whole “betrayed and backstabbed at a peaceful meeting” thing before and he had not been a big fan of it to put it mildly.
And he definitely doesn’t want to be the only one of the group present if things eventually get ugly. Which it probably will, given his track record.
Abeke had disappeared with Uraza, leaving a “Gone Hunting, expect me back a vague nebulous time later” equivalent of a note; Connor had been visiting Takoda and Xanthe at the monastery because he’s been on a spiritual mind healing journey; Meilin had been in Zhong helping the country hold itself together during the whole “emperor getting murdered with his daughter behind it” upheaval in the ruling system like the one woman army she was.
And Rollan wasn’t complaining or begrudging them any of their much needed time off.
It’s just that he’d like some moral support when things go sideways.
The carrier hawk who had been impatiently fluttering its wings and giving him dirty looks took advantage of his distraction and tried to take a bite out his fingers
”Alright, alright chill!”
Cursing heavily, he snatched his mangled fingers out of harms way and quickly scrawled an affirmative on the back of the letter and attached it to its leg.
Giving Rollan one last dirty look and warning shriek, it quickly vanished into the blue sky until it was a speck miles away.
“Oh well” he through gazing at the disappearing bird “ At least I have teasing Worthy to look forward to”
Standing in the spacious inn room as he got a very brief overview from Olvan, he couldn’t help but think that Meilin would have been a better choice. Olvan looked stressed even as he tried to hide it beneath a genuine smile. He had vaguely recognised the easy going Nileon man with a serval cat at his feet as someone he had seen at Greenhaven in passing. The other man in the room with his back towards them was unknown to him as he ignored Rollan in favour of writing something at the desk.
Olvan explained that the rest of the congregation was going to meet up with them as they travelled to the negotiation location— a neutral building owned by the Greencloaks normally not in use to hopefully have better luck than the attempts at Greenhaven.
“Hopefully” being the keyword Rollan thought.
The scratching of the pen stopped and the Greencloak working at the table finally straightened up and turned towards the conversation.
”Ah apologies about that”.
His voice was smooth and had peculiar softening that made Rollan hazard to put him in the eastern part of Eura. He was a tall, slender man with cold grey eyes, long black hair tied neatly back and his mouth quirked into what might be generously called a hint of a smile if you squint.
”The name’s Silvan and this-“ he held out a hand and the bird lurking near the bookshelf flew onto his extended fingers in a flurry of motion “— is my lovely partner Eros”
He makes a short bow towards Rollan and he notices that the bow is curiously stiff and formal.
“It’s a pleasure to meet your acquaintance”
”Likewise” he replied, giving a short bow of his own. Rollan might not still know the proper etiquette for interacting with different sorts of nobles and lords and all that, but he has a rule that hasn’t gotten him in trouble yet.
Just do the exact same thing the other person does and the odds are you’ll be fine.
Olvan cleared his throat and continued on “Silvan is a part of the negotiation team and has generously agreed to lend his aid but a fresh set of eyes would be greatly appreciated. We want this to go as smoothly as possible”
And if those eyes were enhanced by Essix to pick up small tells and signs against masked individuals then all the better, was the implicit subtext.
Which was fair.
But he still thinks that Meilin would have been a better pick for this meeting.
”Sure, I’m down to help” he shrugged “But I’m not very good with legality rules or diplomacy talk so if you are sure that your court politics training can cover for my lack of it then you have yourself a deal”
Silvan stared at him blankly, like a wall had been pulled down over his already neutral expression.
Rollan looked at them and shrugged again.
“What, was that supposed to be a secret?”
It’s not that hard to pick up. Even wearing slightly better than average clothes, everything from the words he used, to his accent, to the way he holds himself reminds Rollan of Meilin and her lectures on etiquette.
The sudden silence was broken by the older Greencloak letting out a small huff of laughter.
Smiling, he shook his head as some warmth finally crept into his eyes.
“ I can tell we are going to get along just fine”
It’s not the building near the Petral Mountains which Rollan can only be grateful for cause he doesn’t have fond memories of that place at all. If he sees that building at the end of his life it would still be too soon.
He set his stuff down in the room he’s been allocated and then slips into the neighbouring room with a knock as instructed by Silvan.
“So what’s the situation like?” he asked, nodding towards the papers spread out in front of them on the table.
“The situation—-
“The situation is that the Redcloaks are idiots” Nico cuts in from where he was lying down on the couch. His serval seemed to have given up on trying to pull him to that table and had instead settled on his chest to glare at him disapprovingly.
”The situation” Repeated Silvan in a louder voice “— is that unless the Redcloaks manage to perform the highly unlikely act of cutting a deal with the government of Eura, they are going to be in hot water soon and it’s better if the Greencloaks step in before that happens”
He looked the most relaxed Rollan has seen him, with his sleeves rolled up and his hair tied up in a bun as he works at the table. Eros was visible at the joint of his wrist almost touching his palm.
”From a legal standpoint, it’s one thing to have an organisation like theirs if they had stuck to the shadows like during the Wyrm incident” he explained, pointing his pen towards Rollan like a conducting baton.
“No one knew they existed and they were spread out and kept on the downlow, enough to slip under the radar so it wasn’t really under the jurisdiction of a single country”
Rollan nods. It made sense, they had been present in Steriol and had been collecting the kids who had summoned the Great Beasts so there had been scouts probably in every country even if their headquarters had been the Place of Desolation.
Which complete side tangent, was a horrible name. Who decided to give it such a pretentious but also weirdly depressing name?
“Here’s our headquarters, it’s a place full of misery. Wanna join?”
”At that point if people had started reporting sightings of strange people with white masks then it probably would have been handed to the Greencloaks to investigate given that the inter-country politics would have been a nightmare to deal with and the difficulty of conducting investigations like this without stepping on other countries toes”
Rollan sat down on the empty chair Nico had abandoned.
“If that’s the case then why would they have to make a deal with the government of Eura. Shouldn’t this be a clear cut Greencloaks issue then?”
”Because of that”
Silvan tapped his pen on the map that was nearly buried under the pile of papers, gesturing to a small part of the southern Eura coast that had been drawn on in pen and labelled ‘Redcloaks’
”Its one thing if no one knows where your organisation is located, but if you build the headquarters right in plain view of the world then sooner or later the government of the country is going to come knocking at your door. Just because they haven’t yet doesn’t mean it’s not inevitable”
Nico snorts heavily from his part of the room
“Because the thing that an underground organisation needs the most is a giant red tiled building to tell everyone exactly where to find them”
Silvan threw his pencil and it would have hit him straight in the head if his serval hadn’t batted it away.
”Jannat he’s never going to learn if you keep coddling him” Turning to Nico he added “ Need I remind you that you were brought here so you contribute constructively, not so you sit there making snarky remarks”
Nico sighed heavily but sat up and detached his spirit animal from his lap. He pushes a few books to the side and sits on the edge of the table.
”If the Redcloaks don’t negotiate with us and keep doing what they’re doing, there’s a pretty good chance that the Queen will have them all arrested and tried for espionage against Eura”
Rollan tries to not remember that last time the Queen had a hand in arresting a group of people. Tried not to remember his own experiences in captivity at various moments of his life. There’s a surprisingly large amount of them for a teenager which is depressing.
”And the Redcloaks are fine with that?” He asked incredulously.
”The Redcloaks say they can deal with this without the Greencloaks butting in, but it’s either make a deal with us and end up being hunted down as fugitives I’m afraid” Silvan said with a sigh as he rubbed his temples.
”What did I say, the Redcloaks are idiots” was Nico’s helpful comment. This time the pen hit him straight on the forehead and he sputtered in protest.
”So our job is to convince the Redcloaks to get off their high horse and let us help him” Rollan concluded.
”Essentially” Silvan sighed.
Olvan thinks that a more formal process regarding the legality of their position might give them enough of an impression of control, and allowing a few concessions to their more safe and reasonable demands will make them more willing to listen to us and be reasonable”
Tomorrow the Redcloaks delegation was going to arrive and the negotiations would formally begin.
Rollan had a sinking feeling that they are going to find the Redcloaks anything but reasonable.
There’s a lot of stuff that Rollan can’t help but notice.
His bond with Essix might help a lot when people are lying or trying to betray them but it’s not like that’s an ability he can turn off at will. Which ends up making him privy to a lot of embarrassing secrets that he really wishes he didn’t end up putting together.
Its a blessing but also very much a curse because he really doesn’t need to know why someone was holding themselves differently when they had been walking just fine on the deck two hours ago.
Especially when he’s pretty sure that they haven’t told anyone so now he has to remember to not accidentally mention anything in casual conversation and that makes the number of secret relations he knows up to eight, which is a lot to keep track of and really people need to learn how to hide this sort of thing better
Because he cannot keep dealing with this sort of thing!
All of this to say that when they enter the negotiation chamber the next day he immediately picks up on the restlessness of the Redcloaks.
The six of them are already sitting on what he assumed was their side of the negotiation table. He recognises three of their masks immediately, the new ones being some sort of canine, a fox and a bat.
The one with the fox mask stiffens and starts urgently whispering in the ear of their leader, Stead, if he remembers correctly. He can feel their eyes flickering back and forth between the members of the Greencloaks group but always landing to where he is standing.
And Rollan kinda wishes that it was because they were in awe of him but this was the exact same group that called him Featherbrains and laughed as Tasha made him go crashing to the ground so obviously they didn’t really care that they were in the presence of one of the heroes of Erdas.
He looked at Silvan standing right next to him, looking poised and calm, his greencloak a deep muted green.
”How high up in the court pecking order are you again?”
Silvan looked towards the Redcloaks and a slight frown passed over his face before it vanished back into a neutral polite expression.
“As high up as they allow Greencloaks to reach”
Got it. So it’s definitely not high enough to warrant this level of tense anxiety from this specific group which means they know of Silvan through some other method.
From the corner of his eye he notices that Eros suddenly perks her head up from where she has been partly covered by her partners braid.
She warbles a strange clipped noise.
Fox Boy’s mask straightens up as he finally looks directly at them.
Eros lets out a louder call of the same clipped notes and the Redcloak flinches ever so slightly.
Next to him Silvan had gone still, his eyes now glued on the fox boy’s mask.
Rollan caught the halted twitch of his fingers before he apparently thinks better and relaxes them again as he whispers something under his breathe to his spirit animal, barely moving his lips.
Barely audible but still plenty loud for Rollan’s enhanced senses to pick up the ‘Not now, later… I promise’ before Eros disappears in a flash on her partners wrists.
The whole thing is subtle enough to not even be noticed by anyone else at the negotiation table.
For Rollan it might as well be a huge sign saying:
“ These Two People Have History That’ll Probably Make Your Life A Whole Lot More Difficult”
Great, there goes his last hope that these meetings will go smoothly.