Rewrite That Witch
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Chapter 1201: Proof

Jean Bate had no desire to become the King of Graycastle’s enemy.

He had never met the man. He had only the rumors — the God’s Punishment Armies of Everwinter and Wolfheart ground to nothing against Graycastle’s forces; the nobles of the Kingdom of Dawn, their alliance and their confidence, dismantled in a single day; Roland Wimbledon’s kingdom welded shut around him in half a year; whispers, even, of Graycastle’s hand in the coup on the Archduke Island.

But rumors were cheap. What sat across the table from him now was Iron Axe, commander of the First Army, and the man had just spent an hour describing a war against demons that had raged for the past year. From any other lord’s mouth, Jean would have laughed. From this man’s, the words settled like stones.

Whether Jean believed it or not made no difference. He had no way to confirm anything.

What truly strained his credulity was the plan itself. Roland Wimbledon did not want Wolfheart’s throne, its taxes, its silver mines, its grudges. He wanted the people. Every last civilian, shipped out by sea and land until the two kingdoms stood empty. Most nobles could be bought with profit; evacuation produced none. A vacant city meant vanishing grain, collapsing revenue, mines falling silent. No sensible lord would agree unless the alternative was worse than all of that combined. And the First Army, however invincible, could not wage war against every noble in Wolfheart at once. Without local support, their supply lines would strangle themselves. Jean also noted, with some unease, that Graycastle apparently intended to conduct both campaigns simultaneously — Wolfheart and Everwinter at the same stroke. He had always understood that kind of ambition as a synonym for ruin.

The silence had stretched a long time before Jean finally said, in a voice kept carefully quiet, “I don’t quite understand the rationale behind all this. If the demons aren’t coming from the Impassable Mountain Range, and we still throw in our lot with Graycastle — we lose men, farmland, cities, mines. I’m afraid that’s a loss we can’t bear.”

“I can’t explain the reason to you.” Iron Axe’s face showed nothing. “As the commander of the First Army, my duty here is to carry out the mission His Majesty entrusted to me. Yet —” He paused. “If you come to Neverwinter yourself, you’ll know the answer.”

Jean moistened his lips. “Fine. One last question.” He let the silence settle. “You said nobles can make their own choices. What if I decide to come with you?”

Iron Axe nodded and turned to the clerk beside him. “This is Remy, immigration officer of the Administrative Office of Neverwinter. He’ll explain the next steps.”

The clerk laid a stack of documents on the table and smoothed the top page. “Hello, Mr. Baron. In that case, you’ll become a member of the Kingdom of Graycastle.” He spoke in the practiced cadence of a man who had delivered the same speech on three continents. “The first thing to understand is that King Roland Wimbledon does not ill-treat those who contribute to the kingdom. Graycastle is governed by a body of laws. Under those laws, nobles hold no feudal power and cannot inherit land — the same will apply to you. That said, your experience in city administration has value. You could join the Administrative Office and serve as a local governor, or help His Majesty develop new territory — the Fertile Plains, for instance. If the demons do not invade the Four Kingdoms, you’re free to continue governing the Sedimentation Bay as before.” He turned a page. “If you’re fortunate, you might govern land considerably larger than this city, given that not every noble will choose to come with us.”

Remy read for the better part of a quarter hour. The documents were dense, precise — the offspring of long deliberation, drafted by someone with a mind Jean could not have matched. The proposal’s architecture was plain enough: surrender short-term interest for long-term yield. How much he could gain depended entirely on himself.

He should have taken days to think it over.

He did not have days.

At the least, it was better than being killed by one of the two families.

He allowed himself one private calculation: relocating two kingdoms would take years. Throughout that process, the Sedimentation Bay would still need governing. That meant him. He would remain behind his own walls and out of the families’ reach for as long as the work lasted.

Jean drew a sharp breath and said, “I’ll pledge alliance to the King of Graycastle.”

“A wise choice,” Iron Axe said, with the same flat expression he’d worn since arriving, as though he’d already seen this ending. “You can issue the administrative order immediately. We have a professional team to assist you.”

“That fast?”

“Yes. The First Army leaves Wolfheart for the interior in three days.”

“But —” Jean hesitated a moment, then pressed on. “The knights from the Tusk and the Redstone Gate won’t let this pass quietly. They probably won’t openly resist Graycastle, but they’ll pick at the edges — attacking patrol teams, interfering with operations.”

He felt the admission’s smallness. An hour ago he had told Iron Axe he was the sole ruler of the Sedimentation Bay. But the problem was real, and raising it now was both honest and a test — a way to see whether Iron Axe’s promises had any weight.

Iron Axe’s answer surprised him again.

“The Sedimentation Bay is the key to this immigration plan. I won’t allow anyone to thwart it.” He nodded to one of his assistants, who slipped out of the parlor without a word. “I’ve done my research on Wolfheart. Nobody will openly resist the First Army, and nobody will play games behind our backs. We will remove those obstacles before they become problems.”

“You mean —”

“Seeing is believing,” Iron Axe said, and rose from his chair. “Don’t worry. The threats you’re worried about will soon be gone.”

“Still coming down hard,” Smarty remarked, reaching a hand out from under the shed’s eave to feel the rain.

“So?” White said, hammering his sore leg with his knuckles. “Why are you still here?”

“I don’t want to get soaked. And this shed belongs to everyone.” Smarty pulled a face. “I can stay as long as I like.”

“You —” White was drawing himself up to deliver a lesson on respect for one’s elders when movement in the street caught his eye.

A column of Graycastle soldiers emerged from their tents and moved through the rain in two tight lines. Water scattered off the pavement at each footfall. The men carried metal tubes across their backs — reflective, slender, wrong-looking in the same way the black machinery installed in the sentry boxes had been wrong-looking. Not the product of any blacksmith White knew. Nobody had tools that made edges that clean.

He watched the column until the rain swallowed it.

Something had been gnawing at him since those soldiers arrived, and only now, watching their backs disappear into the grey curtain of the downpour, did he understand what it was. Those weapons were not made by human hands. Or if they were, not by human hands he had ever known.

Around him, others who had ducked under the shed for shelter were beginning to murmur.

He turned to say something to Smarty.

Smarty was gone.

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