Chapter Text
No. He wouldn’t.
But he was. The current Lord of Meah was suggesting that they -
Fucking hell. He couldn’t even think of it. It was so bad.
All he knew was that he couldn’t let it happen. Couldn’t let thousands of Terrasens die. But for now he had a part to play.
He smirked, even as he could feel bile rising in his throat. “I suppose that would be one way to deal with the rebels.”
Everyone looked at him. None of them looked guilty or horrified by what the lord had just suggested. Some of them even had smug smiles on their faces. He shrugged, one of the casual human movements he had copied and practised over the years.
The Lord of Meah chuckled. “So bloodthirst Ashryver, I knew you would be up to the task.”
Aedion smirked wider. “Always.” So long as he held up this act when the lord was dead nobody would turn their eyes on him.
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The rest of the meeting passed in a blur. He spent most of it trying to work out how he could have the lord killed in a way that would put the least amount of suspicion on him. And would not convince other lords to go through with his plan anyway. Which meant that it needed to be soon so he couldn’t talk more lords into agreeing. Hopefully, they would all be pretending to be lost in their grief to remember his idea.
So when the meeting finally ended (an hour after it should have). Aedion already had a decent plan in mind.
“How’d it go?” Kyllian asks the moment he sees me.
I glance over my shoulder, making sure no one but the people I trust can hear me, before facing the dark haired man.
“Not good.”
“Why?”
He swallowed, trying to get the words out as he looked at the two other commanders Caspian and Flynn. “One of the lords wanted to round up everyone in any area that has even a single suspected rebel and send them all to the salt mines.”
They all stiffen even more. Beside me Kyllian asks, “which one?”
He swallowed again and they all tracked the movement. “Lord of Meah.”
They’re swears fill his ears, the fae blood running through his veins allows him to hear their heart rapidly beating and smell the fear coming off them in waves.
Caspian, a man with light brown hair and light brown skin clutches at the table. “What do we do?”
“He’s got to die.” He said simply.
“Aedion you can’t just kill the Lord of Meah!” Kyllian whisper shouts. “He’s the brother to the King! You’d be executed.”
“Well it’s better that I’m the one killed rather than thousands of people. Besides, you don’t think I’ve thought of that? An assassin slipping poison into his drink will be enough to make it look like a natural death.”
Flynn shakes his head, words rushing out faster than usual due to his fear. “You can’t be seen with any sort of poison on you or even near the lord’s drink otherwise you would be an instant suspect.”
Flynn was in his mid-thirties and a brilliant fighter, but his expertise was more in his strategy and his caution. He could look at a plan and point out all the flaws. It was one of the reasons he was one of Aedion's top generals, but his constant worrying got on his nerves.
“We could hire an assassin.” Caspian suggests, still gripping the table.
“And risk them telling someone? Or even taking all the information to the king and having us all executed?” Flynn challenges.
They keep going back and forth. Aedion ignores them in favour of looking at his lover - no ex lover. After we decided that we couldn’t keep the relationship going.
Kyllian’s staring thoughtfully at the table. His expression is one that he makes whenever he’s so deep in thought that he has briefly forgotten about what was around him.
Usually he’d smile at him in the slightly childish love-sick away only he was capable of bringing out in him. But now wasn’t that time, so instead he nudged him with an elbow and asked what he’s thinking.
“We could always ask Adarlan’s Assassin.” He states.
Flynn whirls on him immediately. “Are you mad?”
“Flynn,” Aedion basically growled the word and the Commander only slightly backed down.
“Think about it,” Kyllian says calmly. “When have you ever heard of someone from Terresan being killed by her?”
Everyone blinked and realised that they hadn’t.
“And if she has killed someone from basically every other nationality except Terresan that means that she’s a sympathiser of what happened or she’s from Terresan. Which means that she at least has enough morals to not kill her own people. Even then surely with the right amount of money we could convince her to do it. I mean she’s the best assassin on the continent, if anyone was able to do it it would be her.”
Nobody talks. Everyone was thinking over the risks and what chances they had of it if it all went south. Everyone (except probably Flynn) came to the same conclusion: that they had to stop the Lord of Meah and if this was the best way to do it then so be it.
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Kyllian goes to talk to our spies and see if there’s a way to contact Adarlan’s Assassin. Our best shot - as he put it - was to find her master. Everyone had one. They just usually weren’t the King of the Assassins. Aedion put Flynn in charge of finding out how much money and jewels we could spare, as he doubted it would be possible to get her to do the assassination of such a large figure free. But if this went well then maybe they could convince her to join the rebels. Such a dangerous figure would be a great addition to their rebellion after all.