A Time of Tigers - From Peasant to Emperor

Oliver's eyes flashed gold at the accusation, and he turned with the sort of quickness that he would to an enemy.

Verdant was undeterred, he remained seated in the sand, entirely unmoved, and he continued, gesticulating with his gloved left hand, as he kept leaning in the sand against his right. "You indulge in it to a degree of gluttony, and the Gods love you for it – your men too, they love you for it, even if they do not know why."

"…" Oliver glared with a harshness. The initial accusation had seemed dangerous, but the way Verdant talked around it blunted the blow to a degree. Still he stood, tenser, waiting, as if for an attack. His heart more fragile than usual, he needed to stay cautious.

"You indulge in the self-sacrificing lie. You lie easily, and freely, for the sake of your comrades. The self-sacrificing lie of a mother, when she tells her children that she has already eaten, when they wonder why it is she won't share a meal with them. She that goes hungry on their behalf. She who carries pain so that they do not have to. That is the lie you indulge in, my Lord, when you shoulder the burdens of this army alone. When there is an opportunity to quietly take responsibility for all that ails us, you undertake it, quietly, without a single word, and you are well aware that none notice."

"That's—" "You do that to yourself," Verdant continued. "Your own history, you carry that with you. The unfortunate demise of your family, you indulge in the lie of self-sacrifice for it, my Lord. You slay yourself, a thousands times a day, and ask why it is you were not able to help them. You put the responsibility for their deaths squarely upon your own shoulders."

"You do that not only for them, but every man that has died under you. Every comrade that you have lost, you wound yourself further with. You add another scar to your back that none can see, and quietly, do you indulge in that self-sacrificing lie. Quietly, do you carry the weight of an entire country's suffering, long before you had put a crown on your head."

Oliver bit his lip, and turned away. A pointed remark, from the likes of Verdant. He that always saw far too deeply, far too often. Oliver had not cried in front of the man before, and he wished to keep matters that way, even as his eyes began to mist over.

"We forced it of you in the battle with Tiberius, for we have begun to rely upon you for it, my Lord," Verdant said. "If you wished for the difference between yourself and the High King, and you wondered why it was he could so easily be labeled as corrupt, then find the answer in that. You would cut yourself into a million pieces in order to find a way forward. He seeks only pleasure. He flees from pain. The lies he tells are the lies that shield himself from pain. The lie of your birth – that shields you from nothing, my Lord, for it pains you more than it could ever pain anyone else. You wish to tell it, because with all you now carry, you can not bear its burden. Worry not, Oliver Patrick. Lady Blackthorn and I will carry it with you, and we will do so proudly. Those years you spent in comradery with us, without uttering a single word of it to us – they too were a self-sacrificing lie. For all the added suffering that we bore together, you breathed not a word of your struggles to us, so that you might not burden them with us. You always make the compromise, Your Majesty. You always bear the burden. You knew the weight of a crown long before it sat upon your head. There is no man in all the land that is more fit to be King. So I ask you, selfishly, once more, not to run from that which destiny has put before you. I selfishly ask you to make sacrifice once more – crudely, and with the hope of your forgiveness, do I ask it of you. Bear the crown, for the sake of the Stormfront."

Oliver coughed, his back turned to Verdant, so the man could not see the tears on his face. "You see far too much, Verdant. It's disconcerting."

"The sacrifices that you have made, I have not missed all of them, Your Majesty," Verdant said. "I have not borne witness to all of them, but I can see the truth of all of them. There is much that you are still unpaid for, much indeed. The years have not been kind to you – but even if I have not seen all that you have suffered, there is a certainty that Claudia has. The path laid out to you, can you deny it now, Your Majesty, that there is the involvement of a God's hand?"

"If that be the case, Verdant… then why is there more to come?" Oliver asked. "Why are we not finished yet? I tire of it, this pain in my heart. Why must we, once more, march forward, and give over a piece of ourselves? Can we not know any peace?"

"King Emerson began a quiet discussion with me, once our meeting had finished," Verdant said.

Oliver had not attended the meeting, after gaining the permission of Hod. He did not think he had any more to add. With the alliance with King Emerson secured, he had not the energy to play the diplomat any further.

"Oh?" Oliver said.

"He spoke to me of something that he seemed to expect that I already knew. He expressed his sympathies for you, Your Majesty, for what he supposed happened to your mother. He said too, that he supposed it was only natural for the son of Persephone to rise up, once he had learned the truth for himself," Verdant said. "The symbolic that I spoke of. The truth beyond the actual truth. The realm seems to understand, and acknowledge, that it is right for the supposed son of Dominus Patrick to be in the position that he is in. That it is right from him to rise up, and see justice done for the crimes of the past."