Ruthless: Path of Conquest

Mina waited for James to go into his plan, curious to know what he was thinking.

He had been so reticent about his encounter with the dream-attacking creature last night that she had no sense of what his ideas for dealing with the enemy might be. Clearly, he thought the monster was formidable, or rather than calling a meeting, he would have simply gathered a crew of fighters and invaded her territory in return.

Complete silence fell over the room as James cleared his throat.

“Tonight, I intend to go and seek the monster out in the dream world from which she attacked our territory,” he said. “I believe I can hold her in place there. The danger of not going to meet her in Dreamspace is obvious. The psychological effects of her nightmares, or the physiological effects of sleepless nights, are her way of undermining our capacity for self-defense. After a few nights of that, we would be softened up for her inevitable invasion in the physical world.”

People were nodding along with James as he spoke, and what he said made sense, but Mina sensed something off in his demeanor or perhaps his body language. A reluctance to say something. And why was he bothering to justify going to confront the enemy at all? The entire Council—and many outside this room, based on what James had explained—would naturally approve any action he might take against this enemy.

He continued, “When I confront her, I need a brave group of volunteers to attempt an invasion of the enemy’s territory. See if her defenses are still in place while she’s preoccupied with me. We don’t know for certain if the visions that people see when they look into her space are the actions of other creatures or the effect of her power alone. If it’s the latter, then this would be an opportunity to attack the enemy’s stronghold and perhaps even kill her.”

Oh. He’s making sure he justifies his plan, because he wants other people to risk their physical safety, and he can’t go with them.

“I volunteer to lead this group,” Dave interjected.

James nodded and offered a slim smile. “I thought you might. If you see anything that disturbs you, please withdraw right away.”

Dave nodded his assent.

“We will also need a brave group of volunteers to stand by in case our intrepid explorers are overcome by the power of the enemy. Watch for strange movements that might indicate they’re under the control of the enemy. And be prepared to either forcefully wake me up—using violence if necessary—or to go in after them yourselves.”

A silence fell over the room as people thought about what James had just said.

Mina resolved to herself that she would volunteer to lead this second group of volunteers if no one more suitable stepped up. After all, she was certain to be involved in this part of the plan if only because she wanted to be the one to wake James up if that needed to happen. No one else was going to “forcefully” wake her husband up, “using violence if necessary.”

“What will we do if the enemy’s defenses are still up—I mean, I know our volunteers are instructed to withdraw in that case, but what’s our ‘Plan B’ if invading while you distract the enemy fails?” asked Luntz nervously.

“We’ll b—I mean, that sounds like something for everyone to mull over,” James said. “If there are ideas, I’m ready to hear them. I have a few thoughts myself. But I’m hoping this works, and we don’t have to do anything drastic.”

He almost said, “We’ll burn that bridge when we come to it,” Mina thought, trying not to laugh.

There was a general murmuring as people promised to give the problem some attention after the meeting closed.

At that point, James asked for the individual committee heads to give reports. This was their first meeting. They might as well get a good idea of what was going on in the Kingdom.

Agriculture reported that their efforts were going well.

New building construction was suffering only for lack of suitable land, but they expected that James’s steady expansion of the Kingdom would fix that. And he offered to firm up some of the existing land that was not within the swamp but verged on being too swampy for construction.

Sewer construction was proceeding quickly thanks to the collaboration between humans and Mole People.

“Frankly, without Lord Magnar and his people, we have no idea how long this project would take,” Zuccarini said, laughing nervously as she looked down the table affectionately at Magnar. “As things stand now, the sewer should be large enough for a population ten times our number in a few weeks. Then we’re hoping to shift into a general ‘Water Committee’ that will hook up everyone with running water again.”

This provoked a round of applause from the table.

“Well done,” James said, smiling broadly and looking back and forth between Zuccarini and Magnar.

To the apparent surprise of everyone but James, Magnar spoke up at that point.

“It is a great honor to be of service to our friends and neighbors,” he said in a voice that was surprisingly high and non-threatening for someone as large and scary-looking as Magnar.

There was another round of applause at this, after the room got over its collective shock.

“What does this gesture mean?” Magnar asked once the noise died down. He pantomimed clapping.

“In our culture, it means that we all approve of you and your actions,” James replied.

Magnar nodded. “Thank you all very much,” he said in a humble falsetto-sounding voice.

“Ahh,” Duncan said quietly. “So that’s what it was.”

Duncan clapped a couple of times as practice, while Magnar sat up straighter with what looked like a proud bearing.

The status reports continued, but Mina allowed her mind to wander. The most important matters had already been discussed, and she could tell that James was paying attention.

This government is working surprisingly well considering the different Races involved—and the fact that it’s composed almost exclusively of people who have never led anything larger than a farm in their lives. Then again, perhaps that was why it was functional. There was no one with a real power base besides James. No rivals. All authority springing from one place, everyone striving to achieve goals laid out or approved by him.

Maybe it wouldn’t be as effective once they were beyond the basic subsistence level, but then, monarchies had endured for thousands of years in countries around the world. Longer than any republican form of government. Perhaps there was something to this, beyond simply grabbing for power to ensure their own family’s continued prosperity and security.

There was a silence in the room, and Mina realized the last committee head had finished giving his report.

“All right. Thank you, everyone, for talking and listening. I think the set of us are going to do great things together. Let’s take a quick break, and then we’ll admit the public,” James said.

People rose from their seats, refilled cups of water, and talked among themselves.

James wrapped an arm around Mina, and she remained seated beside him.

“Skapi?” she asked quietly. Was there something you wanted to discuss?

He replied in a low voice, almost a whisper.

“I hate to put more pressure on you,” James said, “and I have a lot of faith in our people here. But I also have a bad feeling about this enemy. I think this monster is probably going to be more difficult to destroy than some normal flesh and blood creature. I don’t know much about what she’s capable of. It’s just a feeling I have. I gave Carol the System Credits for her expansion. I’m hoping that sometime in the next few days, we can attack Sister Strange in her own territory. Considering her defense system, I don’t know if the Hunters and I will be able to destroy her by ordinary means. If it’s possible to invade her territory tonight, then that will prove I can at least distract her by confronting her in dreams. But I’d need someone else to help me with actually killing her, since I’m basically powerless to attack enemies in Dreamspace. So if it’s possible for you to find the method for killing whatever she is, I appreciate that.”

Sister Strange. So that’s her name. James went through his whole explanation and his plan for dealing with her, but he never said what the enemy’s name was. What’s the source of this aversion?

“Could you tell me more about her?” Mina asked.

And she could see it again—the hesitation, the look of reluctance on James’s face, that she had noticed when he was explaining the threat to the group as a whole.

“You don’t have to tell me about it if you don’t want to,” she whispered.

“It’s nothing I can’t discuss, exactly,” James said. “It’s something I feel—” he searched for words—“uneasy about, I guess.” He looked at Mina. “She claimed to be showing me visions of my future suffering, and I’ve spent the whole day wondering—”

“If it’s true,” she finished.

And suddenly, Mina found that she didn’t want to know. She didn’t want to know what the creature’s visions had shown James. She felt a horrible sense of foreboding.

They’d had the conversation about whether they would want to know their future before. Years ago, long before either of them really believed that prophecy was possible.

“No,” Mina had said, quickly and firmly. “Superstitious people are always trying to find out the future from fortune tellers. It never helps them. Even if I knew, it would only make me miserable. To know how long I was going to live. How I was going to die. Why would anyone want that?”

James was very firm that he wanted to know what would happen in his future if he could somehow acquire that knowledge.

“If you knew what was going to happen to you, it would change the meaning of everything that went before,” he insisted. “I would absolutely want to know. There’s no secret that I don’t want to know the truth about. Whatever it is, I can handle it. Even if it’s painful. Even if it’s horrible. Can you imagine knowing how your story ends? The ending of your life is like the punctuation at the end of a sentence.” His voice became passionate. “If it falls in just the right place, it can increase the meaning of everything that came before! Or, if it’s wrong, it can ruin the meaning. But if you knew about it in advance, you’d change the sentence. You would write a different sentence so that the people who read it would understand what you wanted them to understand. Even if you’re stuck with some shitty punctuation, it’s what you do with it that counts.”

Mina hadn’t known quite how to respond to that. She still felt the same way after his impassioned argument for his position, but she was almost certain that he was thinking of his own father’s untimely death when he said it would have been better to know ahead of time.

You never had the chance to say a proper goodbye, she remembered thinking.

In the present, James nodded.

“Yes. That’s exactly it. I’ve spent the whole day wondering if that hag is actually showing me real visions of the future.”

“That’s part of why you wanted to face her again,” Mina said the words as she thought them.

“Maybe,” James agreed.

“You think she can really show you the future,” Mina said. “And it’s irresistible to you. You have to see it. You have to know.”

She spoke in non-judgmental tones. Her husband’s curiosity reminded her of the great hero of the Odyssey. Odysseus knew that the sirens’ song lured sailors to their deaths, but he had to know what it sounded like. So he had his sailors tie him to the mast, and while they stuffed their ears with wax, he listened.

James swallowed. “I do have to know,” he said. “I also think this is the best path forward to protect our people. But you—you still don’t want to know, right? What the future holds?”

She shook her head and gave him a tight smile. “Blissful ignorance for me, thank you.”

Even as Mina said those words, the curiosity gnawed at her. She didn’t want to know. She was terribly afraid. And she suspected that if these visions of the future pertained to her, they would start to change James’s behavior around her. Like when he looked up the ending of a show.

When that happens, I always end up asking him what exactly happens. Half the time, he gave in and told her. But the other half of the time—well, James was good at knowing what to tell and what to withhold.

“I’m glad we had this conversation,” James said. He sounded slightly uncomfortable but relieved.

“Me too,” Mina said. Her voice softened. “I hope it’s a little of the weight off your shoulders, skapi. Sharing your plans with me, I mean. You know, I would never change this about you, any more than I would change the qualities that pushed you to pursue me, or the ones that led you to start your own country.”

He smiled and stared deep into her eyes.

“I know,” he said. “You always make things easier. Especially the hard ones.”