Song of Blood & Stone (Earthsinger Chronicles #1)(48)
“I do not want to hear another word about the allowable roof colors in East Rosira. They can paint them pink with blue dots for all I care!” Jack slammed his hand on the table; several of the old men jumped. “How much longer must we go on discussing this ridiculous minutiae? Objections to the fabric of the shipbuilder’s guild’s new uniforms? Reshodding the mounts of the dock guard? None of this will matter in mere days when the Mantle comes down, yet you all refuse to seriously discuss the most pressing issue.”
The faces around the table resembled fish, wide-eyed with their mouths opening and closing mutely.
“Your Grace,” Pugeros, the Minister of Finance, said, his face taking on a fatherly quality that held more than a little condescension. “Lagrimar has given no indication they plan to attack. And it has only been five years since the last breach. They have always needed far longer than that to build the dark magic needed to cross the Mantle.”
“Why would they warn us of an attack? I have seen their preparations, Minister. I am warning you. And the time between the breaches has grown shorter and shorter. They are finding new ways to use their dark magic, as you call it. We need to inform the people, especially those near the border. Perhaps even evacuate.”
“That would be extreme, Your Grace,” Stevenot said. “We do not want to alarm the populace and cause a panic. Our superior technology and skilled army will easily defeat their witchcraft as we have done in the past.”
Red stained Jack’s vision. “Easily?” he said through clenched teeth. No one in this room aside from him had ever seen combat.
“The last breach was barely even three months long.” Stevenot turned away as if he’d made his point. As if three months in the trenches was merely an extended vacation. These men hadn’t the faintest clue.
War. The exact cause of the conflict all those years ago was lost to history. Its absence conspicuous since such careful records existed from that point on. Each breach was a devastation. Early on, the Lagrimari use of Earthsong resulted in heavy Elsiran losses. They, in turn, had responded with innovation, better weapons, more artful strategies, but by no means did that guarantee their victory.
“Have you forgotten the Iron War? The Princeling’s Scourge?” Jack looked around the room. “Many of you were alive when they destroyed the citadel, killing thousands of civilians in the borderlands. Ignoring this will not make it go away.”
“The farmers will not leave,” the Minister of Agriculture said, shrugging his shoulders. “They would much rather die on their land.”
“Then may they find serenity in the World After.” Jack leaned back. “There are thousands of borderlanders that can and must be saved. This threat cannot be taken lightly. The Lagrimari have found some new way to weaken the Mantle. There are more and more cracks appearing, and in a matter of days, it will fall. We will defend our lands as we always have, but we’ve never faced the True Father on Elsiran soil before.”
The men blinked stupidly in response. Jack kneaded the bridge of his nose. “Is it necessary to invoke Prince’s Right to make you take this seriously?”
Voices around the table exploded.
“You will do no such thing!”
“Presposterous!”
“How dare you!”
Minister Nirall’s voice cut through the din. “The Council serves at the pleasure of the Prince Regent. In times of war, it is fully within his right to dissolve this Council if and when—” Shouts and censure drowned him out.
Lizvette’s father, Meeqal Nirall, was Jack’s favorite Council member, a former professor and the Minister of Education and Innovation, he was most often the voice of compassion and reason.
“Listen,” Nirall said, his voice rising over the others. “We must not let it get to that point. Let us hear him out.”
“Thank you,” Jack said.
The man nodded.
“If we evacuate the borderlanders, where will they go? How will we feed them?” the Minister of Agriculture cut in.
“Yes, these refugees”—Pugeros spat the word out like he would a rotten bite of food—“are already straining the Principality’s coffers. With this year’s abominable harvest and the increase on import tariffs out of Yaly, we are already facing difficult financial waters. The latest debacle with the King of Raun means an even more dire situation for our economy. If we reduce the refugee rations, or refuse them entry entirely, we would be in a better position to care for our own people.”
“There is international precedent,” Stevenot said. “We are under no obligation to burden ourselves with their care.”
“This is not a financial question, but a moral one,” said Nirall. “They are fleeing a brutal dictator. We must treat them the same way we’d treat our own women and children. There are enough resources to care for them all.”
“Minister Nirall.” The low timbre of Zavros Calladeen’s voice resonated as he addressed his uncle formally. Calladeen, the youngest on the Council save Jack, owed his position as Minister of Foreign Affairs not to his uncle’s influence but to his own keen intelligence, politicking, and ruthless ambition. “I’ve seen this camp, and much as I would like to feel sorry for these refugees, I am moved by something less like pity and more like suspicion to see them crossing our borders in such increasing numbers.”