Chapter 201: Accused of Treason
The accusations unfurled like a poison mist, each whisper sharpening into a blade. Voices rose and tangled, finding traction in the vacancy left by truth.
"He is the Grand Duke’s son-in-law," one minister declared, as if pronouncing a verdict. The words landed with the weight of accusation, and heads turned like a flock sensing prey.
"He should have killed Hadrian to hide this fact," another sneered, voice honeyed with malice. "Lucky for us, Lord Leville’s loyalty dragged this out into the light. Prince Leroy has smeared the goodwill of our merciful Emperor." A few courtier chuckles rippled like rats in the rafters.
"He wants to set the realm aflame. Like Hadrian, chaos is his trade. It was not an accident the Queen of Corvalith died. He must have planned it," piped someone else, face half-hidden behind a fan, eyes bright with the thrill of scandal.
More voices took up the strain, faster now, a litany of suspicion: collusion, treachery, foreign loyalties, secret pacts. Each accusation piled on the last until the room sagged beneath their combined weight.
All the while, the Dowager sat motionless upon her raised dais, like an unmoving statue carved from ice. Her lips did not twitch in agreement or scorn; she offered no clue by word or gesture. The silence from her seat felt like a sentence in itself, slow and deliberate. Leroy had heard Aldric say that the Dowager loved him like a mother.
He understood that remark better now. She did love him like a mother. His mother. A mother who loves by strangling; a matron who would smother the child under the guise of care. The comparison turned in his gut like a rusted knife.
A single voice tried to temper the rising tide. "You should have treated him fairly," a minister said, surprisingly soft at first. "He bled for us, he bled for this court, when war demanded it." For a flicker, sympathy shimmered across the marbled floor.
Then the man’s eyes landed on Leroy and hardened. The softness curdled. "But now... now the dog of Kaltharion barks back," he hissed, the old-fashioned slur tasting like blood in the hall. "We should snap his head off before he does more damage." The laughter that followed him was cruel, practiced; the murmurers closed ranks as if to devour.
Accusation became a chorus. Fingers pointed. Serpents of rumor slithered beneath civility, staining pledges and histories alike. Faces Leroy had trusted turned away or tilted with opportunistic hunger. Even those who had once nodded in respect now measured their distance.
He felt the room constrict, a net tightening around him. No defender rose. No ally stepped forward. The Emperor observed, expression a mask of weary curiosity; the Dowager’s cold stillness bore down like a verdict already decided. In that suffocating moment, Leroy realized how utterly, how dangerously alone he had become.
Leroy did not bow his head to the storm. He didn’t want to anymore.
For long moments, he had knelt in silence, letting their poison seep into the marble floor around him. But when the last sneer echoed, calling him the dog of Kaltharion, he rose. He was done bowing his head to their sneers.
Because if he kept on bowing, then next, they would come for his wife. And he wouldn’t allow that.
Slowly, deliberately, he stood to his full height, the chains of ceremony falling away with the motion. His mask caught the firelight, and beneath its shadow, his eyes burned green, bright as emeralds honed to a blade’s edge.
His voice, when it came, was not a plea. It was iron. Steady, unflinching.
"Ten years," he began, every syllable cutting through the chamber like a drawn sword. "Ten years I bled at the borders; not for Kaltharion, not for myself, but for Vaeloria. Ten years I carried your banner into fields where no lion dared tread. Lands now part of this empire bear the mark of my hand. Villages, fortresses, rivers— all wrested from enemies who would see your borders broken. Ask the soldiers who followed me if I led them astray. Ask the widows of the fallen if I did not carry their grief as my own."
The room had quieted, the tide of whispers pulled back by the gravity of his words.
"I forged treaties when war would have devoured us whole. I faced kings, generals, and rebels who spat at your crown, and I forced them to kneel. I brought peace where only fire was meant to remain. Not for my own glory. For yours
."He let the silence hang, daring anyone to deny it. His shoulders squared, his chin lifted in proud defiance.
"And now, after all this, you would accuse me of courting chaos? You dare say I would undo what I spent a decade preserving?" His hand clenched at his side, not in weakness, but in fury contained. "I have done more for this empire than most in this hall who spit their venom from gilded seats. My loyalty has been tested on battlefields you would not survive a day in. Do not mistake silence for weakness, nor chains for guilt."
He took one step forward, the green fire in his eyes unmasked, unwavering.
"If you would brand me traitor, then you brand your own victories as lies. You brand the soil soaked with my blood as meaningless. You brand every soldier who followed me as nothing more than fools."
The court was breathless, caught between indignation and awe.
Leroy’s voice dropped, firm and final. "I am no dog of Kaltharion. I am the shield that stood between Vaeloria and ruin. And I will not bow to slander."
The hush that followed Leroy’s defiant words was broken by the Dowager as she rose. The silken folds of her robe swept like a shadow across the dais, her veil of composure intact, her authority absolute. When she spoke, her voice was velvet draped over steel. Everyone looked at her.
"Bold words," she said, her tone low but clear, cutting through the hall more sharply than a shout. "But tell me, Prince Leroy... when you speak of battles won, of lands seized, of treaties forged... who do you honor? The empire, or yourself?"
Her gaze swept across the gathered court, inviting them to share her suspicion.
"Have you forgotten, child, that every victory you claim was won under His Majesty’s reign? That each fortress you seized was seized not for your name, but for his crown?" She turned, inclining her head reverently toward the Emperor, then let her eyes fall back to Leroy, colder now. "Yet you stand here, parading your deeds as though you alone were the architect of Vaeloria’s glory."
A murmur rippled through the chamber, ministers exchanging wary glances, the seed of doubt cast anew.
"You say you bled for us," she continued, her voice tightening, "but I hear not loyalty in your tone; only pride. Pride that places you above the throne you claim to serve. Pride that dares to exalt your hand above the Emperor’s. Do you not see what such arrogance is, my lords?"
She paused deliberately, her eyes gleaming beneath her lashes. "It is treason veiled in righteousness."