Ellios placed his hands on the cold marble table. His fingers moved slowly, as if tracing an imaginary map on the surface.

  "Imagine the map of Carta on your war room wall, Madam," Ellios whispered, his voice low and hypnotic.

  "Draw a line from the Southwest to the North, then curve to the Northeast."

  Ellios stared at Reine intently.

  "Three main fortresses. Three giants who have stood alone until now due to their egos."

  One of Ellios’ fingers pressed onto the table.

  "Porto Royale in the Southwest. Where Marquis Hernan Ferdinand stands as the sole wall holding back the savagery of the Nigras Black Lands. You know how insane the Nigras people are, don't you? They don't fight for land; they fight for blood."

  Ellios’ finger slid to the right.

  "Black Keep in the northern mountains. Where Marquis Cheng Leiyin and his army hold back the Larrus Highlands. Barbaric mountain folk."

  Ellios’ finger slid again.

  "And Rivermarch on the northeast side. Where Marquis Alionso Montezar guards the Great Seine River from the madmen in white robes—The Theocracy of Latram."

  Ellios stopped. He watched Reine’s eyes following his finger movements. She knew this geography. Everyone did. But she hadn't seen the bigger picture.

  Ellios leaned his face closer, his voice turning into a serious hiss.

  "Two days ago. Midnight."

  Ellios’ eyes glinted.

  "Those three Marquises were not sleeping in their warm beds. They met at a blind spot, in a hunting lodge in a neutral valley. Hernan Ferdinand. Cheng Leiyin. Alionso Montezar."

  Ellios smiled crookedly, a smile implying not happiness, but terror.

  "They no longer stand alone, Madam. Secretly, they have formed a clandestine alliance. Blood oaths have been spoken."

  Ellios leaned back in his chair, letting the bomb detonate in the silence of the room.

  "The Northern Line has united," he said finally. "The hardest line on this continent. The iron wall damming Carta’s enemies now possesses one brain, one command."

  He saw Reine’s pupils constrict to the size of needles.

  Ellios knew what the woman was thinking. She was imagining the worst-case scenario.

  If Ferdinand, Leiyin, and Montezar united, they controlled over 60% of Carta’s real military strength. They held the borders. If they decided to turn around... if they decided the enemy was no longer Nigras, Larrus, or Latham... but Ironseat...

  Then Carta would fall overnight.

  "Imagine, Madam," Ellios provoked softly, enjoying the fear seeping behind Reine’s cold face. "The three fiercest guard dogs you own, suddenly stop barking at thieves outside the fence... and start staring sharply at their master inside the house."

  Ellios picked up a butter biscuit from the plate, spinning it in his fingers.

  "Is that enough to give you a stomach ache, Prime Minister?"

  Ellios saw it. A rare and precious moment where Reine Blackmere, the iron lady controlling Ironseat, looked like an ordinary human just slapped in the face by fate.

  The porcelain cup in Reine’s hand didn't fall—the woman was too trained for such crude clumsiness. However, Ellios’ sharp eyes caught a microscopic tremor in the Prime Minister’s slender fingers. The tea liquid inside the cup rippled, creating small waves betraying the storm of panic exploding in her chest.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  Reine’s pupils dilated, swallowing her black irises. Her pale face became slightly stiff, as if her genius brain suffered a momentary short circuit processing the disaster named "The Northern Alliance."

  Three Marquises. Three armies. One command. It was a nightmare for every central ruler.

  However, the sight of vulnerability lasted only two seconds.

  Ellios observed the next transformation with awe mixed with wariness. He watched how Reine Blackmere pulled back control over herself.

  The woman closed her eyes for a moment. She took a long breath through her nose, a sharp and deep inhalation, filling her lungs with lost authority. Shoulders that had drooped from the weight of the news were now pulled straight again.

  When Reine opened her eyes, the fear was gone. Burned away.

  No more shock there. Only the cold of freshly forged steel and the fire of ambition refusing to be extinguished remained. Her jaw hardened, forming a firm line of stubbornness.

  Ellios could see the gears in the woman's head spinning fiercely again. Reine wouldn't let herself be intimidated by Hernan, Cheng, or Alionso. She wouldn't let those "guard dogs" bite her hand.

  She isn't afraid, Ellios concluded internally, seeing Reine’s gaze turn sharp and deadly. She feels challenged.

  The woman set down her cup with slow, deliberate movement, as if pressing a war button. She looked at Ellios, not as a bearer of bad news, but as a pawn who had just handed her a weapon.

  Reine refused to lose. If the North united, she would destroy that unity, or she would build a higher wall.

  Ellios smiled thinly at the reaction. The lioness has awakened, he thought. Now the game becomes far more interesting.

  Ellios stared at the woman before him with mixed feelings; half horrified, half amazed.

  He expected panic. He expected Reine to immediately summon war generals or pace anxiously. Instead, what he got was the calm of a butcher watching a cow walk voluntarily into the slaughter pen.

  Reine leaned back into the velvet chair casually. Her slender fingers tapped the edge of the marble table, a slow, measured rhythm.

  The corner of her blood-red lips lifted, forming a smile far more terrifying than her anger.

  "Watching three heads moving wildly in different directions... is troublesome," Reine murmured, her voice smooth like a snake hissing over sand.

  Her eagle eyes stared straight at Ellios, but her gaze pierced far north, as if seeing the necks of Hernan, Cheng, and Alionso directly.

  "But if they unite..." Reine tilted her head slightly, her tone shifting to cold satisfaction.

  "...They have just turned themselves into one thick neck."

  Reine’s hand rose slowly in the air, fingers open as if holding an invisible rope, then slowly clenched tight.

  "And one neck..." she whispered, "...is far easier to leash."

  Then, her hand made a quick, sharp horizontal movement in the air.

  Slice.

  "...Or sever in a single swing."

  Ellios felt his blood run cold. Goosebumps rose beneath his expensive shirt.

  Insane, Ellios thought. This woman is truly insane.

  While normal people saw a combined threat as growing danger, Reine Blackmere saw it as efficiency. She didn't view the Northern Alliance's unity as strength; she saw it as one massive weak point. She no longer needed to hunt three separate wolves. She just needed to cut off the monster’s single head, and the rest would die.

  The logic of a true tyrant.

  Ellios swallowed, trying hard to hide the tremor in his throat. He just realized he wasn't playing with fire with Reine. He was playing with magma.

  Ellios cleared his throat softly, cleansing the cold sensation left by Reine’s "neck slash" metaphor. He had to return control of this conversation to its proper track: the transactional track.

  He didn't come here to listen to the Prime Minister’s slaughter fantasies. He came as a merchant.

  "Enough about neck anatomy, Madam," Ellios said, his voice calm and calculating again. He tapped his finger once on the marble table.

  "I have placed the head of the Northern Alliance on your silver platter. As agreed, I demand my change."

  Ellios stared sharply, demanding his rights.

  "Duke Rahgaras’ Alliance," he claimed directly. "I want the names. Which nobles has he bought? Who owes him favors? And who eats the crumbs from his table? I need the complete political map of the East, Reine."

  Reine Blackmere did not answer immediately. The woman rose from her chair with graceful movement, signaling the audience was over. She walked slowly toward an ebony wood filing cabinet in the corner, but did not open it.

  She merely touched the surface, then turned to Ellios with a look hard to interpret—a mix of subtle disdain and professional respect.

  "The list is long, Ellios," Reine answered flatly. "And I don't have time to read it one by one like a bedtime story."

  The woman stepped closer to the exit, opening it for Ellios. A polite gesture of dismissal.

  "Return to your lodging," she ordered.

  Then, the corner of Reine’s lip lifted slightly, forming a thin smirk full of innuendo.

  "This afternoon, the documents will arrive in your bed."

  Ellios froze for a moment in the doorway.

  In your bed.

  The words landed with annoying precision. Reine chose those words deliberately. It was a stinging retort to Ellios’ earlier statement—about how he obtained information from Louis in bed.

  Reine seemed to say: Since you like working in bed so much, I will send your wages there too.

  Ellios snorted softly, realizing he had just been mocked in a very elegant manner.

  "Thank you, Madam," Ellios answered briefly, bowing stiffly.

  "Just ensure the documents are complete. I dislike missing pages."

  With that, Ellios stepped out of the cold room, leaving the eagle’s nest feeling relieved yet wary. He got what he wanted, but he knew, owing a favor or transacting with Reine Blackmere always left a metallic taste on the tongue.