Chapter 36: The Crowd He Walked Into
For nearly a year, Rodric Maren had been the lord of House Maren in everything but name.
The title of Lord still belonged to his father, Baron Aldric Maren, but titles meant little when their owner spent his days confined to a sickbed, his body wasting away one breath at a time - waiting for the Gods to show mercy and grant death.
The old baron had once been regarded as a capable if unremarkable ruler of the eastern ridge, respected more for his steadiness than brilliance. But illness had stolen that man long before death had the chance to claim him.
In his place, now only silence remained.
The household had gradually stopped looking to the old baron for decisions.
Servants sought Rodric’s approval, stewards reported directly to him, and the soldiers obeyed all his commands.
Even the merchants negotiating contracts no longer asked whether the baron agreed. They simply assumed the young lord’s word carried the authority of House Maren.
For Rodric, it was the first real taste of power.
Unfortunately, it came at the worst possible time.
House Maren’s fortunes had been declining for years. The eastern ridge offered little wealth beyond timber, fishing villages, and the tolls collected along the Serpentine road.
Harvests had failed repeatedly, trade had slowed, and the treasury seemed to empty faster with every passing season. Their neighbours prospered while Maren merely endured.
House Cavel seemed to grow richer with every shipment of iron from its mine, remaining as the Duke’s favored vassal.
And Rodric, who grew up beneath the shadow of this comparison, only learned to hate everyone around him.
He convinced himself that his father had been weak.
Too cautious, too willing to bend the knee and content with simply surviving.
Rodric intended to change that.
He would restore House Maren’s standing, no matter what methods were required.
That ambition had led him to make quiet arrangements with men like Volk, using bandits to bleed rival trade while ensuring Maren caravans passed untouched. Coin began flowing into his coffers again, slowly but steadily, and for the first time he believed he had found a solution no one else had been clever enough to see.
That was until the Scoundrel of the North, Encrid Gannon, had appeared on the North Road.
Within the span of only a few days, the disowned fourth son of the Duke had dismantled everything Rodric had spent months building.
Now, with rumours of Volk’s defeat and reports that merchants, village heads, and minor lords were gathering at the old watch fort, Rodric could no longer remain inside Maren Keep.
Whatever Encrid had uncovered...It had to be stopped before the rest of the North learned of it.
He came up the switchback path expecting a battle.
He had brought the finest men his household could spare-twenty mounted soldiers, two household knights, and the crimson banner of House Maren snapping proudly above them.
During the climb, he had rehearsed the story over and over until it sounded almost like the truth.
The bandits plaguing the eastern roads had been destroyed by House Maren in a swift punitive strike. The evidence recovered from their hideout had been secured. Encrid Gannon, the meddlesome disgrace, who had secret trading with the bandits had tragically fallen in the fighting.
Then he would burn the bandit chief’s records.
The dead would tell no stories and the living would hear only his.
He rode with absolute confidence despite learning that four White Griffin knights had defeated the bandits.
To Rodric, they had only defeated bandits.
Nothing more.
Bandits were expendable tools-filthy men useful only because they obeyed coins. Comparing them to trained household soldiers or sworn knights was laughable.
What he never paused to consider was how those four knights had achieved such a victory.
Nor did he understand the man who had led them.
’History belongs to the survivors.’
If he arrived first and seized the evidence...
If he killed the only witness capable of tying it all together...
Then history would simply be rewritten.
The old fortress gates creaked open as Rodric rode through.
And his plan died before he had taken ten steps.
The courtyard was full.
Merchants from the Serpentine Guild stood beside bales of cloth and crates already identified as their own.
Village heads from the fishing settlements spoke quietly among themselves.
Boatmen, caravan guards, craftsmen, clerks holding copied manifests.
Dozens upon dozens of people were very face turned toward the crimson banner.
Every pair of eyes already knew why they were there.
Rodric’s confidence faltered.
You could silence one witness or perhaps five.
But not fifty.
And among those gathered stood people no noble house could simply make disappear.
His eyes swept the courtyard, searching for Encrid Gannon. Instead, they stopped on someone else.
And seeing the man, color drained ever so slightly from his face.
’Why is he here...?’
He knew that man very well.
Ellis Cavel.
The second son of House Cavel.
If his elder brother managed the mines, Ellis was responsible for the ledgers. Contracts, trade, correspondence, accounts, and all the things that required a calculative mind were handled by him. It is said that few men in the North understood commerce better than he did. While the first son was the heir to Lord Ferris by birthright, Ellis was the one who had inherited all the brains and the cunningness from the Baron.
More importantly, House Cavel stood among Duke Gannon’s closest and wealthiest vassals, its iron arming much of the North and its influence extending far beyond its own lands.
Rodric’s heartbeat quickened.
This was no longer a matter between House Maren and a troublesome fourth son of House Gannon.
House Cavel had become a witness.
And if House Cavel was involved...
Others would follow.
"Young Lord Maren."
His voice was calm, courteous even.
A lean young noble stepped forward from the crowd, a leather-bound ledger tucked neatly beneath one arm. His movements were measured, his expression composed, betraying none of the tension that had suddenly seized Rodric’s chest.
He inclined his head with impeccable courtesy.
"My father sends his regards."
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