The Bee Dungeon

Chapter 379 - Bee-hold the Tower Keeper

The negotiations between the allies concluded for the day with an agreement to meet again tomorrow. Determining what to do with the prisoners was the most urgent issue, so once it was agreed that they would all fall under Belissar’s authority, the group quickly realized they would not finish deciding on the rest that day. Belissar might have ceded some of his rights to the weapons, armor, and corpses, but not all of it, so the exact allocation of the recovered materials would take a while.

Not least of all because they had a true dragon corpse to deal with. Chief Rohsuak argued for an exception for that corpse given that it was one of Belissar’s bees that brought it down, alongside Captain Karpakynne. The alliance ultimately decided that the corpse would have to be handled separately from the rest of the material and would discuss its fate later.

In the meantime, the group adjourned to finish cleaning up the battlefield and reorganizing their forces, and so that Belissar could have a chance to start dealing with the prisoners.

Once she was done stabilizing all of his own casualties, Belissar sent the Second of the Sixth’s hive to heal the prisoners, along with an escort of karnuq, fair folk, and monster bees. Though, since all of the prisoners had been disarmed and most of them had lost their blessings entirely, he thought it was relatively safe. The bees still didn’t want him to go to the prisoner room personally, though, so Belissar asked them to send a representative. Chief Rohsuak also advised that would be the better way to speak with them.

So, Belissar waited in a building near the karnuq’s settlement, sitting in a throne prepared for him while monster bees hovered all around and Chief Rohsuak stood off to his side. After he got settled, Hirkolos and Metsaitti brought one of the former Tower Guard captains.

The former captain blinked when he saw Belissar, but Hirkolos and Metsaitti kept him moving. He knelt down before Belissar. Belissar didn’t say anything right away, letting Chief Rohsuak speak for him first.

“State your name for Tower Keeper Belissar.”

The captain blinked again when he heard Belissar’s name but kept his head down and immediately replied.

“Auschias, former Tower Guard captain of the rogue Tower Lord Starami. We are at your mercy, Tower Keeper.”

Belissar inclined his head towards Chief Rohsuak, so she continued. They had discussed how they wanted to handle this while they were setting up the room and bringing the former captain over, so she already knew what to ask.

“Now then, Auschias, tell us: why did you decide to surrender?”

Auschias complied without issue.

“Eventually, we realized Lord Starami had gone rogue and was directly opposing the gods, including the God of Light. Anyone who confronted him on this was killed. We could not fight for him any longer.”

Chief Rohsuak narrowed her eyes.

“Then why assault the Tower in the first place? The gods themselves gave the Tower Keeper their blessing from the very beginning. The God of Light you so revere made herself known in the very first room. You attacked us before you surrendered.”

Auschias let his shoulders droop.

“We swore oaths before the gods to serve Lord Starami. Even though he had defied the gods, we had to break those oaths to refuse his orders. It was not a decision we made lightly. I had hoped Lord Starami might realize the error of his ways and call off the assault but it appears he persisted to his end.”

Chief Rohsuak gave him a smile, though her eyes remained narrowed.

“I see. Now then: what do you think of this Tower and its defenders? What do you think of me?”

Auschias kept his face impassive.

“I am in no position to judge. There was much I did not know and I am an oathbreaker who served a rogue Tower Lord. What I can say is the God of Light approves of this Tower, defenders and all. I will not defy her anymore.”

Chief Rohsuak then turned to Belissar. Belissar, meanwhile, was happy. This Auschias hadn’t called the karnuq as subhumans at the very least, and was apparently still loyal to the God of Light. Belissar hoped he could work with the former Tower Guard, like he did with Sehfitis and Hirkolos. So, Belissar spoke directly now.

“Do you want to join the Tower?”

Auschias blinked and did not reply at first. He seemed confused so Belissar continued.

“Hirkolos and Sehfitis felt the same as you and decided to make up for it by helping me. Would you want to do that? Or would you like to go back to the Conclave at some point? There’s a lot of spiderkin down in the Underway now, but maybe we can figure something out.”

Auschias took a moment to respond.

“You...would recruit oathbreakers?”

Belissar nodded.

“You broke your oath to Starami so you could stop betraying the God of Light, right?”

Auschias nodded back and then went silent for a moment.

“...we cannot go back. We are oathbreakers and deserters, even if we had our reasons. We are at your mercy, Tower Keeper. If you will spare the lives of those that followed, we will do whatever you ask.”

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Belissar smiled.

“Excellent.”

Auschias was soon dismissed afterwards to relay the news to the other captives. He was greatly distracted on the way back, no part of the conversation had gone how he anticipated. As he was escorted back, he eventually glanced at Hirkolos.

“Hirkolos, can I ask: just who is the Tower Keeper?”

Hirkolos smiled.

“He’s not a fey, if that’s what you’re asking. He’s a human, a beekeeper from Lord Starami’s territory. He was at the village Ruckanos ordered me to burn.”

Auschias’ eyes widened slightly.

“And he spared you after you attacked again?”

Hirkolos nodded.

“He did. He is what I always thought a Tower Lord should be.”

Auschias grunted in acknowledgement, then fell into silence as he considered everything he had seen and heard on this very long day...

Belissar’s work was not done after Auschias left, however. He now gathered with Chief Rohsuak, Leijaliuk the karnuq quartermaster, and the First of the Fifth’s First Daughter. He frowned as Leijaliuk finished her reports and presented the conclusion.

“Tower Keeper, we do not make enough food to feed that many more people.”

Chief Rohsuak had raised that concern earlier so Belissar had not been entirely unaware. He had hoped he could just make more resource plant nodes and animal dens...but it turned out when they examined the actual numbers that he currently didn’t have enough mana to replicate what he did for the karnuq, not at the scale necessary for the much more numerous humans. The additional nutrition of meat from deer and rabbits would help but they now had more than ten times the mouths to feed.

Besides, Belissar honestly didn’t want to spend all of his Tower’s available mana on basic food if he didn’t have to. He still needed to make that dragonvein volcano room or Urubran would be really mad at him, not to mention all the new stuff he had received from the God of Light. The battle had made it abundantly clear that his Tower still needed to grow stronger if he was going to keep it safe.

The First of the Fifth’s First Daughter danced.

“Hive of hives can give honey?”

But Belissar shook his head.

“You need that honey, the hive of hives needs to keep growing. Besides, humans need more than honey to survive, so we’ll have to get more food anyways. I’d rather you keep your honey, at least as much of it as possible.”

The First of the Fifth’s First Daughter danced a happy salute and a “King is best King!” dance in reply. Fortunately, Belissar had an alternative solution.

“Since we can’t feed them all ourselves, let’s ask the fair folk for help.”

He already had an agreement with the green elves for assistance from their gardeners and farmers, they could help him grow some fields. The pixies had helped him a lot already and really enjoyed the bees’ honey, so perhaps he could trade with them. That would require giving up some honey, but hopefully he could ask for more food in return and so keep as much honey for the bees as possible.

So, he and his advisors began to discuss what they might offer if the green elves’ help wasn’t enough on it’s own...

As it turned out, Belissar was not the only one speaking with his advisors that day. Later in the evening and back in the land of the fair, King Taranskare of the silver elves sat in his throne room. The wall was made with white wood and adorned with silver and even mithril that glimmered in the light of the sun...but as the sun set, so too did the gleam fade. King Taranskare sat on his throne and stared out over the nearly empty hall as it grew dark.

Before him stood Duke Turuhave, commander of the Silver Host, and Duchess Bereginna, his current chancellor. Duke Turuhave was just finishing his report on the battle. The duke paused and had to take a deep breath before he continued.

“...It is with great reluctance that I must conclude...the Silver Host is no longer effective as an army.”

Duchess Bereginna gaped.

“You cannot be serious. The Silver Host was outdone by mere humans?”

Duke Turuhave hung his head.

“One on one, I would take one of our warriors over a single human any day. But the gap has closed to the point that we can no longer expect to fight without casualties, casualties we could not afford to risk...and there were human elites so powerful we could not face them at all. Wardmaster Varilold cast us aside for the dungeons and she was right to do so. Maybe if my father was still here with his strength, or my grandmother was here with her mind, or if we still had the masters of magic besides the wardmaster...but the Silver Host is not what it once was...and I am not my family’s equal...”King Taranskare sighed.

“None of us are. Then, what should be done?”

Duke Turuhave slowly lifted his head and made eye contact with his king.

“We need to send our warriors into the dungeons and make them champions of the gods.”

Duchess Bereginna frowned.

“But the Silver Host has never relied on the whims of the gods! We were always the greatest in both might and lore! We were the ones who shaped the world, who forged civilization out of the wilderness! It is from us that all the others, humans included, learned to become more than tribes huddled around a fire! We stood on our own and became a light that illuminated the world, partners with the very gods in shaping it! It was our army and our knowledge that preserved the land of the fair in its darkest hour! Now you want to take that army and split it, to take it from the king and hand it over to gods and dungeon masters? Now you want us to act as if we are helpless, with no choice but to hand over what we have left to others? To place our fate in their hands?”

King Taranskare lifted a hand to stop the duchess, then spoke himself.

“We were the greatest...but...I think the time has come to admit we are not, not anymore. We’ve done our best to preserve our pride and our civilization despite the disaster...but we all know the truth. All we have here is a pale shadow of what our fathers and mothers achieved. All we are doing is pretending that things have not changed, and while we did the world has passed us by. The time has come to acknowledge the truth.”

Duchess Bereginna’s face fell. Tears began to well up in her eyes and her voice fell to a whisper.

“But...without our pride...what do we have left? What will be left of our civilization? Of my...of our fathers and mothers?”

King Taranskare closed his eyes.

“...do you remember my mother and both your fathers’ last command to the three of us, before the Silver City fell?”

Duchess Bereginna slowly nodded, even as a tear fell down her face.

“...live and save our people.”

King Taranskare rose off his throne and stepped down, placing his hand on both the duke and duchess’ shoulders.

“Live and save our people. We can no longer save our pride. We can no longer pretend we have saved our civilization. But we can still save our people. We have to, even if we must now abandon our pride and change beyond recognition.”

All three of them shared a look. Duchess Bereginna slowly nodded. King Taranskare returned it then turned to Duke Turuhave.

“Duke, do you have a plan?”

Duke Turuhave straightened his back, his eyes full of resolve.

“We need Tower Keeper Belissar’s help. He and his people are the ones who have learned to raise champions who can match or surpass a warrior of the Silver Host. It is from them we must learn if we are to rebuild the Silver Host for the challenges of our times.”

Duchess Bereginna winced and shrank on herself. King Taranskare sighed and held his head. Duke Turuhave blinked and glanced between them. Duchess Bereginna spoke in a small voice.

“I...may have placed us in direct opposition to the Tower Keeper. I was...trying to stop Queen Vanieskon and Wardmaster Varilold from usurping control with all their emergency measures regarding him...”

King Taranskare, unfortunately, had more to add.

“And then...Tower Keeper Belissar’s only other interaction with our people was with Lord Aratodel, who threw him out of his dungeon without even greeting him.”

Duke Turuhave’s face lost its color.

“...oh.”