The Corsair's Watch

Jorias, with a flick of his wrist, sent a steaming cup of spiced wine skittering across the polished obsidian table. It stopped just shy of Commander Valerius’s hand, a dark, swirling eddy of ruby liquid mirroring the tempest brewing within their enemy’s stronghold. Valerius, his gaze fixed on the flickering torchlight that danced across the war maps spread between them, merely grunted.

“Still contemplating the finer points of siege warfare, Commander?” Jorias purred, his voice a silken thread woven with amusement. “Or perhaps you’re admiring the strategic placement of the King’s pathetic defenses? I’ve heard whispers that the mountain pass itself groans under the weight of their desperation. A truly tragic spectacle.”

Valerius finally looked up, his eyes, the color of a storm-tossed sea, narrowed. “My focus, Jorias, is on the inevitable. And you know as well as I that inevitability is rarely a spectacle worth admiring. It is simply… a fact.”