The Vampire & Her Witch

Chapter 1077: The Price of Peace

What would the people of Lothian March need in order to end the string of wars that had plagued the March for generations before Loman was even born? The thought of what they needed in order to achieve peace wasn’t something that came instantly to mind for the young priest, even though he wanted it for his people very badly.

For years, the promise of peace had dangled over the march like a carrot on a string. Defeat the Horse Lord, the Cat Lord, and the Demon Lady of the Vale, conquer the Southern Steppe, Airgead Mountain, and the Vale of Mists, and the March would be able to become a Duchy.

But even that wouldn’t bring peace. Lothian March lay nestled in the foothills of the greater mountains to the west. The entire march was littered with places that were too difficult for soldiers to reach, where they had yet to exterminate the local demon populations.

Those pockets of demon-infested lands shrank every year. They were cut off from each other, unable to work together, and even if they had been much larger settlements during the era of Loman’s great-grandfather, they’d only grown so large because they were able to trade with each other for the things that their homeland lacked. Now that they were isolated, it was much harder to sustain themselves.

Then there were people like Loman’s brother, Owain, who ventured into these pockets of dangerous wilderness in order to thin the population of demons, or, as he had during the summer, to destroy an entire settlement.

Until those settlements were eradicated, the people of the march would never be free from the winter raids and the mid-summer pocket wars that defined life in the Frontier. So when Loman thought of what peace could look like, he thought first of what it would take to end the raids.

"My family has been trying to purge de-, er, the Eldritch, from our lands for generations," Loman started awkwardly. "But maybe we could do something different," he said as an idea began to take shape.

"Instead of fighting," Loman suggested as he gained confidence in his idea. "Could you resettle the Eldritch people who still live within the borders of the March? You said that Sir Ollie successfully resettled the people who were affected by Owain and Lord Liam’s summer offensives... Couldn’t we take the same approach to removing the rest of the Eldritch people from Lothian Lands?"

To Ashlynn, the idea was preposterous and instantly offensive. One of the things that Ashlynn wanted most was to find a way to reach those isolated communities, to welcome them back into the world with a promise of safety.

They’d all fought hard to keep their homes, suffering over a century of human aggression and greed. To ask them to give up what they’d fought for just to resettle somewhere else felt like accepting the terms of defeat and surrender when she was on the edge of claiming victory. But clearly, Loman hadn’t begun to think of things from the Eldritch perspective yet, and until he could, it would be impossible for him to offer up reasonable terms.

"Let’s say that we wanted to do it that way," Ashlynn said, taking a sip of tea and leaning back in her soft, overstuffed chair. "How much would the Lothian family pay each family that had to be resettled in order to achieve peace. Building a new life, giving up the home you grew up in or raised your children in... It’s a hard thing. The people that Ollie has helped to resettle have new homes now, but they’re still recovering from the wounds of losing the life they knew."

"What could you offer up that would be worth it for them to make the sacrifice?" Ashlynn asked, raising a brow at the young lord.

"Isn’t peace and the opportunity to struggle for prosperity enough of an offer?" Loman asked, confused by her framing. "As it stands, they’re hunted every year, and they face starvation each winter. That’s why they keep raiding human farms. If you can bring them into the Vale of Mists, or to Airgead Mountain, or wherever else, then they wouldn’t have to fear their neighbors anymore. Humans could have their own lands, and the Eldritch could have theirs. We wouldn’t need to fight anymore."

"Ah," Ashlynn said, frowning as she realized how undertrained Loman was in the art of diplomacy. It was to be expected, she supposed, from a priest who wielded the supreme authority of the Holy Lord of Light. The Church didn’t compromise on its doctrine, so why would Loman compromise with his enemy?

But Ashlynn had grown up in Blackwell County, a place where merchants had grown as powerful as knights in many respects, and she’d long ago learned to understand the things that made for a good compromise. And a bad one for that matter, and Loman’s offer was a very poor start to a negotiation. But her father had taught her that there were ways to bring even the most stubborn of merchants to the center of the bargaining table, and she leaned heavily on his lessons now.

"I think we’re starting from the wrong position if we ask the Eldritch people to leave their homes in order to offer your people peace," Ashlynn said, shaking her head ever so slightly as she rejected Loman’s offer. "But you’re right about giving humans their own land, and reserving a place for the Eldritch to live."

"So, I propose this," Ashlynn said, setting down her teacup and smiling at the Lothian Lord. "Each human village will be offered the chance to submit to Eldritch rule, or one of my armies will destroy it. People who don’t wish to live under Eldritch rule will be given safe passage to Keating Duchy or Crew March. You’ve seen firsthand what just one of my armies can do," Ashlynn said confidently.

"Do you think that the people of Lothian March could stop us if we wanted to take back the lands that belonged to the Eldritch for hundreds or thousands of years before your family ever set foot on this continent?" Ashlynn asked.