I'll Bring in an Arbiter

"I'll bring in an arbiter."

When Roben reported that, Theorn crossed out the verb "bring in" on the order sheet.

The war room at the northern delegation's quarters had two exits. One door opened to the corridor, another led to the supply yard. The window was wide enough for an adult's shoulders to pass through, but it had iron bars set into it, so he didn't count it. Ever since entering the room, Theorn always checked that number first. Today he'd left the corridor door open.

"Invite her."

Roben shook the mud off his boots, twice. It meant there was more bad news. "In the palace corridors they're already calling it a kidnapping. One cart, and thirty two onlookers trailing behind. One neck, and it would draw less attention with twelve carts."

"We won't use a cart either."

"Then what if the arbiter doesn't come?"

Theorn's pen stopped. The habit of excluding the possibility that someone might not come had been with him a long time. When the northern walls were falling, he couldn't ask the enemy for consent. But Eira Vellen was neither an enemy nor a soldier. She was the one who, on her own authority, had halted a treaty put forward jointly by the imperial court and the North. The moment he used troops to make her meet him, the North itself would become evidence of coercion.

"If she doesn't come, it's finished."

Roben's mouth twisted. "Should I note that His Grace the Grand Duke put refusal into the operation plan himself? The Northern Council might mint a commemorative coin."

"Send that up along with your execution schedule."

"I only have one neck, you know."

After the joke, Roben pushed forward the border report. Six southern grain carts had been seized under the pretext of preemptive requisition for the merger treaty. Even though the treaty was suspended, the orders on the ground hadn't stopped. Theorn wanted to send cavalry immediately. But if he started a blockade, the imperial court would call him a traitor, and Eira's objection would become a play staged in collusion with the North.

He also crossed out the rest of the escort order. Twelve guards, a secret passage, standby inside the northern quarters. All of it arranged for safety, and all of it a way for Theorn to decide Eira's exit for her.

"We'll borrow the public interview seat in the imperial records hall. Both doors will be open. The guards stay outside the hall."

"Purpose?"

"A proposal for mutual veto rights."

"If we write it as a new contract to block the marriage treaty, they'll read it as a marriage anyway."

"Write that it isn't a marriage."

Roben pulled out a fresh sheet. Theorn cut down each sentence as it was written. Location, time, attendees. The purpose stated as providing material to confirm the original alterations. A clause stating that the North would face no military or financial penalty for declining the invitation. The right to end the meeting at any point after arrival. No obligation to submit questions in advance either.

"Keep the doors open for protection," Roben read aloud.

"Cross out 'protection.'"

"Why?"

Theorn had to admit he'd almost written that word himself. "It makes it sound like the one protecting also holds the right to close the door. Write that it's open for confirmation."

Outside the war room, footsteps stopped. Serafin Arcel, the regent's niece, stood at the threshold. He'd requested that a royal confirmer be needed to register the invitation with the public receiving office, but he hadn't expected her to come in person.

Serafin glanced between the two open doors and smiled. "Quite the educational war room. The infamous Grand Duke of the North, caught forgetting to lock his doors."

Theorn gestured to the seat farthest from the exits, instead of a chair meant for guests. "I need a confirming signature."

"Let me see the text I'm signing first. Showing a door to an audience and giving someone the right to walk through it are two different things."

She read through the invitation, and at the final signature line she turned the paper upside down. She traced Theorn's handwriting slowly in its inverted orientation, then turned it back the right way.

"The one responsible for the wording is His Grace the Grand Duke himself. The scribe is Roben Ordan. And yet you're asking for public confirmation under my name. What do I get out of this?"

"Proof that this isn't a private collusion."

"That benefits the two of you."

There was always a price hidden in the final clause of Serafin's polite sentences. Theorn knew she hadn't come because she stood with the imperial court. If Eira's objection survived, the regent's unsigned orders could also come under review. For Serafin, this was both a risk and an opportunity.

"The right to view both the receipt original and the copy at the same time. Revision history will also be disclosed."

"Fair enough. One more thing. If the arbiter refuses the invitation, who announces that fact?"

"No one."

"And what proof will there be that the Grand Duke doesn't read her silence as an insult?"

Theorn tried to convert the answer into a number. It wasn't a matter of troops or time. He took off his glove and set it on the table. A habit ingrained in his body, done before asking for permission.

"There is none. That's why we're leaving a record."

Serafin's smile faded, just slightly. The brief blank that only appears when someone has heard sincerity.

She stamped the royal confirmation seal on the copy of the invitation, but gave it the same receipt number as the original. Then, in the space where "protection" had been crossed out, she wrote "confirmation of choice." With that, at least one document would now contradict the rumor that the North was secretly summoning Eira. The invitation wasn't an order, and refusal wouldn't be a violation.

"I'll register it with the receiving office myself," Serafin said. "In exchange, hold today's meeting in the glass corridor. Somewhere any clerk passing by can see. It seems you need a rather undignified kind of transparency."

Theorn nodded. "Agreed."

"You agree too quickly. Leave that same ease for the one receiving the proposal."

That evening, the lamps in the imperial records hall burned twice as bright as usual. Bookshelves divided the space instead of walls, and both doors stood wide open. Three empty chairs were placed around the interview seat, left there in case Eira wanted to bring witnesses of her own.

Theorn arrived first and confirmed that both exits were unlocked. Roben pulled the northern soldiers back outside the hall. Serafin sat beside the public receiving office with the copy of the invitation spread open. It was an arrangement no one could easily call a private meeting.

Eira arrived one minute past the appointed time. It looked like a deliberate choice, one meant to avoid creating a debt of having made him wait, but Theorn didn't voice the guess. Nilo was beside her, and she carried no copy of the black treaty in her hands.

"It said you would provide the original materials," Eira said, without sitting down.

Theorn placed on the table the draft the North had received before ratification. "The margins differ from the imperial original."

"Before I accept it, I'll ask about the conditions first. If I review this material, what obligation does the North take on?"

"None."

"Where does it say that, in writing?"

Theorn looked at the blank margin of the draft. Another omission. A blank that couldn't be filled in by good intentions alone. He didn't make excuses, and asked Roben for a pen.

"I'll add it now. Reviewing or copying this is not to be taken as acceptance of the proposal."

Only then did Eira pull out a chair. She didn't sit in it. "You called this proposal a mutual veto right. Who blocks what, belonging to whom?"

"You can suspend my public military decisions for a fixed period, and I can suspend your public contract rulings for the same."

"And after the suspension?"

"The side that refused proposes an alternative."

"Who judges whether it's actually workable?"

"The other side does."

Eira's finger tapped the margin of the document. "Then the other side could invalidate every alternative simply by saying they don't like it."

Theorn thought of the seized grain carts at the border. The fastest answer would have been to keep final judgment for himself. Giving up that answer took time.

"We write down the manpower, the cost, and the start time. If all three are met, we treat it as workable. If there's a dispute, it goes to public review."

"Time limit?"

"Twelve hours."

"That's too short for a contract ruling. A day."

"That's too long for a military decision. Let's split it by category. Twelve hours for military matters, a day for contract matters."

For the first time, Eira looked at him for a long moment. Theorn didn't decide whether it was regard or distrust. What mattered more was that she'd changed her question.

"Can private approaches also be refused?"

"Yes."

"What if I cancel an invitation like today's?"

"I won't ask for a reason."

"Write that down too."

Theorn wrote it. With the hand that had removed its glove, he wrote, in the same size, the sentence that blocked his own military authority and the sentence that let his own invitation be cancelled. The Grand Duke of the North's hereditary seal hadn't been stamped yet. Today was a proposal, not an agreement.

Serafin cut in from the receiving office. "Don't forget the audience. If the Grand Duke blocks the arbiter's ruling, it will read as the North standing above the law. If the arbiter blocks a military decision, it will read as the imperial court starving the North."

"That's why the refusal and the alternative get disclosed together," Eira answered.

"Good. This will be a very educational collusion. Neither side can win in secret."

Only then did Eira take a seat. But she didn't pick up the pen. "I'll review it. That's not the same as agreeing."

"There's no deadline for your reply," Theorn said.

"The North's grain carts won't wait, though."

She'd already found the requisition marking on the first page of the material. Theorn could have hidden the urgency and still gotten her to choose. But then this proposal would be a lie from its very first sentence.

"Six carts are held at the southern gate. Separate from the treaty's suspension, a requisition order is moving forward. I want to send troops tonight."

Eira didn't answer right away. She might have read it as him rushing her signature by using the North's crisis as leverage. Theorn didn't let that misreading grow in silence.

"Still, that doesn't mean sign now. I'm disclosing this information first."

"Why?"

"Because even if you refuse, the gate stays blocked either way."

After the short answer, an almost imperceptible amount of tension left Eira's shoulders. He didn't call it relief. She handed the draft to Nilo, to have the receipt time recorded.

"I'll take a copy. I'll send back a revised version before the family council tomorrow."

"Family council?"

"My father has framed my objection as a betrayal of the family. He plans to discuss my sister's marriage talks and my inheritance share together."

Theorn's first impulse was to assign her a guard. He swallowed that thought and chose a different question.

"Do you need help?"

Eira looked at the two open doors, one after the other. "If I need it, I'll write down the scope first and send it over."

It was neither a refusal nor an acceptance. But she carried the draft with her out of the hall. Serafin noted the fact at the receiving office. Eira Vellen, received copy of mutual veto proposal. Consent reserved. No penalty incurred.

Theorn looked at the blank space left beneath his own signature. Where he had once crossed out orders, there was now, for the first time, room for the other party's reply to enter.