The Emperor's Plans
The emperor stood at a decorated window that looked over the front of his palace complex.The predawn light glinted lightly off of the scales of the emperors face. The rustle of silk whispered gently in his ears. The snow on the ground held the silence of the night, reluctant to surrender to the coming days business. The soft scents of the night were mixed with the tang of blood as they wafted up on the surprisingly gentle breeze. If the dawn was anything to go by this was going to be a calm, at least in the weather, day. Maybe the court should be held outside today, gods know that the majority of them never saw the sun unless he insisted on being outdoors. Either way this promised to be an interesting day as his court and the rest of the guards found out about the gaps in their numbers. They would surreptitiously look at the heads on pikes hoping that they wouldn't find the missing there. And when they did they would move fast to sever any links to the dead before they joined them in that new state.
From this vantage point the emperor could see the party leaving the inner court led by his personal guard. Music drifted up to him on the breeze from musicians playing to his consorts and concubines who were just waking up in the women's quarter of the inner palace, the Emperor had yet to take a wife as none of his consorts or concubines had given him a child yet. Lanterns lit to show the way formed ever shrinking yellow halos on the snow in the slowly brightening of the day. All around the Emperor the palace complex was slowly wakening and soon it would ring out with the hustle and bustle of the day. The Emperor preferred the predawn to the busy almost frenetic activity of the palace during daylight hours. He could actually think, and when you were the leader of a country as magnificently complex as his, you really valued being able to think in peace.
When his personal aide entered the room the emperor spoke without turning away from the window, "Our plans are finally in motion. With a little bit of luck and some work behind the scenes we will be rid of Mrtis and the empire will be restored to its former glory."
Restoring the empire to it's full glory had been the goal of not only himself but his father as well. It wasn't the fault of his grandfather that the empire had lost so much territory. After the Great War the Celestial Empire had not been in a position to argue with the other countries about the foundation of Kishnagar. Or about the loss of the lands now held by Ashfanabad, but that would be changing in the not too distant future. By then his grandfather had been old and had known that they wouldn't get the lands back during his life so he had told his descendants to find a way to return the lost lands to the empire. The emperor's father had worked long and hard to build the empires forces to a point where they could actually do so but had died unexpectedly only a few decades ago at the hands of the Mrtis cult. The rise of the Mrtis cult had been an unwelcome complication to his plans but with careful maneuvering the emperor was certain that he could influence things in his favor.
The servant bowed as he replied, "We must be most careful Great Dragon. We need to be certain that nothing can be traced to us, we need to move cautiously."
The emperor turned around to face the person that was the closest thing he had to a friend, not that he allowed himself anything so pedestrian as a friend, "Do not worry, my guard will plant the right seeds in the correct ears. It will only take the slightest nudge here and there to accomplish our goal. Before long they will need me to take charge of the Great Council, it won't take much to gain control of the whole thing from there."
The emperor sat at a small table next to the window as his closest aide poured a cup of tea for him, "Don't worry," he added with a smile. "I'll move slowly. This has been developing for centuries, what's a few more years."
There was a long pause before the emperor continued in an almost disinterested voice, "The patient cat is the one who catches the mouse. And this..." he added with a chuckle, "Is a very tasty mouse."
The First Dragon of the Great Celestial Empire smiled as he looked out the window and sipped his tea. Before long the empire would once again become the greatest power on Ardu and everyone else would make sure it happened. That was the best strategy after all, convince the puppets to tie their own strings, it was even better when they thanked you for it afterwards. The coming days promised to be interesting for the first time since his early decades of ruling. After all the first decades of a new emperor's rule were always the most nervous. Which is why the successful assassination of his father was so surprising. That the Mrtis cult had managed to get so many of their numbers so high in the court had be disturbing. It hadn't however taken the current emperor long to find out who all of them were. The reason he hadn't acted before now was to lull them into a sense of false security so he could remove the whole snake at once rather than just its head. The smile that crossed the emperors face would have chilled the most innocent of people. Yes, he thought, this was definitely going to be a tasty mouse. Let the games begin.
