Being back in the home of Lord and Lady Delen so soon again had not been on Baudwin's agenda, and he was finding himself rather frustrated that he was. He would rather have stayed in Ossol to oversee the enlistment of new soldiers and planning the guarding of the mountain range bordering the Dreadlands. Instead, he was stuck in a tedious meeting with Lord Delen and a handful of other lords from the western part of the kingdom, where Delen had the most influence.

They were not taking the news that Baudwin wouldn't allow them free rein to do as they wished particularly well, but he refused to back down. If he had to deal with both the potential threat of Son of Deva and an internal rebellion, then so be it. He would not yield to these old grouches who refused to accept the new laws where servants were no longer to be treated as sub-human beings, and they weren't allowed to set their own tithes.

"What is the point of having given you my daughter, if there are no benefits for me?" Lord Delen complained, his puffy face red below black, knitted brows.

Given? Baudwin had to hold back a scoff. If Rhiannon hadn't conceded, he doubted Lord Delen could have done anything to make her obey him.

"I would be willing to make some compromises," he said aloud. "But there are some things I will not negotiate. You cannot, and I repeat, you can not insist on the lord's night of first rights for your vassals. It's an old and outdated tradition that had been done away with for two centuries before you brought it back."

"It's a time-honoured tradition!" An old lord with spiky grey hair protested. "My family has done it for generations!"

Baudwin levelled a glare at the man, and he shrank back in his chair. "Well, your family shouldn't have. There was a reason they outlawed this despicable tradition. I cannot believe that you got away with it all this time."

"The western lords have always had a certain amount of self-rule," another lord said, his sweaty face looking oddly proud of this. "Being on the far side of the great forest, we've never spent much time in Ossol."

"That may be so, but this ends now. I will send a warden over here if I must, to keep you in line."

It didn't matter if the western lords were far away from the capital; they didn't get to make their own laws. Not having supervision for so long had gone to their heads, and with one of their own as the queen, they had completely lost the plot.

"Preposterous!" Lord Delen growled and leaned closer over the table to stare Baudwin in the face. "The king has always afforded us the trust to rule as we wish."

"And I would have too," Baudwin said, placing his hands on the table and standing up so he could look down on the seated lords, "had you not squandered the right by taking absurd liberties with it!"

"They are not!" Lord Spiky-hair howled. "All perfectly reasonable!"

Baudwin turned his gaze on him, his voice tempered, "You are asking for half of your vassal's incomes from trade or farming. Half!"

"We're allowed tithes!"

"A tithe is a tenth." He couldn't believe he had to explain this. "Sometimes we may ask for more tax, if it's needed. But that is something which will come from me. The king. You cannot ask this for yourself."

"What do you expect us to do?" Lord Delen asked angrily.

At his rope's end, Baudwin looked over to Aurelian, who had joined him on the trip for support, but the knight only rolled his eyes. With a sigh, he mulled over his options. He could try to compromise, somehow, or he could risk outright rebellion. What they wanted wasn't easy to negotiate, but he could not allow them to take such large taxes from their vassals. Which they then kept for themselves, as they certainly hadn't increased the amount sent to the capital. He also could not allow them to continue their mistreatment of the people living on their lands. Rebellion it was, then.

He pressed his lips together in grim frustration. "I expect you to tax appropriately. A tenth. I expect you to treat your vassals and servants with some level of respect. They are humans, just like us. You cannot claim lord's first right. And, for all that is holy, you can not ever harm any elves passing through your lands!"

At the last words, he looked to the sweaty lord who had complained about their self-rule. News had reached him about an elf being attacked while on his grounds. It was rare to see them this far north as they rarely left their southern lands, but he could not have his lords attacking them.

"Human and elf relations are tenuous at best," he pointed out, "without us fuelling the fire by attacking the few we encounter."

"Filthy beasts," the lord spat. "I will deal with them as I see fit."

"The High King has made it very clear that we are to respect the elves," Aurelian's voice was loud and clear, surprising everyone at the table. Finally. Couldn't he have weighed in sooner? As the Envoy to the High King, his words carried some weight, even with these bastards.

"Why?" Lord Delen crossed his arms over his barrel chest. "They did nothing to aid us during the war. Hiding in their huts down south while the Dark Disciple and his horde razed our lands and conquered Messina."

"They considered it a human problem," Aurelian agreed. "But they have since come to realise that if the Dark God is freed, it spells doom for them too. High King Felix is keen to repair our relationship with the elves. We may need their aid one day."

"We don't need their help," Lord Delen said with a derisive snort, receiving nods and hums of agreement from the others.

"I think you'll find that we might." Aurelian was remarkably calm in the face of the lords' contempt. "And in either case, it is not your decision. It is a direct order from the High King."

Even Lord Delen blanched at the implication. The last one to oppose the High King had been Baudwin's parents, and they had been deposed from the throne. Deciding that now was a good time to cut the meeting short, Baudwin grabbed his cane.

"Follow my instructions," he warned. "Or I will send a warden to oversee the west."

He could see a dangerous glint in Lord Delen's dark eyes as the older man glared at him. "I hope you realise what you are setting in motion, King Baudwin." There was no attempt at hiding the threat.

Standing tall without leaning on his cane for a moment, despite the pain it caused, Baudwin glared back. "Do as I say," he said, his voice hard. "Or pay the consequences."

Lord Delen smiled, but it was a dangerous smile, like that of a predator waiting to strike. "We'll see who pays."

Baudwin walked away without looking back, but he could hear his guards and Aurelian following behind. When they reached the courtyard, he didn't go directly to his carriage, instead his eyes strayed to the large, wooden pole standing in the middle. The whipping post.

Filled with sudden determination, he turned his head to Aurelian. "Find me an axe."

His brother-in-law looked surprised, but did as he asked and soon returned with the tool, handing it over. Baudwin took it in one hand before limping over to the wooden pole where Rhiannon had suffered such pain. Tilting his head to observe the imposing length of wood, he felt a surge of anger coursing through his veins. Giving his cane to Aurelian, he hefted the axe in both hands, testing its weight, then swung it wide.

Servants and craftsmen stopped what they were doing to watch his progress in horrified astonishment. He ignored them, focusing his anger on the pole as he hacked through its wooden base. The moment it finally wobbled and toppled over coincided perfectly with Lord Delen's roar as he came into the courtyard to see what was going on.

Giving the axe back to Aurelian, Baudwin took his cane back before looking at the red-faced lord staring at him from the doors to the castle. Raising his voice, he enunciated every word to make sure the lord heard him clearly, "By royal decree, I hereby declare whipping outlawed in the Kingdom of Breoch."

"You do not want to make an enemy of me!" Lord Delen barked as Baudwin turned on his heel and walked to his carriage. He didn't even give the other man the courtesy of looking back.

Instead, he entered his carriage, waited for Aurelian to follow suit, and then tapped his cane on the ceiling to instruct the driver to leave.

Once they were clear of the castle, Aurelian raised a dark eyebrow, his blue eyes inquisitive.

"What was that about?"

"Something that needed to be done."

~~~~~~