So Much Alike
As I said, Charlois was a remarkably perceptive woman.
Well, being the only daughter of the Council Chairman probably helps with that sort of thing. And the moment she heard my words, she caught exactly what I was after.
"When you ask us to bleed alongside the Empire, do you mean mere expressions of support or simply stepping beneath the Empire's shadow — or are you, quite literally, asking for direct participation in the war?"
"That is correct."
At that, Charlois made a visibly troubled face.
Hardly surprising, considering the price I'd demanded in exchange for my advice was a steep one.
Fighting alongside us as a friendly neighbor who listens to the Empire is one thing. Committing to actual combat is an entirely different level.
There would be friction over command authority, and if they happened to suffer heavy losses, the political fallout would be catastrophic. Internal problems were one thing, but if the Empire chose to press its advantage while Novogord was weakened, it would be a disaster.
Even if the Empire swore it would never do such a thing, politics is, by its very nature, an obsession with possibilities. The moment she glimpsed even that potential, joining the war would look like nothing less than putting a noose around her own neck.
"Lady Charlois."
But the advice I was about to give next would solve precisely that problem.
"What worries you right now is Novogord's hardliners — that they might be swept up in Artria's whispering, or more precisely, in the whispers of Dedorant standing behind them, and charge off half-cocked. Am I wrong?"
"You're not."
"A simple refusal won't make Dedorant give up easily. Nor the hardliners, for that matter."
Dedorant wanted, by any means necessary, to force a two-front war upon the Empire. Novogord's hardliners needed a pretext to reclaim their grip on the political scene. Once their interests interlocked, the pressure kept coming no matter how you blocked it, and the wavering never stopped no matter how often you refused.
The moderates, the Council Chairman, and Charlois herself must have found it all thoroughly irritating and unpleasant. Why do they keep trying to abandon the dependable big brother Empire and cozy up to some strange thug?
And yet, reporting all of this to the Empire risked sparks flying onto the innocent.
"There is one method."
Yes. In a situation like this, there is exactly one best answer.
Make those two factions reaching for each other's hands into bitter enemies. Have them snarling at each other, never again daring to dream such thoughts.
And I happen to know a very useful trick for that purpose. Let's just say it came up while sifting through the memories of my past life.
"Novogord and Artria are quite close, geographically speaking."
"Pardon? Ah — yes. There's Imperial territory in between, but it's such a narrow strip."
"And there are frequent encounters at sea as well, I take it?"
"That's right? Even now, everyone we send out to evade Imperial surveillance travels entirely by sea."
That would do. That was plenty. It was more than enough.
"Manufacture a dispute."
"…Pardon?"
"Any pretext whatsoever. Any underhanded scheme at all — anything will do. Find some way, whatever it takes, to spark friction between Novogord and Artria. A conflict. That is my advice."
I said exactly that much, then picked up the teacup sitting in front of me.
Mmm. The tea brewed in our own home truly is the most fragrant in all the world. I've been served finer tea at the Imperial Palace and the Holy Nation, but none of it ever felt quite like this.
"…"
Faced with me and my tranquil sipping, Charlois said nothing at all. She simply mulled something over, and kept on deliberating.
If the Princess had been sitting here instead, what would have happened? In all likelihood she'd have asked, "How exactly would we start a dispute? What method would you use?" And then I'd have agonized in silence once more before inevitably coughing up the answer.
But Charlois was different. There was no reason whatsoever to hand her the complete solution. I called it advice, didn't I? Then this much and no more is what advice should be. The rest, that woman had to work out and uncover for herself.
And… I have a feeling she can.
How should I put it? Yes — I'd say she's of a similar breed to me. If the Princess is somewhat purer and nobler than I am, someone standing in a brighter place, then Charlois gives the impression of a woman with one foot planted in a far deeper shadow.
I mean no offense by it, and I'm not slighting her. It's simply that she seems like the kind of demon who could cook up schemes and stratagems with the best of them. With her political experience, honestly, it would be stranger if she couldn't.
"A pretext… a dispute… friction…"
There, look at that. She figured it out on her own and is racking her brain in earnest, just as I expected. No need to spell out the answer — in a little while, she'll start to…
"I'm truly glad I came to see you, Lord Cael."
"I beg your pardon?"
"To be honest, it's not as if I hadn't entertained a rather similar idea myself. But… how should I put it — I lacked certainty, I suppose. Above all, I kept wondering whether it was truly the right thing to do."
"…"
"But if you — of all people — had already arrived at this same thought, then that means I wasn't wrong after all. Hah. Coming here was, without question, the finest decision I've made."
And with that, she let out a soft "fufufu" of a laugh — and for just a moment, it was faintly terrifying.
The fact that this woman kept ambushing me with worship only made it more uncomfortable still.
"Now then, building upon your advice, Lord Cael — I have something in mind already. Would you care to hear it?"
"Well, now that you mention it, my interest is piqued."
"I have spent considerable time studying your stratagems, after all. Hmm — let me begin with the basic outline."
On land, borders can at least be drawn directly, but at sea, that's impossible. With no visible boundary, the two sides' claims are forever doomed to diverge. And as that resentment piles up, a small grievance can swell into a very large problem!
"I intend to stir up friction over territorial waters. There has always been a discrepancy between what Artria has long claimed and what Novogord claims."
"Dedorant annexed Artria, but such disputes would hardly vanish with it."
If anything, Dedorant might react even more sensitively than the old Artria ever did. After all, they were rabidly obsessed with securing every last hand-span of territory.
"Unlike on land, no one can simply stand still in one spot at sea. Enforcement is woefully imprecise, and into those gaps slip fishing boats that sneak across the line. Sometimes they're Artrian. Sometimes they're Novogordian."
"And if they're caught, well — that's another disaster entirely, isn't it? So the majority of those sailors arm themselves, lightly at least, so that if they run into a patrol, they can resist and escape."
"And in the course of all that, all sorts of things happen. An Artrian fishing boat slips across in secret, starts hauling in fish, and then attacks a Novogordian patrol that comes alongside."
A classic repertoire for making both humans and demons gnash their teeth in equal measure. The other side did wrong in the first place, yet the aggressor plays the victim — a case of the thief crying thief. And in that process, exactly who got hurt, and by how much, becomes a matter of tremendous consequence.
"As it happens, the naval commander of the region is one of our moderates. His entire family is entangled with our faction — betrayal is all but impossible for him."
"And you'll use him to stage events as though they'd occurred."
"To be precise, the performance has to be convincing. For instance, we might deploy our own navy while disguising them as forces from Artria."
A staged production, then. The old trick that political veterans always keep handy for whenever the odds turn against them. One thing at least was certain: it would work. It struck directly at the pride of the demon race.
We treated your fishing boats with restraint and leniency, and this is how you repay us — a sucker punch and a mad dash for the horizon? Public fury toward Artria would ignite without any help at all.
"But a staged incident carries the risk of exposure. If it's discovered, how exactly do you plan to contain the damage?"
"Which is precisely why the preparations must be airtight. Perhaps not quite to your standards, Lord Cael, but thorough enough to make this brilliant scheme of mine succeed."
"One more thing. That alone won't set Novogord ablaze. Heat, perhaps — but not fire."
At my words, Charlois flashed a small smile and answered.
"Where there is heat, there is possibility. The ones who love to talk will do the rest for us."
"Hmm."
"And, as it happens, Artria has never been on particularly good terms with Novogord either."
Meaning: if we play it this way, the Artrian side was bound to react somehow as well. Fair enough — no matter how thoroughly Dedorant had annexed the kingdom, erasing the sentiments still rooted in its people was all but impossible.
Suppose you told Artrians who despised Novogord, "Artrian ruffians attacked a Novogordian naval patrol and fled!" How would they respond? Would they cry, "Oh, the villains! We must find out who they are at once and hand them over!"?
"Given the temperament of Artria's subjects, I'd wager they'd cheer. Don't you agree, Lady Charlois?"
"Though for Dedorant, which annexed that land — with an eye toward the future, it would be anything but pleasant. Wouldn't you say, Lord Cael?"
"And so the leaderships of Dedorant and Artria would be forced to express their regrets in order to appease Novogord—"
"—while the Artrian populace, in turn, erupts in outrage, demanding to know why their own country should apologize."
"And that outrage goads Novogord into an even greater fury."
"Until, in the end, anti-Artrian sentiment — and anti-Dedorant sentiment with it — grows fat and flourishing."
When the conversation reached that point, Charlois and I looked at each other. And then, without either of us needing to go first, we burst out laughing at the same moment.
It was strange. Fascinating, even. We'd hardly spent any time together — who could have guessed we'd mesh this well? All I'd done was offer a brief piece of advice, and in that short span, she had assembled an entire theatrical production. Stranger still was that I had been thinking along almost precisely the same lines myself.
The art of driving apart those who distrust each other yet entangle themselves out of shared interest. Puncture their pride just once, and they'll thrash about in a rage entirely on their own. As I said before — the logic of profit and loss can never, ever beat the logic of pride.
"You claim to have studied me, but you're quite formidable yourself."
"Oh, please. Were it not for your advice, Lord Cael, I'd never have possessed the certainty to put it to use at all."
"For someone lacking certainty, it came out of you remarkably smoothly."
"Fufufu. Does it?"
After that, Charlois and I continued to trade talk of one kind and another. None of it was personal — it was all about the present state of affairs and what lay ahead.
Did I feel affection for her? Well, now. Rather than affection, I'd call it wariness. Meeting someone cut from cloth so similar to my own — of course suspicion raised its head. For all I knew, even the positive regard she showed me was, in truth, an act.
"So, the way I see it—!"
I offered approving nods at the right intervals and kept probing her all the while, in case there was some suspicious detail I'd let slip through my fingers in an unguarded instant.
*
Charlois was in high spirits. And not ordinary high spirits — she was utterly delighted. Here she was, conversing at length with Cael, the man she had long believed to be so extraordinary. When was the last time she had talked this long, and this deeply, about subjects of such weight and consequence?
He truly is everything a genius strategist should be. That judgment. That insight. Ah, I could talk with him until dawn!
While suspicion glinted in Cael's eyes, in Charlois's eyes, admiration was steadily burning brighter and brighter.