Herald of Steel

Alexander felt a slight headache coming as he finally understood where Lady Inayah was coming from.

It was not that Pasha Farzah had been callous, but he was out of his natural depth and fighting with both the king and a powerful Matbar (Marquiss).

Lord Assazd might not be able to match the Pasha toe to toe, but with Ptolomy's approval giving him royal legitimacy and him fighting in his own territory alongside his group of retainers, the odds were indeed quite good for the man.

He was able to sway nobles far easier than Pasha Farzah, whose own nobles in Matrak were already on his side and thus did not have the same low hanging fruit.

The extremely shrewd Lord Assazd was able to take full advantage of this by showing off these results to Ptolomy and the court and at the same time discrediting Pasha Farzah's abilities.

Alexander could not believe Ptolomy was so gullible and that he would 'backstab' his savor so easily.

"Not to mention Pasha Farzah is no longer the bear like man he was. Age is slowly getting to him."

His thoughts were suddenly interjected by this small chirp from the Queen Mother, who added to Lady Inayah's analysis by slowly shifting her head and worriedly musing, "He no longer seems to have the same energy as before. You will see when you meet him… the change is visible on his face."

This matter of age was indeed also something that Alexander had thought of.

Given the time period, Pasha Farzah was already above the mean living expectancy of an adult male, touching sixty. So Alexander optimistically assumed the man was probably on earth for another decade as men living past seventy were really, really rare at this time.

While Seelima's worries did not end only there- with the future. She was also concerned about the present as she further muttered,

"This has caused really some big problems within Matrak, mainly a succession crisis for his seat. With his deteriorating health, there have been loud calls for him to choose a successor but I hear relations between Pasha Farzah and his eldest son, Mirzah is reportedly very strained." "Apparently Paszah wants to hand over his seat to his youngest son Kayvan, but his retainers favor the traditional eldest. This whole thing has created quite the mess, making the man very distracted nowadays. *Sigh*," The Queen Mother revealed this bombshell of an information with a great frown, exhaling out of her bountiful chest a deep breath as she felt like she was seeing darkness all around her.

"Inayah do you know anything about this?" Then finished with this query to her friend, sending a very notable look. If there was one person in the room who knew the state of things as close as they were to the truth without being directly involved, it was surely her.

While in the case of Seelima, the royal family's reach in Matrak has always been poor.

This was mainly due to the great distance and Pasha Farzah's own counterintelligence abilities. Then to make matters even more complex, the two were now allies, so many of the spies had to be a lot more tactful lest they ruffled any unwanted diplomatic feathers.

Such as- many of the noblemen and ladies who used to relay the information readily now had to be very selective, in fear of being suspected and ruining relationships.

"....." On the opposite corner, Lady Inayah first animatedly pursed her lips at the ask, eyes dimming and face shifting.

It appeared she was contemplating on what to reveal and exactly how much.

"Haaa… Your Highness, is right, Pasha Farzah is indeed having some trouble." Finally she broke her silence with this sigh, the formal address showing her distasteful for the topic.

But she also understood given where she was and with whom, it would not be appropriate to hide this. As allies, they needed to understand the man's situation.

Thus with some acrid taste in her mouth, she opened up in full,

"Let me start with some context first. Pasha Farzah has… had eight children, five sons and three daughters. Alexander, you already know about the eldest and youngest daughter, the former Lady Laila, and the… 'infamous' Mikaya." Lady Inayah could not help giving a small, sheepish at the word, subconsciously recalling that girl's antics with this man, before quickly focusing her thoughts back and continuing,

"The middle daughter is fourth in line and is married to the elder brother of Pasha Ozman. I believe she has already arrived in Adhan, so you will likely meet her tomorrow."

"But for our discussion, they are not that important. They have little actual power and their husband and to be husband do not seem interested in getting involved in this mess. So the ones that truly matter for this are the sons."

"Among them, Mirzah is the eldest and the favorite to inherit the seat. His mother is Pasha Farzah's official main wife and he is without doubt the most astounding of all his siblings. Tall, handsome, with silver hair and a knack for both war and diplomacy, anyone who looks at him will think he is a younger version of his father."

"He led his first incursions into the northern barbarians territory when he was just fourteen and then led several more by now, capturing many settlements and slaves. His biggest haul was apparently the largest in recorded Matrak history, the total loot coming to in the hundreds of millions."

"He is also currently the one who is looking after Matrak while his father stays here in court. And from what I hear he is doing a fantastic job."

"It is actually because of him that none of the Matrak nobles ever raised an objection to Pasha Farzah's rebellion. Or else he could have never gotten away so easily with so blatantly colluding with Thesos and killing a king."

"If that was not enough, Pasha Farzah even deposed the crown prince and puppeted the court. All this… it was only through Mirzah personally handling the matter that the nobles in Matrak stayed quiet." "You should know that the royal family holds considerable sway in all the grassroots, local nobles regardless of the province. Under any other circumstances, there would have been at least some noise, if not some small inconveniences for the man. But there was nothing. The whole thing was…."

There was a mixture of both admiration and bitterness in Lady Inayah's voice as trailed off with a longing tone, but Alexander could not quite understand the reason for the latter emotion.

From all that he was hearing, the man had glowing reviews… even from people who disliked him.

And Alexander felt the man deserved every bit of it.

The fact he was able to retain his family's retainers loyalty despite his father killing their god king and virtually usurping the divine throne, gave all the proof one needed of Mirzah's shrewd skills. Even Alexander was not sure he could have pulled it off with such grace and silence.

The whole thing was eerily similar to how the court was silent when Lady Laila was burned. It proved Mirzah had great sway over his retainers.

And if even all this was not enough, the Queen Mother chimed the following interjection, adding to the man's resume,

"He is also married to Pasha Ozman's favorite daughter and already has three young sons to succeed him. Pasha Ozman quite likes his son in law and I would not even be surprised to hear the idea for marriage between Mikaya and Sahel originally came from Oliya…ahhh... That is Mirzah's wife." Seelima added the last bit while turning to Alexander, while sounding quite sure of her hypothesis. She had based it on her few interactions with that clever lady, and was sure the lady at least had some hand on it… only the extent of her involvement was unknown.

Finally, lifting her chest, the pregnant loyal disapprovingly exhaled,

"*Sigh*...really…I do not know why Pasha Farzah is fighting this. All his other boys combined have no chance here. He should just officially hand over the seat and focus on being the prime minister here."

Seelima thought the Pasha was wasting his time with a problem that did not exist. Mirzah was the perfect successor any father would feel blessed to have and any enemy would bleed with jealousy to see.

Hence according to her, Pasha Farzah should really concede here to focus more on her family and their well being. That was where the main attack of the enemy was focused on.

"Yes, it certainly seems that way." While Lady Inayah also agreed with her friend's analysis, although the agreement was said with a lot more helplessness.

Then suddenly changing her tone, breezily added out of topic, "I just met Lady Oliya and the kids yesterday. They seemed to have come alone. Apparently, Lord Mirzah will not attend."

Saying this, she sent a peculiar look towards the Queen Mother that Alexander could not quite pick the meaning of.

Neither did Seelima reveal anything as she only kept that same facade and simply chimed, "Mmmm… that is prudent. Someone should always be there. It would be a great tragedy if someone tried to take advantage of us during our time of festivities."

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