SEVENTEEN: Prepared
Barclay.
The dark-haired soldier with a large build and gruff voice.
Naturally, Calix was displeased to find such a leech clinging to his prize. Dashien had confidently assured him that the princess was what he'd be getting. Nothing more and nothing less.
He had no trouble overlooking the fact that he hadn't received a princess at all, but to think he had to keep a useless Mevanian soldier alive just to avoid getting on Keliyah's bad side.
And for what?
In the end, Barclay went ahead and got himself killed, and Keliyah, obtuse as she was, could only think to blame the emperor.
"How did this happen?" Calix growled to the groveling man below him.
He recognized the pathetic man as a misplanted spy from Subterra.