Page 101 of Not That Impossible

“Bring him to me,” I shouted. My voice boomed across the vaulted Great Hall. All the enemy soldiers, huddling like the cattle they were, shivered in fear. I thrust out an arm and pointed. “That one. The arrogant bastard over there.”

Adam, my second-in-command, looked the man up and down. “Are you sure?”

“Yes! That’s the one I want,” I said.

“Isn’t he too arrogant?” Adam asked. “Too much of a bastard?”

I threw my head back and laughed. “Ha ha ha. We shall see how long that lasts. He will serve as my war prize for the next fifty years.”

“He’s kind of old,” Adam said. “In another fifty years, he’ll be in his eighties. Besides, you’ve got plenty to choose from. Apart from this one. I like the look of this one. Can I keep him?” He indicated a shuddering, slender man with brown eyes and hair who was clinging to my war prize and trembling like a delicate flower.

“If you like bland, I suppose you may,” I said. “Now! Bring mine up here so that he may kneel before me and pledge his fealty.”

Adam poked the arrogant bastard in the back with his broadsword.

The man scowled and shuffled forward, hampered by the shackles around his ankles.

“Commander Nash,” I said, propping my elbow on my knee and my chin on my fist. “Yes! I do indeed recognise you, my arch-enemy. Hiding amongst the rabble like a common soldier? How the mighty have fallen.”

“Jasper,” Nash said through gritted teeth. “I’m going to kill you.”

“That is Great Warlord Jasper, ruler of ten empires and…just…that iswarlordto the likes of you. Address me correctly. Mewling peasant.”

“I am no peasant. I am the ruler of this land, and I will vanquish you.”

“Ha ha,” I said, successfully quelling my nerves at the simmering fury in his beautiful blue-grey eyes. “It is you who are vanquished. Which one of us is in chains, huh? You are.”

“For now.”

“Forever, if it pleases me!”

“We’ll see.”

“Okay, Adam? Could you, like, push him down to his knees for me? On the throne steps. Right here between my boots? That’d be great. Show him his place and all that.”

Adam tried, grunting and heaving down on Nash’s broad and lovely shoulders, but Nash wouldn’t go.

“Maybe give him a little chop?” I suggested. “At the back of his knees—no! Not with your sword. With your hand, come on. What the fuck, Adam?”

Adam re-sheathed his sword, kicked the back of Nash’s knees, and grinned when Nash hit the marble steps.

“Oh my god,” I said, “are your kneecaps all right? That sounded bad.”

Nash just glared.

“Right. Um. Swear fealty to me.”

“Not a chance.”

“You are vanquished! Accept it, wretch. Your forces are beaten. I sit upon your throne. You will yield to me.”

“Nope.”

“You will. You must!”

This wasn’t really providing the right optics for my victorious army, having the guy who lost sort of not acting like it. At all.

I stood and stared down at my helpless captive. “We shall continue to discuss this in private,” I announced.

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