NOTE: I will be Latinizing/Romanizing more names to make them fit.

It could have been worse but it was already bad enough. Pina could barely stop seething after she had already cracked the goblet she was drinking from over the head of the commander of her own reinforcements.

Lady Bozes Co Palestaea, legate of the first cohort of the Scarlet Rose, dropped to her knees as blood trickled down her forehead. She was as much stunned and confused as the rest of the relief force that had raced all the way from the capital to Italica assuming the worst. Yet here she was in the grand hall of the Formali palace, unsoiled and undamaged, wondering what in the gods had happened.

"Y-your Highness!" gasped Lady Beofetra E Catia. "W-what did we do wrong?"

Pina collapsed against the throne and pressed her fingers against her temples. A moment later, she straightened herself and apologized. "I'm sorry. It's...a rather complicated series of events."

"Did we miss anything? Did something happen?" Beofetra asked as she pressed a rag over Bozes's forehead.

The princess eyed the spoils of the Scarlet Rose's first skirmish with the Mongols. Despite the cracks in his armor, Tami could have looked worse. Sandwiched between two massive woven baskets that had some of the goods that the Mongols rightfully claimed from the battle, the lone prisoner-of-war could barely reciprocate Hamilton's pleas. It was not much a provocation of open war as a minor engagement. But for all she knew, she had, by proxy, compromised a treaty that was only a day old.

The evening cold helped to ease the panic in her chest. Along with the sound of water streaming through the ducts, up and down the little canals that made the Formali garden a marvelous sight, Pina cleared her again just to think.

"We could initiate negotiations with the Mongols before they could retaliate," Grey remarked, eyeing his protege and liege pace back and forth between the clean-cut hedges.

"It was tiring enough the first time," the princess groused. "And now because of this, they're going to tear apart any peace options we're going to offer!"

"They would want the culprits," the veteran countered.

"You know we can't give them that!" Pina stopped to gaze at her reflection rippling at the base of the fountain. The way she looked made her feel sick. "Gods, what a mess!"

"It could be worse. At least Tami is alive."

"Not so much capable of walking without a limp." She looked up at the stars. How amazing that they were so innocent and free from these kinds of burdens. She closed her eyes and wished to be a star, an ethereal spirit in the realm of the gods looking down upon the mortals below. Unbothered, uncaring. Just sweet, sweet solitude among the vast emptiness of the sky...

Pina heard footfalls crunching rapidly against the grass.

"Your Highness!" Hamilton gasped. The Scarlet Rose scribe had her helmet on and her gladius drawn.

The princess rested her hand on the hilt of her sword. "What is it?"

"The Mongols are inside the estate!"

And to think it could get any worse.

Pina felt her chest aching from the physical stress of sprinting in her full lorica sans her helm and shield. She had grown accustomed to the weight of her own equipment after years of training but she felt far too winded when she wove from corner to corner until she slid into the great hall where about a dozen Mongols were completely surrounded by three times their number.

What made things worse was that it was Tami's group including Lelei, the elf Tuka, and the Oracle. This could not get any worse.

"Stand down!" she ordered. Her knights heard her but looked too confused to obey. Pina breathed slowly before yelling with more control. "I said, stand down! That is an order!"

"Your Highness?" Bozes called from the front, facing down a taller man.

"Your Highness, we're keeping the intruders from making a move," Beofetra argued, the edge of her sword inches from that of a smaller female soldier whose own curved saber was pressing against her side.

"You heard the order!" Grey hollered, his voice booming around the hall. "Stand down!"

"Bosod sogso!"

Pina snapped her head to the end of the hall. Tami, partially wrapped in bloodstained spider-silk rags and a tunic, half stood with the help of a maid. The Mongols appeared conflicted but they eased away from the knights and sheathed their sabers. Even the Oracle stayed her halberd much to the astonishment of the Scarlet Rose.

The princess was dumbfounded. The Oracle obeyed a Mongol command. Willingly.

Tami spoke. And Lelei translated: "A nice evening, isn't it, princess?"

Pina could feel the gazes of her subordinates. "The treaty still stands," she worded.

"The boyan is not going to like it," he replied.

Word traveled fast in the Empire. As all roads lead to the capital, so did every bit of information from the farthest marches finds its way to the Senate. Pina anticipated the backlash and sure enough, five days later, the delegation of representatives arrived in Italica to await the detachment of Mongols parading down the city's streets to the Formali estate.

"Princess, you are aware that you are walking a fine line here," Senator Casel El Tiberius warned as he watched from the wide alcove fronting the mansion's facade.

Pina did not meet his gaze but she felt the daggers he was glaring into her. "We have one of theirs alive and treated fairly."

"Oh? You seem to have neglected mentioning the countless citizens they have in their camps," Casel snarled.

"Without our prisoner, you would not be looking over a vast ruin here," she growled as she kept her head craned down to the courtyard where these horsemen casually rode up the estate grounds. Every soldier was mounted—even the standard-bearer and the shield-bearers had their own mounts. And similar to how an echelon would stiffen like a wall of legionnaires, so did these foreigners and their steeds.

It was the same mingghan and this time he looked far less enthusiastic about revisiting the city so soon. Interestingly, and much to the alarm of Casel and his fellow representatives, a Falmarti native groomed like a noble and clothed in modest robes acted as mediator and translator. For all they knew, he could have been an enslaved Saderan citizen. For Pina, it was a relief knowing that Lelei was not the only person trying to learn—or being forced to learn—the Mongol tongue.

Within the grand hall, Pina and the four senators stood opposite the mingghan and his entourage of twenty-three men, all dressed for war. Both Hamilton and the translator acted as buffers between them, the former ready with her quill and board.

Pina felt a trickle of sweat bead down her temple despite the air in the hall being colder than the northern winds. Sandwiched between two fickle forces, she could feel her lungs squeeze out every once of air with every breath.

"I am Casel El Tiberius..."

Pina would later endure a more tedious negotiation process.

ORIGINALLY DRAFTED: September 26, 2017

LAST EDITED: October 11, 2017

INITIALLY UPLOADED: October 11, 2017

NOTE: This is all I could muster up for now. Hope you like it. Also, it took me awhile to get the Mongoltage reference. Thanks for that. :)