The walk back along the beach was slower than the one that had taken them away.
Antares and Tayron moved side by side, boots sinking into the warm sand, the crash of waves filling the spaces between their words.
The earlier killing aura still lingered in the air like smoke after a fire — thin, sharp, impossible to ignore. Every Ashfang warrior, every Red Son still circling above, and even the pirate crews unloading the last of the cargo felt it.
Secret glances followed the two young rulers. Hands rested a little closer to weapons. No one spoke of it, but everyone had felt the weight of that pressure when Antares had cut the ocean itself.
Yajin's tusks were clenched tight. Lady Sira's cyan eyes never left Tayron's back.
They reached the waiting group. Yajin and Lady Sira immediately bowed deeply.
"We are done getting everything off, my King," Yajin reported, his deep voice steady. "Most of the cargo has already been sent back to camp. The Ashfang are moving the rest now. Grain, seeds, spices — all accounted for."
Antares gave a single nod, satisfaction clear in his blood-red eyes.
"Good."
Lady Sira still stared at Tayron with open, undisguised hostility. The pirate prince noticed. Antares noticed. Neither of them commented. Some tensions were better left unspoken for the moment.
Antares turned to his people.
"Return to camp. Secure the supplies. Double the watch on the southern approaches tonight and add more patrols against jungle beasts.I will join you shortly."
"Yes, Your Majesty."
Yajin and Sira bowed once more. The hundred Ashfang warriors shifted into motion without further command, lifting the remaining sacks and crates with the effortless strength of their kind. Within minutes the beach began to empty, the organized columns of crimson-skinned warriors disappearing up the basalt path toward the plateau camp.
Antares remained.
He walked with Tayron the final stretch to the waterline, where the two lion beastmen waited in perfect stillness, heavy chains gleaming under the afternoon sun. The longboat bobbed gently in the shallows, ready.
For a moment neither young man spoke. The wind pulled at Antares's long black hair and Tayron's crimson cloak alike.
Then Antares stopped and faced him fully.
"Let us be clear, Prince Tayron," he said, voice low enough that only the two of them could hear. "What we sealed today is not a casual friendship. It is a blade pointed in two directions."
Tayron met his gaze without flinching.
"I understand that, Your Majesty."
"You will give me everything your intelligence network can offer on the goblin territories beyond the Godwall," Antares continued. "Maps. Troop movements. Supply lines. Weak points. Names of their warlords. I want to know how they eat, how they sleep, and how they die. In return, when the day comes that your siblings decide your blood is better spilled… the Ant Tribe will answer and fight in your name."
Tayron's crimson eyes narrowed slightly, calculating.
"Military support," he confirmed. "Not just words."
"Not just words," Antares agreed. "When the succession war truly begins, you will have Red Sons and my other troops at your side if you call for them. And if the battle reaches the sea, you will have the full weight of whatever force I can project by then. But understand this — I will not bleed my people for a lost cause. You must be worth the cost."
A thin, sharp smile touched Tayron's lips.
"I intend to be. My father has three sons and three daughters who still draw breath and a countless number of bastards. Only one of us will sit in the high admiral's chair when he is gone. I do not plan to be the one floating face-down in the sea."
Antares studied him for a long second, then gave a short nod.
"Then we understand each other."
He extended his hand again.
Tayron took it. The grip was firm, deliberate, and final.
"Support for support," Tayron said. "Blood for blood if it comes to that."
"Blood for blood," Antares echoed.
They released.
Tayron stepped back, the two lion beastmen moving instantly to his sides. He climbed into the longboat with the same elegant ease he had shown all day.
As the oars bit into the water and the vessel began to pull away from shore, he looked back once more.
"I will come with the first intelligence reports with the next shipment, Your Majesty. Do not keep me waiting too long when the goblins start dying. I want to see what an Ant King looks like when he goes to war."
Antares stood on the sand and watched until the longboat was a dark speck against the open sea.
Only then did he turn and begin the climb back toward the plateau.
The alliance was sealed — not in ink, not in ceremony, but in the quiet understanding of two young men who both knew the price of power and were already calculating how much blood it would cost to keep it.
Behind him the last of the cargo disappeared inland. Above him the Red Sons wheeled once more and began their descent. The southern coast fell quiet again, save for the endless voice of the ocean.
And somewhere far to the north, beyond the Godwall, the goblins continued their lives in ignorance of the storm that had just taken its first breath on a white sand beach.
They had forgotten the doom they had brought on the antmen, they thought they were hiding in the earth and never gave them a second thought.
Now, a new ant king was ruling over the antmen and he was determined to get vengeance for his people that had died at the hands of the goblins and for the curse they had thrown on the antmen of the Arcanis clan and Antares himself.
He was determined to get revenge on those creatures. The death of the goblins would be the only thing that could calm him down.This alliance with Prince Tayron was the first step to his plan.