Heavy Is the Crown- Chapter Fifteen

For the first month of winter the cease-fire held, a tense quiet punctuated by movements just beyond the front lines on both sides. Yet when Gora Empire's new drill tanks arrived, manufactured in Sega and shipped via air drop to the front, everything changed. The Mushroom Kingdom's realignment of forces became terrified, frozen retreat as Gora Empire's infantry forces, led by the tanks, marched forth.

The first two weeks of having those tanks would become forever known as 'The Days of Red Snow'. When Gora backed off finally, the front lines had been pushed seventy miles into the Mushroom Kingdom from north end to south tip. Villages were looted, greenhouse crops stolen and distributed among Impirial supplies, and livestock slaughtered for meat. Stockpiles of Power Mushrooms and three hundred drums of oil were discovered and taken as well.

Bowser observed all of this numbly, reading all about it in the papers. His work occupied his days, but his evenings and days off had become focused entirely on research. He'd been working on a drill tank, finishing up some repairs it needed due to damage in transit. The electrical system had been thrown off when several cables and wires got tangled and broken off. While rooting around in the tank's guts, he came upon a thought seemingly out of nowhere, and it was this- every web can be unwound and observed, tracked back to its beginning.

The assassin who'd slain his mother and Prince Nurik, kicking the Cold War into full flames, left a letter with orders from Prince Tangerine to fulfill the mission of slaying Nurik. But this struck Bowser as sloppy, and thus, suspicious. What assassin would be so careless as to leave documentation around?

Someone had pulled those strings, and it hadn't been the crown Prince of the Mushroom Kingdom. Bowser had been pouring through all sorts of records, requesting papers from the capital that were as many as twelve to fifteen years old. The capital's reply to these requests had been simple; fearing some kind of lawsuit in the making, they'd tried to bury him in paper.

This only worked to his advantage, because now he had everything. It took him until winter's tail end to discover writings about a group within the government referred to as The Impirial Shadow. These men and women were the Empire's spies and assassins, and a few of their number shocked him, as they were toadstools who had defected from the Kingdom.

As Bowser lost himself in work and research, the Empire carried on.

Edward Meechum sat at his small folding table, looking at the map before him and the figurines placed to represent warring forces. Now a major in the Impirial Army, he had found himself handed command of an entire division and ordered by general Resik to lead it to Prince Tangerine's hillside demesne and lay siege. Now, ten days into said siege, he found himself getting impatient for progress.

Meechum didn't like this war, not any part of it, but he did find himself noticing a few benefits. For starters, within the enlisted ranks, the caste system seemed to vanish entirely from consideration in the men's minds. Blue shell privates listened to and obeyed green shell sergeants and corporals, their tribe never even once raised as cause for disobeying an order.

Even the officer corps from major down to second lieutenant seemed blissfully color blind this way. He never had to argue with his three blue tribe captains; he said jump, they asked how high. Whatever other problems the Empire had, this war had put the army into a different mindset. There was only victory or defeat for them, and in both instances, each and every koopa in the field might end the day dead.

A tapping came at his front flap. "Enter," he said, not looking up from his map. There came a shuffling of feet, and soon a goomba stood beside him, an envelope held in his teeth. Meechum took it gently.

"This was delivered a short while ago by a Hammer Brother," said the goomba. "He said to make sure that when you finished reading it, you destroy it. Must be pretty important." The goomba used one foot to salute, then quickly toddled out of the tent, leaving Meechum alone with his letter.

The yellow tribe paratroopa used a dagger to cut open the seal on the envelope, pulled the paper out and read it:

'To Edward Meechum, major commanding North Division Three. You are now the closest thing Bowser Entem has to family, so this is vital for you to know. Young Bowser has been requesting all manner of old records and papers, and the capital has been more than happy to oblige. Too happy. Many believe he's seeking some way to file a suit against the Empire for the death of his parents. I personally believe otherwise.

'It is my firm belief that he is attempting to uncover a series of connections which will reveal the cause and party responsible for the assassination of Prince Nurik, which also caused his mother's death, for the purposes of revenge. If the person responsible catches on, I fear Bowser will be in grave danger. Either Bowser must be convinced to stop his search, or he must be helped along so that he can finish before the guilty party can figure out what he's really up to.

'I write you this because I have watched him grow from a distance, and I have arrived at this conclusion over the years- Bowser Entem is the last, best hope for this nation to return to its proper glory and state of honor. Help him not just for his sake, but for all of our sake.

'Signed, Turiya Ferone, Hammer Brother Third'.

Meechum reread the letter twice, committing it to memory before setting it ablaze and letting it burn out in his tent's portable heating pot. He'd heard of Turiya over the years, as would have anyone familiar with the Hammer Brothers. There were always one-hundred Hammer Brothers scattered throughout the Empire, numbered in rank from the least of their number, One Hundredth, to their most elite leader, the First. For the Third to be concerned spoke volumes of the potential danger Bowser was in.

Commanding the siege, Meechum's options were limited, but he began immediately working out what he could do for the boy who had been his ward.

Prince Dulaha yanked the blanket off of Bowser to awaken him one fine Saturday morning a month after Meechum received his letter, the young koopa groaning and coming blearily awake. The Prince stood smiling with his huge hands planted on his hips, dressed in what Bowser could only hope was a joke outfit. On a smaller, more refined koopa, the suit would look dapper, but on him, Bowser was put in mind of someone throwing fine clothes on a gorilla.

"Come on, lazy bones," Dulaha proclaimed loudly. "It's a big day! Get up, get up!"

"It's my day off," Bowser complained, rolling away from the Prince. "Leave me be."

"Have you forgotten already? My betrothed arrives today, Bowser! I needs must make a good impression, or my father will have my hide!" He grabbed Bowser by the shoulder and roughly shook him, careful to be more playful than harmful. "Come on!"

Bowser got up and went about a quick cleanup routine, walking alongside Prince Dulaha toward the dining hall. The young koopa now stood even height and width with Dulaha, who had long been one of the biggest koopas in the Empire, and he wasn't done growing. Soon, he would be over six-and-a-half feet tall.

In the dining hall, servants brought Bowser coffee just as he liked it. His relationship with Dulaha had been essentially neutral until the war began to swing in the Empire's favor. Since then, Prince Dulaha had tried to become at least acquaintances with him. Bowser didn't mind, but he also spared no time of his own to further develop their relationship.

"This all seems like a lot of wind and noise," Bowser commented, taking a bite of toast smeared with strawberry jelly. "Have you ever met this woman, Highness?"

"Twice," said Dulaha. "Though my brother Renoit only met his betrothed once before they married. Which reminds me, you'd mentioned you wanted to meet and speak with Renoit, yes?"

"Very much so," Bowser said. It had taken weeks of tracking clues through hundreds of official documents, but Bowser had finally arrived at the conclusion that Renoit Harin was in charge of the Impirial Shadow. If anyone knew the toadstool assassins working for Gora Empire, it would be him.

"Excellent. I have arranged for you to visit his castle and stay with him for a few days, Monday through Thursday," said Dulaha. The Prince tucked into his breakfast then, eating like a savage on the brink of starvation.

The remainder of Bowser's day was spent in quiet contemplation in the library, barring one interruption for Dulaha to introduce him to Minerva, his betrothed. Bowser thought her one of the most hideous koopa women he'd ever met, but when he saw how fondly Dulaha regarded her, he held his judgment in check. Who was he, after all, to hold contempt for anyone else's view of beauty?

When they departed his company, Bowser's mind turned back to his coming visit to Prince Renoit's.

In four days with Prince Renoit, Bowser learned more than he had over the entire course of the war. Renoit turned out to be quite forthcoming when Bowser, upon being introduced, asked if he was in charge of the Impirial Shadow. "You already know that I am," Renoit had replied with a cold smile. "Walk with me."

Where most of his brothers were large and war-like, Renoit was svelt, toned, and reserved in dress and style. He spoke in a cultured tone, however, giving him a genuinely aristocratic aura similar to Nurik's. However, where Prince Nurik had been warm, inviting and conversational, Renoit was cold, calculating and informative.

The moment Bowser had requested the combat training records for the Princes, Renoit had sent an agent to keep tabs on him at Dulaha's keep. For three months now, Renoit had been receiving daily reports about Bowser's doings, and he admitted to being impressed by the young koopa's mechanical genius and his tenacity in researching, well, whatever it was he was after.

Over tea and biscuits Bowser questioned Renoit about the Shadow and its agents. The Prince didn't give away too many specifics, but through careful questioning, Bowser learned that a total of three former Shadow agents were toadstools, all three now acting as freelance agents.

"Ardin is the best of them, and the one most likely responsible for my brother's death, and thus, this war," Renoit said. He barely managed to recover from letting a hint of anger slip into his voice. "That, frankly, perturbs me moreso than does my brother's demise."

"I'm afraid I don't follow," Bowser said, clearing his throat.

"Assassins are like scalpels, Bowser," said Renoit, pacing now in the modest study he'd brought himself and Bowser into. "We are finely tuned, honed to cut through everything in our path. But like scalpels, we are supposed to be used to prevent catastrophe through subtle, suspicious changes."

Bowser thought on what Renoit said for a few minutes. "So, if I have you right, when the Shadow kills someone, it's in order to prevent something even worse from happening. By leaving no trace, no proof, nobody can claim a feud or point fingers that might escalate into an international incident."

"Precisely," said Renoit. "The Shadow is not just some gathering of murderers. We are the silent, unseen hand guiding the course of events along the best path for the Empire. We do not leave tracks in our wake; at least, not physical ones. Those traces we leave are unavoidable."

"Like paperwork and reports," Bowser said with a grin.

"Yes, exactly so," Renoit replied, raising his tea cup in a casual toast. "You are one of only eight people in the Empire who has a full awareness of us outside of my family or the Shadow itself. Of those eight, you are one of two who figured us out on your own. You should be commended for your intellect and wit."

"Thank you," said Bowser. Renoit went on to tell Bowser about Ardin, a political exile from Mushroom Kingdom who had enlisted in the Gora Army seventeen years earlier. Within weeks he was tested by Shadow agents who saw his potential. He quickly rose through the Shadow's ranks, but after only four years in service, he cut ties and became a freelance spy and assassin.

"We hear whispers, notice events seemingly without explanation, and are able now and again to tie them to him," said Renoit. "There was one incident about seven years back, an entire village in the Fourth went up in flames. We thought it was Ardin's doing, but the local Magistrate had an investigation performed and found it was the fault of Fire Flower seeds being stored in a high-pressure, high-heat weapons cache." Bowser nearly choked on his tea.

"Fourth Magistrate? Was his name Benjamin Godash?"

"Yes, our current First Chair Advisor. Why?" Bowser crushed his tea cup in his hand, and as he bled freely, he began to explain.