Zayneth's gaze swept across the figures gathered near the prince, lingering on the faces of his closest advisors.
Most of them had followed the so-called Peasant Prince since his days as a mercenary, and their loyalty clearly ran deeper than any gold-lined offer could hope to match.
Trying to turn one of them against him would be as fruitless as trying to make a cock lay an egg.
Still, what struck Zayneth most wasn't their loyalty, as much as their diversity.
The first to draw his attention was the towering figure of a man standing to the prince's right, broad as an ox and dark-skinned, his arms folded and his eyes calm, unreadable, a mountain of a man. Next to him stood a sharp-faced man with slightly slanted eyes and pale golden hair, an unusual combination that whispered of far western blood, that of the equestrian tribes far west from even the Sultan of Azania.
