Leonel raised his eyebrows, clearly having not expected Arthur to come to a decision so quickly.
In fact, the most surprised were those from the hidden families. They had come here with a lot of confidence and the only reason they hadn't interrupted during the extended silence was to give Arthur some space and respect.
Negotiations were meant to be like a game of tug of war. A single volley of arguments should have never been enough to close the subject completely. They had expected Arthur to have some back and forth discourse with Leonel first before tracking back to them. Then, they could try to rebuttal some of Leonel's views.
But, instead of any of that happening, King Arthur shut it all down from the beginning. In fact, he didn't even pause to have a conversation with his court ministers either. He just directly made the decision before them all.
