Maintain Relations from Time to Time - Get a Knight, Spy, or Monarch and send them on Patrols through the road by the village shoppe, the forest, and at sea. This will maintain your relationship once you've finished the Alliance Quest. Edicts are generally a poor way to maintain relations with another country as it usually makes someone else mad. It just won't do for you to go through all that trouble to lose an alliance from another country's relations with you bottoming out. It will take many patrols to do this, but those hero classes all gain XP from doing so and get valuable random event opportunities.