Chapter 1: Movement I: Dances at Sundown (1)
Chapter Text
The sunlight of the waning noon beamed into the room, disparate flotsam glittering in the rays. It was the sort of sight that only came to be in the long draw between the day's height and the evening scramble. Too early for dinners and late for sports, these were times best paved over with teas, or with socials, naps; baths; books. Him. The like. Anything but looked at straight, lest a woman be reminded that she was just a pile of flesh, subject to time and constraint, yet in command of neither. So stewed the room's one occupant, and under the crushing weight of a life, sought to break the monotony with the first of her list.
She huffed, then sipped, tea rolling over her lips and into the gap between teeth and tongue. Flowers. Grass. Honey. Flowers. Roots. She grimaced. Sourness was unbecoming. She swallowed the mix of saliva. The taste lingered, and she made to swallow again; her teeth and tongue jammed – too dry. Frustrated, she fought a glass through her tacky lips, pried apart her mouth, and killed the moment with cold water. With this, Renner conceded.
Failure, absolute and total. How did this happen?
Dispossessing herself of the glass – its hatching matching the table’s – she placidly sunk back into her chair and wallowed. It was her sincere hope that the leaf would have been better than the last shipment. Instead, what she received was simply bad; not offensively so, but its tepid unpleasantness kept her in the hoping and in the desiring for something better.
Malpractice? Maleficence?
The whole endeavor had taken on the order of a year. The previous spring – the thirty-eighth of her father’s reign – she had cuttings procured; by the start of summer, they were in the earth; furnished by autumn; burgeoning by winter; leaves were severed and set to dry; before the faintest trickle slipped her allotment of the countryside into that slice of Re-Estize given unto the king, that slice of Ro-Lante given unto his family, and that slice of Valencia given unto her. The ambitions she had held died within weeks.
And now, Renner- no, Chardelon, for your most grand of lies, tell yourself that the growing of tea on your land has been subordinated to criminals, and that some dark conspiracy has been woven solely to deny you your tea. Would such an absurdity satisfy you? No, it wouldn’t, and you would be left here with all the tallying and mewling and-
She clicked her tongue, took another drink of water, and vanquished what she could before the day spiraled.
No matter. Learnedness takes learning, itself bestowed by time; I couldn’t have expected a quality product in the first year of growing. Even excepting that, whom would I blame? The peasantry? Trite. This is no greater their fault than mine. Little lent, little lost.
It was a poor bundle of lies; doubly so against herself. The omission laced in her framing were the middlemen. While the traders were of note – men who in admirable fashion beguiled whomever possible of their coin – this failure fell on the crown. The scheme came clearly to her: she had given the purchasing order to the household chamberlain who shed the ignominy to lesser men; those went to the Merchant’s Guild and posted it; unscrupulous wholesalers took note of the attached name and forgot their fears of the king; samples she had insisted upon pre-purchase were adulterated; fine product was swapped for coarse, gold was exchanged, and what was bought was planted, not to be tasted for another year. Had she been present through negotiations, she would have taken note, but Her Highness could not have flaunted her image to speak with salesmen. This and other broodings came to her; most morosely, that agents under her auspices were treated exactly as such.
This reputation of mine is distending itself. The nobility have always had their opinion of me, but to think it’s spread to the merchant classes. Peddlers of luxury value little more than court-talk, but even this is a little far. Selling the crown substandard goods? How have things degenerated so far? The irony is that, for all material aspects, such behavior is completely correct: if my house cannot be trusted to take my requests seriously, then there is no reason to seriously fulfill them. There is profit to be made in that gap.
The fraud, while itself bitter, served as part of colder remembrance: that to all those near her but a handful – and perhaps one other – Renner Theiere Chardelon Ryle Vaiself, The Third Princess, was a dullard.
What of integrity? That my house seems so willing to spurn me. That others are! It’s nonsensical. Had Igana or Ield lodged a request – as Zanac and Barbro respectively – they would have received a mark of consideration. No one would dare cut their liquors, but when I, Chardelon, do the same as Renner, all the bilkers and flimflammers creep from their holes, and for what? Quick coin from the hands of the king at risk of the gallows. A hollow risk, clearly. Pray tell, what is a Vaiself?
She paused, mind tumbling over the little absurdity of her father’s house letting itself be swindled; it was, in truth, less a matter of her father than her siblings.
No, what is a Ryle?
Renner sighed, tasked herself to a vengeance against those who had conned her, tasked herself to a vengeance against the chamberlain, vowed to take complete control of her Merchant’s Guild account, vowed to secure a true source of tea for her lands, and let the matter rest. In its place came thoughts of something else. Him, and his dusty blond hair, that precious, proud smile of his and azure eyes set in a face ever too expressive.
I need to see him.
At this, she grabbed her handbell and flicked it. Elsewhere, beyond her room and across the hall, its pair rang – of this, she was assured – in the former quarters of her sister, now a staging area for the maid staff assigned to Renner. A new catch of motes fell through the rays before a knock came, Renner remade herself, and maid Laina bid herself an entrance.
“Your Highness, how may I be of service?”
What a lanky thing you are.
“Mm, in several matters. If you wouldn’t mind putting the kettle on again-”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
“And assuring me that the time of my brother’s arrival is, as of now, unchanged.”
“It is, Your Highness.”
“Wonderful. I suppose I should get dressed. Do summon Climb for me.”
“Y-yes, Your Highness.”
A slip. A slip? How? Merely seeing that the rumors of a Ryle’s relationship with her bodyguard are true provokes such incredulity in you? How were you hired? I might as well have my fun.
“He should be done with his training… Nevermind the fact that Jelca insists on running him ragged outside of Ro-Lante. Tell me, do you consider hosting field exercises on the day of the Crown Prince's return is in any way appropriate?”
“I’m not sure, your Highness.”
Are the standards slipping or the culture degrading? That makes four of the newer maid staff that have slipped – if not so blatantly: Julia, Illurin, El’ya, and now her too. Odd. I suppose rumors are flying a little faster.
A fifth task entered Renner’s queue: ridding herself of Laina. A vague scheme muddled its way into her mind, no more complex than dizzying the maid with inane chatter so boring that when an opportunity to leave the post appeared she would take it. That, and making sure her reassignment was so trodden and miserable that she would alway suffer. Renner decided she ought to start now.
“Well, never-the-mind. See to his summoning, and do put on the water.”
Laina bowed, and with a nod from the princess, exited. The few seconds she spent doing so were an agony, and by the door’s contemptuous latching, Renner had lost all ability to stand the woman. Nursing her hate, she forced herself down to equilibrium; in the rage over the insult, she had lost composure. Climb would come, exhaustion or otherwise. She rose, and made for her bedchamber.
Composure, yes, but visage too.
Entering from the drawing room, her clacking heels muffled as she passed over the rug underlying her poster-bed, retrieving a clasped pocket mirror from the nightstand. Snapping it open, the princess saw herself in clear relief, eyes devouring her cheeks and lips.
There’s going to be a trick to this. My brother returning from a paper campaign that deserves no recognition, and yet all Six in attendance. I do a dull look – flatter tones, lighter blends – and I’ll seem disjoint with the rest of my house. Something more typical and I'll run afoul of my brother's sensibilities. Anything too youthful, too blushy, and I'll have suitors making serious attempts. This will be difficult.
Renner withdrew to her vanity, tracking herself in the trinket; in the same way her kettle did not lose its warmth when taken from flame, the mirror did not lose the light when taken from day – a gift from a woman whose friendship Renner valued. Sitting and setting about herself, Renner layered up blush, repaired her rouge, blended, streaked on highlighter, blended again, plucked errant hairs, redid her nails, jaunted to her closet, snatched two dresses and the heels to match, centered herself in the room, spun to peer into her floor-length mirror, let slip her expression, and spoke.
“I love the trim on both. What do you think?”
Renner’s visage coiled again, curling down her lips and drawing apart their center just enough to reveal her teeth.
“I love the trim on both. What do you think?”
Renner held the expression, but her eyes fell to her mouth; it fluttered in a way it oughtn’t.
I’m missing something. Too cloying, too helpless, and with too little effort on my part. He wouldn’t question it, of course, but I want him to double back, to spin over himself for a moment.
“I love the trim on both, which is what makes this so hard. What-”
That’s less than natural; almost as if I’m forcing pity. Reverse my inflection, lengthen the delay between sentences.
“I love the trim on both, which is what makes this so hard. What do you think?”
No, still labored; lumbering even.
“But I don’t know which dress to pick. But I don’t know which one to pick. But I don’t know which one is best. But I don’t know which is best. But I can’t figure out which is best. I can’t make a decision. But I can’t decide. But I-”
Her voice fell away, overborne by the shouting in her mind. The light swelled, and Renner was once again aware of herself, lapis and gold staring back from silver. Childhood had its woes, but late adolescence wrote every rote hour anew. Arguments with the day were something Renner had long learned to lose, ceding sleep and its precious black worth it for him. It was in the gaps that the bargain seemed like trickery. And then it broke.
And I can’t- Ah, that. “I can’t decide.” Hard stop for just over a second, followed by that surrender, then stress “you” in the next sentence. A contrast in construction and effect, no? All together then.
Chapter 2: Movement I: Dances at Sundown (2)
Chapter Text
“I love the trim on both… I can’t decide. Climb.”
And, with that confidently helpless delivery, Renner had hoodwinked him into bearing the burden of choice.
Wait-
Her six minute diatribe on properly princessing oneself fled him. Pouting eyes set atop pouting lips looked expectantly on – as if he was to produce an answer. An instant later, he realized crushingly that was the exact expectation.
“Uh-”
Climb caught his words immediately. Panic wouldn’t help, and so he used all the sharpness of a warrior’s mind to issue an apology.
“Excuse me.”
“All of this would’ve been so much easier if my brother had simply committed to his campaign in autumn. Though… I suppose that’s a little selfish of me.”
“Absolutely not, Your Highness.”
The response was spoken and forgotten immediately. The decision was much more pressing. The left dress was green. The right was also green, though a lighter shade. This was the extent of what he could state with confidence.
We’re past the half-way of spring… so the lighter green one, right? I think that makes sense.
He dared to raise his eyes to hers, regretted the decision, and went back to the dresses.
No, what about trim? The bodices… are both fine – I think – but the sleeves. Flowers or points? Pointed lace makes sense because of… war. Right? No, it doesn’t. The flowers? What would the Crown Prince want to see?
The gazes of others blended into the moment, Climb no longer furnishing season and imagery, but the desires of royals, courtiers, the swarming opulent; what they would think of her for her dress; what they would think of him for his decision. With an incorrect choice, the maid leering at the pair of them might suddenly whistle, summon her sistren, and have him dragged off for a thorough denouncement. This had never happened, nor did he think it would, but the ripely estimated age of fifteen had begun to hit-home all the adumbral anxieties of adolescence; anxieties that he could bear when not forcibly reminded of himself.
What about modesty? If I choose something less complete, then- Oh Gods, I’m taking forever. The lighter one!
“The one on the right, Your Highness.”
“Yours or mine?”
“Er, mine, Your Highness.”
Her Highness flipped, thrusted out, and inspected the lighter dress, chuffing with pride.
“Right. Thank you, Climb.”
“Of course, Your Highness.”
“Now, necklaces.”
As always, Renner noticed a reaction Climb was sure he didn’t give.
“You know, you really can’t claim incapacity in feminine matters. Haven’t you been inundated with enough of my pestering?”
“Pestering is absolutely not-”
“How you would characterize my mutterings?”
“No, I-”
Renner collapsed into a giggle, trailing into a markedly false smile before she flicked her eyes away.
“Ah, forgive me, Climb. I’m all out of sorts, and I fear I’m pouring my rancor onto you.”
“Absolutely not, your Highness.”
“I can understand Jelca’s decision making, but I shan’t agree with it.”
Were Climb to speak in the negative or positive, he would violate his duties to either the princess – his mistress – or the palace’s supreme commander – his superior; worse, he could equivocate and violate both, something the maid peering at him would spread halfway to E-Rantel within a week. This was a circumstance he often found himself in, particularly when the princess took it to complaining about away exercises. Calmly, Climb nodded, meeting eyes that contained muted satisfaction. They lept to the maid a moment later.
“Laina, is it?”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
“Did you have thoughts?”
“As to which matter?”
Renner tilted her head.
“Hm?”
“To which matter you discussed with your bodyguard?”
“To which…”
“The subject of Sir Jelca, or of the dress?”
“Oh, prithee, the former. Er, latter?”
Climb blinked, as did the maid. This was also common, the princess making a leap beyond him; all the worse, wrapping it in wordplay. Again, he kept his silence.
“I’m sorry, Your Highness, I don’t follow.”
“We – me and my Climb – spoke of Jelca afterwards, yes?”
“Afterwards… after- my deepest apologies-”
“The matter of the dress, yes?”
“Yes, apologies, what of-”
“Your thoughts, then?”
“The dress or the supreme commander, Your Highness?”
“The Commander, and his indecipherable decision to host exercises outside Ro-Lante.”
She’s never going to get over this, is she?
Climb suppressed a smile; despite himself, he found a little humor in the princess’s continued refusal to end this particular dissent. For the sake of force-readiness, the Supreme Commander of Ro-Lante’s forces, Knight Marshal Sir Jelca, had always insisted on exercises. This, as thoroughly explained to Climb on several occasions, was completely permissible to Renner; what wasn’t were field exercises outside the palace or the capital itself, which she had rejected, in each occasion, as downright spendthrift. This criticism had some truth to it, though not as much as the disappointment in her eyes when she couldn’t find an excuse to come and watch.
“I am not… I feel it would be… inadvisable- inappropriate for me to speak on this matter.”
“Eh? Laina, I shan’t- hm, oh, how to put this… I’ll make no reprimand to you on this point. I am not my eldest sister. I merely- I find Jelca’s predilections unreasonable, no? I figure that sort of martial display-”
Renner vaguely waved her arms in what Climb guessed was a sword swing.
“-Would be valuable on palace grounds, especially today, yes?”
“I wouldn’t- I wouldn’t quite-”
“Ah, we can speak to exhaustion on this point later. For now, the ‘latter-former.’ Laina, I would dearly appreciate your aid in dressing.”
The maid visibly blanched, something Climb hoped Renner didn’t see. Still, she had called the maid to reclothe her, which meant he had been obliged to leave. Climb fell into a bow, Renner waving a hand as dismissal. He rose and left toward the drawing room, the maid rushing him out until he stepped over the threshold, turned around, and bowed.
“Your Highness.”
“Let’s hope for a success, shall we?”
The door shut. Things fell apart, the self reassurances that allowed him to do things like occupy the Princess’s time and stand in her bedchamber collapsing. Somewhere beyond the whitewashed relief, the most important person in his life was being undressed, cleaned, redressed, and remade, and there was nothing he could do to draw closer to her, to say express gratitudes he had already exhausted, entreat her to new heights of confidence, to lessen her crushing burdens, to be the boy he once was for her, to be the man he had yet to be. Climb turned around, sidestepped to the right, set his hand on his hilt, and stood vigil for his beauty.
—
[40st Year of Foresai, Middle Wind Month, Day 28]
Renner was seated by the side of her father when the throne room doors opened. Horns cried into the chamber; palisades of men flanked a cleared center aisle, down which came a dozen knights and a man Renner loathsomely knew as her eldest half brother.
“Presenting to His Majesty and His court the Crown Prince of Re-Estize, His Highness Barbro Andrean Ield Ryle Vaiself!”
The sound of the crier unfurling his scroll was lost in the bated applause, metered out by each member of the Royal Court to neither patronize nor spurn. Renner did not let her eyes dart, making what accountings she could through the edges of her vision.
It seems everyone of note has made it here, excepting Lord and Lady Pespea. Shame, I was looking forward to my sister’s company. Likely a genuine delay rather than a snub; pray tell, trouble on the roads? Perhaps now I’ll get his backing on extended patrols.
Bitterness not bleeding into her smile, Renner applauded a little further, before falling into the same silence as Zanac and her father – seated once and twice over to the right, respectively - did.
“Having departed this court in the days of Upper Earth, he has campaigned for seven months in the territories of E-Rantel. There, in the borderlands, his Highness lead the slaying of a forest hulk, beast of boughs; put to rest an incursion of the dead, including nigh a dozen weirders of the dread cult Zurrernorn; encircled and destroyed two bands of highwaymen, recovering their spoils and rendering it to the seneschal; seized and burned over thirty shipments of Laira-”
Half the room’s clapping fell off beat.
Seized and ‘burned?’ It’s so juvenile. How does anyone- Oh my gods, he’s written it himself!
A handful of slight smirks and knowing looks were exchanged, some faces were frozen with smiles, grimaces for others; were there chuckles, none made it to the dais. The Crown Prince’s campaign had been understood as a polite farce, but this mistake overwhelmed even that expectation. The crier, such was his merit, read steadily on.
“-and countered several imperial actions, His Highness and the men under him encountering the enemy eight times and going-to-blows with the enemy four times.”
‘Forest hulk, beast of boughs.’ Repetition in the aim of adding emphasis – shoddy aim with his pleonasm. “His.” My gods, this does have all the flair of his hand, doesn’t it? Didn’t father teach him better?
A few in the crowd seemed to catch this too, their confusion slipping to concern. Of the Great Six, only five were actually in attendance. Dear and true to her father, public leader of the Royal Faction Margrave Urovana shot a wizened look to his ostensible underling Marquis Blumrush, who didn't see it, and was, for his part, perfectly composed. Renner figured his calm was by way of his treason; selling the secrets of his nation to ears in Arwintar meant he was less a member of the Royal or Noble factions than of El-Nix’s, and thus gave no special import to the stability of the throne. Raeven, too, kept his composure – though this a much greater feat: not the free-agent member he purported to represent, the Marquis was secretly aligned to the throne. The true Noble ilk – Marquis Boullope himself – chewed on Barbro’s error through a quick sequence of blinks; his lackey Count Lytton had the occasionally useful indignity of a lower court rank, and was thus buried too far back in the crowd for his reaction to be measured.
“Of these melees, three saw imperial patrols scattered and thrown back across the border, the fourth destroying the enemy entirely, with the Crown Prince’s force taking the heads of two lieutenants and a captain.”
Verily? Embellishment of gore withstanding, taking a captain implies fighting a company, something I wouldn’t see my brother actually committing to… unless the legions are poaching officers and assigning them to lesser commands in the east. Plausible.
Renner followed along with a slight nod and a purse of the lips, gently processing her brother’s acts. Despite the ceremony being only that, it was the first actual opportunity to hear details of Barbro’s maneuverings in months. The usual trick of goading information from maids worked poorly for military matters; the actual thrust of his efforts in the east would have been conversations with the local lords, echos of which – to Renner’s annoyance – had yet to reach Valencia. The Crown Prince’s cavalcade had simply outpaced any impolite talk. This left her in an uncomfortably equal position to the rest of the court, assuming her brother had sent no runners ahead with messages to his allies, be they within or without the faction. This would have mattered had she cared, which she didn’t, and so her interest in Barbro sinking to his knees before the dais and beginning to speak was, at most, passive.
“Father, I have returned from my campaign.”
“And spring has grown just that much warmer. Glad to see you, my son.”
Ramposa meant these words, a love Renner would deem a flaw if she did not hide behind the same. More smiles in the crowd – many forced; at a glance: Urovana’s, Zanac’s, Lytton’s, most the Royal faction. Sardonic ones were worn by Boullope, Blumrush, and most the Noble faction. Others, genuine: the king’s, Raeven’s. Then there were the bitter: Renner’s, Barbro’s.
“The crier gave an account, but I do have more to share myself.”
“Then speak.”
That irritating current of pride in his voice. The son can be forgiven for his mistakes, but the father? Is this not the same error you made in your youth? Jilting duties to the royal line for martial glory? How is this permissible to you?
Renner was suddenly overcome with a great sense of absurdity. The last half year and a half had been filled with plenty of glib conversations about this moment, noble men and women making light of the fact that the first son of the king had, of all courses, chosen to go on campaign, and of how the second son – who, by all rights, should have been out doing exactly what his brother was – merely continued eating, drinking, and cavorting with friends, seemingly aloof to his elder sibling’s blunder. The latter act was slothful but inoffensive – the exact course Zanac would have taken had his brother simply played his part as crown prince. In contrast, the former was an inexcusable error, Barbro seeming to completely misunderstand the role of a first son. Had he desired the throne – which he did so clearly covet – he needed merely to wait. Whether his failure to do this was from idiocy, impatience, or impotence had been the thrust of most jokes since his departure; for Renner’s part, she bet inadequacy.
“On battlefields improper and unchosen, I met with the Empire; Not in the drearland of Katze, but in the high forests and hills of our east. There, in the March of Rantel-"
Using Boullope’s words, are we? An open accession to the enemy, then.
Renner dared a quick glance at her father and brother, seeing the former shift slightly in his chair and the latter blanch. Barbro had broken the House line, employing the Noble faction phrase for the borderlands, one that implied the royal family did not hold perpetual control over those territories and that, one day, the March of Rantel would be restored. This second blunder was less innocent; Renner suspected it would only feed the fear of Royalists that Barbro had fallen into the influence of their rivals.
“-I came to know the character of the enemy. Father, I come to tell you that rebels parading themselves as a nation are quick to break, yet quick to move; cowardly, yet persistent; that they, in their vileness, embody every strength of vile men, and that we, forthright and upstanding, shall and do struggle against their intrusions by way of this fact. This is not to say that we abandon our valor and virtue to do effective battle with them, but that we burden ourselves once more with vigilance, once more with determination. It is in that spirit, father, that I went into battle myself, and there, in the far reaches, did I and my men take the head of an imperial scout captain,-”
Barbro was lying – a fact transparent not just to her, but to the rest of the rest of the court. This was not a mark against him, but rather part of an expected performance for high bloods. All told little lies of battle, embellishments that turned skirmishes into dread melees, stray arrows into assassination attempts, and the delivery of orders from horseback into frontline combat; the only exception was the warrior captain, whose implacable humbleness hampered him more than she thought worthwhile. Renner knew all this, and yet, a gentle unease came over her: the sense that she had no idea what her brother was doing.
“A captain whose blade I present now to the throne as a gift.”
Renner suffered the cost of her footing; Barbro had claimed mastery over the ceremony, to her surprise – and everyone else’s. Per etiquette on campaign returnals, the presentation of a weapon was appropriate to the format; per the character of national politics, any opportunity to unilaterally gift the king with a weapon was a victory; per court convention, the king could not refuse it; all this forgotten by the lack of formal campaigns for three decades. Renner struck a mark against herself anyway. Barbro’s adjutant unknelt and brought to bear a second scabbard, stepping past his master to present the arm to Gazef Stronoff.
A little small in his hands, no?
The Warrior Captain took the blade and began his inspection, first of the sheath twice over, then by drawing and posturing it. Renner was no purveyor of martial matters, but some things were basic: it was a longsword, fullered in a way that made it foreign, reflected sunbeams catching across its polished, flat edge. This last point sat with Renner for a moment, before tangling itself in an unpleasant way.
That isn’t a calvary blade, is it?
Barbro’s intonation of an “Imperial Scout Captain” – a nonsense phrase unto itself – had hinted at the general character of horseback combat, men rearing up their steeds on hillsides before charging down dells to do death. This had obviously not happened, but authenticity mattered in politics – doubly so when lying. Her brother’s failure to find a proper blade was baffling, almost saddening - of the crowd, only Boullope failed to hide raw shock, wide eyed blinks breaking his bullish masque. As for Gazef, he fought back a grimace; while the nobles’ duty was applause, his was this, and thus he finished his purely adequate inspection to sheathe the blade, turn toward the king, step up onto the dais, and kneel.
“Sire. A gift from your son.”
Renner’s father gently unfurled, wizened hands tiredly reaching out to take what was given. One grasped the scabbard, one the hilt, and Ramposa lifted it from Gazef’s hands with all the reverence he could. Barbro was enraptured, lips fluttering in that boyish excitement that men only hid as they grew. Of all Re-Estize’s nine million, he had the sole attention of his father, the king. The speech, the moribund tale, the lie acknowledged by all present as true – none of it mattered, not to Barbro, for this was the moment where his father, the king, was focused solely on him.
Ramposa drew the blade. It hung there in his hand, light weakly dancing on its edge. Renner was struck with a melancholy.
An old man holding a fabrication in the interest of all to adore; a hollow thing in the hands of a hollow person, little left of his life but fear for his house and of his sons.
Her father thrust the sword up, and all else cheered. Renner cheered with them.
Chapter 3: Movement I: Dances at Sundown (3)
Chapter Text
[40th Year of Foresai, Middle Wind Month, Day 28]
This was to be an unpleasant eve, need the food add to it?
Renner cast a sidelong look at her plate, casually pinning and slicing another piece of meat with her fork. It wasn’t an issue of quality; rather, pairing and pacing. What had been a plate of entrecôte and cabbage medley was now a plate of goose liver over barley, and come a quarter hour would then be a plate of veal and roasted potato. She had stopped bothering to read the menu after that point, deciding that the head chef had committed to a series of ‘show’ dishes and left everything else to rot.
Now, committing to a bite better left untaken, she imagined that something had happened in the kitchens, a petty maneuvering among the servants that had ousted someone and enthroned another, and that now, this newly promoted man had begun a consolidation, a thunderous campaign not unlike her brother’s to secure his place, outlining a lavish service full of all the things that cooks felt pride in cooking to earn both their favor, that of the guests, and that of her father. This was a fantasy of hers, but it had the shape of things that did happen, and so she committed it to the pile of truths, prepared herself for her later food-addled torpor, and took another bite.
At least it tastes good.
Though pleasant, she’d have eaten it otherwise. Dinners with the royal court demanded precise etiquette. Some eighty-two of the nobility were in attendance tonight, and with another thirty invitees, well over four score sat together, sat amongst various long tables, with a separate seating for the royal family upon a dais. In consequence, this meant her father, her siblings, and she were giving little more than a performance.
“We’ll have to give our compliments to Rennac.”
Eh? This again?
Renner hummed noncommittally, swallowing before responding to Barbro’s question.
“Certainly.”
This counts three times you’ve suggested complimenting the chef.
Renner was missing something. Renner had known she was missing something since the ceremony. Her brother was off balance, and secret glances over her shoulder revealed Gazef was too. Something had happened then that she had not seen, or had seen and not understood. She felt the latter most true; that earlier, somehow, Barbro had committed an error, one that was now eating at him.
How odd. He made several mistakes, of course, but ones he doesn’t have the wits to realize; even then, brother-dearest has not the honesty to confess them to himself. What is this fear of his?
Taking a lazy sip of her wine, Renner found a minor marvel in the fact that brother’s conspiracy had become the most interesting topic of the evening. Climb was unfortunately inaccessible, shunted into some guard posting far away from her by necessity of politics; this, and the slow internal admission that Barbro’s machinations were likely a problem for the house had focused her entirely on his behavior since arriving.
It’s something with the blade, but what? The discrepancy about calvary doesn’t seem significant, and even if so, I see no reason for that to hang over the Warrior Captain’s head. It’s a simple lie! Why pulse the lower lip? Why linger eyes on my brother’s neck? Stronoff is nary worrisome; his fits and creeps emerge from substantial turmoil. Why? “Why,” I sound like a dullard, unable to grasp simple things. Am I? Suppose I’m missing something obvious, drawing a connection between unrelated behaviors.
Renner thought to sip again, thought better of it, replaced her glass, and dismissed her doubt.
No, two people at this dinner see a clear and obvious wrong. One, the perpetrator. Two… the Head Warrior, the king’s bodyguard, an eminent captain, a traveled bladesman, a former mercenary. In what capacity of his has Gazef found an issue? Why, I simply can’t say.
She flitted her eyes right – the course was obvious.
Play to the ceremony, then, and bludgeon something out of brother.
“Ield?”
Barbro snapped to the use of his intimate name. The two of them seated together was itself an oddity. Evening dinners held for the court’s viewing segregated the royal family by sex, the king seated center, his sons seated to the right, and his queen and daughters to the left; sickness having had its glory over her mother, and marriage its glory over her siblings, Renner was left directly at the side of her father. Either for the purpose of shaming those sons which did not participate in the campaign or reminding the war-weary of the pleasant things in life, the princesses were instead moved to sit alongside their returning brothers, and the homebound princes made to fill in their place. Neither she nor Barbro had recalled this before the chamberlain had made note, and so the two had been thrust together without preparation.
“This campaign of yours in the east, you’ve spoken some, but I would wish for some elaboration on specific actions.”
“Specific actions?”
“Mm, yes. It’s all so… oh what’s a good word…-”
Pick something diminutive.
“-Fantastic.”
“Fantastic?”
“Like something out of the house myth.”
Barbro’s fork hovered over his food.
“I’d ask that you not-”
He cleared his throat unconvincingly and went for his flagon.
Call a myth a myth?
“I’d ask that you not reduce my act to the measure of myth.”
“Eh? Not the purpose of my words at all!”
Another pull from his flagon. Renner looked on expectantly as he set it down. The seconds drew out. She realized suddenly he had no intention to respond.
Nothing at all? Why so cold to your sistren, brother-dearest?
At once Renner was reminded of all the little annoyances of interacting with her brother. Awkwardnesses like this wove into every conversation they had had, the one they were having now, and seemingly every one they could have. Now, nearing sixteen years of age, Renner had never counted a proper discussion between the two of them.
Whatever your compunction is, brother, I am blameless in it. I understand you never had that toxic taste for the outwardly embittered child I once was, but I have shaped a visage with which to speak to. You needn’t engage in feminine matters either; the public persona aside, you know of my friendship with Lady Aindra, and that woman is a dame true and proper. Simply put, you could speak of all the things you do to Zanac to me, and I would be ever just as capable of suppressing my annoyance at them. Why then, brother, can you not do the same for me?
Renner avoided the answer between her legs. She returned her fork to her plate.
And if you can’t, brother, can’t you do so for father?
She lagged for a moment, catching her question right after.
He cannot, which is why this matter with the warrior captain and the sword. To study this piece by piece: my false-tell of a brother presented a gift, one which our near-and-true Gazef Stronoff understands to not merely be debased, but defiled. There, the crux; were my brother’s fretting alone, this would have all the current of a mere embarrassment, him sinking into the black errors he made in the ceremony. This, were it not for Gazef’s reaction. Gazef has spent too long in the company of false-tales to be disturbed by a lie – too-many a nobleman singing too-many a hyperbole; not the tale, then, but the nature of the blade which unsettles him.
Renner shared the feeling, finding her deduction altogether strange. She made to revise herself.
“Nature of the blade.” It is in the ‘nature’ of the blade that it is straight, lengthy, and fullered; it is in ‘nature’ not for mounted combat. There marks the untruth, but not one of consequence to the warrior captain. Lo, what is? Have I not the same eyes for seeing? Angersome. That only I and he should notice – though in verity, Chardelon, Boullope seems to be keen as well. I am not wont to dismiss open shock; the Marquis lives necessity, not excess. Had he the knowledge of others, he’d remain mute as others, not goggle.
Turning her fork on its side, she smushed through a piece of meat, lazily scooping it with the now-embedded grain up and into her mouth. Smokey notes blended evenly with the au jus, developing further with a sip of wine. Idly, Renner picked Marquis Boullope from the crowd, tabled with the unruly Counts Lytton and Caillou, the latter of which having been recently named the House of Lords’ ‘Prime Minister.’ A long neglected role that had been left unfilled for decades, the ministership was broadly a clerical position, one that empowered the Count with directing the general minutia of the body. This promotion was part of a larger work of the Noble Faction, the last eight years having seen the House of Lords go from a moribund congress to something more. Once called only when logistical difficulty precluded the Royal Court’s assembly, it had shifted to regular sessions, bracketing any perpetually scheduled events hosted by House Vaiself.
Inflexibly, Ramposa had regarded the tumult with watchful indifference, issuing a token statement that spoke in part “rights of the Lordship for participation in desultory mechanisms of assembly remains uncontravened;” though diminutive, the king had broadly acquiesced to the House of Lords, sanctioning its growth into a vibrant, living, and parallel institution. The unsubtle hand and pocketbook behind most of that development had been Boullope, and while his reach was understood to be vast, Renner wondered if it was just that much longer.
I propose a conspiracy; one that entangles my brother abreast, the marquis adjacent, and another afield; one which involves the blade, and one which was advanced far in the east both in caution and necessity. Boullope, being party to the scheme but not the intimate turmoil of my brother’s mind, was awestruck when Barbro fumbled forth a broadsword and assigned it to a dragoon. My brother’s tale is thus not an embellishment, but a complete fabrication; if he or his men retrieved it in combat with imperials, I’d go happy. Further, this cannot be the sole work of my brother. Consider him simply purchasing it on order from a blacksmith; unlikely to slip past our dear Rettenmeyer, but doubly untrue on the basis of Boullope’s reaction. No, he foreknew of a sword, and he foreknew of that specific one, one that he did not expect Barbro to show.
With another swig, she washed down the lingering fat. Her thinking had delivered her to a new, yet not novel, understanding. Barbro had become entangled with the noble faction for the six months preceding his departure, blithely advocating for maintenance payments to lords participating in the annual war, a pet cause of Count Lytton. At most, this signaled alignment, but the scheme unwittingly revealed to Renner indicated an outright alliance. Little moments scattered over the past year coalesced. One particular conversation accounted for most of this: an odd detail overheard from the maids that Barbro’s liegeman – who rode from Re-Estize a week ahead of the campaign – arrived in E-Pespel not from the east, but from the north. The discrepancy had irked Renner then, but now, a quick accounting of travel distances and methods meant that he very well could have made it to Re-Boullore – the seat of the Marquis’s court – and reunite with secrets abreast.
There’s a wrinkle here. Dull boy he may be, my brother is not yet mad. He would not blunder something integral, not until its purpose was spent. I propose that the sword was given to him by that other afield, perhaps as a promise, perhaps as a pact. He, in his cleverness, doubled it as a gift. Wherefor, the pressing line becomes “whom did he forge a pact with;” to precede this, “how did the warrior captain see this?”
Dumbly rapping her glass, Renner turned back and sent a sidelong gaze to Gazef. He caught it, the two exchanging weak smiles.
I saw an incorrectness of purpose, and deduced from that an incorrectness of origin. Being a martial man, saw an incorrectness of form, and deduced from that-
“Is this what you’ve been eating for the last year?”
Renner jerked right to meet her brother’s stare.
“Eh?”
“I said ‘Is this what you’ve been eating for the last year?’”
His voice had hardened. His eyes had too. Renner was overcome with an unbecoming and foreign sense of danger, one she pushed past to speak.
“I’m sorry?”
He held his stare, gazing down at her with sharp regard. Again, he kept his silence.
What is this, brother? Some envy of yours? Some resentment? You, brother, were not eating gruel or pickled greens as were your men. When not dwelling with the Rettenmeyers, you were in a carriage or a tent, well heated and furnished, served all the comforts your force could provide. If you’d the wit, you’d understand that our dear Zanac is indulging twice what I do – in generous terms. Is my sex such a mark against me?
Unacceptably hypocritical, her brother held this line none-the-less. Snuffing a flash of anger, Renner tersely entertained ignoring him as he did her, her better instincts winning over.
Meet his sharpness with confusion and concern – cloying entreatments and fear for his state. He will drag himself away, but if I batter him with enough… Ah, I see, he’s made an error. He’s raised the matter of his comfort, and pursuit of that leads to discussions of visits and stays. Start with shock.
“Brother, you don’t mean to tell me-”
Barbro jerked upward and struck the table with a grunt. Snapping back down, he shunted back his chair and unseated himself properly this time, giving half of a nod to their now curious father. He sent up a lazy hand in return, excusing Barbro, who had already come up from his bow and made to leave.
Lo, he excused himself. I’ven’t imbalanced him, have I?
Renner broke from her eldest brother, looking for reassurances of disapproval from her family. A deliberately unconcerned Ramposa avoided her gaze, and she stared past him only to meet the dim expression of a Zanac too deep in his glass to make comment. She pursed her lips.
Against all reason, I have. This was completely unproportional.
The crowd had remained blessedly talkative through Barbro’s exit, though a glance revealed some watchful observers were sharing word of the sight with their neighbors. In the immediate, this would mean social consequences for her, but these were likely minor. What wasn’t were those for Barbro and ‘House Vaiself;’ to Renner, if not elaborated upon by some further excess from her half-sibling, tonight would prove to be an intriguing friction and nothing more. This was if Barbro chose to act optimally in political self-preservation, a stupid hope she dismissed out of hand.
I’ve not the mind to weave this together yet, but be it an inner ill of menfolk or one specific to him, a sickness has taken its quarter in my brother. Indescribable as it is, it has never-the-less endowed him with a great instability, be it from this conspiracy or something else. Likely, his question and retreat here constitutes only a facet of this, as was his presentation of the sword. I fear too, Chardelon, that you have no able response beyond waiting. He will in glad fashion recover and continue his queer act; only then will I wrench more answers.
Renner felt an unfamiliar energy. The days she spent were far outnumbered by those she didn’t, and while today was respite from her teenage distress, she had expected nothing from tomorrow. Instead, sun adumbrate on the horizon, she sensed the next light would bring captivation in both its best and worst forms. The moment was self-intimate, redoubled by a realization.
Ah, I see Gazef’s dilemma. The blade is not imperial, but neither is it ours.
Chapter 4: Movement I: Dances at Sundown (4)
Chapter Text
[40th Year of Foresai, Middle Wind Month, Day 29]
Climb peered out his mistress’s drawing room window, finding its view of the palace grounds ruined by a shrill spring sun. It had yet to cook Valencia, nor would it for a few more weeks, but that time of year for melting in full plate and soaking through his undergarments was uncomfortably near. He looked away, as if to ward off the change in seasons. Luckily, there was something much more pleasant for his eyes to rest on.
“Climb, you look agelast. Something nauseant about me?”
“A-absolutely nothing of the sort, your Highness.”
Damn it.
Something was weighing on the princess. Less than subtle self-admonishment had always been a pastime of hers, but ordinary degradations had turned frequent within the past day. Climb hated it. He forced a sheepish smile to placate her.
“I just can feel it getting warmer out, is all.”
“Eh?”
A twinkle was back in her eye.
“Odd is that who enjoys a muggy day, but to loath summer? Though I suppose I merely interlope the outdoors, not inhabit them.”
His lips parted, but could conjure no words. She had – as usual – deduced the core of his complaint, posed and answered a question about it, and found an irony while doing so. With his unsurprised, silent assent, she continued.
“Indoor patrols would be unworkable, though not morning and evening watch.”
Is she saying she’ll have Jelca move me from day-patrol?
“Your Highness, your servant did not intend to ask for a reassignment in his auxiliary duties.”
“‘His Mistress’ did not think he was. You would not underrest overmuch, yes?”
“Again, I-”
“Climb, hush.”
“Apologies, your Highness.”
“Answer.”
Protecting the princess was Climb’s first duty, though not his last. Barely a vagabond, he had aged out of ‘pitied waif’ at age ten to be begrudgingly entered into the palace professionals, a force of regulars drawn from Re-Estize’s city guard; against Renner’s fierce protest, Supreme Commander Jelca pressed that the sole responsibility of her safety not be in the hands of a no-name, and so the exigencies of palace politics meant that Climb was “Assistant Bodyguard to the Golden Princess” – despite there being no other for him to assist. Jelca’s meddling had gone further, placing Climb in the standard professional rotation of grounds patrol and wall duty, something that became miserable in summer. The princess was offering him relief.
“Your servant would be grateful for such consideration.”
“And ‘His Mistress‘ would be grateful if he were to stop using such distant terms.”
He didn’t think he shriveled, but the princess noticed anyway. An immediate look of regret came over her.
“I’ven’t exhausted you, have I?”
“No, your Highness.”
Climb stood and bowed in apology, meeting her piercing blue eyes again right after. She mouthed the words ‘False-tale,’ silent to avoid cuing the maid; following this up with a warm smile, she bid him to sit again. This was how it always was, everyday the two of them dancing around the same grim combination of etiquettes.
It’s not that I don’t want to refer to myself as ‘I’ – I mean, really I do not want to, but if she does, then I should. I would, but I cannot. I don’t want to catch more glares in the hallway. I don’t want her too.
He sat and wallowed in turbid thoughts, meeting the soft gaze of the princess. Her lips trembled for a moment, darting away a moment after. Regret? Likely yes. She was struggling as was he, and, though it shamed him to feel, he felt companionship in it. Pitiless quiet fell over the room, and after a few empty moments, Climb shifted himself back in his chair. This was in itself a wonder; the princess had simply accepted no protest on the point of him standing guard while seated, as much as he argued the contradiction. She too sunk further in, folding her cup into both hands in an utterly girlish way, seemingly ignorant to the season. Not that she was; Renner had always been afflicted with a chill in her hands and feet, something that left her scurrying for blankets on days right for him and fires on days ill. Or, as she had in childhood, fold up her hands in his.
It’s inappropriate of me to desire this, but I wish I could speak. Really speak with her. I know I can’t wish the maid away, but if only I could… If only she could. I think the same things every time, don’t I?
Climb was crestfallen. The goodly way of things – that there were kings, high men, commoners, and pitied waifs – had always been right under The Most Holy Four, yet never seemed wholesome. He was not so vainglorious as to believe his doubts, yet neither could he dismiss them. He dared not curse his circumstance for no other circumstances could have propelled him to her side, and he dared not wish the order undone for such a wish would contravene Creation; all this he felt, and yet he could not defeat his own desires, his secret need to be by her side, his shameful wish not to be “Climb the No-blood” but “Climb the Noble.” It was a stupid wish. He knew it was. Rather than peace in hatred, he had only weary nights overbrimming with unweary thoughts.
What if I were a nobleman? Would I have the right to stand by her side? To be in her service without Jelca’s meddling? It’s possible, though, the favor I would need to earn… How long would it take?
As dour as he felt, Climb’s ruminations did not stay serious for long, thoughts of potential glory on the eastern battlefield regressing to boyish dreams of heroics. Recently, he had been absorbed in “The Second Mountain,” an epic from an older time only recently refreshed in the modern tongue. Following a knight, his bard, and a benevolent elf on their quest to defeat a wicked spirit, it had spurred Climb to thoughts of romance and high adventure, and even now, he wondered how the hero, Casimeir, would slay the Carmine King and free the Dawnlands. That he saw so much of himself in the lead had been a point of embarrassed pride, and something which he dared not bring up to Renner.
If not a noble… A knight. A knighthood would be alright.
Less downtrodden, he went for the tea Renner had prepared for him. Sharply oversweet, Climb downed it, looking up to meet an eager-eyed princess.
“There are skulks in the dark, Climb. You’d need blacksight.”
“Yes, your Highness.”
“Night duty is imprudent otherwise. I fear, Climb. Not just this danger, but all you may encounter in your service. I worry, and feel that as your Mistress, I-”
Renner was interrupted by the entrance of her eldest brother.
—
“Ield!”
Had I a knife and time, brother.
Renner was about to get to the good part, where she would allude to Climb that he was to receive a gift; he would get flustered, his cheeks would turn rosy-red, and he would protest his undeservedness, something that would steadily break down under her pressure before he – quaking in his seat – would spring up again and bow, thank her abashedly, and sink back down eyes averted. Leading the conversation here had taken steady prodding, made worse by her excitement. Now, her brother had come in and dashed that.
To enter without knocking? That’s a privilege I reserved for my darling Climb, brother-dearest.
Barbro’s behavior had become downright absurd. Always a bull, the last day had graduated him to brute. He plod in with two, his retainer, Sir Teloran, and another man unknown to Renner. Viciously unremarkable, he had the middling clothes and common styling of a gold-strapped lower house – the sort of people that royals rarely deigned to speak with. That Barbro had was downright queer, amusing if not for the growing danger.
Likely a retainer. Easterner. Austere clothing – border house. Whom? Hard to seem, but likely someone far from even E-Rantel, away from Rettenmayer, on the edge of the edge. That leaves six options, or is it five now?
Renner had not felt an electricity like this since El-Nix’s first declaration of war. Procrastinating the issue of her brother with Climb hadn’t worked, and her play was dampened by a rare sense of unease. Notwithstanding Barbro’s current intrusion, the issue of the sword itself threatened to unglue the political order; this, for it was from the Theocracy.
“Sister, I’ve come with a guest. Hospitalities, would you?”
The maid, Miss Lucilia, bolted off before Renner even gave the order, pattering over to the hearth and retrieving the kettle. Climb likewise sprang up, refastening his scabbard and circling around to stand behind Renner. The crown prince narrowed his eyes.
“He sits with you?”
“As he has always.”
Curses, this is sharp. Cohort all you want with Slaine, brother, pull not me into it.
The fetid truth of the blade’s national origin had Renner brooding through dinner, the party afterwards, supper, and bed all the same. Swords were weighty imagery in Re-Estize; in the grim emergence two centuries prior, when men slagged with their armor and rivers ran gray with ash, steel unbrittled by the foul magic of the Demon Gods was worth its weight in platinum. Per the myth, the progenitor Vaiself of Barbro’s namesake, King Andrean, collected such arms from the scattered survivors in exchange for their vassalship and fought back the inferno with all that were unblackened. That Slaine had gifted one to Barbro – the only plausible deduction – meant they unequivocally backed his bid for the throne, a meddling beyond anything Renner had known them to do.
Oft whispered, Slaine’s interference is always the domain of lurid rumor, not reality, something passed around like pipe tobacco to justify why our levy hasn’t dashed the Empire at Katze, all the while treasons like Blumrush’s go undiscovered. What of this, though? This has none of the subtle character of the Bloody Emperor’s economic plot, this is open, this is violent. Evidence literally in hand, and yet no one is going to notice.
“No such thing as always, Chardelon. We age up and out of certain things.”
Is that what you tell yourself?
Renner sensed she was swept up in something awesome, the lopsided fight for the throne no longer a conflict merely of Re-Estize, but of the broader human world. Not that Ciruxsantex or Arwintar were ever uninvolved; rather, that they along with the minutiae of border houses had supplanted the jockeying of the Royal and Noble factions in relevance.
What would backing his ascendance gain Slaine? A puppet? Zanac is too tied up in tired, stuporous honor, but Barbro is uncontrollable from principle. Consider yesterday; whatever thin thinking he mustered, it wasn’t enough to avoid general embarrassment, nor dodge the eyes of the keen. Do they intend to precipitate a collapse? Perhaps my knowing is part of that.
“Do we? Gosh, I ought to have been doing that.”
“I’d prefer not evasion.”
“And I’d meant none. Truly, I’ll start… tomorrow.”
She beamed mischievously, meeting an unsettled look.
Existential matters can wait. This is to be painful for you, brother-dearest. If you so detest the feminine, then I shall be aggressively so. All the more worthwhile to charm your companion.
Renner moved her eyes to the other.
“You’ll forgive candor among siblings, Sir…”
“Jonque- Mister Salco Jonque, Your Highness.”
Stumbling over our words, are we? I’ve no knowledge of a House “Jonque” – not even a baronial scion – so certainly a retainer. Having traveled with only my brother… Ah, he’s a babe in the woods.
Her smile grew wider. Barbro was an enigma, but he was a blunt, tactless oaf; that he had been the exclusive companion of Salco for the last month voided his preparation.
All the better then; you two are to meet a true Ryle.
“All correct. Please, I bid you to sit.”
He did after Barbro, Teloran taking up the spot opposite Climb. Lucila finally over with the kettle, Renner signed that five cups be prepared and that hers and Climb’s be cleared away before turning again to Salco.
“Prithee I the moment?”
“There’s no permission I have station to give, your Highness.”
“Now, I may not be known for my wit, but, from the timing and character of our introduction, I presume you represent the interests of an eastern house?”
“Entirely correct.”
“Then, whatever your master seeks my assent in, he has already gained that of my brother?”
“Indubitably.”
“And, be this the nature of east and west, his request constitutes a transfer hither to thither.”
“Thrice you’ve shown mastery, Your Highness.”
“Then, I’ve earned a genuine question. His name?”
“Lord Lakuc Joshel Nuen Harlink – though, please, you needn’t feel limited.”
Eh? What relation we’ve to him?
One of now five noblemen who bordered the empire, Lord Harlink was a baron hastily upgraded to count when but three springs previous his only neighbors imploded. Specific details of the scandal that consumed House Jecna included multiple failed harvests, delinquency on loans to the merchant’s guild, and an affair between the first daughter and a cooper, something which culminated in a night of brutality that saw the manor razed without survivors. Uncannily similar to the turmoils the north faced during Ramposa’s ascendance, the collapse was sudden, violent, clean, and ultimately, convenient. To Renner, it was a culling internal to the faction, and though unsettled, she was grateful that a brewing crisis had gone and burnt itself out.
Jecna was an open wound. Be your master the arsonist, or where be it another, I’ve not a care. However, I do fear, Salco, that such suspicions have already fallen upon you, and that the open ascendance of our house to your cause is once dangerous and twice foolish.
“Ah, you never cede the game, Mister Jonque!”
“Apologies, your Highness. I-”
“Chardelon, the man has his time, as do I.”
A tactless thing are you, brother. Come now, I was building fatal rapport.
Renner pouted, halfways aghast at her brother’s ineptitude.
“And you needn’t spoil it, either.”
“Salco, I’ve wrested my sister to the subject. Make use of her attention.”
Interject before he can speak.
“Mm, yes yes. Rushing through it, offense taken and struck against you; verbal thrust, verbal riposte – in the imperial – ad absurdum. No matter. Let us speak of your Master’s request.”
“Y-yes, let us.”
Lucilia layed four cups onto the table without a noise and placed the fifth into Renner’s hands.
“Now, please endure the suspicions of a princess, but I sense your master’s request a stroke martial-”
Salco’s lips parted.
Eh? I’ve misinterpreted. Follow through, even if wrong.
“-something the prime province of my brothers and father. I do wish to reiterate what you no doubt oft recall that while we hold his contract of fealty, any request of defense – legal or otherwise – be levied in E-Rantel, not Re-Estize. Of course, my brother and I are providing our attention and hospitality, so understand that House Vaiself and its Ryles will not slink behind procedure.”
Salco’s lips fluttered into a smile – at the least, he was charmed.
“I fear her Highness wrong in a most precious way.”
‘Most precious?’
“Eh?”
“If only my master were here rather than I.”
“My dear Salco, you don’t mean to imply…”
Salco retrieved a scroll from his bag, unsealing it while Renner looked on in mute terror.
Blazes.
“To the Golden Princess, Third Daughter of His Majesty Ramposa the Third, Her Highness Renner Theiere Chardelon Ryle Vaiself; I, Count Lakuc Joshel Nuen Harlink have a request. It is the most important request of my life, and one I hope with all my heart you will grant. There are no words that would capture so much as a twip of your beauty, but forgive me for trying. You are sunlight, the highest cloud, the grand joys in life. You are the heavens above, the anticipation of a new day, the secret love locked in the heart of every man. You are mirth, the petrichor of those precious moments after dawn, the flow of water through pristine ranges. To gaze upon you is to give a starved man the feasts of a palace. True happiness fills the hearts of all who are graced with the sight of you. To be in your presence is to be exalted. Verily, you are the Fifth Treasure of Re-Estize. What I ask is for the greatest boon you can bestow. Your Highness, I wish to meet you upon the altar and to take your hand in marriage.”
Is it worth chastising myself over this? This is absurd, but my brother is full of absurd things. Did your co-conspirators in the City of the Gods ask you to do this too?
Cheeks aflame, she realized she had burrowed her mouth in her hands – all the better to hide her cringing.
“I see why you found my misconceptions cute.”
“Adorable, Your Highness”
The princess giggled.
“And I second your shame that he could not come here and speak that in person.”
Genuinely, I do. I think I would have folded over.
“He meant his words quite passionately.”
“Do tell, his accolades are spoken from experience? Surely he’s never ventured here, and threat of imperial trickery must preclude him doing so to war councils in E-Rantel.”
“Ah, the latter once, when the Bloody Emperor made known his intent to struggle but not his depravity in doing so.”
So his master has not seen me in a decade and yet speaks this only now? No, there’s a sharper critique here. He seriously believes himself to be a count? I expect overinflation from lordlings, not delusion.
“I see- I’ve said that twice now, I’m all discombobulated.”
“Something I will be glad to share.”
“Quite. Such things entreat sharing.”
Oh how dearly I wish to jeer. You’ve been waiting eager to read that for a month? This is comedic. Brother seems a stripe cunning in comparison, earning concessions for merely introducing a proposal. You, however, were hopeful; an easy mistake from lesser men.
Lowering her left hand, Renner revealed her smile.
“Mister Jonque, I do accuse you of improving my day.”
“An intent of mine!”
“And I thank you. Now, not to dampen things, but such matters are not only in my hands. My house has its part to play.”
“Without a doubt.”
“And, to dearly consider your master’s request, we must speak further at another-”
“Tell the man yes, Chardelon.”
Renner blinked. Salco did too. Climb rustled in his armor. Teloran didn’t. She looked to her brother. He continued.
“You will accept his offer.”
What? He intends to prosecute this? Have you lost the thread again? Have I?
The only explanation for this was stupidity, be it hers or her brother. Renner shot a glance to Barbro’s knight and met a stoic mask, then, onto the maid, found the poor woman frozen over the fire.
“Perhaps in due time, Ield, but not without the opinion of father.”
“We both know the worth of that.”
Salco sputtered out sounds but failed to form words.
Baleful. Utterly baleful. I was to lodge a polite refusal at a later date, and you take issue with that.
“I fear a stripe of misunderstanding-”
“Intentional, at that.”
Ignominy begat rage. An interruption was inexcusable, but inactionable; two was absurd.
Base violence, then.
“Mister Jonque, forgive me, but I wish to speak to my brother and I ask that you wait outside. Directly across is the former drawing room of my sister, and I give you my permission to sit there and request maidstaff for any service or refreshment. Afterwards, I will come and give you the pick of my gardens.”
His stuttering trailed off into a nervous swallow and a desperate smile.
“Of course. I’ll leave Her Highness to… to speak with candor.”
“You may bid your exit.”
Salco rushed out of his chair and the room, issuing no goodbye to his companion of over a month. Renner shrunk into her chair and tested her tea, finally cool enough to drink; the other four cups remained untouched.
Does the poetry make up for the waste?
“A lecture, then.”
“Eh? Did you expect a reprimand? Brother, what you said was terrible, but you knew that.”
He scoffed, and she went on.
“So, speak. You’ve eyed me tensely since last night, and I wish to hear what could have compelled you to get up from dinner, and what caused your haste here.”
And sooth your lies into a broader truth. You’re party to conspiracy brother, and oh do you wear it.
“You don’t know?”
“I have no interest in troublemaking before a vassal best left at length.”
“...Do you believe what you just said in earnest?”
Unbidden, unease returned; something subtle in his posing. Men grew themselves in contest, puffing up and straightening out for size and height. Anger provoked this, but the way in which Barbro unclasped his hands only to let them hang – balled at his sides – seemed to contain only rage. Renner glanced right; Climb was gripping his scabbard at-the-ready.
Brother, your words escape me entirely. I spoke no lie, this conversation needn’t happen at all. Speak truth again?
“I haven’t the faintest idea what you mean.”
“‘Troublemaking,’ Chardelon. Perhaps you know of it?“
Renner looked on silently.
“You do know of it; you certainly do it all the time.”
“Brother, I am not aware of-”
“Yes, you are! Playing at mistress and commander of the common folk like some do-gooding heroine.”
“And good I do for the peasantry!”
“Ere the consequences hit!”
“What? What outcomes of mine soured?”
“This is why father’s accolades upon you are so damnable – look at what pride has overcome you.”
“Ield, what outcomes came to be negative for the peasantry?”
“For this House! You prattled for emancipation for over a year; worse, you got it! Do you realize what you lost us in doing that?”
‘Lost us?’ To quote again: ‘do you believe what you just said in earnest?’ I spent capital with the polity, yes, but demonstrated that even the youngest Ryles could shift the course of the nation.
“That was a victory! The legal contest was swift, and the effort to eliminate the practice has held steady since its passage. Yes, criminal efforts still march on in the black, but-”
“Not the victory, Chardelon, but the cost. That was the act of a king! Not a princess. You lost us face, the rest of us shown up, all for that moniker of yours.”
Isn’t it obvious, brother? I may have embarrassed you and Zanac in the immediate, but I raised the value of my hand tenfold, and demonstrated that even the spares and women amongst us held value. That my second sister’s fate was a fluke, not destiny.
“You accuse me of pride, Ield? Slavery is an abomination! I would have pursued its abolishment irrespective of a title.”
A defunct mechanism whose profits blind. Tell me brother, where doth the labor flow? A peasant reaps his field and hands it unto his lord who brings it to market, hawks it, collects his tax, and returns the remaining share – yes, calibrated only for survival, but something with slippage. A slave receives not, all the profit kept by the lord, who yes, spends it, but only on the purchase of more slaves and bondsmen to keep them there. That precious ‘excess’ we gain at harvest time is lost. Are you blind to that too?
Most were. Arguments from principle only worked when those principles were understood; lords could hold coin in-hand or transform it to credit on paper, but knew little beyond that. Gold was something extracted via taxes, which were thus maximized to grab all but that needed to sustain the basic conditions; the sum gain to the demesne beyond personal profit was dismissed, and what they named a boon of stability Renner knew as a bane of stagnancy. Wresting slavery from the hands of freedmen was the most she could do to shatter that; the ban would not deliver Re-Estize from its imperial doom, but it would slow it long enough to live her life in full.
“Right, you would have, and to the detriment of our dignity.”
“Dignity? How can you speak of preserving that at the same time you try to give away my hand to a far-flung count?”
“Are you seriously making to chide me?”
“I said I was not to deliver a lecture! I have no interest in that. We must be a bulwark together. If you are too ashamed to add your voice to mine, then at least know silence is stronger than dissent.”
“I cannot help but dissent!”
I can tell that, brother.
“Irrespective, had you warned ahead of today, we could have wrenched so much more from him. This needn’t have been botched.”
“It is not your place to bargain, that is mine and father’s!”
A slip. Pursue it.
“Then you hath his assent?”
Barbro contorted; he clearly didn’t.
“It is not the place of a princess to sell herself in negotiations.”
“Then you hath father’s assent?!”
“Damn his assent! I care not for the totterings of an- an old man clinging to what he once beheld in his youth and a relic of his second wife!”
Barbro struck the table, spilling every cup into its saucer. Lucilia screamed. Teloran and Climb both crossed over their blade arms, the latter provoking Barbro to spring from his chair and gesticulate.
“Not to mention letting you keep this toy of yours, an offense I can’t even describe!”
“Brother, sit and unspeak thineself.”
“How do you do it, Chardelon? Lazing here every day, following through whatever flit enters your mind: picking flowers, pitying the peasantry, cavorting with this damn dog of yours.”
I do not cavort with him, I covet him. He is the only thing in this tepid life my heart actually sings for; the rest is filler for him. Can’t you tell that, brother? Did I not express that in childhood? I will have him.
“Have I not earned it?”
“Do not joke. That wasn’t appropriate in childhood, how could it be in adulthood? Unwed at fifteen, Chardelon! Are you content to simply age away?”
Both of Renner’s sisters had long since been married off by her age, the eldest to Marquis Pespea and the middle to Count Selusa. The former was shrewd, sealing a new generation of Pespeas to the royal house, and, to Renner’s eye, endowing Vena with a modicum of happiness. This did not happen to Lulara.
“Brother, do you not remember my full-blood sister? The mistake father made with her?”
The most vibrant of us Ryles, lively and carefree. Never lost to obligation like our eldest, never to substance like Igana. Now, she isn’t one of us at all.
“I forget that not! Which infuriates me all the further! That you dodge your duty when she did not. That you can-”
“Gilbert is a beast cast in the flesh of a man and father learned that!”
That I would ever need to risk the company of a man like him. It’s inconsiderable. I’d flee to the temples before that.
“Godsdammit, I care not about our in-law! I care about you, Chardelon, and how at every chance you’ve subverted the house through father.”
Subverted? No, corrected. Deny.
“I have no control over father!”
“False-tale!”
“Twice, brother, unspeak yourself and sit.”
Barbro raised his arm again, interrupted by a bead of sweat falling from his brow. Blinking, he snapped his gaze to the mirror in the étagère and took stock of himself, snatching his handkerchief a moment later to wipe himself down. More fell from his hair, and he did over that too, staining his cuffs. He whispered a curse to himself and fell back into his chair, handing the soaked cloth into Teloran’s open-hand as soon as he saw it.
One day, brother, you will be crowned King, but will you ever be one? Consider your goal here. Count Harlink is one of Bajan’s rivals; he’s trying to secure western support before a challenge is launched in court, all for the possession of four villages – Ulrena, Telkirk, Carne, and Rellenue I believe; you step into mediate, and, so desperate to earn the favor of both, offer my hand to Harlink such that he may cede. It’s a poor solution to a poorer question. Why do so? It’s desperate – the sort of thing Zanac should be playing at, not you. Are your insecurities so great? Do you feel father is to do anything but give you to the throne? Fool.
“Think what you will of me, Ield, but think of the house first.”
“Would you think of it either without my critique?”
“Then sputter it out and be done with it, because I am in no mood to be berated by a man who has always loathed me and always will.”
Again, silence, Barbro not finding a retort and slowing. Renner’s tea was at risk of going lukewarm and so she sucked it down, at the same time forcing a cup into Climb’s hands and signing that he drink too. Barbro still said nothing. She had trounced him; he knew it. The pair looked into each other's eyes until he could bear to no longer, shunting his eyes to the table.
“So it’s a ‘refusal’, then?”
“You need ask that?”
No response. Renner finished her tea, prompting Climb to gulp down his. He had done exceptionally, standing stalwart in the face of a vexed crown prince and his bound knight; Renner would reward him later.
The aforementioned gift, or something else? Mm, perhaps I’ll get him the sequel to his current reading. That’d be lovely enough.
Renner drew herself up and made to leave, stopping at the door.
“I’m to go talk our guest down gently, and invite him to a noon dinner; you may attend if you wish. Either way, I won’t be back until after midday. Leave when you please.”
This is why you cannot rule, brother.
Climb opened the door and bid her through, and the two crossed over to meet Jonque in the other room.
“Mister Jonque, would a bouquet blunt my next words?”
You forgot to dismiss the maid.
Chapter Text
[40th Year of Foresai, Middle Wind Month, Day 29]
When the sky turned to wine and the brow of his mistress went heavy, Climb slunk from the palace to the fortress that ensconced it, Ro-Lante. The largest construction in the kingdom, Climb nevertheless found this normal and anywhere else cramped. He bedded here, ate here, drank here, pissed here, hefted himself out of here every morning, and crammed himself back here every night. His place was by her side, but hers was in Valencia, and Valencia was inhospitable – today’s awful fight proved that. Thus, burrowed in the cold depths of a training chamber, his mind unfit for reading, he guiltily ignored the book she gifted for something kinetic.
Climb took in the chill umber air, swelling his chest and holding it. A force of being flowed through him, pulsing in step with his heart; flowing through his limbs, pooling in his joints. He breathed out, sinking, then in. Everything ached. Everything hurt. It didn’t matter. The air went out; so did the force. The air came in; so did the force. It filled every nook of him, reminding him of that truth all warriors knew; that blood, beyond life and status, conveyed a Vital-Current. That the flow could be harnessed, focused, sharpened; swelled in parts of the body, and made to sharpen them too. That the current could be forced into parts outside. That a man with his blade could send it through, and smite with it. He burst forward.
Release!
The dummy blew apart, splinters lit by an instant shimmering arc. It was a poor strike – his earlier five had cloven it cleanly. Instinctively, he checked the edge of his blade; no new chips.
Can I do seven?
Climb felt he could, something startling. A year ago, he could issue only one such strike a day; tonight, he had issued half-a-dozen. Any warrior of sufficient strength could use ephemera to enhance his or herself; harden their strikes; lengthen their stride; land a blow they couldn’t. What limited a man was not his internal being, nor his constitution, but poor form that forced power through the body instead of guiding it. In this way, Climb was a conduit for the art, not its master. He drew himself up and prepared to make another blow – nearly toppled by a pat on his back.
“Mountain’s asscrack, Climb. Training this late?”
Before he could track, the closest thing he had to a friend slipped under his bare shoulder and braced him.
“Woah, now. You can stand, right?”
Panting out something resembling a yes, he removed himself. Jonnah gave no contest, backing away stupidly with arms raised.
What am I, a runaway ass?
“You idiot.”
“Hey, I kept you standing!”
“Yeah, definitely.”
Jonnah was a horsley thing, teetering on legs a handspan too long. He looked down on Climb with deep brown eyes.
“I can see the gratitude on your face, you know.”
Can you, now?
Like Climb, he was new to manhood, inducted into Ro-Lante through an act of petty heroism. The details involved exemplary service and a chance scrape alongside the King’s courier, Sir Elias Brendal, but nothing that would have assured his entry without the oft denied advocacy of Climb’s mistress. Despite her many evasions and reasoned arguments about City Guard morale, her impetus was simple: by recruiting Jonnah, Climb would gain a friend his age.
“What of it?”
“It means you know you’re exhausting yourself.”
‘Without good cause,’ was the unspoken followup. Climb coldly disagreed.
“Aye.”
Jonnah’s eyes narrowed.
“You know you can’t win her.”
“Her Highness isn’t someone to be won!”
And what if she was? That’s not why I serve her, and you know it!
Renner’s thinking was, unfortunately, a bit too simple. Always fit to frustrate, Jonnah had gotten stuck on this stupid idea that Climb’s service was somehow selfish. Climb knew it was ignorance – or envy; or both. Either way, he had long tired of Jonnah’s winging, his thinly expressed concerns that went nowhere and never amounted to anything. Today made that all the worse; Climb was not a dog.
“My point. She isn’t seeing this, is she?”
“Does Ramposa attend Gazef’s training?”
His retort was too sharp. Climb stuffed-down his anger.
And besides, she does attend my training. Just not tonight.
“You aren’t the Warrior Captain, Climb, and she isn’t Queen Theiere.”
“And if the course of events makes it so?”
“That’s beyond me, or…”
Jonnah trailed off, then threw his hands higher in defeat.
“Nevermind. Just take a break for once.”
“Jonnah-”
“Sorry.”
Climb closed his mouth; a lashing could wait. Visible regret came over his opposite.
“A-anyway, Ekhan wants to see you.”
Couldn’t you have just said that?
Dryly sheathing his sword, Climb realized he hadn’t quenched his feelings, just hid them. At this, he actually let go. Sighing and flashing his palm, the two made for the exit, Climb swaying to snatch up his tunic. He regretted it. Sore and illimber, he fought it up and over his head as they left the training chamber into the underpassage, shuffling the wooden door closed behind him.
Ro-Lante was less one fortress but dozens, twenty towers built up in a double ring that protected both the inner keep and Valencia. A monument to the might of Re-Estize, the fortilage had only been besieged once – and only during its construction – in the Dulcet War of a century and three-quarters prior. Though the ruinous forces of that age struck into the inner ring successfully, the combined action of garrison forces completely encircled and destroyed them, a maneuver Climb and his comrades drilled once yearly as a reenactment of their forefathers. It was a stripe of pride and continuity where Climb had little, something Jonnah had yet to participate in. The pair found their way up a spiral stair, nearly colliding with a decidedly disgruntled Ekhan halfway down.
“Jonnah, could you have taken any longer?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“I’m not a knight!”
Portly and overround for the stair, Ekhan was Climb’s informal commander. Holding neither land nor rank, he was nevertheless the oldest amongst the palace professionals, and with experience in excess of all but the royal guard, came to the fore as representative to the staff forces and hired guard both. Even the marshals begrudged by the Warrior Band found no fault in Ekhan, the only who had being Royal faction flunkies overcautious of exposure to the nobility. Thus, by no mandate was Climb bound to him – his only master, his mistress – but as someone who had lived here nearly as long as he, the two shared something resembling a family bond. Not quite father and son, but uncle and nephew.
“You had me coming down after you. Gods damn you when you’re late, but need you make Climb too?”
Already curled around the post, Climb struggled to straighten himself, earning a chuff.
“Jonnah, get lost. Climb, come with me.”
Awkward shuffling followed, resulting in Climb and Ekhan headed up and Jonnah back down. Always one to fear silence, Ekhan didn’t let the moment rest.
“Hacking at dummies late into the evening again?”
Climb hummed a yes.
“Good. Making progress, then?”
“Yeah, I made six strikes in a row.”
Ekhan made two quizzical steps before exclaiming.
“Winds, boy! Why the push?”
“It’s my duty.”
This was met with a scoff.
“What?”
“That effort would kill most men.”
It shouldn’t. Who wouldn’t strive for better?
“Not truly-”
“No need to humble yourself. Did you destroy the dummy?”
“It was sloppy of me. Didn’t mean to blow it apart.”
The two spilled out into a larger corridor, through a portcullis outside, past a pair of guards – Gregor and Cenoc – and into the interspace between walls. Again, the silence overwhelmed his dual.
“Either way, you’re thatching a new dummy.”
“Sir, what was it-”
Ekhan exclaimed under his breath.
“-you needed me for?”
“I knew I was forgetting something. The Knight Marshal wanted you.”
Now Climb’s turn to be nervous, he picked his words neutrally.
“I see.”
“No need for nerves, boy.”
It doesn’t help when you cut right through me.
“Yes, Sir.”
“That too. You know I’m not a knight.”
The pair wordlessly greeted a patrol – Enis and Lemos – and arrived at the inner wall. Entering, they turned down its inner corridor, candle light thrown in regular lines down its length. Passing silently for a minute, they bent along the turns in the wall and came to the fore of another stair.
“Miss myself another flight. Go on, he’s just in his study.”
And how do you think my legs feel?
Dutifully, Climb went past and up, leaning on the stone banister until it merged into the ceiling. A few more painful steps and he landed at the top, floor no longer slabs, but tile. This lasted a step until he reached carpet, muffled footsteps carrying through the upper hall. Louder was his heart, now thrashing in his chest so hard it made him hurt to breathe.
What could Jelca want with me? And why so late at night?
He managed a few more brave steps into the black, then stalled.
Has he found fault with me again? I did as he asked, and did my shift away from the ceremony. This isn't fair! It was my duty to stand by her side there; I am her servant, her bodyguard. Were, Gods forbid, an attack to come, I’m to make sure it happens on my person rather than hers! How can I do that from across the palace?!
Many hated Climb; for a few, he returned it. Jelca was one. The supreme officer in both the royal guard and the entire Duchy of Re-Estize, he had taken an oddly personal role in obstructing Climb’s life. Taking offense at the idea of a commoner charged with protecting a royal, he had bogarted Climb’s entrance into Renner’s service on the basis that he was untitled – conveniently ignoring Gazef. These arguments – all of which were conducted by the princess on his behalf – continued until age ten, Jelca finally breaking under Renner’s threat of personally paying the castle-guard rent of enfeoffed knights and shorting his manpower. Still, by his hand Climb was rendered an assistant to no one, and at and by every formality he looked to someway inhibit Climb.
With every second wasted now added to his coming castigation, he rallied himself and went on. The Knight Marshall’s study wasn’t much further anyway, Climb arriving too soon and making thin knocks on the door.
“Come in.”
Climb did, meeting a plussed Jelca leaning on his desk from the front in an atypically uncomposed way. At this, Climb finally realized how odd Jelca’s calling was; not merely that it had been done in the evening, but that it had happened when the nobility, their dignitaries, and foremost, their men were still at the palace. That he had not enthroned himself behind his desk endowed not authority, but anxiety. Climb was completely lost.
“Sir. Should I sit?”
“No. Your mistress spoke with the Crown Prince?”
The world seemed to lurch, Climb speaking once he could.
“Yes, Sir.”
“You were there?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“His Highness brought a suitor?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“And he walked out?”
“Dismissed, Sir.”
“By whom?”
“My Mistress, Sir.”
“And Her and His Highness spoke further?”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Passionately?”
Climb swallowed, then nodded.
“That’s all. I had nothing further.”
Bowing, and after a polite moment, Climb made for the exit.
“Oh, actually, Sir Brendel carried in a request earlier. Your Mistress is requesting you move to night duty?”
“For some rotations, Sir.”
“You’ll start tonight. Get some tea and report to Sir Retha. Sharpen up.”
Climb’s nod was a little stiffer this time.
—
[40th Year of Foresai, Middle Wind Month, Day 30]
Easterly windows dumped the waxing day onto Renner’s breakfast, she and her father cornered at the end of a table meant for ten. No more than fruit and eggs with bread for the dipping, it was insubstantial and unpalatable, her appetite given flight by last night’s carousing. Either way, she ate it, this in the company of her father, an utterly miserable-looking Climb, Gazef, and two maids – Miss Roselyn and Miss Sanssouci. Valencia being a project the pride of her bloodline to produce, this meal occurred within the royal chambers in a room dedicated to the serving of breakfast. Swallowing what was in his mouth, the king turned to her – and in a voice airy with age – spoke.
“Enjoying the proceedings, dear?”
Renner paused mid knife cut, and looked thoughtfully at nothing.
“Is it just my notice, or is Lord Boullope acting estopped?”
Sharp laughter ensued, her father setting down his silver by the end.
“I asked if you were enjoying things, and, for completeness, I haven’t taken note. Elaborate.”
“Eh? I have little to say. Normally he’d have given his compliments to me by now.”
“Mm.”
“‘Mm?’”
“Hm?”
“Why ‘mm?’”
“Need you be so litigious with your own father?”
“I contest the term ‘litigious.’”
He’s scrambling around something. No wonder in what that is. Push? No. Let him initiate, spin things out seamlessly from here, and maybe then put an end to these proposals..
With a warm smile, Renner dropped the topic, and went on eating in silence. The sun grew a little steeper, illuminating the table crystal, the wine inside, and her suspicions. Her father was practiced in subterfuge; thus, he kept his hand casual as he forced his wine down, flicked his eyes to the maids, and made his pointed request.
“I’m of a mind to have for a little more. You two, please go and get the Chateau Devant as well as a glass for my daughter.”
Ramposa was kingly and polite, especially when he wanted his servants to leave. For their part, Roselyn and Sanssouci took the cue for what it was, gave unflinching bows, and bid their exit. With the door closed, Renner set down her knife and fork, Ramposa giving the silence a moment to settle.
“You and your brother spoke yesterday, yes?”
Lead him in gentle, apologize for intentional acts, expressed muted frustration, and then press.
“Mm.”
Renner lightly nodded, and his face fell.
“A confrontation, then?”
“Per the talk.”
“Well, with a maid in the room, there’s always talk.”
“I should have dismissed her. It slipped me. Concerns of house were lesser to me than being a good host to Harlink’s man at that moment, and I thought not to question your sanction. I sent him to the other room and – without thinking – thought Ryle business contained. I apologize father, I’ve made trouble for you.”
“No, you did your best.”
“Still, had I-”
“No effacement, please.”
Which to sell this best? Solemn? Pained into resignation? Ah, shock into neutrality into pitiful indignance.
Renner blinked.
“Aye.”
She drew her mouth to its sides, careful to keep her exhale soft.
“Then, fine, no effacement.”
“Speak.”
“Father, I don’t know what I was to do. I was not forewarned of the meeting, its content, or its guest. My brother entered without a knock – as I speak, he did – pounced upon a chair before I knew cause to his coming, and that he- he- sicked a suitor on me.”
“‘Sicked?’”
“On one another. The poor man went in utterly unprepared, starting and ending his formalities with the proposal itself.”
“You mean he was uncouth?”
“Uncoached. As if delivering a piece of poetry would gain my hand.”
“Verily?”
“Yes! I hadn’t the dullest idea what to say. I hate to bandy the term, but, well, it was a lordling's hand. He offered nothing – nothing at all.”
“And what’s why you refused?”
“What was there to accept?”
Ramposa had no answer, and point made, Renner turned about in her chair to Climb and gave a slight smile. Managing back a nod, Climb forced his eyes wide open again in a battle for wakefulness.
You look positively empty, darling. You were forced on patrol, I see. Jelca’s subverted me; this was meant to be a gift for Climb on sweltering days at my hand, my discretion. Now, exhaustion unto frustration unto resentment, most upon the Knight Marshal, but a scant lot against me. Unacceptable. When I bar my brother from this clade of impropriety, I’ll make a vengeance for us.
“What of Barbro?”
She spent a moment pretending to find words.
The way I end this is by getting father to drag Barbro’s fetid words from me. Tantalize him with fragments of an anecdote, something that causes him to leap on the matter.
“Forgive me, father, for saying things ill of Ield, but he hadn’t come in equilibrium to begin with. We spat immediately, and although I did my best to keep good cheer, I can offer no guarantee of that. After Salco- that being Harlink’s man, recited his letter, I politely moved to a disengagement, and my brother… went a bit mad.”
“You believe my son mad?”
“No… not in full. I wasn’t able to record events from the outset, and so you’ll understand my account isn't a full reckoning, but he accused me of troublemaking, foolishness in my advocacies, of sloth and like folly.”
“All against you?”
Grow vague.
“Not all; I’m nary a certain target for his frustration on specific matters, more of a medium.”
“Such as?”
“His grievances were merely broader. Not of a stripe-”
“Chardelon.”
“Father, this table is not a place for things so unpleasant as-”
“Chardelon, his words, exactly.”
She dropped her head violently and precisely, pairing a labored breath to her crafted distress. Swallowing before she wet her fluttering lips, Renner forced her eyes wet, and tipped her gaze right.
“He said- he said he cared not for the totterings of an old man clinging to what he beheld in youth and-”
In triumph.
“-a relic of his second wife.”
No response came. Renner fought her urge to look up for a full minute, meeting a terrible gaze when she did; the anger in it had burned off, Ramposa looking weightily through her to the wall behind. The general shape of the scheme had come to her the day before; exposing Barbro’s trespass to the maidstaff would bode an investigation and lure out her father, an opportunity to finally kill the marriage-plots of her siblings.
Nevermind the price of silence, this is an opportunity for pure, continued calm. No more offers matriculating in through my siblings, those from my father controlled. Come, father-dearest, lose that sternness in your stare and realize a quiet alway.
Slowly, his eyes fell, and the two slipped again into silence and resumed eating – nothing to be heard but the rustling of table cloth, chewing of food, and scant plate scraping to be heard. Renner did in hers and counted it a victory, going for her morning brew of white tea. Ramposa was a kind man at heart. Per her estimation, he had truly loved his wife, Queen Nunia, then later Queen Etsana, and even after both their passings gave true affection to the children they had borne him. Entering the world long after the former’s expiration and soon before the latter’s, Renner had known neither – much to Ramposa’s displeasure.
She couldn’t care; her father was an appliance, there to head the goings-on of house and throne. His empathies meant little, promises even less; his mild competence at kingcraft had held the nation steady for forty years, and when he might slip beneath the ground, he would at least leave his child simple enemies. Whether that be Barbro or Zanac was less clear – the historic length he gript the crown measured that. Either way, Renner felt no insecurity, content to remain a bachelorette until she grew out of wedding-age and could settle with Climb on her royal estate. Mean that dodging proposals for the next decade, she was willing.
“What say you?”
Snapping to him, Renner found Ramposa had finished his meal, abiding by his glass. It struck Renner that the two maids had likely long returned, and were now lurking outside. She kept her voice quiet.
“Perhaps, father, it would be best to release this matter by preempting all its future shapes. Provide my brother naught but a writ to no longer seek hands for me and let things rest – my siblings too.”
“And these are your earnest thoughts?”
“Yes.”
“You propose something impermanent.”
The sunlight was robbed of its color.
I’ve been uncautious. I did not estimate this. ‘Impermanence,’ he’s to suggest I accept Harlink’s offer? Impossible. To reject all in future? Implausible. What is he to say?
Gravely, Ramposa turned to her purpose.
“Climb, I remind you of your bond to my daughter, and that you sure your silence or leave.”
“S-sire.”
“Gazef.”
“Sire.”
For the third time in as many days, nervousness fell over her. Neither Climb nor Gazef were ever to speak, and Ramposa never would ask that of those who would, but never before had she seen him emphasize the point. In brave fashion, Renner undid her arms.
“For what you say, Chardelon, you must have faith in your fellow Ryle’s. Faith I do not share. Were Vena given manhood, or, had your darling mother given me one more as we hoped together, today would not be so dim, yet I tilt up and cannot find the sun. Barbro is not to become Andrean IV; Zanac, not Valleon II. Yet, one must be.
“Barbro – my dear little Ield – I’ve failed to teach anything. Yes for swordplay, yes for the doing of war, and yet he goes tither through the body of Earth, Water, and Wind only to return with a half hewn proposal that he bungles on his first full day back. If only he could have been my second – what a marvelous second he would have made. All the right qualities with none of the faults; no drunkardness, no calm. Were he and his brother transposed, perhaps Zanac could have grown a quality better, but all I have had are years to see something remarkable in him which I have not. For them both, all I have spent are my years, and I have spent mine all for nothing. A proud fool and a merryman, what has my father’s line come to?”
The tears beading in the corners of his eyes broke free.
“There are terrors in me, Renner. Deep in my bones. I wish for you to relieve me of one. I need know your future secure. Were I to lose myself to the Hallow Gale, disincorporate without settling this question, I cannot guarantee you a fair tomorrow. You are to be sixteen in a month’s time.”
A timeline! Interdict now.
“Father-”
“I cannot as father or king let my daughter be unwed at seventeen. It would be a scandal, and beyond it damaging your future, it would set your brothers to ruin you either through vanity or vengeance. Fickle men already threaten to write you off, doubly with him at your side.”
“Climb is not-”
“I know, but replete things need not be true. Renner, you are a woman, and have been for near to four years. I have given you play. I loathe my next words with the weight of me, but age may become a barrier for you. Do you understand, dear?”
No, for there is nothing coherent to understand! Why need I be shackled to concerns of house?! Andrean’s name be damned, render my portion of the estate fully unto me now and do away with anything else! This land is moribund, father! Why concern yourself with a long tomorrow when a prodigy in the east is to seize that flank in the coming year, the March of Rantel within the decade? There is to be no more of us. Even now, Slaine conspires with your eldest son to unknown ends – surely destructive, surely mortal. I need my partition and my partition alone. That would be my security, father, nothing tied to politics, nothing tied to some doomed county, freedom for me and my Climb.
“I do.”
“Is the matter of marriage unappealing to you.”
“Frightful.”
A marriage is a way to death. Genuine harm, virile injury. How would I not be scared of such things? Why are you to force this unto me?
“I will not let my folly with you be lenience, but neither will it be commandeering. Soon will come your birthday, and past that, on the equinox, I wish you to have accepted an offer. I trust you, Chardelon, to find the right fate, and so I fully enfranchise you to seek or solicit these, take your pick of them, and negotiate without interference. If my aid you need, then ask, but I leave you in your fullest capacities in this task.”
“Father-”
Her tongue seized, and with the flight of her rage, she couldn’t muster hate. The tile beneath her feet had opened up and all she knew was vertigo.
“Yes, father.”
Notes:
Hi there, going to drop all 15 rewritten chapters soon in blocks of 5, then the edited chapters later in the fic as I go through them. Should hopefully be caught up all the way soon, and ready for fresh releases. I-6 through I-10 should drop by the 30th, and then 11 through 15 ASAP after.
Chapter 6: Movement I: Dances at Sundown (6)
Chapter Text
Hard rain went and shot out the roads, whatever earth not trod on by metropolites churned to mush by their horses.
Maybe now they’ll support paving it.
It made sense to Renner. Paved streets meant an easier time selling, which meant things sold for less which meant more things sold which meant the cost came back in taxes. It didn’t to father, who insisted the only people who appreciated the act were those enfeoffed at the city center. This wasn’t a sound position, and now that their carriages had sunk into the mud, she hoped he would see the sense in her argument.
The carriage door opened, a roundly dejected Sir Macnamera leaning in to look at Renner then her sister Lulara. He reached out to foist her up off the seat and up onto his shoulders – the dress, his face and her haunches – only to look at Renner and deflate.
“Can I walk?”
“No, not happening, Your Highness.”
“You aren’t going to be able to pick me up.”
Macnamera said nothing. Lulara started giggling, leaning back to catch the rain.
“Your Highness, your dignity, please.”
Interrupt. He’s confused.
“I can walk.”
“Renner, not you too.”
“Like I said, you aren’t-”
Father rounded into frame, hair twice slickened by rain and age.
“Sire, Renner refuses to hop on.”
“Can she fit?”
No. There is a solution here.
“I can walk.”
Lulara piped up.
“If my sister gets to walk, I should too!”
Ramposa burst out laughing.
“Earth below, why do I have such litigious daughters? Let them walk.”
“Sire, the maids won’t be able to wash their dresses.”
“Then we’ll send them to a mage. Not as if they’ll fit much longer.”
That was that, and Renner was unceremoniously picked up and set on the ground, parasol thrust overtop her too late to keep her dry. Some shouts went up around her, father’s men coordinating for her protection, her family’s, and the carriages. Renner folded up her hand with Lulara, who linked with Macnamara. One by one, they signaled ready, and with a pat on the back, she was sent walking.
That she was here at all was a function of ill-circumstance. After father had donned his regal countenance this morning, he had delicately informed her and her sister of “tumult” in the east. Margrave Urovana was to host an impromptu meeting for the Royal Faction in his capital estate, and as their brothers were off on an expedition, and Vena was away touring E-Pespel with its young Marquis, the duties of attendance fell to them. By no means did this make Renner unhappy; if anything, she cherished an invitation to discrete statecraft, but an urgent council held under the poor guise of a party was downright clandestine.
News flown in by rider on the hour gave the King and his courtiers the image of an imperial succession crisis. Emperor Ubren Kyne Preta El-Zenn had ceremoniously passed away a month prior, and though always understood to be afflicted with a thinness of blood, jumbled communiques from the Kingdom’s diplomatic mission in Arwintar relayed that the ducal houses of the Empire now believed it to be murder. Little was clear, what messages arrived dated from four weeks to three days prior, but key points of agreement were that House Zenn had accused the eminent matron of the Nix family, Jimila Al-Nix, of the assassination, that some form of fighting had broken out in the capital and countryside, and that garrisons at Ilmlith and Voer-Moun had been seized.
Tactlessly interspersed in battle reports was the notice of Jimila’s death, not at the hands of the Conspiratorialists, but by that of her own son, one Jircniv Rune Farlord El-Nix. Of Zanac’s age, he had been rightful heir to the imperial line before the troubles. Though it took time for the news to promulgate, this act slaked the Five Families, and they, eager to put a credulous boy on the throne, halted the violence and let him be crowned emperor. Confusingly, the afternoon following the coronation, fighting resumed, all four of House Zenn’s estates waylaid by air cavalry within the week. An imperial notice of mobilization was issued to the legions, and with the apparent loyalty of both them and the Ministry of Magic, the boy regent had posed the question of war.
Thus, in the gallows past few weeks, House Nix’s first son went from being the youngest emperor in Baharuth history to its bloodiest; far removed, it was both easier for Renner’s house and its associates to accuse El-Nix of plotting the entire crisis and harder for them to believe him succeeding it. Renner wasn’t sure why such a coup was surprising; plenty of children were smarter than every adult around them.
The mud was fun, but cold. The squishing got Lulara laughing, which got Renner too. A quick look up showed her father beaming. Renner grinned back. Vena’s trip in E-Pespel had surely been cut short, but no word had yet to reach Re-Estize.
She’s to marry him soon.
As nice as time with Lulara was, Renner preferred her eldest sister’s. Vena was simply electric to be around: tall and pretty summed to regal, witty and tasteful to refined. Every moment the pair shared sunk into Renner, methods of speaking, methods of movement, of being. When Renner spoke, little was granted to her but confused looks and weak smiles; Vena received true laughs, genuine attention. Her ideas, no matter how inconsequential, received consideration. Renner wanted to be her. At least, she had.
Vena’s company has been so short. I know she and the Marquis are busy, but I had hoped for more time. Weddings are big, but this much planning? There’s no time in her days for herself. I wouldn’t like that. Am I to be married at thirteen too? Maybe. It’s not like she’d have time after, either. She’ll be living in E-Pespel. Visiting would be impractical- er, impracticable. My days with her are already spent, aren’t they?
Renner flinched from a raindrop, a spurt of water from the parasol coming down and soaking her left arm. Macnamara was holding it wrong, not quite managing to cover both her and her sister. She tried to push closer, but Lulara pushed back. Renner stuffed in her arm and was about to whine before seeing something off in that direction.
Oh? Who’s that?
The rain had grown so heavy that most sorry parties had already fled indoors; those outside were only either rushing home or those without one. A person lay balled just behind the gutter to her left. Small – a child – he or she was burrowed beneath a blanket, only wispy blond hair peeking out through its holes. Renner stopped, and when Lulara tugged forward, Renner let their fingers unlace.
You must be so cold.
Her cover lost, the rain fell fully upon Renner now.
Who are you? Why would you be out here?
Impoverishment, surely. Though so far removed, the privations of kingdom life were not alien to Renner. She knew there were those without houses, those who slept on nothing and worked for air. The child was shivering, badly. Ghostly white things poked out near the bottom of the blanket, feet if she guessed right. She drew forth, seeing the cover as less as a blanket, more a rag; not a rag, but a pall.
You are going to die.
The reality struck her. The cover was tattered, soaked through so much that it robbed warmth, not safeguarded it. It was the early spring, and what rain that did fall was but a breadth away from the snows of a week prior.
You will die without the hand of another. What if one were to give it? Would you listen to them? Would you obey them?
A yelp rang out behind Renner, Sir MacNamara finally noticing her absence. This led into a commotion, horses reels and panicked yells at the discovery. Within a few seconds, shouts went up as to her location, and an ashamed MacNamara ran over to grab her. She had to be quick, and so she quickly leapt over the gutter, yanked back the blanket, and peered into a pair iridescent blue eyes.
—
[40th Year of Foresai, Middle Wind Month, Day 30]
She was looking into those same eyes ten years later. They were red.
I need build us a future. I need have you at my side endlessly. I know not how, but I need you.
“Climb, my darling Climb.”
She wicked the tears from his face. So rarely had he let them spill that Renner had no reference for the sound – hicked and deep – of his lamentations. Going through that transformation boys did, his face molted with pimples at around age eleven and dried up too, with nothing let loose since. It was a pathetic, mannish noise, and if Renner was not similarly fraught, she would have attended more to the frettish beating of her own heart.
You have no past, no blood; barring escalation in the east, there's not a chance of you earning any. Marriage is thus out, and the leniencies so oft afforded men of courtesans and whoremongery are shameful for women. No concubine would appear in the records, and I dare not hazard one’s existence.
Climb slowly drew off into hiccups, and with a few more swipes, Renner dispossessed her handkerchief and fell back into her chair, grateful for her forethought in dispersing the maids. There wasn’t much comfort in it; an aching had swept up from her neck to her eye, and she hadn’t the strength to rise and take a curative. Tears were dry on her face too.
How cruel is the human form that half born to it are sexed wrong? So second are we that the doings of things bias our brethren. Why, that a generic woman, silver-on-standard, stands shorter, weighs lesser, and strikes limper? Why, that in a world constituted of material, that we would be less to influence it? Are our sensations duller? Our thoughts? The breadth of what a woman absorbs may be confined, but the scale is not lesser. Be I of manflesh or womanflesh, I occupy the seat of experience all the same.
Renner knew the complaint was rote – she had grown sick uttering it – but was unable to issue any other. In worst fashion, the inequities of existence were not arguments; prolix wordplay could not vanquish them. She and reality had been formed by the Gods, and per those imbibed with holy doctrine, this formation has been perfect. She was thus powerless, fated as ever to falsely-comfort herself for a day – or a year – before some new pain of her sex sent her into agony once more.
Or have I fallen to a fallacy? For their strength, for their tepidity, men are denied that bloodiest and holiest part of existence. Whom am I but one that bleeds upon the leg? Whom am I but she who can bear new life within? Yet, such a thing condemns me, denies me even the common adventures of men. Rob sincerity, rob joy, rob novelty and a love of people and I am left regretting a lusterless form which does naught but cramp and disgorge itself upon the month. Foul trade.
Gluttonously, Renner had self consumed before midday. Loathing her Ryle’s vice, she had always consigned herself to dooms and in doing so, worsened them. Every stride regretted, she could lead herself from genuine pain to a mendacious hatred of herself in the course of an hour – not that the hate was false. Rather, the arguments were.
No, there is a greater lie here. The true incapacity of women is so dwarfed by lies of the same. I am lesser by the mark of others, but I am not lesser.
Climb shot up stockishly, stiffly making off to the cabinets. When she could muster the strength to look, she found him busying himself with a modest tea. Something about this summoned a deep-set itching about preparedness; rather than fight it, she slipped up from her chair and to her bedroom vanity, washing away what her tears had smeared and building herself anew.
“Not lesser” is a weak framing. It is an unhumble thing to deem oneself peerless, but do I know any word better? No mere master of witty games, more was given unto me; others read the page opened to them, but I’ve got the book by its spine. What a waste on a woman, then. Mark it the ill fortune of the land that I was not tasked to save it.
The order that had bound Re-Estize for two centuries was to fail, and only Renner knew this with certainty. The Kingdom had simply been outrun, the weights of a person’s life, low or high, arrayed wrongly. When the last Demon Gods were vanquished and restoration began, overtop the land were arranged men and women in a system of contracts; that restoration stalled was deemed the natural limit of the former, not a false end of the latter.
Gains for house are gains for house, but the motion of money sweeps up value otherwise never realized. As to Jircniv’s awareness, he needs it not to kick the process over. His investments in the bureaucracy – no matter how spendthrift – will return their value. He will strengthen, and then the whole of the east will be eaten up. Consider, massacre at Katze, the ‘Play-War’ suddenly becoming one of maneuver, E-Rantel overwhelmed with novel magics of the ministry, a great conflagration as the March of a dead line is ripped from us, every lord a petty king. House Vaiself will only stand first amongst them.
Water whistling from the drawing room, Renner decided she had finished and returned. Finding Climb still over the counter, she had a sudden resolve to walk up, break him from his work, and kiss him. She felt his lips on hers, her hands slipping into his. Stricken, he’d dare not tear away; she would push until he pushed back. The embrace would grow stronger until he grew virile. He would grab her up. She hung on the words ‘and then.’ The image fizzled, and steady on her feet, she sat down.
Father’s demands are useless. Give he the power to right my life with a marriage, I’d end it.
Plodding over with the serving tray, Climb sat too. Sprinkling in sugar for the taste, meadowsweet bitters for the headache, Renner found her cup adequate, dipping and nibbling on a little crumble bread. Climb was mechanical with his.
Escape, then. Abscond to the churches? Father would obstruct that, and I’d not stumble upon an inroad, not even considering Climb. Force his pen that I may be indemned in the palace or royal estates? Nothing my brothers couldn’t undo – his death would be mine. Something more radical; liquidation and an attempt to purchase assets in a private fashion. That would only be possible through a renunciation of my blood. No more would I be subject to the royal peace, I would be outlawed; then, taken by a flash in the dark.
Her murder had grown easier to imagine since she impressed emancipation upon the kingdom. No persons were as protected as the king and his children, but she more than her siblings relied on it. Though owners received compensation for their compelled manumission, it was in no way equal to the lifetime value of a slave, to say nothing of the industry which produced them. The animosity her laws directed at her was to fade with time of which she had precious little. Actual flight from her duty as princess was a fantasy, but the contingent intoned the black fact that Renner had already spent the sum of her political being.
“Your Highness, forgive me, but Your servant would like to say something.”
Renner softened her eyes and looked to Climb.
“You need seek no permission to speak, but I’ll grant it nevertheless.”
“Your servant hates how Your Highness is treated. I loathe it. Your Highness doesn’t deserve this.”
“‘Deserve?’”
“Your brother- His Highness should not have said what he did. It’s unconscionable. Trying to- to-”
“Sell me?”
“That is Your servant’s opinion.”
“I know the framing is crude, but true. Zanac has made such overtures – bluntly, and in jest, but he still made them.”
“It’s unbearable”.
“Oh, Climb, I’ve got you all worked up, haven’t I?”
Renner facsimiled sympathy with a cock of the head.
“This isn’t Your Highness’s fault! None of this is. The Crown Prince’s actions were offensive, and wrong. Bringing the hand of a border count isn’t just insulting, it’s- the news got out. I’m not sure if it was the maid or maybe Mister Jonque, but Jelca asked me about it. This hurts Your Highness and the House; only the Gods know how this is being talked about. My Princess, the demand that you marry by the equinox is simply-”
Climb came to a halt, swallowing.
Impassioned, you speak that and stop short of profaning my father? Chardelon, you’ve trained him so well. This whole conversation has been exemplary. Crook him.
“I agree. It is unfair. My father’s demands leave me short; though he names and believes it so, he is not offering me deliverance, but goading me with my brothers to his desires. He is not a turpid man – in every sense the opposite – but I can’t help but claim injury at this. No matter.”
Are those most desirous freedoms to be mine, am I to lay with Climb, am I to bear his childe, I must have my liberty. If all other routes are denied me, then I must not spurn but claim it through marriage. No husband may ordain such privileges upon me unless he is so compelled, but how?
Often were lies spoken sincerely by do-betters, the sum of which had no greater part than those men intoned to women. Promises made in seeking a hand had no passing basis to fact; even were Renner to gain assent for keeping Climb as a consort, in no capacity could she keep it.
Compulsion, then, must be a continuing thing, a perpetual bargain where both I and my husband to be understand this perpetuity. Destructive measures – accounts of affairs, treasons – would assail me too and could never be credibly threatened. Construction, then, but what do I have to offer? The prestige of my hand is entered once into his record; no possession of mine would remain bound only to me, and for any lord I am to marry, my incomes would mean nothing.
Her niblings turned to bites, finishing the last of her bread, at which she perfunctorily refused Climb’s silent offer of his.
There is one thing I can offer, the major aspect of my being. Were I to share my aptitude, my skill, to speak not from the lectern but from the bedside, that could work in full. For that, though, credibility. Arguments to the goodness of my works, no matter how sound, cannot stand upon a mistaken foundation. I must have evidence for believing in. What new policy could I concoct and implement in four months, both with the air of charity and abundance of justification? ‘Have implemented,’ I should say. So, I’ve circled back; no vicissitude will earn back those relationships I strained in driving out slavery. This is, of a stripe, hopeless.
Am I to be denied a life, then? My brother strolls in, and in the course of a single conversation, condemns me.
“Your Highness?”
“Yes, Climb?”
“You are a valorous woman.”
“Valor is a word reserved for heroes.”
“Your servant feels that this is his point.”
She tilted her head.
Perhaps policy needn’t be the sole scope of my considerations. Why speak of vicissitudes when I possess a more potent violence?
Chapter Text
[40th Year of Foresai, Lower Wind Month, Day 1]
Sun on her face, Lakyus passed over a bridge and into the capital of the kingdom. The gentle change from hedgerows to urban outskirts had slipped her by, and she had been delivered to the city wall. Tipping the cobalt-blue plate around her neck, the guards – awed and affrighted – stepped aside and granted her entrance without comment. Her steed, an eight legged beast known as a Sleipnir, jaunted over the threshold and into the lower markets, clopping off to the palace. Looking back, she found her companion’s beast following riderless; a little plussed, Lakyus whispered into the air.
“You know, it’s not a good look for an adventurer to skip inspections.”
An invisible, floating sorceress responded.
“I don’t want anyone from the guild to see me – I haven’t paid dues in years.”
Recluse.
Only she and Evileye had come south, Gagaran and the twins curled-up crapulent from their latest night out. Normally, Lakyus would have taunted them with the virtues of temperance, cured their sickness, and whipped them out onto the road anyway, but it was better for discretion if they abstained. Renner had sent a letter, and in it, bookended between deliberate blithing was a call to "a prolonged dialogue on a matter of some import too cumbersome to be conducted through mail." The Regal Countenance was always subdued, but rarely was it sly; Renner wished Lakyus’s ear in something she could not relay by post.
She’d only pen that if she felt unsafe. This is for a job, and if it was typical, she would have hired me through the guild.
Brooding on horseback, her steed took her past the caravansaries and onto the main north-south thoroughfare. Home to some one-hundred thousand, the Royal Capital of Re-Estize – locally, the City of Re-Estize – was the most populous in the world of men. Too many were plodding the street begging. Compared to the cleaner poverty of Arwintar or the genuine splendor of Ciruxsantex’s public endowments, Re-Estize was no great metropolis.
Open air markets that caught traders gave way to more squalid burrows, morose poor coming out to gawk at her. A pet peeve of the Princess had been the city’s ‘beautification campaigns’, a euphemism for the spearpoint expulsion of waifs from the main drag; with how many were out today, those units had either stopped patrolling or been overwhelmed. The ticktack of dense urban housing thinned and the people fattened, her beast’s hooves once again upon the pavers of an upper class neighborhood. Here, beyond banks, exchanges, and row houses, were walled manors, shops trafficked with carriages, and the general bustle of the landed. Things grew larger and quieter, Lakyus peeking through manicured hedgerows to spy the occasional garden party. Then, all structures cleared and the ground began to slope up, only a single bricked road weaving the empty hill up to the fortress of Ro-Lente.
Sighted by sentries well before her arrival, a triplet had filed out to greet her, palace knights flanking a butler stuffed-up in a ruffled shirt. He waved his, then doffed his hat.
“Hark, my Lady. If I could not bother to share your name and your intentions.”
He’s new, I think.
“Lady Lakyus Alvein Dale Aindra. Her Highness has invited me to spend an afternoon.”
“Ah! Yes, you’ve been expected. I trust your travels were well?”
“Quite.”
His eyes looked to the plate around her neck, then the second steed, whereupon Evileye materialized and nearly sent the trio to the ground.
“R-right. We’ll have space for your Sleipnir, and forgive me for being improper to ladies such as yourselves, but as you are adventurers, you will need to disarm yourselves on castle-grounds… Also we please ask that you do not practice sorceries of any nature within.”
Lakyus silently shed her backup blade – a mithril longsword – to one of the knights, her companion carrying and thus surrendering nothing. At this, the men conducted a noteless inspection of their saddlebags, and bowed to let them through. As Blue Roses both, two of ten Adamantite adventurers in the land, they had few equals.
—
Renner was enjoying a tea when the closest thing she had to a friend knocked on the door.
“Enter!”
Lakyus did; always beautiful, today she tempered her strength with a verdant dress cut past her shoulder on one side, blonde locks falling over the other. She bid in a companion of hers, a runt thrown over in a red robe and alabaster mask.
This must be Rigrit’s replacement. Their new witch, yes? Why- Ah, Lakyus understood my invitation. This is deference.
“Your Highness, gorgeous as always.”
“Lady Aindra! I’d say the same for you, though you may prefer the term ‘handsome.’”
“The Guild Mistress would sick every last party on me if I said yes – my femininity is critical for recruitment.”
“Hush! You’ll bode Baharuth’s agents to spread rumors of your secret manhood.”
“Rumors?”
Renner broke into guilty laughter, waving Lakyus over to sit around an already prepared table. She did, smiling at Climb, who was himself nervous at the second guest.
“I’ll forgive Lakyus for the indiscretion of bringing another uninvited, though I assume you are the sorceress Evileye?”
“That’s right.”
Lakyus elbowed the woman.
“Y-your Highness.”
Evileye’s voice pompous and youthful, Renner had the immediate sense that she was looking at something inhuman.
Tiny, yet adamantite; a young magician, yet one of the finest of the day. What kinds are long lived, short statured, and ill-protocoled? A halfling, perhaps?
“Address the princess properly, would you? She may forgive you, but Climb won’t.”
Renner cut in before he could.
“Quit teasing him, Alvein. Climb is allowed whatever grudges he wants.”
“My Princess!”
“Fine, fine. I’ll keep mine in line if you keep yours.”
“Deal.”
Clearly offended, Evileye spun in her seat to Lakyus.
“I’m not property!”
“Yes, actually, you are.”
“Just because I lost a bet to that-”
“Esteemed old-”
“Bat doesn’t mean that you own me.”
Prideful too. Am I sure this woman isn’t a dwarf? I’m assured their womenfolk have beards.
“Own? Lakyus, you mean to tell me you are secretly a man and slaver both? How terrible!”
“I know. I’m quite wicked.”
This should be enough to excite the staff. Better the gossip be meaningless.
Quite deliberately, Renner and Lakyus were lulling the maid in the room with inanities; they made to rid her.
“You ventured out early this morning, yes?”
“Yes, my Princess.”
“I imagine you’re famished, then.”
Lakyus nodded.
“Miss Elena? Four slices of last night’s cake, please. Make up the cream fresh.”
Elena bowed and excused herself. With a click of the door, Lakyus’s smile slackened.
“Evileye, do we have silence?”
“If someone was spying, I’d know.”
Lakyus made a face, Evileye unmasking her beardless chin to taste the tea. Apparently not to her liking, she sprung forth a flame from nowhere and materialized two cubes to plink in.
So casual. Still, she can sense magical organs? Mark me newly paranoid – at least I would be if anyone thought anything in this room mattered.
“If scrying defense is of such import, I could invest in a copper lining.”
“Like that works.”
It doesn’t?
Evileye caught another blow from Lakyus, who forced a reassuring smile to Renner.
“Apologies for her behavior, my Princess.”
“I’m not to reprimand your friend for sharing something so useful. I trust your worries about security are settled?”
“Yes. Renner, why the call?”
Brooding through the evening of the twenty-ninth, Renner had decided that Lakyus was her first and last measure against the king’s ultimatum. Though undecided on the shape of violence she was to have the Blue Rose inflict, its targets were sure.
How to argue this? Hifalutin rhetoric will not work here, not as it did for the slave question. Yes offense, yes indignation, but tempered with a mournful edge.
“Forgive my use of a question as a response, but, Lakyus, what is the greatest threat to the Kingdom?”
“Need I answer?”
Renner hid her smile.
“I’ve one already, but I’m not being rhetorical.”
Lakyus gave a cautious nod, and after a moment of genuine thought, responded.
“Baharuth.”
“As many would say. Insofar as the Kingdom is a contiguous political body constructed from fiefdoms, your answer is correct.”
“But that is not what you see the Kingdom as, is it?”
“No, not strictly.”
“Then explain.”
I've netted you. Now to drag you back.
Renner let her strength drain until she was too weak to meet her opposite in the eye, looking away with performative tears.
“Alvein, would you forgive me for something so close to treason?”
No response came.
“Were tomorrow the land to be declared a part of the empire, no change at all would come for those who work it.”
“Punishment would come for the nobility.”
Not for House Aindra, and not for those who threw themself aground before his Imperial Majesty. You've an impractical streak in you, don't you?
Her words were cautious anyway, and so Renner forgave the offense.
“Only those who’d dare chafe with El-Nix. Of every contract in a person’s life – written or unwritten – few would change. I’ll grant that the Empire is an existential threat to my house, and that, were its bloody regent to triumph in the east, my life would too hang by the sword. No, what ails the body politic is not war.”
“Then what does?”
“I am saying, Lakyus, that the body is rotting.”
“The letter was a petition for my service, wasn’t it?”
Renner nodded and judged the moment right to turn back, finding her friend wearing stoic contempt.
“Every night, women walk out and sell themselves in service of debts they will never pay off. Every night, a new youth is introduced to that flower which numbs. Every night, brigands heave up their blades and p-plunge them into victims anew, highwaymen assault carriages, thieves steal away with the wealth of a nation, and nameless other crimes are committed. Be most petty, be most disconnected, some are not; some are connected, some are organized, some are directed, some all by one hand.”
“You’re speaking of Eight Fingers.”
“No other group like them has existed in living memory. How foul a-”
“You want us to hunt them.”
“Yes! I do.”
“Destroy them?”
“I'd'nt dare d’more than cripple them.”
“Why?”
“I cannot undo a nation’s worth of vice!”
“No, I meant ‘why now?’”
Come autumn, Renner was to be engaged. Without recourse and with the singular commiseration that she might pick her husband, there was no other path but marriage.
If my matrimony is absolute, then I must act absolutely. Think not of escape, but of eminence. Ere fall, if I have not spent the worth of myself in pursuit of a secure future with Climb, a marriage where I might keep him, then I am no woman at all. If my words be denied to me, then I shall pick up the sword. Lakyus, you are to hunt for me. To kill for me. To take victories, accumulate bodies, lay low criminals, lay waste to their enterprises, and at the end, deliver me the proof of your works that I might turn ‘round and show a Lord that my title, “Golden Princess,” is not hollow.
Renner halted, recalcitrant. Of course, she could say none of this to Lakyus.
Now, to sow tales of a plot. In this, excuse myself.
“I spoke of disease not in the singular.”
“My Princess, elaborate.”
“There is a streak of secrecy in my house. One that may tie a member to others near and far. Among those closest are shared conceivable- nay, acceptable political goals, permissible by the standards of our day. For those far, however, I am less convinced of their good intentions.”
“Whom?”
Dare I say it? This is, as I understand it, the truth, but need it be so fantastical? No compulsion could be had otherwise.
“My brother walks in league with one aligned with Slaine, who have arrayed themselves against the Kingdom.”
Clamor came all around.
“What?!”
“I believe so.”
“His Highness, Zanac?”
Mournfully, Renner shook her head.
“‘Your brother’ the Crown Prince!?”
“My brother the brute, my brother the fool.”
“What evidence do you’ve of this?”
“None.”
“Then why-”
“Gazef seems to think so.”
“‘Seems?’ So he hasn’t told you?”
“No, but that man is unflappable in court procedure, and so to see him startled at the sight of a sword gifted to my father, what other answer could it be?”
“Renner, first you send me a clandestine letter to bid me to surreptitious violence presumably outside of the eyes of the guild, and indict our next king in a plot as cause. This is-”
“Mad? I know.”
“‘You know?’ Then why consider it?”
“Because here the walls are slathered in conspiracy and always will be. I do not yet view these accusations as credible, but be they or not, my actions remain the same.”
“Why act if you don’t take stock in your own words?”
“Consider the consequence of a conspiracy general. Are lands anywhere to buckle by any hand, then it is Eight Fingers who will profit. A border bodes smuggling, anarchy bodes larceny. When the lord’s footmen are felled in battle, who will take their place but Eight Fingers?”
“Criminals are always opportunists, but-”
“Rarely do they have organization!”
“Eight Fingers is not a cult, Renner.”
“Neither is it a club.”
Lakyus finally paused, shooting a glance to a still Evileye. Renner was herself riven, the conversation having nearly slipped from her hands thrice. She went to Climb for comfort, slipping in a hand to his and squeezing. He squeezed back.
“I want to do this. I want to run these bastards down. I hate them. But, Renner, this is…”
“Beyond me?”
“Your reasoning is muddled. Dismissing the matter of the conspiracy, I don’t understand how it motivates you to move now.”
“This is not something I intend to abandon.”
“Intentions are weak.”
I’d make no further advance on this point. Divert to what you had practiced.
“Why do you think I prosecuted the slavery question? Goodness?”
“What? Yes.”
Renner spurted out a giggled.
“Alvein, I am still a royal. I do have stripes of self interest.”
“Climb, how do you stand her humility?”
“I-It’s tough, Lady Aindra.”
“No, but, truly, you had a selfish cause in that?”
Doesn’t everyone?
“The injuries of slavery were unforgivable, but with its absence, the land is to strengthen – like patching the finer eye to save the other. The motive was to do good, but the impetus was calculated. I truly believe that the destruction of Eight Fingers benefits my house.”
“But Prince Barbro-”
“Brought the hand of a baron to me and went nonlinear when I refused it; lied to my father in view of the entire royal court; was struck with bouts of erraticism and couldn’t hold etiquette through a dinner. The only other who seemed invested in any of this was Boullope, whom my brother had just wide enough a gap on his campaign to meet. My suspicions are rightfully aflame.”
“Then why have us sent to different ends? If you suspect your brother of treason, then send us to him!”
“Move against a member of my own House – the heir apparent himself – when I’ve no evidence of guilt? Lakyus, may I remind, you asked ‘why now.’ This is my answer. If I see guilt in innocence, then I am a madwoman financing a righteous cause. If my suspicions prove to be more, then we are spared one piece on the board when it is flipped.”
Further contemplation from Lakyus, again casting her view to her would-be rescuer in Evileye. The sorceress seemed to understand her part, thin slit eyes looking directly into Renner’s.
“There is one other possibility, your Highness.”
“Hm?”
“You’ve heard of the six shrine princesses, yes?”
Those from the theocracy?
“Hierophants of a sort, correct?”
“No, invalids can’t preach. Anyway, those six became five recently; natural deaths are normal, but the current crop is young. Further, they haven’t begun the selection process yet, which implies they lost her crown.”
She’s again slipped the forms of address. Am I a peer to her? She certainly isn't to me.
“I profess weak knowledge on these things, but do you speak of a murder?”
“Defection. The offender got away, and they’ve continued to avoid capture. Depending on where they’ve fled, well, the Theocracy could have cause to be there.”
“And you think they’ve blundered north? Miss Evileye, practically, you are proposing that my brother may have obtained this sword through honest combat through agents of the Theocracy? Agents who did not reveal their identity as such, and could not lest they leak word to those they are hunting?”
Evileye snagged.
“That’s… exactly correct.”
“Lakyus?”
“Remote chance, likelier they fled south.”
The two Blue Roses exchanged another, strangely pressing look. Lakyus’s face went through all the expressions of conversation, yet none of the words.
How you read anything from her mask, I’ven’t a clue.
“All correct then. Climb, you’ve the gatebook record?”
Climb gave a stiff bow and jaunted off to the armoire, coming back with a sturdily bound volume that he thumped on the table. Flicking it open, Renner slid over blocks of pages, explaining as she did.
“Yesterday, I sent Climb to the eastern garrison and had him explain opportunities for advancement in the city forces. There, he delivered a letter to its governor explaining that the superintendent of finance was considering a revision of existing customs duties and wished to discreetly audit his copy of the entrance logs to avoid tipping off the guilds.”
“Is the superintendent considering tax reform?”
“Not to my knowledge.”
Renner found the page she was looking for, hefting up the book and turning it round.
“These will be your targets.”
“Grain shipments?”
Picking these out had taken the better part of yesterday’s evening. Cross referencing signatures with specific inspection stamps, Renner made a guess at which inspectors were circumspect, and went through their work in detail. Of this group, she found oddities in the counts they listed; be it weights, number of bushels, or assessed tax burden, the final digit was more often than not, odd; the sort of number that felt random to a person fabricating it.
“Ones that arrived after dusk, not as part of a larger convoy.”
“Why is that suspicious?”
“Few would push on past the nearest town and risk banditry.”
“Plenty of honest folk fail to make the gates before sundown.”
“Regularly?”
Lakyus blinked, then looked back at the ledger.
“These are arriving regularly after dusk?”
“Yes.”
“And you think that means maleficence?”
“No, but if we are to find any, then it will be here.”
Renner’s heart stammered on, her body oozing sweat she wished it didn’t. Were a rejection to come now, she would have no recourse; her position wasn’t merely desperate, but calamitous. She had no experience with violence. War was a province for the other sex; she had never ordered it upon another, and certainly never had direct impetus in causing it. Were she to convince Lakyus, this would change. Renner would need to reform herself from a princess with passing knowledge of her men’s affairs to one consumed by it, clawing at whomever she could until her nails sunk in. This was part of that, ripping apart petty criminals to trace their superiors. It had to work, else she wouldn’t exist. Lakyus finally looked up.
“So, what do you want us to do?”
Notes:
Hi, sorry 8, 9, and 10 will be after I wake up. Have to check them for typos and stuff.
Chapter 8: Movement I: Dances at Sundown (8)
Chapter Text
[40th Year of Foresai, Lower Wind Month, Day 2]
Tina was starting to get a headache. Out of boredom, she had flipped around to hang by her legs on the beam’s underside, cleaning the dirt under her nails with a kunai. Sighing silently, she looked down – up for her – at her target.
Go on, do crime.
He was Chief inspector Durnen, and there was no traffic that passed through the Capital’s east gate that did not fall under his eye. Of course, seeing didn’t mean much if his mouth could be bribed shut. When Fiendish Leader set off for the capital on a social call, Tina hadn’t expected her to come back with a job. Further, that it was the Princess Renner who bid it meant that the whole enterprise was in violation of the guild’s ‘no national conflicts’ bylaw – not that Tina cared, it was good for Boss to break the rules. Either way, it meant that tonight, she was lurking in the gloom above a man she would hopefully get to kill.
Her left leg cramped, so she sheathed the blade, wrapped her hands around the beam, and stretched out. She had been up there in the rafters of the eastern inspection house for over an hour. Apparently, some noble with too much time and money had played his hand at architecture and designed the damn thing like a church, then gifted it to the city. It was almost too easy to sneak in, Tina simply scaling the fresco out back and slipping in through an open window. There was an irony to it, an imposing symbol of law effortlessly defeated, the officials within it completely corrupt.
Rapping rang out from Durnen’s office door.
“Come in.”
A baggy skinned youth entered the room. Even under dim candlelight, he had all the signs of a black dust addict.
“Caravan, correct? We’ll need to perform an inspection on each of your carts. Please provide your manifest, fill this out, and sign here, here, and here. Before coming here you should have precalculated the tax levy. If you are part of a company or guild they should have done this for you. Place your coinage on the scale.”
That the youth did, not merely what was required, but several dozen gold coins. He then handed off a manifest, and without comment, Durnen flipped around the forms and began to fill them out himself. Within a minute, he had completed the sheet, yanked out a blank inspection log from his study, and filled that out too. Finished, he removed the coins from the scale, swept them into a desk drawer, and handed the parchment off to the other man.
“Here’s your rit of entry and your receipt. It's late at night, so watch for criminals and miscreants. Godsspeed.”
This was proof enough for Tina. As the door closed a second time, she positioned herself above the commissioner, readied her knife, and dropped.
—
Face sallow under the lamplight, Tia’s mark shrunk off the road and into an alley. With a few jumps, she threw herself up the nearest building and onto its roof, landing without a sound. On the balls of her feet, she dashed to the edge and looked over, finding the woman rushing along in the dark. Admittedly disconnected from her sex, she knew a woman cutting through a city at night was taking a risk – which presently, Tia was.
The woman left out the other side, Tia pursuing by rooftop. Her twin had signaled that this woman was some flavor of wrongdoer– having exchanged a letter with a man Tina had promptly stabbed. Frightened, the woman had run off right into Tia’s plan: tail her until she reached a safehouse and hit that too.
Like most in organized crime, the woman was performatively feminine, flowing from paver to paver with a pomp that most shed after witnessing a murder. To Tia’s eyes, it was protective instinct; appearing as men expected you to blunted them.
At least lose the heels.
Tia wasn’t sure what attracted the second daughters of merchants to crime. Sure, murder was exciting, as was sneaking around, but Tia had been raised in the practice. How they switched from “I need marry a stable man to secure my future” to “I will marry an erratic and violent man to ruin it” eluded her; granted, most of her confusion was at the “man” part.
She was getting distracted. Quickly inspecting the street, she saw nothing but a few waifs curled up in some crates. No other tails, no criminals. Tia looked back to find the woman stopped, and quickly leaned into the shadow of mansard. Whipping her head around, the woman stared down the empty street, then scanned what windows were lit, before turning off into a tenement across the way. Building power in her legs, Tia skipped from the roof to a streetlamp to another to the other side, flipping herself overtop the roof’s parapet and bolting to the building the woman entered. On its roof now, she found two chimneys, one with its flue closed, the other open. Grabbing her flask, Tina wet her scarf, knotted it tight to her face, and squeezed herself in.
Knife tight to her chest, she slid down by her feet, soot rubbing off from the brick. Stopping a few paces above the fireplace, she calmed her heart and listened. Muddled shouting came from another room, the words “murder” and “rogue” emphasized enough to be audible. It grew louder, then became clear as a door was thrown open.
“And you came back here?! What if she let you go to tail you?”
“I ran around the city for two hours! I’m not going to be found dead in a gutter somewhere. Besides, I didn’t see anyone.”
“That’s their whole shtick. Gods, what gang do you think it was anyway?”
“I don’t know.”
“If they’re pushing into our territory-”
“I don’t know! There hasn’t been fighting since the fourth peace! Gangs collect from petty thieves, we collect from the gangs, the organization collects from us. That’s how it works, no one wants to break that! The system is too good.”
Must be lieutenants.
“Are we looking at another war?”
“If we are, then we need to push this up – put in a request with internal security.”
This organized?
Tia frowned. Before she worked for Evil Boss, Eight Fingers had courted her and her sister’s services for exactly these sorts of killings. Now, it seemed they had moved those operations inside the syndicate. It didn’t matter. Tia clapped her feet together and fell into the room.
—
Evileye was perched atop a post in a field, the scarecrow that had once occupied it ripped off. Although it was near midnight, the moon was high and bright, casting fallow grass pallid.
Hope the weres stay put tonight.
Voices flitted in on the wind, and so she hopped up and peered west. Deep in the distance, her nightsight caught a glow on the boughs of an oak from over the hill. Removing a mechanical timekeep from one of many pockets lining her cloak and dispelling her invisibility to read it, she wound up the dial and set it.
At Tina’s recommendation, she had tailed a small convoy. For three hours, she had floated ghostlike amongst the guards, taking notes on their gear and catching what conversation she could. They certainly weren’t irregulars. Tightly disciplined, they moved in pairs, conducted rotations, and kept silent the entire time. To boot, they were well armed – by kingdom standards at least. This was enough to convince Evileye that they were criminals, but the Aindra girl wanted this job done clean, and so she relented from charming a rearguard for information and zombifying his mate. It wasn’t until highwaymen popped out of the bushes that things became interesting. Rather than kill each other, the lead carriage driver simply displayed a charm from underneath his coat, and the bandits let them through.
Upon seeing that, Evileye had flown a mile ahead of the wagon train, and began to lay her snare. Speaking sorcery, she wove incantations into the air, thickening it with ethereal wires and mines. There, she had left two dozen spellbombs hanging on nothing – some that would daze, some that would kill – and tied most of their threads together. The rest she looped around her stopwatch, hopping off to find a good vantage point.
The glow grew brighter, a hooded lantern poking over the hill. Then lumbered up three carts and the rest of the men, the entire convoy coming into a small dell. The light bearer yawned. Evileye clicked her watch and lit them up brighter.
—
Gagaran struck a final blow to the tree and felled it. Holstering her ax, she grunted the log up off the ground, slid it onto her shoulder, and started walking.
Eighteen should be enough, yes?
Step by step, she passed several fresh stumps on her way uphill. A stream was near, its crisp roar dinning the night alongside frog song and bug hums. Daybreak would come within the hour, the western sky already blotched purple. Legs burning, Gagaran plunged her free hand into her bag and ruffled around for a stamina potion. Finding one, she uncorked the vial with her teeth and downed it. Sickeningly sweet, it almost came back up. Either way, it eased her aches immediately, and by the time she crested the hill, restored her completely.
At the top was a pile of logs, wedged on one side by a rock and the other by her warhammer. Gently adding her last birch to the pile, she buried her ax in place of her hammer and looked down the slope.
You’d think these guys’d be smarter and post a night watch.
Nested in several tents below was a bandit outfit, a dozen horses tied up by the river’s edge. The Woman of Mystery could take six in a fair fight, but twelve was pushing it. Besides, a straight charge violated her most important rule: fight smart. Though seen as a brute, if she could exploit her strength for an advantage, she would. The logs were her cheat.
Thankfully, she wouldn’t have to capture any, Boss having sicked her on them with orders to kill. That was fine by Gagaran; petty theft was one thing, but holding gold-strapped farmers for all they were worth couldn’t be justified. People struggled enough as it is; to go and steal what of their harvest that wasn’t already stolen by lords was unforgivable. People would get desperate, they’d want revenge – all the more reason to post a damn night watch.
Why not? You guys should be smarter than this. What if someone sneaks up on you in the night? Like me!
It’s not like they weren’t skilled. They moved quick by day, quicker by night. At least one of them had a darkvision item, and so they knew how to provision. They kept on the move, swapping between hitting the routes to Re-Raevel or E-Pespel. They were well armed, had good horses, and good discipline. By Gagaran’s reckoning, they should know to do this.
To her, the whole operation stunk. Here were twelve men dedicated to taking the take of others, but a bandit’s life wasn’t any easier. They slept in tents, lived every day on the move, and were outlaws in their own county; all she could do was wonder why. Sure, she had roughed it too, but she was an adventurer; privation had driven her to fight monsters, not farmers. Cowardice could be the reason for that, but she couldn’t see how one could live with themself otherwise. It was better than this humiliation. She answered her earlier question.
They don’t post a guard because they don’t need to. No one is hunting them.
She licked her lips; that was to change. In one swift motion, she wrenched her warhammer from the ground and sent the logs rolling.
—
Lakyus’s heart thrashed. She was standing an arm’s length away from the door to an abandoned farmstead – at least it was abandoned until Eight Fingers began to use it as a waystation. She knew that beyond that door were a band of armsmen, at least two of them assassins; that once she broke it down, she would need to kill at least six and capture the seventh alive. She would have to be swift, lest anyone find egress on the back of a horse. Any mistake on her part could result in the poisoned steel of her enemy plunged into her body. This was not why her heart was racing.
Release us, Lakyus, it would be easier that way.
Her grip tightened. No matter what ghosts haunted the twins, nor curses befell Evileye, Lakyus bore a heavier burden.
You would enjoy it. You’re that sort of person.
Blacker than blood, blacker than blackest night, it had formed in blackness out of blackness, Fourth of Four of the Blades of Darkness, borne first by the Thirteenth of Thirteen, the cursed Black Knight, it was the Cursed Sword Kilineiram, and now that Lakyus bore it, she wondered if she was cursed too.
Why are you waiting? Kill them.
Her length long and width wide, Kilineiram was a jet black bastard sword that speckled with evil stars and spoke in her voice when no others were there to hear it. It stole her words and her laugh and her wit and her likeness when she dared to look at her reflection in it. Around others, in the day, it talked not, but locked to her back as sellswording made wont, it frayed her nerves and impressed its presence, never leaving, ever present. It consumed all things Lakyus; her thoughts, her mind, her time, her goals and hopes, her sense that she was a person, a noblewoman, an adventurer and a hero, a worthy servant of her God, her resolve, her confidence, and her sleep too.
Crush them. Ruin them.
Worse, she wasn’t even sure if it was the sword that had corrupted her. “What if it was my sin,” “my disloyalty to my God,” “my self incurred malediction?” The solution was all the same: prayer, atonement, repentance, faith in her god. This was enough most days, but not tonight.
What is murder without pleasure?
Moonlight defined Kilineiram’s edge, its gem twinkling with uncounted dark dreams, whispering to her.
Tear them to bits. Tear them - no, He of the Crystal Drop, get out of my mind!
Silence came, and Lakyus remembered she was in the middle of a mission. She remembered she was a Blue Rose, hero of the Aindra family like her uncle before her, successor to Rigrit, and the most gifted servant of her God in all the land. She remembered her friends. The pollutions of Kilineiram would not subsume her. Tensing herself, she blew through the door.
—
[40th Year of Foresai, Lower Wind Month, Day 3]
Everett began to rouse. Forced into consciousness, the first thing he conceived of was pain. His head pounded so hard it felt like his skull had been split in half. He pieced his first thoughts of the day together.
How late was I out last night? I must have drank the whole fucking town under.
Hangover was the wrong answer, and he knew it. His whole body hurt, and that either meant he had either really fucked himself up, or some one else had for him.
I got in a fight? Must’ve. Shit.
Brawl made sense, except he hadn’t been in town, and he wasn’t the type to get drunk on countryside swill. As he grew more aware, he took stock of himself: upright; sitting upright; sitting upright in a chair; bound to that chair. His eyes went wide and he shot forward, only to dig into the rope and lose his breath. Wheezing, he quickly tied together what he could of last night.
No, I wasn't drinking! We were in the safehouse when the fucking door exploded. That armswoman cut us to pieces.
He tried to blink, then realized his eyes were swollen to shit. Only his right worked, what it could glimpse smeared with candlelight.
I was captured!
He was dead. The Division of Assassination pruned its members regularly; anyone suspected of harboring disloyalties was killed. His band must have been tagged, but he couldn’t think of why. He needed to beg.
“We didn’t- we didn’t betray you. We weren’t doing any side work, I promise. We ain’t work for the other divisions either. Not without p-permission from above. We- we have our records-”
“Where?”
A voice – cool and feminine – spoke from the dark. He couldn’t see his captor, and though he opened his mouth to talk, nothing came out.
Fucking think, where did we keep it again?
He didn’t remember.
Of all the times not to-
“Where?”
“Hold on, hold on-”
It wasn’t at the forest hideout, was it?
“Speak or get gutted.”
“It wasn’t my job! It was Cev who handled that stuff.”
“Cev said it was yours.”
That lying bastard!
“That lying bastard! I promise I don’t know. I promise it was his job. We did the work that came down to us. Our time logs are clean, I promise. We never went running around behind the organization. We had no extra pay. I was living comfortable! The organization kept us all comfortable. We wouldn’t betray you. We wouldn’t betray you. We didn’t need extra money. I promise we didn’t need-”
He swallowed. They were never going to listen to him. This was exactly the way anyone sounded under a knife – lies flowed like water. Struggling against his bonds only bruised him more. Suddenly, a hand pressed onto his face, gloved thumb pushing his good eye open fully. In front of him hung a bone-white face, two thin slits looking into his.
A ghost?! N-no, that’s a mask.
Beyond that, the specter was thrown over in a red cloak; his heart dropped – no assassin dressed like that.
“You’re internal security, aren’t you?”
Four more figures came into view, the blonde woman who had slain his mates and captured him, two twins armed to the teeth with throwing knives and smoke bombs, and a strong-faced hulk of a woman slung up with a massive warhammer. She spoke next, low and gruff.
“Oy, loverboy, are we gonna have to keep asking you questions, or can you make this easy and just tell us everything you know?”
Chapter 9: Movement I: Dances at Sundown (9)
Chapter Text
[40th Year of Foresai, Lower Wind Month, Day 6]
Renner burrowed her nose in forget-me-nots and smelled nothing.
Odorless? Well, at least these really do match his eyes.
She had them planted for exactly that reason, chancing upon the powder blue pressings in the annual catalog from her flower merchant. Brought in from the other side of Karnassus, she’d kept them under magical preservation the whole way. Climate had been a worry too, these supposedly only taking to the ground in the cooler, dryer summers of the far south. Nevertheless, Renner had gotten it right, exotic buds abloom in her hands as if it was normal for them to be here.
Do I mean this?
Renner was a pastiche. This was deliberate, girlhood, later womanhood, a ‘doing’, not a ‘being’. At the time she uptook them, it had meant an agonizing divestment from topics of rulership and a centering of secondary pursuits, but that pain had since dulled. Botany was one such hobby; though she had spent over half her life and a fortune cultivating it, Renner could not tell if she enjoyed her flower garden. It certainly looked pretty.
If I don’t, I’d be planting this anyway. No matter. Besides, everything is dull next to Climb.
This caught her; thinking quickly, she snipped a forget-me-not at its midpoint and turned up and around only to miss the bouquet her puppy was holding and slot it right above his ear.
“Oops.”
“Y-your Highness.”
What good is suffering for a lodestar when I have you?
He blushed so deep that Renner snorted.
“If you turn any redder, I might have to plant you.”
This cracked him, and they both laughed purely. There were no servants around to ruin it, her gardens and the palace lawn that surrounded it empty of all but Climb and Renner; only a few watchmen up on the walls leered down, but Climb would take their teasing in stride. These moments were few, and if her garden had bought her one, she supposed it was worth it.
“Could you get the daisies for me?”
“Yes, Your Highness.”
Name me Chardelon.
His stiffness had returned, and though still smiling, he walked off carelessly, sabatons trampling the muddy earth. To be casual with another was a blessing which heaven had never gifted her. Lakyus came close, but she was an Aindra first and Alvein second, third great hero of that house. The distinction between that and family was something Renner had only recently learned to make, hers numbering too few for a genuine impact on her life. With her sisters in overwrought marriages, hopeless bachelors for brothers, and the cousins that could make up cadet branches having been murdered to the last in her grandfather’s time, Renner had been denied much other than her father and mother, the latter conveniently dead by the time she hit two. Vena had borne twins, but neither were yet old enough to make the journey from E-Pespel, and bar the same miracle as her birth, Renner doubted either would be her peer.
Is that victory? That he might forget my title in place of my name? Indemned from the world, he might find those sounds for me. Not else may he.
Climb returned with the daisies, she joylessly placing the white and yellow blossoms in the bouquet, a well-wish for Countess Miran and her latest child.
“Thank you.”
What then but the fruit of us? What would a child mean to me?
Were her plots to work and she to lay with Climb, Governor Yelta assured Renner she would bear one too. He denied her a detailed script of women, men, and their functions, but the heat between her legs told her something of it – some part of Climb’s surely matched hers.
To extend love, to have a daughter who might receive my gifts, neither interests me. The propagation of Climb’s line, however… If I could take him, gain his intimacy but keep his pliance. To drive him down and lash him to the ground. He is mine. He will always be mine.
Renner hoped those words could leave her lips and be true. Climb’s gaze narrowed; she followed it to see Warrior Captain Gazef plod out into the daylight, meet hers, and approach.
Father must be calling for an early dinner again. Wait, have I not just had contact with a Blue Rose? Surreptitious, yes, and with a false story, yes, but those are things exactly desirous for Gazef. Is that his purpose? He would be seeking their confidence, for whom else could look upon that weapon and speak its origin?
Though she had days ago determined that Gazef was unlikely to spill his worries to Ramposa, she hadn’t considered that he might to her. Either way, she smiled and waved, snipping a few more flowers as an impromptu greeting.
“Captain Stronoff, a beautiful day in the gardens, yes? I pray a few flowers will be enough of a favor.”
He smiled, eyes flicking to Climb and narrowing for an instant.
“Perfectly adequate.”
“It’s a troublesome gift – you’ll need a vase now. Poke the treasurer.”
“Aye.”
“I presume you are here to relay the words of His Majesty?”
“Actually, I’m afraid not, your Highness.”
And right I was. What now? There’s no need to address this in a blunt capacity. Lead him to the point and let Lakyus do the talking whenever that happens.
“Oh? What can the Third Princess do for you, then?”
“I understand that Lady Aindra of the Blue Rose came to visit you, recently. Your servant was wondering if she could be sent after.”
“Eh? Right when I thought House Vaiself had you for good, you declare intent to run off with a Sword Saintess.”
Renner gave a flippant laugh. Stronoff wryly smiled.
“Nothing of the sort, Your Highness.”
Harden, but don’t cool my voice.
“Quite. I presume different character to your request. In seriousness, Captain, may I remind you that you are an officer of the crown and cannot petition her services through formal channels.”
Renner hung her words pregnantly.
“That said, she is set to make a decidedly informal sojourn soon. I can arrange a pairing of you and her for an hour or so in the coming weeks. Off palace grounds if need be.”
“That… would be preferable to me, thank you.”
Gazef gave a deep bow.
“Apologies for the preemption, but I’d a sense of things.”
“Twice you’ve apologized for no reason.”
“Stronoff?”
“Yes, Your Highness?”
“Be careful out east.”
—
[40th Year of Foresai, Lower Wind Month, Day 8]
“I don’t get it.”
“You don’t need to brawn for brains.”
“Runt.”
“Brute.”
“No, but, seriously, I don’t get it. Is he going to ask us to go after Slaine?”
Lakyus looked from the squabbling Gagaran and Evileye to Renner – who was caught mid bite. Embarrassed, she swallowed and answered.
“I think it unlikely. Such an act could be construed as a violation of his oath to my father.”
The princess continually baffled Lakyus with her charm and politeness. Many of Lakyus’s peerage would have verbally eviscerated Gagaran for asking that, and the rest of those that did not would have patronized her with an aggrandized response. Far beyond pleasant, Renner was humble, kindly answering what was, honestly, a stupid question.
Does she even know she’s a princess?
“So he just wants advice?”
“Something like that. Is that billable under guild by-law?
Lakyus cut in before her team could say something else idiotic.
“No, and, Renner, how are we gonna handle this?”
“Hm?”
“What should I say?”
“Oh. Well, Gazef is savvy, he’ll know you know. I hazard he’d name me eventually, but no need not to nudge him.”
“Could your Highness have used more negatives in that sentence?”
“Apologies. Be honest in your evaluation of the evidence he provides. That you are unsurprised will arouse him, so allay him with the assurances that I only and only I guessed that. Wear no bias from your previous battles with Slaine, and heed not theories baseless. That should work, yes?”
“Right.”
“Remember that he is coming in need of aid. I ask no allegiance that compels you to deceive him.”
“Right, I understand.”
Renner flashed a smile, eyes veering off to look at the other patrons. Having been in the real article, Lakyus did not think The Explendant Palace lived up to its name. A tavern catering to gold rank adventurers or higher, only people who made a successful career out of monster hunting could afford to bed or dine here. Despite the attached spa, slime cave, and brothel, the multiracial clientele was typically enough to turn away most noblemen and plump merchants; that these were also the people who hired veteran teams was inconvenient, but unavoidable – the mercenary and extractionary rich only ever tolerated each other. In lieu of this, Renner was done up in the simplest outfit Lakyus had ever seen her wear, remaining politely unnoticed by the other guests – she had even left Climb behind. Strangely, if the plaque outfront was to be believed, this salon had been built two years before Valencia.
“That settled then, I do wish to speak of your actions, though I’m not sure this is the best place to do it.”
Ah, she didn’t notice.
“Can you hear anyone else?”
Evileye cut in on Lakyus’s behalf.
“Eh?”
Renner blinked, then looked around again and frowned.
“I can’t make out anything anyone else is saying. Is this the result of magic?”
“The effect is termed ‘Silence,’ Your Highness.”
“Your doing?”
The sorceress nodded, Renner mumbling something to herself about needing a court wizard.
“Well, all correct. Lakyus, your report, then?”
“We were able to investigate all seven of the convoys you provided. Six were in service of Eight Fingers; we hit two. We also found two safehouses, a bandit hideout, and a waystation, all of which we raided. All in all, we laid low twenty three, took five prisoners, burned about eight cart loads of contraband, and conducted three interrogations.”
“Haven’t gotten to the last two?”
Lakyus swallowed, the Princess ignorant of what she asked.
“Actually, no. In truth, one of the prisoners slipped out of her bonds and… slew another, then herself.”
How were we supposed to know she had swallowed a stiletto? We had her in enchanted bonds too; if it was clear she was a rogue trickster, we would have locked on a silence collar.
Renner stared before retching.
And your inexperience has lost you another. What hero of men are you when you can’t even hold a person captive?
“I… see.”
“Renner-”
“I know what you’re going to say. That I’m horrified, but that my horror is useless. I agree. I need to get used to people dying if I order them dead. I agree. Apologies. Can we move to- Actually, it's not a problem yet, but on the matter of prisoners.”
Have you not failed her? No, I haven’t.
Lakyus nodded along blankly, pushing out Kilerenam’s voice.
“I doubt your keep needs a gallows out back. I’ve made arrangements with the Superintendent of Justice to convene a closed court in the capital bailiwick; you will be provided the services of a bailiff and a crown prosecutor; they will have your take charged under a false name, and while you will need to give testimony, it will be innominate. You will be recorded as a person of peerage and no more.”
“Under what jurisdiction?”
“Pending further discussion, I think yours, though we could move it under the crown.”
In Re-Estize, justice was the total purview of the nobility. Every lord – if not otherwise bound by contract – had the inviolate power to enact or enforce their own code, with no provisions besides those respecting the jurisdictions of others. For Lakyus and her family, it had allowed them the admitted convenience of posthumously charging any human quarry with a capital crime and the ability to give testimony almost always accepted over that of their mark. For other houses, they carved systems of justice that separated petty thieves from their heads and condemned others to lifelong slavery.
“No, that way seems best. Still, doesn’t this unveil you as patronizing us to the ministers?”
“It would if you were the only people to use this framework.”
“Oh?”
“Of my grandfather’s legacies, judicial reform is not often mentioned. He was the one who meted out the kingdom into bailiwicks for crimes against the crown – insult, treason, the like. As you know, Lakyus, I am supportive of the adventurer cause; while the provisions prohibiting certain requests are certainly useful, they in no way codify the relations between a lay sellsword and a lord, or between one lord and another’s hirelings. I aim to expand that, providing a kingdom-wide foundation for the nobility to formally empower adventurers to act as their agents, recorded in a way that others might have their rights protected. To observers, it will have the air of another reform; for you, it will allow unrestrained disposal of the ‘chaff’ you pick up.”
Twice this week, surreality trounced reality, and Lakyus was not at all unconvinced that behind the closed door to Renner’s bedroom was a magical realm where fairies and maybe narcotics made the nonsensical sensical. The Princess, either aloof to goings-on or elevated above them, had first made the connection between a dour look on Gazef’s face and an international conspiracy, and now set forth a humble proposal to overhaul law countrywide for the purpose of hanging half a dozen prisoners. Gagaran cut in where Lakyus couldn’t.
“That is a lot of effort for cover, my Princess.”
“Less than you think; once I tie relevant parties to their chairs with a framework, drafting should go on with little effort.”
“I’m not sure we- er, I understand.”
“Eh? Um… You said you six of seven convoys, yes? I’m not so self-enthused as to think I caught everyone. Likely, we’ve missed the bulk of traffic in and out of the capital, and multiply that ninety fold over the country, and we’re considering boggling amounts of illicit freight. Consider too the sheer economic inertia of such an effort, the proportionless demand for Laira and the like. This isn’t a small effort, or even a sole effort. If we, the body of the nation, are to repudiate Eight Fingers and their poisons, then we will need a legal machine for doing so. This makes sense, yes? I know not the shape of my enemy, but I’ve a sense of their danger.”
“My Princess, all we’ve done is raid a handful of targets.”
“And you will again tomorrow.”
This silenced Gagaran, and, when no one else came forth, Renner continued.
“Now, share the details that justify this labor. Miss Tia, you look like you want the floor.”
“Found something concerning.”
“Pray tell.”
“They have a system of bosses and overbosses. Gangs report to bigger gangs report to captains report to bosses.”
“Not surprising. The organization serves to keep peace?”
“Sort of. At the lower levels, gangs compete for territory and rights to ‘syndication.’”
“That is pretty blunt for a euphemism.”
“Mm.”
“This competition is violent?”
“Yes, but not lethal. High performers are rewarded. The lieutenant we captured from the city got her rank by pushing product, not bodies.”
“So the organization regulates this competition. Inheritance is ditched in favor of competence. Sounds like a merchant outfit, or even the imperial bureaucracy.”
Despite herself, Lakyus felt dually insulted on the part of both merchants and imperials.
“That’s a bit far, don’t you think?”
“It’s what I expected. How else would they operate so competently?”
“I loathe to call it competent.”
“Perhaps I speak wrongly. We will relitigate this with better arguments in future. Then, to speculate, these bosses divide up territory in exchange for what, protection?”
Something implacable in the princess’s words disturbed Lakyus in a way she couldn’t vocalize before Evileye mistook the silence as an invitation to continue.
“‘Division’ is the term we heard used, but it’s not regional; they seem to be separated by function.”
“Like a merchant band? Transit, finance, security, et cetera?”
“Effectively.”
Would it kill her to use the proper form of address?
“You’ve a sense of their count?”
“Uh, from the prisoners we interrogated, eight.”
The princess’s stoic expression melted.
“Oh. Well that’s a bit silly.”
“Stupid, too. They reveal too much of their structure.”
“I’m not to bemoan a mistake on their part, but both naming and numbering your organization around the Kings of Greed is a bit chintzy.”
“They haven’t.”
“Eh?”
“The lore goes back further than that, to the being Divanach; he had eight fingers on his hand.”
“Ah. I’m no theologian, but that is the divine attendant to He of the Ruined Gem, yes?”
“The God of Earth’s pickpocket, but yes- er, no offense, Lady Aindra.”
“Me as well, Alevin.”
If I were to litigate every insult of my faith…
In Lakyus’s experience, far worse than those indifferent to the Gods were those that donned vestments and falsely proclaimed them. The priesthood of Re-Estize knew no better passtime than waxing bitterly about the secular rights of Vaiself succession or opining for the faithful despotism of the Holy Kingdom. They did do healing, and at charitable rates too, but acted no further; the true militancy of Robel’s faith or even the idolatrizing theocracy never had a home in the Kingdom’s temples. Exclaiming one’s faith the only virtue they knew, pastors maintained the open pulpits and no more. In this, neither Renner nor Evileye were offenders. As little more than layfaithful, they had done more to sweep away evil than any hierophant she knew.
“The name is less relevant than the reverence.”
“Quite right. I do ask, Lakyus, what are the divisions?”
“We don’t have a complete count, but, for now, ‘Smuggling,’ ‘Larceny,’ ‘Narcotics,’ and ‘Assassination.’”
“Those are the actual names?”
“Yes, they also seem to funnel coin through ‘Banking;’ whether it’s lending or money changing we don’t know.”
“The scale of Eight Fingers presupposes the latter; as licit commerce necessitates the exchanges, so does the illicit.”
“There’s also reference to something called ‘internal security,’ but we’re less certain on the details.”
Faintly displeased, the princess stopped her fork mid bite, and Lakyus had the inexplicable sense that she was about to be chided.
“And you are to say that all three interrogees tearfully pleaded their loyalty?”
What in what I said offended her? Is she accusing us of unjust treatment? You’ve lost her trust. No, I haven’t. She’s young and with none of your experience. She will need to be eased through these things.
“Our methods are not brutal.”
“That was not my misconception.”
“Then what did?”
Hold your tongue, Alevin.
“I speak of ‘Security.’ I was not so convinced of their need before today, but all conceptions change. Who hunts the hunters? No, by merit of their job, they would need be truly dangerous. Maybe my comparison to the Empire was not an extension.”
“You are speaking disconnectedly.”
“Run on I might, I apologize.”
Renner clicked her tongue, pausing to collect her words.
“I suspect that, in the coming moment, I am to be made aware that luridly told tales of dark adventurers’ diabolic doings are not tales.”
“Have you heard the name ‘Six Arms?’”
“Need I have to trust that we might one day do them death?”
“Why have you hired us?”
“What change is brought by anguish on a feather bed? I’ve useless feelings on this point, but I am no longer content to prattle with a pen when I can patronize the sword. At my word, death was brought to a score men who’d not have faced it if our land had given them more. If all people are to have dignified lives, then we must be rid of Eight Fingers – even those criminals suborned to it.”
“Compassionate killing is still killing.”
“And I have no response to that charge. I merely wished to prevent this ending from doubts of my conviction.”
A conviction founded on the excuse of a Slainish conspiracy?
Honestly-told lies were never so disturbing as dishonest candor. Completely convinced of an incomplete truth, Renner had moved to stake her arguments on air, deluded that over the cliffside was good ground. Lakyus realized that Renner was an excellent liar; that, evinced of the belief that her nation was facing multiple dooms, her exterior was never-the-less banal. Quite easily, the princess could have flushed Lakyus with false tears and a tale of some injustice heard second hand that convinced her that Eight Fingers needed to go. Instead, she had struck with raw reason, meeting challenges with unrefined response. Either gript by prophecy or sickness, Renner had made a feckless, doubtful prediction, something which Lakyus had experience in meeting with faith.
“I trust you.”
“Good, which is why I have my concerns with your opening.”
“Concerns?”
“Why did you only hit two caravans?”
Isn’t that obvious?
“Doing more would entreat suspicion.”
“Suspicion is the point.”
Oh.
Lakyus understood immediately, letting the princess continue for the sake of her comrades.
“Our information came from the æther. Are they to suspect that an here-to-for disengaged enemy spent a day trawling through paper records to sleuth shipments, or are they to assume a rival is entreating them to a knife fight?”
Renner pantomimed something unrecognizable as a stabbing motion.
“Wait, your Highness, you assume they are going to start killing each other.”
“Suspicion does more damage than we can, Miss Gagaran.”
A waiter slipped in through the silence bubble, depositing a bill Renner immediately took up.
“Now, let’s speak of tomorrow’s operations.”
Chapter 10: Movement I: Dances at Sundown (10)
Chapter Text
[40th Year of Foresai, Lower Wind Month, Day 24]
With a thwip-bang, Climb took a thin line out of the stone. An exercise Captain Stronoff showed him, it was a way to train the energy of a strike, focusing inner power to damage an obelisk with a wooden rod. The only way you succeeded was by landing the ‘Slash.’ This, Climb did eight more times.
Concentrate.
“Slash!”
Concentrate.
“Slash!”
Concentrate.
“Slash.”
He was pushing too hard. Jelca’s latest orders halved his free time, the marshal and the princess in some protracted duel over what cooler hours Climb could work. For now, he was still stuck on nightwatch, toughing through that and his day duties with stamina gum and grit. He would actually get to sleep tonight, but the stubborn teenage idiot he felt proud to be, he refused to drop his regime. Anything less than his best was not enough. He shook the sweat off his head; his thoughts were going nonlinear.
Concentrate!
“Slash.”
Concentrate!
“Sla-ah!”
Climb tumbled amongst the remains of his staff, gript by a disabling leg cramp. Rolling onto his side, he waited for his calf to stop spasming before he poked it, wincing from the pain. Soon, it sallowed – something clearly bleeding on the inside. He frowned; if he went to the chaplin now, he’d lose an evening of progress. Magic would heal the bruise, but training only worked if the muscles grew back properly, painfully.
Nothing for it.
Standing was out for a few minutes, so Climb made himself comfortable on the cold floor of Ro-Lente’s basement. He wasn’t sure what he was doing with his life.
The Princess is off fixing the nation with Lady Aindra and here I am doing the same thing I always do. I made trouble for her again, even if she won’t admit it. Is my service enough?
It wouldn’t matter to Renner – Climb could merely exist and make her happy. Pressed into service by his own guilt, his career as a professional was a lifelong apology for the fights she took on his behalf. Dimly accomplished, Climb was overcome by her new work with Lakyus, committing to a campaign no-one else was brave enough to prosecute. It took real gall to feel guilt from that too, that all he did was stand at her heel, useless.
How could it be?
Common musings had Climb winning the Grand Tournament as Gazef did, or somehow ending up on a city patrol and knocking down a few hooligans or two, or meeting an assassin in the night and running him through. Climb had never killed, or gotten into a serious fight. His swordplay wasn’t shabby, and he could lay out a few good men in a match, but the daydream that he might be Renner’s knight or champion or secret consort was always hollow; would always remain so. He was no warrior; he was unproven. An unproven fifteen year old boy that tried his hardest to grow up, Climb failed to be strong; Climb failed to be stoic. That he might one day win the tournament Gazef did, that he might find glory on the battlefield and take her hand, those were fantasies and would stay so. He just needed to convince himself of that.
Feeling no less morose than when he fell on his ass, Climb drew himself up. Not one to mooch on accommodations, he spent a few painful minutes sweeping up the stone dust and dumping his staff into the brazier. He was halfway up the stair before realizing his pockets were still laden with rocks – his trick to mimic full plate.
I’ve really been carrying these the entire time?
Unwilling to go back down, he trudged on to his bunk, passing through the palace grounds at sundown, towers and spires lit with orange. A few watchmen on the evening rounds only now lit their lanterns, nodding to a terribly tired Climb as he passed. After a too long walk he couldn't remember, he collided with his bedroll – boots and all – and blanked out.
—
[40th Year of Foresai, Lower Wind Month, Day 25]
Climb woke, basking in the night air and the drumming of his heart. That had been his worst nightmare in years, a hodgepodge of childhood motifs: indistinct adults; pallid bodies; clammy hands; rains so thick they killed. The order was indistinct, Climb drifting from muddy street to street, never able to find shelter or warmth. A mongrel set upon him at the end, Climb struggling so hard to run the world blurred. Every muscle on fire, he rolled over and hugged his pillow. He had watched people die in downpours like that, kept heatless and wet until their faces went slack and they never woke up. That would have been him if not for her. He still hated dogs.
Pushing up, Climb realized he was still on top of the covers, seams of his tunic etched on his skin. Teetering over the side, he unlaced his boots and beat away quickly to escape the smell; he was rank, stumbling through corridor after corridor to the guardhouse bath. Stripping and plopping himself in, he shimmied over and settled on the caliduct – still warm from the kitchen fires. Being that many served in the house of the royal family, knights, royal guards, and prize waifs actually upheld standards of cleanliness. He lounged a few minutes before scrubbing himself.
How do I hurt worse than when I went to sleep?
The body was enigmatic. Exercise could extend its limits, but the how of that had eluded description.
As scars grow back tougher than skin, so does muscle. But then shouldn’t injury strengthen rather than weaken?
Ancient wisdom from the All-Talk Sage claimed that exertion expelled a ‘water of pain’ that greatened muscle when it soaked back in, but speed, reflex, and vitality were equal parts of a warrior’s might, none of which had basis in alchemy. Direction of inner essence was the most detached. Never taken from the blood, it was said to be a strength of the soul, an ability that did not diminish with age nor was robbed by illness. Dissimilar to the life force monks harnessed to harden their blows, it was an inexhaustible capacity that could be tapped to the extent of one’s constitution; a layperson could never draw upon it, only dedicated warriors able to invoke it to shatter armor or stop strikes dead. Sharpening this was Climb’s focus, but he knew not if healing would impinge his progress. Not that he would risk it – he would just have to forge through.
Finished, he crawled out and wandered back to the dormitory. As a child, Climb had been assigned the unprecedented position of human hug pillow; By Renner’s command, he laid with her every night and got the life squeezed out of him for six halcyon years. Her hands were denied crawling over him in the night when the king finally ordered it stop, earning the chagrin of an eleven year old Climb until he himself hit puberty. Now, he couldn't imagine how it had been allowed at all – he would do anything to become her plush again.
I shouldn’t think things like that. She’s not mine to be… jealous of.
It really did twinge him. Barring miracle or disaster, they would never be that close again. Instead, he was relegated to the guard bunk here until she got married, and then the guard bunk of her husband. He felt like a cuckold.
Quiet to avoid waking anyone else, he withdrew a fresh set of clothes from his footlocker and fought them on. Doubting that he could sleep, and hungry anyway, he set off to the kitchens for an early breakfast and something to wake him up. Passing into the dinning hall, he filled his tankard with something stiff and snatched a yuzu – a southern citrus that by the Gods’ grace grew here. Daybreak and duty shift a few hours off, Climb had nothing better to do than read, and so he wandered off to the library.
This took him outside, walking under the light of a waning moon. It hung between two shadowy spires, stars vaulting up behind it. The higher he looked, the closer they seemed to get, until they looked close enough to grasp. He tried and missed. This wounded Climb so badly he started to cry.
—
[40th Year of Foresai, Lower Wind Month, Day 25]
Wavy hair already bundled up in a chignon, Lady Aindra waved to Gazef and disappeared past the city wall. Standing too stout to slip to the ground, he mounted his horse and kicked off. Somehow, the Third Princess had guessed his thoughts near and true.
That Slaine would be the ones behind this plot… I refuse to believe it. They have no business interfering in our succession; no cause to think we’ve abandoned humanity, even as heretics. More likely that I’m just seeing ghosts. If mine was an Imperial blade, then Barbro’s was too, which makes his story innocent even if untruthful.
Thinking like that was wishful. Eight months prior, a visitor came knocking in the night to his home. After suspicious greetings, the copper blond leveled a simple ultimatum: abandon Re-Estize or face death. Captain Stronoff pointedly indicated that this would betray his oath to the king, and an oathbreaker’s service was – by its nature – unreliable. Met with a conciliatory shrug, he bid the man leave at bladepoint, but not before forced upon with a sword as “guarantee.” Fullered, and made from fine steel, Gazef destroyed it immediately upon being given permission from Ramposa. His Majesty thanked Gazef for his loyalty, and the matter was buried until a fortnight prior, where His Royal Highness the Crown Prince gifted a weapon of the same make to his father. To relay this new fact to the king would shadow a well intentioned gesture with suspicion; to say nothing risked the anecdote making it out anyway. Worse, he had come to Lakyus for council, only to find it already had.
That the Princess seems to think the theocracy the culprit is folly on her part. Still, to think she worked out my worries from facial expressions; I didn’t think she was so shrewd. Was she baiting me into confessing my misdeeds to Lakyus? That woman is inscrutable; leverage like that could kill.
Not that Renner was the type to use it; even if surreptitious, her manipulations were not to harmful ends. Gazef was to seek Lakyus anyway. An adventurer, a presbyter, and a lady, she knew of politics while remaining unmotivated by them; a sword saint, there were few better to answer questions as to the blade’s make, and she had done so honestly when he presented it. The fine craftsmanship of an anonymous smith, no tells were left as to its creator.
I’d prefer not to blunder – even if into friendly arms. Was the Princess suspicious of me? It’s not that she thought me in bed, but swayed by their threats. What else could I do? This situation is impossible.
The weakness of how Renner concluded this aside, the Theocracy was certainly better equipped than the Empire to execute such a threat. Whispered to command echelons of humanity’s finest, or ‘scriptures,’ Slaine could sick assassins on him without compromising the government, not so for Baharuth. The Monster of the East could rightly kill Gazef, but he was only one. Depriving Arwintar of Parodyne’s aegis, even temporarily, could invoke the reaction that always hung above El-Nix’s head. Still, inconvenience did not mean incapacity.
What if it was a domestic threat? Who has an interest that far east? It’s all crown land. The only person who could plausibly try to kill me is Marquis Raeven; he has his team of ex-adventurers, but would they really challenge me? It’s impossible to tell.
Morosely, Gazef was unable to exclude Royalist plotters. Those who felt that the sovereign project of Re-Estize necessitated House Vaiself and its holdings as its core, Kingdom Royalism did not mandate accession to commoners in high office; Gazef’s assent to ‘Royal Warrior’ was as just as much an insult to the Urovana’s ilk as it was to Boullope's, and for some, threatened the credibility of the monarchy. That members more enamored with their peerage might move to end him was depressingly imaginable. Nearly running his horse into a cart while thinking this, Gazef reared his beast and focused on getting back to Ro-Lente.
Bolting up the cobble, he was granted passage through the fortress gates and entered the space between walls. Dismounting, he left the reins to a page only to find himself waved down by a critical Sir Elias Brendel.
“Captain Stronoff, fending off a proposal from the Aindra girl are we?”
The second most dangerous man in the King's service, thirty years of service had whittled the Royal Courier to nothing but muscle and reflex. Sharp and slavishly loyal, Elias held most everyone in a degree of distrust, Ramposa and his daughters the only exceptions.
“What if I was, Elias?”
“Don’t accept. Just try siring a child with her, you’d regret it.”
Gazef’s precarious political footing aside, the Aindras were dogged by lurid tales of their marriage practices. Political mindedness was assumed, but the Aindras had long selected by strength, children of the family marrying out of the peerage with successful adventurers, only for their children to regain honorary or legitimate titles. Both Lakyus and her uncle Azuth had done this, each obtaining a smattering of holdings across the kingdom through basic heroics. Most insultingly, neither had taken to the land, instead waiving control to seneschals for hire.
“I doubt she’d need me to provide.”
Elias narrowed his gaze.
“Guess not. Still, no meeting her alone again. Rumors like that have a destabilizing quality. Besides, that woman is parlous. Bad influence.”
Gazef raised an eyebrow, meeting an eyeroll.
“Jelca sent for you. Should probably talk to him before he gets pissy.”
You could have led with that.
“His office?”
“No, war room.”
You really should have led with that.
Gazef hardened his face and made for the keep’s command post. Entering and circling up a spiral staircase to the second floor, he marched in through the double doors to find Jelca and his aide-de-camp scrutinizing a map of the eastern territories.
“How quickly can you call up your warrior band?”
“We are dispersed, so two days.”
Jelca finally looked up.
“Send for them, we’ve received missives from Rettenmeyer of border violations. We’ll be issuing a formal protest with the Imperial mission tomorrow.”
Letting a few squires pass, Gazef slipped around stacked drawers filled with survey maps. This room was old, one of the first built in Ro-Lente. Never expanded, it hadn’t even been updated upon the completion of Valencia, simple wooden candle-holders molded into bare stone walls.
“What happened?”
“Border violation; a village was crisped. The scouts thought it was a dragon attack until they saw the grain stores looted.”
Gazef’s scowl grew deeper. Though enemies throughout their entire history, Baharuth and Re-Estize practiced the civilized way of war. With scheduled time and place of battle, fighting oft ended when the peace was signed. Only scouts kept on, in skirmishes or minor raids, but it was light – dragoons burning fields or absconding with a village treasury. None of that was wholesale slaughter. His suspicions quickened.
Maybe there are ghosts.
“That's a major escalation. Out of character, even for the Bloody Emperor.”
“It was only a matter of time before they made their incursions known.”
The Marshal looked around, leaning in and lowering his voice.
“But, privately I agree. This is strange.”
“Are we sure it’s the Empire?”
And if not them, the plotters against me? This timing is cursed.
A frown on Jelca’s face said no. He pulled back, a squire of his hefting a case up onto the table.
“Irrespective, it needs to be quashed. We want your men for this; knights are knights, but their skills start at misadventure and end at field battle. You’re more experienced to deal with whatever banditry- I suppose barbarism this is.”
Flipping open the lid, the squire revealed metal figurines used as force markers. The boy set those out for the warrior band and imperial scouts. Gazef looked at himself in pewter; the painter didn’t have Gazef’s deeper flesh tone, so his was the color of hide.
“Understood, sir.”
“His Majesty put out probes to the Great Six; unlikely a full council will get called, but there’ll be attendees.”
“Do you expect interference?”
“Don’t know.”
If nobility had moved against him, they would press to weaken him in official proceedings; that this would also happen without a conspiracy was supremely unhelpful.
“Oh, also, you’ve any knowledge of this ‘martial garden’ business?”
“Oh?”
Gazef didn’t; Jelca continued.
“Our bachelorette Princess, bless her, has taken to a new initiative that would strip us of manpower, fifteen silver-on-standard, and rotate them with the city guard. I have signatures from two-dozen commissars on my desk already.”
“Ho? Why the effort on her part?”
“Just trying to get her damned toy off night duty.”
Gazef snorted. The Princess’s manipulations were not to harmful ends.
“I don’t think it’s worth the fight.”
“It never is with her.”
JRS on Chapter 1 Thu 25 Apr 2024 10:29AM UTC
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MyHyperfixationIsTrees on Chapter 1 Fri 03 May 2024 11:18PM UTC
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Mr_Bones on Chapter 1 Sun 05 May 2024 09:58AM UTC
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The_Gallant_Heartbreaker on Chapter 1 Wed 10 Jul 2024 08:26AM UTC
Last Edited Sun 28 Jul 2024 05:13PM UTC
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JRS on Chapter 2 Thu 25 Apr 2024 11:04AM UTC
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Lightofdarkness (Guest) on Chapter 3 Mon 29 Apr 2024 12:57PM UTC
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JRS on Chapter 3 Tue 30 Apr 2024 06:04AM UTC
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JRS on Chapter 4 Tue 30 Apr 2024 07:35AM UTC
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wiseman207 on Chapter 5 Thu 25 Apr 2024 03:38PM UTC
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wiseman207 on Chapter 7 Wed 01 May 2024 01:38PM UTC
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hackslashbash on Chapter 8 Fri 03 May 2024 10:54PM UTC
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wiseman207 on Chapter 10 Fri 03 May 2024 09:54PM UTC
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hackslashbash on Chapter 10 Sat 04 May 2024 12:22AM UTC
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Lightofdarkness (Guest) on Chapter 10 Wed 08 May 2024 08:06AM UTC
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Olve on Chapter 10 Thu 17 Oct 2024 03:30AM UTC
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Chronicler76 on Chapter 10 Sun 20 Oct 2024 02:00AM UTC
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Luigi432 on Chapter 10 Tue 25 Mar 2025 08:14PM UTC
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MyHyperfixationIsTrees on Chapter 10 Thu 28 Aug 2025 11:20PM UTC
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