Chapter Twenty-Eight: Lady of the Realm

With what I knew from Ben's account and that of the German sailors, what I knew from my own account, and what I'd just learned from Jacopo and Thierry, I probably knew more about our mysterious enemy than anybody in the fae realms. For one thing, their 'vizier' was Vernal fae - so the green hair and fair skin suggested. Of course, this wasn't guaranteed… I appeared Vernal fae in most respects, for instance, but had the blue hair of my father's Hibernal heritage and eyes halfway between the ice-blue or sky-blue of Hibernal fae and emerald-green or mossy hazel of the Vernal fae. In any case, the vizier was a fae, and he was far to the south with this King in the South, who might be a man of any race. He was able to bring humans from Earth to Alfheim but could not control when or where the breach between worlds happened, and his king was recruiting soldiers from the war to fight at his behest. And now they had Ben and the artifact that had bonded to him, a relic capable of deliberately breaching the barrier between worlds. And, again, it didn't take Alathea to guess what they'd do with that relic: bring in more help.

For some reason, we were their enemies. At first, We'd assumed that the kingdoms of Wisthelm were somehow behind the attacks, but that seemed less and less probable. This menace, far to the south of the fae realms, apparently across the Shimmering Sea on the strange continent called the Outer Realms, had felt threatened enough by the union of Estival and Vernal to try to break it up. And, now that the union was approaching finality, who knew what their next move was?

"I have very bad news, my loves," Calivar said. He hopped into the carriage across from Meliswe and me and signaled for the coachman to depart. "It seems, according to the latest sage's prognostication, that the realms of Vernal and Estival will not fully merge. The gap between Vernal and Estival only closed by three yards yesterday and we'll be lucky to get another three all things told. Perhaps our union wasn't so strong after all."

I kicked his shin, but not too hard. "Don't be an ass. How big is the gap between realms?"

He grinned. "Four hundred yards."

"Four hundred yards?" Meliswe gasped. "That's practically nothing! If you posted archers at either wall, you could skewer the whole wilderness if you wanted to! I suppose raiders won't be much of a problem anymore. How about the realm itself?"

"By some estimates, it's doubled in size. Mostly jungle and desert, though there's a nice new river greening a strip of what used to be dunes that will be a nice hold for the king to gift somebody. Marzilar, our cartographer is still figuring out the details."

The mention of the cartographer made me remember Becounia, who'd been captured, recaptured, tortured, and killed in those wilds that were just about gone. I wondered what had happened to the ruined fortress we'd once been imprisoned in, whether it had been swallowed by the terrain as the realms shifted or whether, like many of the little towns and villages that peppered the wilderness, it had found itself drawn into one of the two expanding fae realms, suddenly in spring or summer climes, connected to the fae road system, and subject to the rule of a new king or queen (depending on which side absorbed it). If Becounia ever found her way back to Alfheim, I would see her rewarded for her bravery… maybe I could reserve some bit of new land for her own holding in Estival.

I peeked out the window - the city was behind us and we were now rolling past the neat, curated jungles of the Estival Reserve, where many nobles hunted and 'braved' the mostly-tame wilds for sport. Calivar had promised that he'd be giving the three of us 'very fitting' surprise presents. "Where are we going?"

"A surprise," Calivar grinned. And, when it was clear that that wasn't going to cut it, he added: "We'll be going to one of the wilderness towns that just became part of the realm. Large for one of the wild towns at two thousand souls."

"Is there anything special about this town?" Meliswe asked.

"Yes, but not to you," Calivar winked. "Not yet…"

He wasn't going to tell us. Intolerable, my inner princess said - but I wasn't about to give him the satisfaction of seeing me vexed. Instead, I slid closer to Meliswe and started kissing her, caressing her, sliding a hand under her straining blouse. Meliswe knew the game and played along: Calivar could look but he couldn't touch. It must have been some secret, because he just sat back and enjoyed the show. Or maybe it was a very enjoyable show… either was a distinct possibility. I certainly enjoyed myself.

We rode through the Reserve, through a tract of rolling savannah beyond that, and into a wilder, denser jungle, across dozens of little rivers that suddenly had charming stone and wooden bridges built above them. When the fae realms expanded, some strange creative force extrapolated how to bring the new lands together and extended and expanded existing roads to accommodate the new territory. Most fae assumed it was Gaia herself who designed the new infrastructure. Sometimes, she made mistakes, leaving 'orphaned' road systems or otherwise giving new residents no access to the greater realm, but that was vanishingly rare. This new town was connected via a very nice road system, smooth, ochre-yellow stones paving the whole way across jungles and wetlands, miles of roads raised over impassable terrain in what would have been a decades-long labor-intensive project if it hadn't just popped up overnight.

The ride out to the town occupied most of a day, culminating in a several-mile stretch past some of the largest trees I'd ever seen, and I wouldn't have been surprised if there was an Elder Tree or two further out there. Finally, we drove over an ancient stone bridge and past a trio of roaring waterfalls had had to top a hundred feet each. The bridge appeared to be truly ancient - all of the 'faux-ancient' additions to the new parts of the realm had a certain bland feel to them, but this felt genuine. Beyond was a broad clearing perhaps half a mile across and surrounded by trees. Dozens of small buildings were packed into the clearing, centered around a sizable temple vaguely shaped like a tree. We debarked from the carriages… the air smelled with the pungent sweetness of exotic orchids and possessed a pleasant, cooling humidity from the waterfalls.

"Recognize the place?" Calivar asked.

I glanced to Meliswe and shook my head. Neither of us did. He strolled over to the carriage behind ours - the one containing our attendants - and rapped on the window. Dill poked her head out. "Yes, my prince?"

"Miss Dill, is there anything familiar about this town?"

She craned her head back and forth, taking the town in, before gasping. "It's… we're in Blue Fern!" She bustled out of the cabin and past Calivar, sinking to her knees, her trembling fingers reaching down to touch a mossy paving stone. "I can't believe it."

"I got a report from the cartographer about this place last night, and I thought to myself: where have I heard that name before?" He clapped, which scared a duo of tropical birds, sending them squawking up into the trees, multicolored feathers settling to the ground. "That's right! Laeanna's pretty sylvast handmaiden!"

"I'm only half sylvast…"

He waved that detail away, as if it were unimportant to him. "Let's see the temple… I've sent a letter ahead and they should be expecting us."

The temple didn't just look like a huge, squat tree, it was a huge, squat tree… several of the, in fact. Two great oaks and to sequoias merged together and spiraling around one another on the outside of the temple and a great ramrod-straight ironwood tree buttressing the middle. The whole crown of the place was a vast canopy of leaves so dense that only a faint green glow of sunlight was visible through the crown of the roof. Green Mother Glwffau and Broulufou, who was Dill's sylvast father, met us inside and reunited with her. We gave the three of them their privacy while the green mother's acolyte gave us a tour of the place. The floor of the temple was about fifty feet across with an altar and little seats, all of them grown from the living roots of the trees that made up the place.

The dome above us gradually tapered to the crown, which was about a hundred feet up, and little staircases along the wooden outside had been extruded from the trunk, leading to a dozen platforms that could be used as meeting areas, prayer spots, or storage. The builder must have been a woodsong expert with a lot of time on their hands - which, I suppose, made sense.

"This is a powerful sort of sorcery," Calivar observed. "If it could be done quickly, a single practitioner could build houses, buildings, stockades, everything you might want in a defensible town."

I nodded. "It would have to be done responsibly, too."

He chuckled. "Responsibility to plants?"

"Plants are connected in a way that we aren't. They can sense the energy from one another, and they know if you've acted in good faith in the past. They don't think like we do, but you develop a rapport of a sort, like an officer with a good reputation versus one with a bad reputation, the men beneath you will respond differently. Plants must be given a good place to grow and, barring that, have somebody attend to their care for a good while. Otherwise, they'll come to learn that they're only being grown for your benefit and your efforts will be less fruitful… sometimes literally."

"I suppose that's why it's fallen out of favor. Anything that comes with responsibility is like pulling teeth when it comes to teaching people."

Meliswe nudged me. "It looks like the green mother is done with Dill."

Dill and her father were waiting near the temple entrance, an arched seam in the wood twenty feet tall and a bit over half as wide, separated from the outside by a great green drape of dangling ivy. I waved them away, calling out: "meet us back here at sunset!"

"That's only about an hour away," Calivar said. "We've got to have a quick conversation with Green Mother Glwffau before I show you what I really came here to show you."

The conversation with the green mother was about the town authority. Throughout most of the fae realms, everybody in the four realms was the subject of the king or queen of whichever realm they called home, but that had almost no impact on most people's lives. Realistically, the monarch required taxes and levies from the various nobles under their authority and, in return, provided support for the infrastructure and development of each holding. Unless there was a claim of serious wrongdoing, the local lords could be as strict or as lax as they liked in local governance. Most lords deferred to local mayors, town councils, or elders within the various holdings, passing down the monarch's expectations and whatever other requirements they had on top of that. When new communities or holdings were established, nothing much changed for the local people other than that the protection money they paid to raiders would now go to the queen's taxes, more traders from afar might wander into town and attempt to establish business, and work crews from the king would sometimes show up to help with local projects. Calivar explained this to the green mother who seemed neither impressed nor angered at this new state of affairs.

"And this new lord of ours, will he be the strict sort or the lenient sort?"

Calivar glanced to Meliswe. "You'll have to ask her," he said. And, when Meliswe didn't quite get the implication, he unrolled a scroll and cleared his throat. "I, King Alvaelic, being the uncontested lord of all Estival, do hereby welcome the town of Blue Fern and the holding of Blue Fern Valley into my domain. At the consultation of my advisors, I have decided to name the Lady Meliswe of the Blue Fern Valley as protector of this hold and grant her standing in the Estival Court. I have reserved funds equal to three years' taxation from the holding to commission the construction of a hall and shall not expect taxes from the holding during this time, though normal levies shall apply. The authorities of Blue Fern and Lady Meliswe shall sign below to seal this agreement."

"Lady Meliswe? That's me!" Meliswe practically shrieked. "The king is giving me a holding?"

"You cannot be a proper lady if you don't have lands," Calivar stated. "And I would be a poor husband if I let my wife behave improperly!"

Meliswe kissed my cheek, since I was the closest one at hand, scampered over to kiss Calivar - and she really kissed him, enough to make me jealous. Then she took the green mother's hand and looked at her very seriously. "Green Mother Glwffau… I'm pretty good friends with Dylthonouo, and she's always said this was a good town with good people. I promise I'll only work to make things better, and I'll always consult with you or your successors before doing anything that would affect Blue Fern…"

"My… successors?" Glwffau asked cautiously, as if there might be plans in the works to usurp her already.

"Distant successors, we hope," I added. Meliswe wasn't used to interacting with people who weren't deeply acquainted with the fae and how they interacted with the other races. Outside of the fae realms, most people regarded us as greedy tricksters, in large part because most fae who lived outside of the realms did so because they were merchants and had found better profits in distant parts of the world - so these were, by definition, fae who had been successful in their business endeavors. Add to that that the average merchant had probably been growing her business and amassing her fortune over many lifetimes… that meant the few fae a person was likely to encounter outside of the realm were wealthier, had better connections, and had more inside information than anybody else they'd ever met. And I could tell from the red bloom of her hair-petals that the green mother had heard our bad reputation and the jury was still out on whether she thought it was true. "Fae live very long lifetimes, sometimes thousands of years, and so a promise from a fae lady is a serious thing, for it means she'll still be bound to it a dozen generations from now…"

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"If she is honorable."

"If she is honorable," I agreed. "You trust Dill, don't you? That's what we call Dylthonouo."

"She has been through a lot," Glwffau said. "Quite a lot. But she was my favorite acolyte and seems a good girl still. I suppose I will have to wait to see if her woodsong has improved as much as she says it has."

"It has!" I laughed - I was now better at woodsong than Dill had been when she'd started teaching me, and Dill was still noticeably better than I was. "And she's probably my best friend… best friend who I'm not married to, I mean. She'll vouch for our honor… and, if you don't believe that, I guess you'll just have to wait and see. But I'm willing to stake my reputation on it." I undid my necklace and handed it to the green mother - thin, tightly-braided strands of dark ironwood with a single thread of red oak weaving through in the outer styling of the Vernal crest. In the center, in lieu of a patterned chrysanthemum bloom, was an actual blooming flower, its petals alternate orange and golden yellow.

The Glwffau examined the necklace carefully, marveling over the craftsmanship - and it had taken me most of a week to make, so she'd better have been impressed. "This… this is woodsong?" she asked. "Dylthonouo made this?"

"I made that. Dill's better than me - she's my teacher. Keep it if you like - making woodsong jewelry is a hobby of mine."

The green mother brought the necklace around her neck and hummed a happy note, causing the rootlets at the back to twine back together. "If the plants will do this for you, then they place great trust in you and so shall I. Therefore, I will be forthright in asking for our help - five young people from our town ventured into the wilderness to search for the source of the strange changes to our land. We did not yet know that the fae realms were expanding… I only heard of this happening once before, whispered in awe when I was a young acolyte, and those seventy years ago it was so long ago that I considered it a fable. They haven't returned and I fear that they've been separated by many leagues, far beyond what they've supplied for."

"I'll have notices posted and launch a search party," Calivar said. "If they can be found, we'll find them soon. Now… I'm sure we'll meet again, green mother, as I plan on returning now and again. But I really must get going - I have something else to show my wives before it gets too dark outside."

+++++

Just outside of town was a trio of waterfalls cascading down a jagged cliff face. At Calivar's indication, the three of us buzzed up to the top of the cliff, where the river feeding the three waterfalls had carved a channel into a relatively clear area of flat bedrock over many thousands of years. I looked about the place - somebody had stuck surveying posts around the place and asked him about them.

"I thought this might be a good place to build Lady Meliswe's estate. There's a spot where we can carve rocks into the cliffside, but otherwise we won't have to bother the townfolk at all, except whomever we hire to help with the building. We can build right over the river to give the manse fresh flowing water and a source of power if we drop a wheel into the thing. Plus…" he pointed out over the cliff.

The sun was beginning to set over the distant jungle far down the valley. From our vantage, we could see the entirety of the Blue Fern valley from the ridge we stood upon all the way across to the distant hills perhaps five miles away. A great river flowed through the valley, too, no more than half a mile from the outskirts of the town, glowing like sunstruck copper in the ebbing daylight. It must have been a mile wide, far broader than the Missouri River back home, and it curved lazily along the valley until it terminated in a delta in the flat wetlands beyond the end of the valley.

"That's the largest river in Estival now," Calivar said. "I imagine this will be a pretty prosperous place in a century or so - lots of opportunity for trade and growth, especially if that body of water connects to the ocean. Marzilar is still mapping the coastline."

"This is to be my holding?" Meliswe asked. She clutched at my wrist so firmly it hurt.

"It's not much, I suppose. The valley is five miles across and twelve miles long, plus the delta and the heights along the valley. It's around a hundred square miles… not a duchy by any means, but nobody will blink an eye at our giving…"

"It's beautiful!" Meliswe said. At that moment, the sun was just about set, the distant, rolling mountains cast in orange and crimson with streamers of dark clouds radiating out like a great grown. The river was a violet snake glittering indigo, and a small flock of tropical birds burst out from below our promontory and dispersed, shrieking away through the warm, flower-scented air.

I pouted, mostly in jest. "I thought you had surprise presents for all of us," I said.

"I do!" Calivar beamed and strutted over to me, opening a small sack he'd been carrying the whole time we were here. "Go on, reach in."

"It's not going to bite me, is it?" I asked.

"I would be very surprised if it bit you. Go on, my princess."

I reached in with some measure of caution, half-expecting a trick. Calivar liked to play harmless little pranks sometimes to see if he could get me to shriek. He did it to Meliswe, too, but less often - he said it was more amusing when it was me, since I used to be a man but was now captive, seemingly, to old Laeanna's shriek sensibilities. I begged to disagree, but he did it anyway. He didn't make me shriek this time, though - inside the bag was a handful of small red and green fruits, about the size and feel of grapes.

"It's… a fruit?" I asked.

"Go ahead and squeeze one."

I did so, and with a little finagling a slimy white seed popped out. I frowned, turning the thing over in my finger. "It's a seed…" it looked somehow familiar. My eyes went wide. "It's coffee?"

Calivar nodded. "It's coffee."

"It's coffee!" I shrieked.

He chuckled. "I knew I could make you shriek, no trickery needed. I'm afraid there aren't too many of them yet…"

I danced around, plans and machinations suddenly swimming through my mind. "With these, I can learn their woodsong and turn just about any plant into a coffee plant. We've got coffee in Alfheim now!"

"That's sunset," Meliswe said. "We should go meet Dill." She just didn't understand the importance of coffee - but I wouldn't let her remain in the dark for long.

+++++

As soon as we got back to Estivalia, I sent a summons to Albrecht and Otto, the two German mariners who'd been shipwrecked in hibernal at the same time Ben was. Otto Meyer was an ace with all things mechanical and almost as much of a fiend for coffee as I was. Albrecht Weber appreciated coffee but was more of a casual enthusiast - but he had some mercantile experience, too. I thought the two men would be a good pair for starting Alfheim's first coffee company and, as their financial backer and one of the very few people who knew where to procure coffee beans, I intended to be a very active third partner in the business.

I bought them a storefront a block down from the merchant stalls I'd set up near Master Dhyr's new dojo. That way, I could stop in for a coffee and track the progress of the business on the three days I went to the dojo to train. The other three days, Dhyr came to me - one of the benefits of being royalty. It had to be that way because I was expected in court at least one or two times a week. That was good, though - it gave Albrecht and Otto a few days when they didn't have to worry about the Princess of the Vernal strolling in and insisting that she should try every new formulation they'd come up with. I doubt they got any work done when I was around beyond running Otto's new machines through their paces - I could be a real blabbermouth. Nobody in Estivalia aside from Calivar and Meliswe really knew me, and so I didn't have to stay taciturn out of fear that I might expose that I wasn't the same old Laeanna.

The midday sun was beating down and I'd already worked up a sweat from an hour and a half training at the Dhyr's Fang Dojo, where we'd gone over rolls, dodges, and neutralizing your opponent's weapon. The dojo already had forty students, more than half of them women, and that was after Dhyr rejected three quarters of applicants as not being serious enough. I entered Beanheim - that's what we were calling the café - with my security detail. This consisted of two women, Alfina and Khruze, from my fighting class, all of us clad in the loose beige trousers and brown, carefully-wrapped vest-tops. I inspected the café layout, still under construction with a final layout very much in flux, and mused over Otto's latest coffee invention, a boiler with a built-in frother. Laeanna was better than Larry Born at so many things that it was easy to forget that Larry Born had been pretty mechanically-inclined. I was still very mechanically-inclined for a fae, but I'd definitely lost a step or two. Laeanna's brain just didn't follow contraptions with the same ease. Fortunately, Otto still followed them plenty well. I sipped at the espresso he'd just handed me, wincing a bit.

He ran his fingers through his dark hair and winced in sympathy, as if I might get mad at him. "I think it's a bit too strong…"

"Maybe a bit," I allowed. But, truth be told, slightly-too-strong espresso is a godsend after months with no coffee whatsoever.

Khruze, a full-blooded sauryx, scales and all, took a sip from her cup. She made a sour face, nearly spit the stuff out, and glanced toward me uncertainly. "I think these men may be trying to poison you, princess."

"It's supposed to taste that way."

"It's an acquired taste, miss," Otto said. "I'm going to add a dial to adjust brew time so we can adjust the strength to whatever you like."

"Whatever the customer likes," Albrecht corrected him. "The ones who aren't princesses will still be paying good money, so we'll give them whatever they want, even if it's hot water with a whisper of coffee. We've got to court our customers."

"Court!" I shouted - I'd completely forgotten that I was expected in court. While I didn't have to be there most days, afternoon court was hosting delegations from all four realms to discuss the aftereffects of the union between Vernal and Estival and how to account for its effects on trade and travel. Afternoon court started at two o'clock on the dot, and I was expected to head the Vernal delegation. I nudged Alfina and Khruze. "To the palace, on the double!"

I suppose I could have commandeered a coach, but that seemed like taking advantage of royal authority. Instead, the three of us dashed through the streets, weaving around the slower pedestrians and bounding up the stairs the whole two miles back to the palace. I could have just flown to the palace in two minutes flat, but I wasn't supposed to leave without my detail unless it was an emergency, which this wasn't. It would be embarrassing if I was to show up late, but nobody was getting killed or imprisoned over it.

I didn't show up late - in fact, I made my appearance in court two minutes early, just as the king was getting announced and everybody was supposed to bow or curtsy. So I planted myself into a princess's half-curtsy, panting and dripping sweat and still dressed in my sparring clothes - the rough-spun beige trousers, the wraparound vest-shirt, and no shoes whatsoever. I was, by far, the most underdressed person in the place. I glanced up to the throne area, where I would have been standing if I'd arrived four minutes early, and spotted Calivar. He'd definitely spotted me, too. He grinned like a maniac and waved his fingers at me before turning his attention back to the entering king.

"King Alvaelic, King of the Estival, The Lord of Summer, and Defender of the Fae Realms!" The court steward boomed. And as a taurin, he could really boom.

"Yes, yes, as you were," the king said, sliding into his throne. "Have the delegations all arrived? I don't see my daughter-in-law, Calivar. Where's your wife at - the princess wife, that is?"

"I'm here, my lord," I shouted, and suddenly all eyes were on me. I blushed, though I doubt you could tell over my sweaty exertion. "Sorry… I was away training."

"Well and good. It's good to be prepared, though we fae haven't faced war for a thousand years. And haven't I told you to call me father?"

"Yes, father." I curtsied. He had told me this, but there were also circumstances where I was supposed to call Alvaelic 'king' or 'my lord', and I erred on the side of caution when I wasn't sure which it was to be, which was usually. "I apologize for my appearance…"

"Still fairer than almost anybody here," Alvaelic said. I worried how the assemblage of lords and ladies in court would take that. "And I see Fostolas's boy has arrived. Prince Gaelin, isn't it?"

"Yes, king," Gaelin said. He was seated next to Meliswe in the gallery of VIPs. They'd left a seat open for me, but I'd arrived too late to occupy it. "My father sends his regards and has granted me writ to see to the affairs of Hibernal."

"Good. And what of Queen Presimiwe's people? Have the fae folk of autumn arrived yet?"

"No, your majesty," Lady Philiastra, the king's chamberlain, said. "Nor any indication that they've yet reached the Desert Gate… perhaps they didn't account for the substantially greater distance."

"Well… I'll not hold everybody else up on their account. Laeanna and Gaelin, please bring your delegations to the royal courtyard. I've a meeting area and refreshments at the ready. Lady Chamberlain, I grant you leave to carry out the mundane tasks of court in my absence."

Philiastra curtsied. "Thank you, majesty."

We retreated through the royal preparation room and into the broad, sunny courtyard behind it. The yard was mostly open to the air, but great shades had been erected past the awnings to cast half of the courtyard in shadow. Beneath the shade was a large table with room for sixteen with slightly more-ornate seats where each of the delegation heads were supposed to sit.

"Elena!" Alvaelic waved for a maid's attention. "Get a towel for Laeanna to sit on! I don't want the upholstery ruined!" he turned back to me. "I got these chairs from my mother - they're very old."

A minute later, I was able to set myself on my terrycloth throne next to Vittoro, Surburrus, and Lithya, who was serving as Alathea's cartographer until Becounia returned from Elysheim - we were the Vernal delegation. The Autumnal delegation still hadn't arrived, but there was plenty that just the three parties could discuss. We broke out the draft maps - the still-sketchy maps of the changed fae realms. While Vernal and Estival had doubled in size, Hibernal and Autumnal had only expanded about twenty percent - enough for the kingdoms to line up, even if they were now visibly outsized by the other two kingdoms. Estival was about the size of Iowa and Vernal was just a bit smaller. At their juncture, the four realms met in a nearly-perfect x-shape of wilderness - very narrow between Vernal and Estival and widest between Hibernal and Autumn, maybe twenty-five miles across. At the center of the realms was a great mountain atop which sat the Palace of Gaia. When the realms were smaller, the monarchs used to meet there about once a year, rotating between the solstices and equinoxes, but doing so was impractical now. Now, the palace was reserved for the time when a single king or queen would unite the fae realms - a time still thousands of years off if it was ever going to happen. Still, I hoped to see the place some day…

"What do you say, princess?" Alvaelic asked - I hadn't been paying any attention. Something about ships?

"About who shall provide ships for our new coastline," Vittoro whispered.

I nodded. "I am open to any option, but this is what I propose - Vernal is going to build its own shipyards, obviously, but it could be a few years before they're productive. If we can rely upon you to provide ships, we'll buy them for double cost, provided you can also train our sailors. We've never had a navy beyond a very small littoral one and good seamen take time to train. Because of my ties with my husband, I feel it would be more appropriate if Estival provides our military vessels so I can oversee the military training, while Hibernal provides our mercantile ones."

"Very well… shall we start off with twenty of our barques?" Alvaelic asked.

"Fifty ships," I said. "Eight dreadnoughts, seventeen barques, twenty-five sloops. We're a larger nation now with much more coastline than we'd expected… in these uncertain times, we'll need to expand our defenses - as, I imagine, should you." Vittoro just nodded, which I suppose meant I was making good strategic sense.

"And how many flytes would you request of Hibernal?" Gaelin asked.

"I think for-" I didn't get a chance to ask for forty cargo ships because a shouting messenger burst through the door, even more sweaty and breathless than I'd been after sprinting two miles from Beanheim.

The messenger wore a lieutenant's uniform in autumn colors turned splotchy with mud and blood, ripped and tattered in parts. He bowed as quickly as decorum would allow and slapped a paper on the table. "Your majesty, lords and ladies… Autumnal is under attack and requests the aid of her allies!"