"The Great Heirling of the Red Sword is too arrogant. Forgets about the ambitions of the little people." Said the purple-haired fae.

The shadow monster roared, murder, hatred, and rage spilling out. The servant girl gripped what must be what was left of the Golem, and darted away.

The former Heirling of the Red Sword, however, sighed.

"Hello, Kane." He said. "I go by Branch, these days." And then Vye, or Kane bearing the mantle of a midling, felt her world rock as gravity shifted and she and Elswith hurtled to the ceiling.

She landed hard, not braced properly. Elswith had escaped her hold on him, using one of the Library's self-defense arts against her despite her much higher strength.

"How long have you been holding Esra's spell?" She cursed at him, rage. This was all a game to him. He, the puppet master. Elswith, dancing along a knife's edge of fae politics, always making the right move.

She tried not to notice how slowly Elswith moved. She knew he had a trick up his sleeve. He must.

The moment between them seemed to drag on forever.

There was much hope and anticipation for Kane. She had been the best and sharpest of her generation. Desperate had her parents been, when they had been so utterly lackluster themselves, to stay in the Citadel, and not be sent back to the outer territory. Her family had no ancient bloodlines nor great power. But what they did have was connections.

The Senate was designed to be a wise governing body, designed to keep the power-hungry courts in check, and designed to give voice to the small fae. The Senate could draw members from prominent families, courts, low fae.

In many ways, it was a regional governing body. It allowed deals to be struck between Courts too opposed ever to reach an agreement. Deals were made. They always were. Small deals, good deals, kind deals, hard deals.

Then a change happened. And Unfair deals were made. The Law of Fae allowed for unequal trade. One Fae's goose was another Fae's treasure. What was extra for one was salvation for another. And the Senate could broker those kinds of deals the most easily.

The Senate rose in power. Suddenly, one did not need an impressive ability to wield power. Unlike the Factions and the Courts, where heirs needed to master great arcane powers and be skillful in battle to be worthy to inherit, suddenly, the Senate was amassing power, intangible and tangible alike.

But the Senate reached a limit. The Courts and the Factions could still strong-arm them. The Senate had no military power. But true devastation occurred when the Current Fairy King began to act. He hated the Senate and set about to break them down. The progress of several generations, up in the air and being drained out.

So then the Senate turned to their family members and gave an ultimatum: Secure power. Become Lords. Or else you will not enjoy the privileges.

Suddenly, Middling Fae who had enjoyed privileges for dozens of decades had to actually do work. Children, which had been a somewhat unpopular choice for many of the Middling Fae coasting on their relatives in the Senate, were the easiest option. As long as someone in the direct family line achieved proper Lord status, the entire family line was secured.

Which led to a great population boom.

Which led to Kane.

The best way to reach Lord was start young, as a Lordling, and join a circle. Through great many connections and deals, and one or two broken promises, Kane had been installed to the Red Circle.

She was different from them. She had always been different from them. They had never truly accepted her. She knew that. They had always mocked her. She had never been accepted.

Except...late at night, sitting with her feet in the sand before the great ocean, and listening to the stories the others told, she had almost believed those in her Circle. That they enjoyed spending time with her. That she was precious. That Elswith had...viewed her somewhat more fondly than the others. In a different way.

But she knew. They never understood her struggle. Her fighting for position. Everything had been given to them. To this day, she had never been given a griffin, her family simply didn't have the correct connections. How her circle must have mocked her, hated her, behind her back.

Besides, that was fine. She hated them too. Her family had paid much for her to attain a place there, only for the group of the most powerful offspring of various Houses, Families, Factions, and Swords to stall. Hollis, despite being from a powerful lineage, bore the curse of both families. Cleo, the granddaughter of the Lord of Time himself, was always late in her timing and her attacks. Every single one of them was in one way or another worthless. Worst of all of them was Elswith. In his first battle, he had disgraced himself on the field of battle. How could the son and heir of the Red Sword not even control his stomach? She hated them. Hated that they took this so casually. Carelessly.

She had fought for so long, and yet...it was clear she needed to make some changes.

Which led her to her recruitment into the King's Enforcers. It was a difficult decision, of course. She had moments, many of them in fact, where she felt accepted by her circlemates. Where she had fun with them. Where she knew, just knew, that they were almost ready to be completely magnificent during campaigns.

But after watching her cousins get taken to the country estate, former rivals though they were, unlikely to ever return to the Citadel again, she knew she needed to act.

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So she had left the Red Circle. She was promised a good position in a unit of the Enforcers and eventual promotion to the equivalent of Captain. Everyone in the Circle had begged her to stay. Hollis in fact had taken her to the ocean, and proposed she join his Family, like a squire. "They can't send you to the country if you have ties to me. There is still respect for my family, even if our power has waned. Believe in me. Believe in our Circle. We can do it. We can make it together. "

She knew if she did that, that would limit her future. Becoming an Old Lordling was worse to her than dying. So she had walked away.

That had...hurt. Walking away from him. If it had been Cleo or Elswith who made that offer, she might have accepted it. Though it cut her to walk away from her friend, she knew Hollis had no future. His family's ties to the defeated Ocean kingdom were dragging them down, deeper than the black depths of the abyss.

During her last campaign with the Red Circle, she had watched how easily they interacted with the few humans. How Elswith had toyed so easily with the weak creatures. Much of the group treated the humans the same way they treated her. Did they view her as equal to the magically insensitive humans? Humans. The rightful plaything of the Fae?

The Red Circle may have the freedom and resources to mess around. But they didn't understand what it felt like to be in need. To be the underdog. To be...the main character.

So she joined the Enforcers.

Fate had a sense of irony. As if she had been the thing holding them back, the next campaign the Red Circle was majorly successful. They had even treated with several human kingdoms. This was a major feat because for many decades the human kingdoms had only dealt with the Senate and no other branches of Fae power. And since the only member of the Red Circle who had ties with the Senate had left the Circle...that had earned the ire of her family.

Only after the Senate's spies investigated and revealed how close a thing it the Red Circle's success had been, and how nearly they had failed, did her pride sooth.

To mock her, her Circle had reached out. Perhaps some of them had good intentions. Perhaps all of them did. But she knew there was an element of pity there, and they couldn't hide their 'well-wishes' as anything other than mockery. Ria, the worst of them, always proper, had privately expressed to Kane "I forgive you. I understand why you left. Come back. We miss you."

The Law of Fae wouldn't allow one to lie, but Kane knew from growing up in her family how hollow words truly were. Ria forgave her, did she? Implying Kane had done something wrong. High and mighty. Disgusting.

So Kane had refused.

And then the Red Circle made it.

They defeated a dragon.

It didn't matter that they had only sealed away a long-dead corpse of a dragon. It didn't matter that they were late and the landscape forever devasted. Even the loss of several small realms was forgotten.

All that mattered in the Citadel was that the Red Circle had defeated a Dragon.

It would have been enough favor earned for Kane to become a Lord. Not a very powerful Lord, but all the Senate required was for her to acquire Lordhood. None of the others in the Red Circle choose to transcend to Lord, leaving the protection of Lordling behind, which infuriated her for some reason. Like the great accomplishments weren't enough for them. For those with deep roles, like Elswith and Cleo, it was probably little more than a drop in the bucket of power they needed to earn.

But it would have been enough for Kane.

And that is what had led Kane to truly desperate measures. She had to make deals, swap alliances, and beg, to be in a position to stop this game. Or the power behind the Senate would crumble.

"Esra flipped my gravity," said Elswith, calmly. Why was his face always blank? Why was there always a placid calm? "Right after he brushed by me. I was gripping the podium with my legs. I suppose the magic spread to you, somehow." He said vaguely. The Law of Fae agreed that he had not lied.

But it lacked a certain sparkle of the truth. A certain sparkle she was normally accustomed to when dealing with him.

Kane knew. He hadn't lied, but the word 'somehow' could mean anything, from a magic spider accidentally leaving extra magic to the First King himself doing the magic himself. But she knew. Though he never spoke of it...Elswith had used that...understanding of the Law of Fae to manipulate Esra's spell.

"If you think that keeping me here will stop the shadow monster below, you are gravely mistaken. And even if not, even if Esra and that other Middling have any chance, they won't be able to save you from me. I'm at a Middling's power, while you've had...less than a full day to gather power. As a Lowling."

"I beat a Lord before. As a Middling Lordling. Lord Fredar, has he recovered yet?"

Anger burned in her as she held the dagger. He must have known the deals she had had to make. Even as much as she had hated Fredar as a Lordling, she knew that they at least shared a common enemy. "If you start this game, Elswith, you will destroy the power of the Senate."

"If the truth can destroy something, how can it stand at all?"

Below them, Esra and the green hatted middling who was still tripping over his feet, were losing ground to the shadow monster and Kane's allies.

"When did you know?"

"Lord Fredar may have challenges with his mental capacity, but the Waasla Alliance does not. They have one chance to directly stop me from starting the game. But that doesn't mean they only have to send one party. I am sure they have numerous parties, searching for me. Perhaps only one can act on me, but they spread a net to catch me. Who sent the Golem, by the way?"

Since he had answered her question, the Law of Fae compelled her to answer back. She should have been more careful with her words. Time was ultimately on Elswith's side.

But she could choose what question to answer, "I knew you had fondness and familiarity with the O'Tells Family. I knew that when an alarm went off here, that it was probable that you had caused it, one way or another. So I used my Mantle as Vye to attack you. It's fun being at a Middling power level again. After promoting up, it's so different. Too bad you will never know what it feels like."

"Is Vye even alive?"

"She is fine. She may even get her identity back after this silly game is done. She traded her name, she knew the risks."

Elswith's express was cutting, cold and somehow even put a pang of guilt into Kane's chest. "I hope you never know, my old friend. What it feels like to have all your power taken from you. How hollow it feels."

"That was your own choice. Elswith. Wait, that's a bankrupted name now, isn't it?" she said, to hurt him.

The look in his eyes made her feel angry. Like he knew something she didn't.

The fight below was not progressing as Kane had imagined. She had thought that the Middling under her direct command would quickly loose chaos. But they could not keep up with the chaos that Esra was unleashing. Esra's involvement should have been forbidden. Esra was easily targeting both of 'Vye's' subordinates, and assisting the greenhatted Middling.

"If you win now," said Elswith, "The Senate will lose face."

She gripped her dagger and charged at him. He evaded, slower than her now, but still narrowly redirecting her attacks.

"Despite your loyalty to the Senate, Kane, right now you represent the Sky Court."

"Fight me!" She said, swinging at him.

Her blade narrowly missed him as he flowed away from the attack. She recognized that form. That was the form used to defend against aerial attacks. Anger boiled in her chest. How dare he pretend, how dare he act so weak.

Always leading her on. Making her think he had...perhaps even loved her.

Then to speak the same way with that human wench.

How dare he speak of loyalty, when he had none?

Standing on the ceiling, upside down to the rest of the world, Kane cursed in her heart. "Don't I mean anything to you?"

She charged forward again.

And then Elswith attacked.