The ride in the carriages through the sprawling city that had been allowed to grow up around the outside of the walls of what was now the defensible “inner city” of Fastel was informative. Myrl knew there would always be trades that had to take place outside the walls of the castle, but Fastel had been allowed to grow far beyond what any ruler of the city should have permitted. The footprint of the city outside the walls was now so far beyond the size of that inside the walls, that none of it would ever be defended from attack, and any siege would end quickly, with sappers and siege engines being able to get far too close to the walls for any of the defenders to ever be effective. The buildings were claustrophobically close together, and loomed over the streets, making most of the streets dark, and drearily damp. Sunlight only briefly would touch the cobbles of these streets at noon, or thereabouts, if Myrl judged correctly.
Myrl wondered if the other duchies of the Kingdom of Rhiada had allowed their cities to creep and grow like so much mold on bad bread. He shuddered at the thought.
From the window of his carriage, he could see the daily life of the people of Fastel. Several bakers’ boys walked the early morning streets of Fastel crying their wares to the streets around them, their voices repeating and overlapping in a singing rhythm.
Most of the recognizable businesses, tailor shops and grocers of various stripes, were not yet open for the day’s trade, Myrl could see many empty stalls, but he could see the residents and workers stirring. From his seat he could hear the sharp, almost musical tones of smithies ringing through the city with the first labors of the day.
As their procession finally wound its way through the sprawl of the city to the inner wall, there was a momentary slowing, as the guards at the gates had been learly of allowing a column of armed soldiers into the inner city proper. But the four men with minimal armor holding pikes were not ready to hold off seventy armed and well armored horsemen escorting two well appointed carriages adorned with heraldry. Though, Myrl would allow, the seventy horsemen probably had more to do with the Fastel guards’ complacency than did their heraldry bedecked wagons.
Inside the walls of the greater city, the streets were clearer, and more widely spaced. Shortly after their entry, he could hear Lady Elbana yell a command, and the Royal Guard increased their plodding, walking pace to a trot. The procession made much better time moving through the inner city toward the castle itself now.
From his window he could see the inner walls of the original Fastel Hold. Some kind of rusty, pink granite had been the main source of stone used in the construction. In more recent years, the Lords of Fastel had obviously embraced the idea of lacey architecture, intricate carved surfaces, and an overwhelming enthusiasm for all of the colors of the rainbow, as long as that rainbow consisted solely of reds and pinks.
It was a gorey nightmare to Myrl’s eye, the few purple bits of Fastel heraldry showing here and there made all of the reds and pinks even that much more dire. He couldn’t imagine living in such a monochromatic landscape. Even Jibiril Keep, with its black and gray stone, had used other colors, a wider selection of colors, in creating both the keep and the town. Even the wood here had been painted to match the reds, mauves, roses, scarlets, and pink shades.
There were no guards on the doors to the Fastel castle itself that Myrl saw, though he would admit they may have run into the castle to tell their superiors that Fastel now had guests. It was an idiotic reaction for ALL of the guards to abandon their posts to do so, rather than to just send a single runner or two, but Myrl wasn't sure what bar there was for service to the Duchess of Fastel, nor how low that bar sat in its track.
He momentarily wondered if the guards at the outer gate kept the peasants from the inner keep, and some social construct kept the middle class from the inner keep. But then he remembered “servants.” The higher one was positioned, the more they had to be surrounded by servants. Rhiada had made most forms of slavery illegal almost two hundred years before, so servants coming and going from the keeps, castles, manses, and palaces was common.
But, as the carriages and the guards came to a stop in a large courtyard, Myrl could see some grooms, and a few undistinguished menials, but no guards, and no liveried, nor even High Servants.
With a series of shouts that Myrl found inarticulate, but that his Guard knew well enough, half of the horsemen dismounted, handed their reins to their nearest mounted cohort and then fanned out, spreading evenly across the large courtyard.
The door to Myrl’s carriage closest to the doors of the inner keep itself opened revealing Master Sergeant Donchaminar Kammick Nit’Sammish. The outsized orcish soldier stood at attention by his door, left hand extended to aid in Myrl’s descent if he needed such, his right hand resting upon the pommel of the largest “shortsword” Myrl had ever seen, but nonetheless Myrl had had commissioned especially for the man when he had entered Myrl’s service.
“Thank you, Master Sergeant.” He said, as he stepped from the confines of his carriage. Myrl winked at the giant as he stepped past to take the sting out of the formality of the situation. Their usual interactions were notoriously casual, but in public, even the limited “public” represented by the other soldiers of the Royal Guard, the rule was strict observance to protocol. “Donk” wouldn’t have it any other way.
Off to his left, he saw the mother and son ducal duo from South Wall exit their carriage, along with the Royal Page. He nodded to them, and gestured to the Page to join Lord Ashe where he stood by the open doors to the inner palace. Once they had all taken their place in the very truncated Order of Precedence, the party set off into the red stone monstrosity that was Fastel Castle.
Lord Ashe walked near the head of their party, behind two guards and Elbana and Donk, followed closely by the Page, then the Duke and Duchess, then Myrl himself, once more followed by eight of the guards who had dismounted in the courtyard, through the doors to the great hall of Fastel Castle, his tall boots, hobnail soles in gray and black dyed leather tapping and clacking loudly with every step. Myrl knew the man was purposefully making as much noise as he could, just to make their presence known.
After two short sets of stairs, and three turns in what Myrl thought of as random stretches of hallways, they came to a large set of closed heavy doors, a pair of purple clad soldiers on either side of the rose stained, iron bound, carved wooden doors. The soldiers, from what Myrl could see, were wide-eyed with panic. They hadn’t known Myrl and his party were coming.
No one had come to tell them, which meant no one had gone on to tell the duchess. Myrl suppressed a grin. He had thought, two days ago, that when they arrived he might just have her ripped from her castle, and thrown from the tallest wall.
But on the ride from Jibiril, Myrl had decided to go another way. A more subtle way. And depending upon how he was received, he would offer her some measure of clemency. Possibly even forgiveness.
Possibly.
Ashe stepped forward, and made an elegant gesture to the Royal Page. The Page, finally feeling in his element, stepped forward with a grace and dignity he had yet to show in Myrl’s presence up to now, tapped his Staff of Office, an oak staff topped with a Golden Goose, wings elevated and looking for all the world like it was about to start hissing at the two guardsmen.
The old man inclined his head, and stated firmly, without shouting, “The King, Myrl Vac Fadric Rhiad, Fourth of His Name, and his Royal Party, here to see the Duchess Yggrel Nich Fassik. She will be present.”
He spoke this last with all the assurance that only someone who spoke with all of the confidence and certainty of a mountain could.
The two guards stood, gaping at their party, until Ashe leaned forward and mumbled something to the guard on the left. the man shakily nodded, and reached clumsily behind himself to the tall doors, and levered them both open.
Myrl heard an angry female voice distantly through the now open door. The Royal Records Page stepped through the door and to the right, as Lord Ashe mirrored him to the left. Then the first two guards, and Donk and Elbana followed suit. There was another squark of outrage as they entered, and Myrl thought he heard a woman’s angry voice declare “You!” from the distant end of the hall.
The Page began to chant the name and title of every noble who then entered; his cadence was quite amazing, to Myrl’s satisfaction.
Finally Myrl entered to the sound of his own name and title, and he had an unobscured view of the great hall. A table rested at the far end, at which sat a tall, slender woman in her late thirties wearing a purple and red robe, and a fine gold coronet adorned with golden oak leaves and large oval cut rubies.
Her hair was a nondescript brown, plaited into a thick, long braid that trailed over her left shoulder where the end of the braid had been pinned to her gown above her heart with a bronze rose brooch. Her face was a long, pale oval, thin lipped and scowling at his party as they entered.
He had expected her to react negatively to his Master Sergeant. But as he approached, she was staring intently, murderously, at his Master of Arms. Elbana would be an issue here in Fastel that Myrl wanted to see what might develop. But, he wasn’t here to sew chaos.
The tall thin woman stood still and continued looking angrily at Elbana until she was forced to recognize the other, higher ranking members of the party entering her Great Hall.
As his name and title finally registered, she quickly stood straighter, here her eyes going wide in surprise. Or possibly fear.
Then Myrl saw the young man, little more than a well dressed boy in his early teens, that had sat across the table from the duchess. HIs wide jaw, high cheekbones and thin eyes conspired to make him look like his face had been flattened with the help of a wide plank moving at speed. The reddish blond hair, watery blue eyes combined with his flat features made him look like the spitting image of Myrl’s late uncle, the Pretender-King Filian.
Myrl wondered if they were close cousins, or if Yggrel had been his uncle’s “favorite” courtier, and been more than just the noble who read fake letters from the Prince to the Populace. This was illuminating, all on its own. He wondered if his aunt had known.
He grinned at his subjects.
And he waited.
As with all things “royal” there were protocols to be observed.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
And he waited. He stared at Yggrel, and the duchess stared at him. Until finally Lord Ashe Cleared his throat meaningfully.
There was a curtsy. Poorly executed, and clumsily done, as Yggrel mumbled, “Apologies, my prince.”
The Royal Records Page, acting as both Herald and Protocol Officer, said simply “King.”
The woman’s eyes widened even further, and a slight tremor shook her narrow frame from head to toes. Slowly she dropped her eyes, and lowered herself into a properly deep bow. On the opposite side of the table, the teen dropped into a formal and precise bow worthy of the best trained of courtiers.
Myrl let her hold the bow, not releasing her, nor her son, as he began to speak.
“Duchess I have come to tell you, in person of the tragedy that has overcome my Aunt and her husband who were stewards of the Kingdom until I came of age.” He was clear in his preference for his “Aunt” and “her husband” as the terms going forward. It was good to remind this woman that her lover had not been the King, and now never would be. And that she, and her son, may rule in Fastel, but they would do so only at Myrl’s pleasure.
“I…” She paused. From her bow, her voice shook, and her face was reddening. “We had not heard of …” another pause as she reassessed. “...your Aunt and her husband’s passing.”
“No. There was an accident at the palace in Ghlow eight days ago. My Aunt, her children, and her husband all died. Protocol says that I was to be informed first. And now that I have been informed, and am on my way to the palace to take up my throne as my parents had intended, I have had messenger birds and riders sent out to inform the Landed Royalty.”
He watched her. She didn’t move from her bow, though she was starting to shake slightly. He stepped around her, and her breakfast table, and stepped toward the throne that sat at the end of the room. It was, like everything else here, heavily carved stone in a mass of red hues.
He turned and sat upon it. “You may both rise.”
The teen and his mother both rose from their bows, and the boy looked concerned as they turned to where Myrl now sat. The boy looked at his mother and looking petulant he opened his mouth to speak, but the duchess said “Sire, may I pre…” here she stuttered a little, “...present my son, Odo?”
Odo bowed to Myrl, looking smug. Myrl wondered where he got his confidence. Enough confidence to smile like a cat to a small bird at the man who had just been introduced to him as his king. Myrl smiled wryly to himself, and possibly smirked at the boy Odo.
“Odo. It is a pleasure to meet you. I assume you are almost thirteen?”
Yggrel looked startled at the guess. Myrl had simply done some basic math, and guessed that his uncle, having had his throne for just over thirteen years now, and so in all likelihood his oldest indiscretions would be approaching that same age as well. He had hated his uncle for years, but now he was starting to loathe the man.
Odo preened, thinking it was a compliment, and said “Mother says I am to be presented at Court this coming year! And she said there will be a great celebration!”
Myrl laughed now. He was genuinely amused. “Does she, now? Imagine how you will be presented to the Court! What fun.” He couldn’t help dropping his voice a little at the end. But, Myrl rallied, “Well, we shall have to make your presentation at Court a thing to be remembered.” He left the statement hanging for a moment, holding Yggrel’s gaze. “You know, Odo, your mother is quite well known for her oratory. It's said she reads letters to the populace every New Year's Day Feast.” He held her gaze, asn he could see she wanted to be anywhere else in the world but here. “Your mother has been bringing the joyful news from the Prince in Waiting,'' he gestured to himself. “To the citizens of Rhiada. I came here today to thank her for her efforts, and to collect those letters from her, if she still has them..?”
The woman nodded slowly to her King, sweat visibly prickling across her brow.
“Lovely!” Myrl laughed again, and smiled at the boy. “Odo, your mother really is amazing. Did you know she came to visit with me? Every year? Right around the holiday? It was so good of her to come visit with me, I lived in a very lonely place, with only my tutor, and a garrison of soldiers for company. I hope you don't begrudge your mother the time she came to visit with an orphan around the Winter holiday.”
Now Yggrel looked like nothing so much as a miserable and downcast lump where she stood before him.
Imagine, Odo, being all alone around the holiday. I wrote to my uncle and aunt, who were acting as Stewards of the Kingdom until I came of age, I wrote to them almost every year, asking to come to Ghlow for the holiday. But my uncle always wrote back 'No.'"
Here, Myrl turned his gaze on Yggrel, and let her see his anger, before he again smiled and turned back to the boy. "He said I could not be risked, and that Rhiada and its people needed me to stay in Jibiril Keep. For the good of all. So, I stayed there, in that cold, dark tower, on a bay that no ships could pull into, surrounded by a very small town, and a garrison of soldiers. Not being allowed to leave Jibiril, I just waited for someone, anyone, to come and visit with me."
Odo looked like he was torn between crying at this sad story, and running to hug his mother for being the hero of this tale.
"And that visitor was YOU, Mother?" The boy's eyes shone with pride.
Myrl interrupted before Yggrel could ruin this majestic lie with the odious truth. "Yes! Every year. Wasn't your mother so kind to a lonely orphaned boy?"
At this, Yggrel began to look ill.
But, maybe not so oddly, Odo looked at his mother with a measure of respect and appreciation. These trips she had taken from Fastel to Ghlow had been a sore spot for the boy, but now he might forgive her if he thought she might have been making some poor child’s life a little better as she left Odo alone for a few weeks every year around the Solstice.
“You know, Odo; your mother took letters with my name on them, and read them to my people to bring them hope. Have you read them, or did she ever read them to you?”
Odo looked at his mother and shook his head.
“Oh, I will have to see that you get copies of them.” He leaned forward slightly as he said this, looking directly at Yggrel, daring the woman to in any way contradict him. She and his uncle Filian had been working together to cement Filian’s place as King rather than Steward. Myrl was certain that his own death in the near future was a part of this plot, as well as the deaths of his aunt and cousins.
Filian may have been caught up in the gears of that very plot. Maybe the deaths of his cousins and aunt were intentional, but the death of his uncle was an accident. He didn’t know.
He would be looking into it, though.
Myrl sighed. It was slightly more dramatic than was warranted, but he wanted this next part of his message to be as clear as possible to Duchess Yggrel.
“Duchess. If you please, I would like to think of you, going forward as my staunchest ally in Court. And like the gulls at sea that follow in the wake of the harlequin whales. The gulls find schools of large, tasty trancerfins, and the whales then attack. After the attack, the gulls feast on the successfully hunted trancerfins. The harlequins prosper, and the gulls prosper. I want to think of you as the gull to my harlequin. Do you understand?”
“My lor…” she started. Then remembered herself, and restarted, “Sire, I’m not certain…”
Myrl interrupted the willowy duchess then. “Ohhh, on my ride here, I had been reading a lovely history of Old Carse. Do you know the tales? But the author kept avoiding saying certain things of certain people about which he was writing concerning the Fall of Old Carse. I need a moment… I cannot think of the word at the moment, it must be all of this travel by carriage scrambling my thoughts… We rode very hard to get here. It’s the word for when someone attempts to steal the throne from the Crown. Just on the tip of my tongue…”
“Sedition?” Answered Odo, with an odd sense of excitement in his voice.
“No. That’s a good word, but it doesn't quite fit here. That would be “Enticing citizens to support an Enemy in a time of Interkingdom hostilities, or to cause those persons to rebel against the Crown.`` Lord Ashe’s resonant voice filled the great hall, though he didn’t speak louder than as if in close conversation. It was a good trick, and one Myrl thought Ashe would be mildly smug about later.
“Ah, you are correct, my lord. No, not sedition. This word is more pointed. Deadlier. More…” Myrl paused here for a moment as if considering. “This word I am trying to recall has a very direct impact on myself and my family, and can lead to entire families being rounded up and removed from the kingdom. With finality. Entire lineages can be torn out by their very roots, and thrown onto the midden heaps of history like so many errant weeds, growing where they are not supposed to grow, until the good gardener comes along with his blade and makes room for better plants. As happened in Old Carse.”
Duchess Yggrel looked from where Myrl sat on her hereditary throne, to her beloved Odo where he fidgeted, his left hand twisting a golden button on his fine purple coat. Her skin, to Myrl, grew more pale as each moment ticked away, finally beginning to look slightly green. Her thin, reedy lips pulled into a grimace, attempting a smile but only achieving “rictus” as a consolation prize. Myrl could see that she had finally caught on to the game.
He knew she wanted to play a very different game. He knew she thought she would be the winner of the game she thought she had already been playing with his departed uncle.
But now, here was Myrl. In her duchy. In her very palace. And the game she had been playing was no longer on the table, and all of the other players upon whom she had been counting were nowhere to be seen. There would be bitterness in her admitting this defeat. Myrl knew she would never be his willing ally, but he would make her see that being his unwilling ally was the only way she would survive this new, and very exciting, game.
“I believe, Sire, the word you are looking for is treason.” She exhaled slowly, obviously not knowing what to expect next.
The smile Myrl used was as wide as one he could produce, and if he were honest with himself, it hurt his face a little to force it into this shape. Myrl suddenly realized “smiling” was not in his regular repertoire of facial expressions. He would need to revisit this thought later. For now, however, Myrl forced his eyes wide in feigned surprise. “YES! That was the word! Exactly that! My goodness it had just completely slipped from my mind.”
He looked between the mother and son for a moment, and then nodded to Duke Vorner and Duchess Kalenia of South Wall where they stood with the Royal Records Page, all of them resplendent in their finest clothing, dressed to impress. And then he focused back on Duchess Yggrel.
“Duchess, I expect you will be attending my coronation. It should be in about ten days time. I will be sending you a formal invitation. And if I again forget the word…” he left the sentence hanging. Waiting with one eyebrow raised.
Yggrel looked down at the polished pink stones of the great hall as she said in a soft voice, “Treason, Sire.”
“Yes. ‘Treason.’ I expect you to be there to remind me. I want you to keep reminding me of all the words a King should always keep close to his heart. And if needs be, even point out to me others of my Court whom you know can make sure I remember that word. It’s such a bad idea for any Crown to forget that word, and it’s a wonderful thing for a King to know who in His Court knows these important terms.”
As he stared at the tall, thin woman, looked into her eyes to see that she was terrified of what he might have done here today, and also how she now knew she had a way to avoid that fate, Duchess Kalenia’s words to Myrl of five days ago played through his thoughts, again and again.
``Your Uncle, King Filian, Your Aunt, Queen Lurgetha, and Your Cousins, the Prince, Hyrel, and the Princesses Meolina, Caolia, and Unshedhni, have all... passed.”
It had become an echo in his thoughts these last five days. And now, he had blown into Fastel like an unexpected storm, and upset this ruler. Myrl knew there would be more encounters in his Court like this one. He just wanted to be the one guiding the storm, rather than having the storm roll over him as others would have him unseated.
He stood, abruptly. “Duchess. Odo. Please forgive my brief appearance, but now I must take my party to Ghlow.” He paused then, with a thought. “Also, You will be receiving a new bill of taxation to the Crown from my Exchequer.”
Yggrel looked suddenly mad again.
“Your taxes will be lowered by fifteen percent for the next ten years. During that time, I expect these funds to be used to build a new siege wall around the greater city that has grown up around Fastel. And you will need to enlarge and provision your guard to properly keep your walls, both new and old, safely patrolled.” He raised his eyebrows at her in inquiry, watching the brief flare of anger drain from her. He began walking back the way he had come into the cavernous room, his party falling in behind him as he gracefully glided across the polished red floor. “Good? Well. We’ll be off now. I’m looking forward to seeing you and Odo in Ghlow soon.”
As the mass reached the large open doors, he called out, just because he could, “Come Along Master Elbana! Places to go!”