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Now, he simply needed to persuade his parents. Perhaps not so simple.
He sat at attention in his fathers study. This was the correct way of being in a place that had been vested in authority from his earliest memories. He awaited the man in front of him. Elsewhere his father could laugh and love, tease, and play the fool—but this was his place of business, and so interactions with his scion must inevitably pass through that lens.
Here he was assessed, questioned, and measured for worth in a manner alien in all other parts of their relationship. He understood the necessity of this demarcation. But the tension of past scoldings and anxious evaluations marred the appeal of the handsome oak panelling and fine leather seats.
The novelty of the curios gathered over a lifetime of dealing with adventures and travellers were diminished for their familiarity. They reflected his fathers pride, but he wanted his own. Such is always the way with sons following their fathers–a need to stand as an equal by their own merit as opposed to a father’s decline.
It was these thoughts his father interrupted as he shifted his attention from his papers precisely on the hour of their scheduled meeting—such was his way when in that seat.
“So, you have a proposal for me?” His tone did not avoid some level of condescension, but such was a measure of his respect. He would not coddle his son here.
“I-” Jack swallowed, steeling himself for the argument he would be putting forward. “I believe I’ve found something of significance.”
Jack explained the discrepancies he’d noticed in the Meäl region, how they represented an opportunity for them beyond just treading water.
“Someone is hiding something, and it would be a coup for us to uncover it. With the lengths they’re going to, it’s something valuable, but discreet, requiring them to push others out of the region for months. If we brought this to clients, it would turn our reputation around—we could sell ourselves on the intel we can bring, not just our legacy.” Jack argued.
Jack could see his father’s cards at work as he flipped through the notes Jack had provided. His eyes seemed to almost thrash in their sockets as the information was consumed and assimilated at a rapid pace.
“This is exceptional work, Jack. Supremely well spotted, very thorough.” His father paused to retrieve a bottle of eye-drops from his desk. He tilted his head back and with a practised hand he applied them. Even as the liquid struck his eye he refused to blink, staring up at the ceiling in a manner that could almost seem repose, were his jaw not stiffly clenched. “What do you suppose they’re hiding?” He continued, slightly breathless.
“Well… and this is purely speculative, of course.”
“Of course, speculate away.” His father gave him a permissive wave.
“The possibility of an illicit excavation crossed my mind. It would explain their desperation for privacy; it wouldn’t remain hidden long if there were competitors about. The fraudulent books for the expeditions that are making it out there could be explained if they’re veiling their true purpose of resupplying their comrades.”
“And the disappearances? There were… two such cases, I believe?”
“Those disappearances occurred early in the timeline I’ve approximated. They want the region to appear unattractive, but not so dangerous that an investigation is called for. A couple of prospector crews going missing is an excellent cover for a semi-permanent team to remain in the region and continue their efforts, while also discouraging too much interest.”
Finally his father raised his head. There was a sparkle of excitement in his expression.
“Yes. I believe this is worthy of investigation. A commissioned team won’t come cheaply, but if we promise them places on the expeditions of any clients we bring in... that should sweeten things nicely.”
Jack sat silently. This was not going as planned, and he could feel the anxiety welling up inside of him. He needed to be the driving force behind the investigation, but instead his father had immediately seen a pragmatic and effective approach for discovering what was in the Meäl region. An approach that had no place for Jack.
‘Since when did other people think cleverly? Always. They’ve always been clever, you just forget.’
Internal recriminations aside, Jack had been still long enough for his father to notice.
“Is there something wrong Jack?”
“Yes. I believe I am being underutilized as an asset in anticipation of my carding.” Jack paused, unhappy with the stiffness of his reply he tried to gather his thoughts.
Where other men might interrupt, to remind him of his youth or contradict him on his involvement in the day-to-day of the business, his father instead waited patiently in the silence Jack had left—trusting a full account and logic was forthcoming. This was why Jack loved his father, and the courtesy troubled him for the deception he planned.
“I believe I should go to the Foothills and do my own assessment. I’ve already made overtures to a caravan heading that way, they have a record for high reliability and safety. The caravan master has a young daughter, whom he’s concerned isn’t receiving the education she needs while on the road. I’ve been offered a provisional contract as a short term tutor, pending your approval.” Jack laid out the proposal in a rush, producing the caravan charter and the written offer he’d been given. The tension of the moment clawed at him—in this moment his father was unaware of the weight of what he held.
His father gave the papers a token glance before centering his gaze on Jack, and with that Jack knew he hadn’t been persuaded.
“It is... Understandable, admirable even, to bristle at the restrictions you’re currently facing with your carding impending. But this is truly nearing the last round for you. Once you’ve received your first card the pressure will be relieved. We’ve never been ones to act above our station, never letting you experience the world like some noble’s child. It’s only during this critical time when you could card any day that I ask that you keep to these behavioural shackles.”
Jack knew the liberties he’d been given growing up, helped in no small part by the idiosyncrasies of his mother, with whom his father had eloped without either parents consent, entirely besotted with the charm of the dark-haired beauty. Her natural intelligence had been a greater boon to the business than a dozen carded clerks, and when their fortunes had begun to fall, she had managed to maintain the household to a respectable standard.
She had never abided by any pretensions that infringed on her children’s happiness. While many of Jack’s friends had been sequestered away in mock imitation of higher classes to grind away under tutors, he had been given a balance, educated, but also allowed to wander the streets and find trouble. Realistically, it was known that there were diminishing returns on restricting behaviour to only activities that would spark an appropriate carding, particularly in early childhood. By Jack’s age it was more than just status games that kept young men and women of worth to tight routines, as the expectations for their career paths compelled them.
But Jack hadn’t benefited from the drills meant to sharpen his mind and the dull routine of bookkeeping, he had stagnated until a freak accident had lost him his first primary carding.
Now he just needed to get his father to understand.
“I’m not just bored of the drill-work, if it was just boredom I would continue. I know how important my carding will be. But this mystery... I can feel the card behind it. Just think, what it might be. A card derived from hunting unknown information, from uncovering something like this myself. If it’s as strong as I think it could be, it could be exactly the piece we need.”
Jack could see on his father’s face that the temptation had overtaken him, and guilt for his lies warred with relief.
----------------------------------------
Torn between the excitement of success and the burden of fear of uncertainty, Jack acted on the impulse that rests silently in the background of all elder brothers: he went to harass his sister. He knew that at this time of day she’d be firmly ensconced in a book in the parlour, and so made his way there.
Walking through the house had felt surreal to Jack for as long as he could remember. It was a curious mixture of contradictory purposes and contexts. It had been built by his great grand-parents nearly a century ago, with the full amenities of that era. There was an expectation of live-in servants, and perhaps even the residence of extended family. In practice this meant it was far too large for his family of four.
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There were some obscure corridors and rooms that could sit vacant for weeks between visitations. After the downward turn of the business, they had cannibalized much of the more excessive accents of wealth. Jack strolled through a hallway where there were obvious absences on the walls where artwork had sat. He couldn't really recall what they had looked like.
The modern features of the home clashed with its older design. Conspicuously present in many rooms were spring-batteries, usually stealthily hidden within walls or otherwise integrated into the construction through some other artifice, in this un-renovated and older structure they clashed with their surroundings.
The base construction of spring-batteries was highly utilitarian. A simple, durable housing encased the intricate mechanisms within; ensuring that even in the event of a catastrophic failure no rapidly moving bits of metal would tear through unfortunate bystanders.
Jack had seen the interior of an unfinished battery during its construction. They were fascinating assemblies of card-modified springs, densely packed in inscrutable, almost organic patterns. The card treatments the metal received gave them strange properties: distortion of light, strangely pitched noises when struck, esoteric magnetic fields, and more.
The technical advances had been accumulating for decades at this point, and the construction of each had become bogglingly sophisticated for anyone not steeped in the industry of their construction.
The batteries were a necessary tool for his mother to maintain the household, as she tapped the energy stored within them with her cards to efficiently maneuver through domestic life, whisking dust at a gesture or producing the required heat to cook a full meal.
The bygone house would have employed servants with specialized cleaning cards but modern Calamut had done away with much of that, as the stored kinetics of a spring-battery allowed a much smaller number of otherwise less efficient cards to achieve the same purpose.
They lingered on in the house, at least in part, to maintain their reputation; the unwillingness of his father to be the inheritor who lost the family home. But to Jack’s mind, he wondered if such persistence was only delaying the inevitable.
Jack’s musings were interrupted by his arrival to the parlour, and he paused by the entrance to lean against the door-frame with high drama. He took a moment to study his sister. Syra lolled haphazardly upon a chair, feet curled in, snugly wrapped in a blanket. She had a slim build, much like his own, but with such grace that even he felt ungainly.
Hours of training had given her an assuredness in her body that was reflected in the calm precision of her motion. She was beautiful in the complex way that men flatter themselves for thinking only they had noticed.
She needed to be taken down a peg.
Jack sighed loudly, obnoxiously. This was his overture. She could either choose to ignore him, refusing his implicit offer, or...
“Is that a final breath leaving your poor enfeebled body I hear? But no, you still twitch like a guttering candle. Quickly dear brother, impart your final words so I can forget them!” She paused, now pointedly ignoring him in the manner that evidenced her focused attention was in fact entirely his.
“If I’m nearing my final breath, how would I be expected to reply to you?” Even as he replied Jack winced, pointing out a logical inconsistency in her premise was a weak rejoinder, and so archetypal to him that it was almost certainly a trap she’d set.
“Oh, you’re ever so clever Jack, I expect the pathetic flopping of your body in its last moments could carry a wealth of meaning, a profound soliloquy of mediocrity expressed only in the thrashing of limbs. Perhaps like this?” She delivered on his fear, hammering home the insult with mimed accompaniment, hands and arms twisting in grotesque death throes as her eyes rolled back into her head and a wheezing rattle crept from her throat.
She wasn’t even using card enhancement for the performance, she was too young to have one. It was simple talent and practised skill, carefully honed into a blade against him in her time as a performer.
The days when he could leave her flustered in their mock rivalry were clearly past. He wondered at the change in the time he’d been focused intently on his own trials, it had been nearly a year since he’d had much time for her, and clearly she’d grown into herself more than he’d thought.
His quiet went for long enough to attract her attention, and she broke her rictus to catch his gaze.
“What? No clever rejoinder? I’ve been saving up material you know. Working out all kinds of catches for you.”
“Mercy please, however am I to fend you off when you’ve had such ample preparation?”
“Well... perhaps I’ll hold my most powerful attacks for when you truly deserve it.”
They fell into an uncomfortable silence as their old routine failed to strike quite the note they remembered. But it was not just that they had grown apart. Jack had a nervous thought he couldn’t shake, and Syra was the only person he could reasonably ask.
“I’m going to be going away for a while, on an expedition,” Jack spoke plainly, but the truth of it was clear. He was apologizing for what would be an even greater distance between them.
There was quiet then, as Syra looked away. Jack was afraid that there would be things left unsaid, that the gulf between them would only widen until they truly became strangers.
But he was surprised by her instead.
“Do you need to do this?” She spoke softly, not looking at him.
“Yes, I do.” He replied, his voice as metered as hers.
“Then you do it Jack, you do it better than anyone,” she spoke with a sudden resolve, blinking too often as she looked back at him. “You’ll return and I’ll have raced ahead of you, one scathing look from me and you’ll be tremulous forevermore. There’ll be a three-act play, I’ll call it ‘Foolish Bore’ and you won’t be able to show your face.”
He smiled, her affected aristocratic tone was masterfully delivered, but there was still a pressing question, and he raised it now rather than risk losing the chance.
“There will be nobles on the journey,” he said.
She looked at him strangely, and he realized that this was perhaps the first time he had come to her in a capacity outside that of brother and sister. With that statement was an admission—and a request. He needed her help in a domain where she had knowledge that he utterly lacked. For a moment, the surreality of engaging with a novel aspect of a person that had been there all along, but went unexamined all the same, overwhelmed him.
He’d known in the abstract about the time she had spent as a companion to young nobles. After a successful debut in a comedic performance where she’d stolen the show even as a side character, she’d been requested to a handful of estates. It was fairly common to show such favour, with compensation going to the theatre and of course the possibility of more prestigious roles for the actor.
However, he did not understand what the nobility got out of it. Certainly the status garnered from supporting the arts, but that could be done more directly, without involving the artists themselves. There was something else, and now that he would be travelling in close proximity to them for some time, it was time he knew all he could.
“I need to understand how I should be with them, I know there are ri—.”
She raised a hand to halt him, and in his ensuing silence peered at him searchingly. Jack steeled his expression, hoping to meet whatever standard she clearly was determining. Apparently satisfied, she began.
“You must not repeat any of this. I’ll tell you once, no names, no identifiable details. You mustn’t ever try to learn more about whom I visited. They have ways of finding things out, and you ask too many questions. Others told me, when I was asked to go, about a girl who gossiped about what she learned on her visits. She’s not around anymore, understand?”
He took a moment to consider her words, the nobility had always been distant to him, capricious threats to others but with no reason to ever regard him. Hearing her now would be a first step into possible peril, but better to know the threat than stumble blindly.
“I understand. If anything, the necessity is becoming more clear to me.”
After a moment to see the resolve settle into him, she began. “The most important thing to remember about the nobility, is that for all their obsessive adherence to carding purity, they’re still human. They don’t truly want to focus only on combat at the expense of everything else, but they are compelled by duty and expectation.” Her hands were clenched white. In the breaks between her sentences her jaw worked out a tension that had settled into her entire frame.
“Don’t think this makes them relatable. Our burdens, even those of our peers, are nothing like theirs. If you could hear the gossip they raise about one another. It’s always centred on who’s acting out of caste, who’s risking a poor carding by indulging in a secret hobby. All they do is fight and snap at one another, even the friends, if you could call what they have ‘friendships’, they’re more like alliances. It’s not natural for a person to live like them. It’s why they bring me around I think; the real reason, not just to support the theatre; but so they can have someone sing and joke. I think it lets them feel human.”
“So should I just act naturally around them? Would that put them at ease?” he asked during a pause in her explanation. “Treat them like a friend, like you do?”
“No Jack, you mustn’t do that. When they watch me, it’s like a drug or obsession to them. I think the only reason I get to leave is because they can’t admit it. But their eyes, I can tell, the jealousy they feel, it’s almost hate.”
Her words chilled him. The nobility had always been distant to him—existing only as variables to be included in certain analyses. Only once had he had any kind of personal proximity, when he had seen the beast hunt with Mouse and the night-runners. Syra’s words cast their actions, which had already been somewhat gristly, into an even darker light. Was their bloody slaughter of the creature youthful exuberance or a momentary unfettering of stifled impulses?
He needed to understand.
“Tell me then, how should I be?”
“You should be background to them. They live their lives surrounded by servants that never rise above furniture to their eyes; that is what you need to become.”
It discomfited him to take such a role, but the necessity of it was clear.
“Do not volunteer information to them unless directly asked. If you overhear them discussing something related to you, or even about you, say nothing until you’re addressed. If they don’t address you then, talk to one of their aides, discreetly, at the earliest opportunity. They’ll relay whatever it is they were curious about.”
“And how should I answer?”
“Be humble, factual, and concise. Do not speculate or hypothesize. At least one of them will be carded, they go… a bit wild after they card. They’re still figuring out what’s normal, what’s allowable now that their leashes are a little slack. They do that by testing boundaries. They can be like young children sometimes, hopelessly naive one instant, and then the next thing they do is tear the wings off an insect.” She paused. “In this metaphor you’re the insect.”
“Oh, I didn’t realize.” He answered dryly, then more seriously. “It will be somewhat close quarters, how should I… be the rest of the time?”
“Behave like the others on the expedition. Be boring. If the caravaneers make a joke, you laugh with the rest of them. If they eat a meal, you eat with them. If they go to relieve themselves…”
“I should start unbuttoning.”
“He understands, very good Jack.” Her mouth quirked into the slightest smirk at that. “The worst possible thing you could do is be your usual clever self. Don’t share ideas. Don’t do your ‘problem solving’ discussion thing.” Her face twisted with the remembrance of past sibling-derived irritation.
“I am trying to pursue a card you know.”
“Then pursue it quietly. And don’t let on that you’re uncarded, it will only make them jealous.”
He didn’t have a ready reply to that, of course.
“I know you love impressing people Jack, but if you want to impress someone impress me by coming back in one piece.” Her voice hitched a touch at the last, just enough for him to notice, but also clearly an expression of emotion she was pushing down.
“Now off with you! I have been waylaid from my reading quite long enough! Go shadow some other doorway you cretin!” Syra cried out suddenly, imperious and haughty.
Dismissed, Jack gracefully rose and made his measured way to the exit, suffering abuse the whole way.
“Malignant malingerer! Loitering lout! Away with you!” She taunted him with a screeching cackle only to suddenly switch to a gentle tone with words to chill his heart. “Oh, and mother said to tell you she’s waiting in the sunroom.”