It was happening. She had made it happen, and now it was happening. In front of what felt like the whole city. Gentian planted her spear gently against the cobblestones and, with a pair of gilt scissors, cut the ribbon. The Dillwater Xia Academy was now open.

The crowd was cheering and applauding, Gentian knew that much. She could see it, hear it, but it only had a sort of intellectual weight. She couldn’t feel their joy. All she could feel is the weight of that horrible night. She could hear her people burning as the incendiaries rained down. The axes and long knives splashing blood and lives as they passed. She was blinded by rough men laughing as they stripped what little food and wealth a home had, slipping on the torn bodies of its owners. Dragging off captives for darker predations. The bright, cold afternoon smelt of winter’s dark, of burning homes and people. The air still shook with the desperate fight through the allies. She was smiling and waving at the crowd now. She was screaming at grown men and women to move, to follow her, through burning allies and the teeth of murderers.

She was here, opening a school. Showing that she hadn’t died that night. That the city and the people hadn't died that night. That they would rebuild. That tomorrow would be better because they would make it better. She was here, it was now, and if she focused very hard and remembered her breathing, “then” would stay away for a while.

City Councilors were standing around her, milking the crowd for all it was worth. A high number of Chanticleers too, for all that her relationship with a lot of them was kind of delicate. Which hurt. She never had an issue with a Chanticleer before she got married. Having them look at her with such suspicion cut her. They were looking content today. Maybe. Definitely some mixed emotions there, if she was reading their faces right. The schools were wildly popular, so the Chanticleers would have a hard time not acting enthusiastic. But when you got right down to it, the word “Xia” stood in big letters in the middle of the sign. The word floated all the way through the school, in fact. And that was a sour apple to chew.

“Now, everyone! This is the very first of the Xia Academies built after our darkest night. The first of dozens of such lights. A pathfinder, leading our children out of the darkness of ignorance, guided by faith into the light of knowledge and reason. It is our hope that these children will be the next generation of leaders. The next generation of pathfinders.” The Councilor who was nominally hosting this event was grinning hugely. “We managed to keep it a secret, everyone. You see, we thought the school needed a motto, and really, only one fit. Valle, please bring up the plaque.”

A young lady, young enough to be a student at the Academy, brought up something wrapped in red cloth. With a dramatic flourish, the Councilor swept the fabric away, and Valle held it up for the crowd to see. “What better motto could there be for the new Dillwater Xia Academy? Yes, everyone! For the very first of the new schools, the motto shall be: “Follow Me!” Making a line under the motto was a simple outline of a spear.

Gentian sat bonelessly in their living room. She didn’t have the time to be flopped, but she needed it. She couldn’t seem to get grounded. So she just sprawled, and waited for her family to come and put her in order.

“I’m quite certain that they are not available on the market- rationing has come down hard on citrus. I’m running the bookkeeping for the rationing committee. I never said “buy them on the market.” I said “The Xerecazo grapefruit growing season is just starting to hit its peak, go get a few cases of them.” Xiatoktok’s voice was urbane as always. And firm, as always.

“Of course, President! However…”

“Yes?” The word was deceptively calm. And yet, deceived no one. Gentian could hear the butler gulp.

“Xerecazo citrus comes up through the Collective’s territory, and you know how they have been diverting cargos. The caravans I have a relationship with won't even take the order without payment in full, in advance, and they refuse to guarantee delivery.”

The voices in the hallway were silent. Gentian could picture Xiatoktok stroking his little mustache and frowning. No grapefruit would be a significant blow to his breakfast routine. It was a serious matter, deserving his full attention.

“I assume that… informal delivery services are no better?”

“Worse. Same terms, at eight times the cost. I would suggest cultivating more in the greenhouses, but that’s now quite impossible too.”

“True. True.” The greenhouses had been given over to the highest yield fruit and vegetable crops they could manage. Gentian knew Xiatokja had barely managed to get the new seeds to maturity before everything got ripped out. She was a little sad to see the mature plants forced to struggle in pots and private homes, but she was with the City Council on this one. Every possible effort had to be made to avoid hungry bellies.

“Alright, never mind. I’ll try and think of something. Let's… turn whatever we have left into preserves, I suppose. Stretch what we can for as long as we can.”

“Thank you, President. I will see it done at once.”

“Mmm. Nothing further.”

Gentian had half expected him to throw a fit. She didn’t know why she thought that. He was not, generally, a fit thrower. Prickly, argumentative, stubborn, arrogant, vindictive, a born snob and frequently mischievous, but he hung on to his composure like it was a delinquent debtor.

He walked into the living room and dropped heavily into the seat across from Gentian. He smiled warmly at her, and squeezed her hand. “My day is better just for seeing you. Tell no one.”

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

“I’ll take it to my grave.” Gentian swore piously, a grin creeping up her face. That was the other thing. Behind all that other stuff. He cared about her. A lot. He showed it in the damndest ways, but she no longer doubted that she was loved. It seems that once you were one of “his” people, there was nothing in the world that was too good for you. Including his full attention and devotion.

“Tough day? I thought you were opening the new school?”

“I was. I did. Open the school. I’ve had tougher days. No, it's just-” Gentian looked out the window. Their neighborhood got through the Night of Burning Tears almost untouched. She could see the ruined east of the city in her mind anyhow. “The city is barely starting to put itself back together. Thousands are still homeless, tens of thousands more will go to bed hungry, and wake up to an empty larder. And here I am, my hair smelling like honey and roses, my dress clean and pressed, my belly full of fish and white bread. And I’m the inspiration. I’m the big hero, leading everyone forward.” Gentian shook her head.

“Is it too burdensome?” Xiatoktok asked softly.

“Sometimes. Most of the time, I’m very happy… no, I guess the word is “satisfied?” doing it. Makes me feel like I am contributing, even though I know I’m totally in over my head. No, it’s just that it all feels unreal. You know why they rushed the Dillwater School, right?”

“The symbolism isn’t subtle.” Said Xiatoktok.

“Right? And I keep thinking- they rebuilt it because of me. Or, not even really me. More like their idea of what the idea of me should mean. They built it to persuade everyone else that their idea of the idea of me is true and right. Instead of building a house for someone, which, to my way of thinking, would be even more true and right.”

The conversation went silent for a little bit. It wasn’t awkward. Xiatoktok was thinking about what she said, and she was just enjoying the warmth of his attention.

“You aren’t exactly right about the… relative value of the buildings.” Xiatoktok said slowly. “I don’t often say this, but… maybe think a little less like a Xia, or what you think a Xia thinks like, and think more like a chanticleer.

“I could never be a chanticleer.”

“You would be a fantastic one and you know it. Think. A quarter of the city burnt down. Other than immediate survival concerns, what do the people need?”

Gentian just shrugged. ’Tock blew out his lips in mock irritation.

“Everyone acts like hope is some nice thing, some little flag of optimism that gets everyone going and lah-dee-dah. But if you stop and think about it, hope is a nasty, dangerous thing. Leaders, generals, business executives, all make a major study of “hope,” and how to manipulate it.”

“Starting to make it sound creepy.”

“It is really, really creepy, because it is so damn powerful and everyone seems to not want to think about it seriously. Look at Roberta.” He pointed in the corner. Roberta had been standing silently for so long, Gentian had genuinely forgotten that she was there. “She is not bored. She is not anxious. She has no “hope” that things are going to be, in any meaningful way, better for her, nor any anxiety about that fact. She is essentially immobile unless prodded into action, because she is hopeless. There is almost nothing she's willing to actually get up and do on her own initiative, because there is nothing she hopes to achieve.”

“You are talking about her like she isn’t there again.” Gentian groused, mostly for the sake of doing it.

“Roberta, did I say anything incorrect?”

“Nothing that mattered, President.” Roberta answered in the approved form, then faded back into immobility. “See? And the Chanticleers and the City Council understand this at the gut level. What the City needs is the willingness to get up and move, and the conviction that they can make things better. With those things, you can have unity. You can have power. So you can build a proud symbol of hope and unity… or a shack.”

The conversation went quiet again. Gentian didn’t really want to follow up on that line of thinking. Eventually she asked “Xerecazo grapefruit?”

Xiatoktok shook himself a little and smiled. “A nothing little town built on top of some of the largest, most sprawling ruins on the west coast. A very long ways down south, though not so far that you reach the land bridge to Grand Tawantinsuyu. Why the ruins are there, nobody is really sure. Usually there is a logic to it, like a good river or mines or something. Not this place. It’s a desert, and always has been. Anyway, Xerecazo is this flyspeck place, but it’s got some great docks and a great port. The produce industry, and oddly there is a large and thriving citrus growing region there despite it being a desert, all goes through the port.”

“Alright, but, and I don’t mean to alarm you, we are landlocked and on the other side of the Ramparts from the ocean.”

“Really?” Xiatoktok’s voice was dry as the desert where they grew his beloved grapefruit. Gentian nodded seriously in reply.

“Well, shocking though your revelation is, until the last few years, the citrus was loaded onto boats at Xerecazo, shipped up to Vast Green Isle, then packed into special refrigerated chests and transported at ferocious expense across the Ramparts to us. And before you ask, yes, that is the reason ’Ja grew so many citrus in her greenhouses.”

“I can’t even imagine what it cost.”

“It was purely a vanity thing. I actually developed my fondness for grapefruit when ’Ja got the first crop in. First time I could properly taste it, rather than make a whole display of eating it.”

“So… is Xerecazo in Collective territory?”

“No, actually. Near it, but their lines stop a little north and inland. Like I said, a desert and a mostly worthless one. The ruins are largely worthless too, having been picked over for epochs. No, the issue is that the Sea Folk have gone berserk and have basically shut down the waterways around Vast Green Isle. We have had to import overland, with the horrible impact on both cost and food quality that you can imagine. It was fine, for a little while, but now the Collective is just seizing stuff and daring people to do something about it.”

“Fantastic. I already hated them, and now I have a new reason.” She frowned. She never developed a taste for grapefruit, but oranges were another story. She had gotten used to eating oranges at least once every few weeks. “Don’t suppose we could find out what’s going on with the Sea Folk?”

“I don’t mean to alarm you, but we are landlocked and on the other side of the Ramparts from the ocean.” Xiatoktok touched her knee reassuringly.

“Ho ho. But really.”

“In all seriousness, I would like nothing better. The problem is that we know next to nothing about the Sea Folk, despite millennia of trying. They have always been paranoid, but they are generally not erratic. Nobody can figure out what’s going on with them.”

“Humans tend to have the same kinds of problems. Just the details that change.” Gentian fidgeted with her fingers.

“Funnily enough, “Human” is the one thing we think we know about them. In that, we don’t think they are.”