Back inside the room Felix was busy examining the bodies of his Uncle and Grandfather. They had both suffered, but only briefly. Getting back to his feet again he thought about calling down Renal and Arisan. Something held him back however. He wanted a moment to himself. A moment to take in what had just happened with everything as it was. His uncle, grandfather and grandmother all dead. All dead by his hand. He had imagined this same moment many times in the four years since he had received his Father’s last will and testament. He had usually pictured it with him being more elated, or at the least fulfilled. Instead he just felt rather empty.

The will was something only he now knew about, one kept secret even from the rest of the family. Though his mother had been its keeper until Felix’s eighteenth birthday she never knew of its contents. It was to be seen by Felix and Felix alone.

It had only been handed over to him on his Mother’s deathbed. (Felix had kept it in his breast pocket ever since.)

Mariana, or Lady Mariana as she was always referred to, had herself only received it seven days before Felix’s father’s own death. Despite misgivings about such cruel timing she never imagined the horrifying truth behind that same cruel timing. She had a kind soul, Mariana, one not built to deal with the often brutal reality of life as a Balduin.

Felix only ever spoke of the will once, and that was long after that infamous family meeting. Years after the fact, he nevertheless recounted the story with immense detail.

In the last hours of her life, his mother had called both him and Karina into the room. First her daughter and then Felix. Both entered alone. There, on her deathbed she revealed to Felix the details surrounding the will.

Heartbroken at the prospect of losing his last remaining parent, his mother had been the one to speak first.

“No crying Felix. Now you must listen, and listen well. Your Father told me to give this to you when you reached eighteen. I do not know its contents. He forbade me to read them, curious as I was I did not break that promise. You do not know how many times I considered breaking it, but something always stopped me. This, is for you and you alone Felix. Not Grandad or even Uncle are to look on it. Your Father made that clear. In it are his final thoughts and notes Felix. I do not know why or how he knew. He….he acted strangely towards the end. But somehow he knew his time on this Earth would soon come to a close. And so, he wrote you this. I hope it will give you some comfort and joy in your life. For you deserve it, my precious son.”

Felix had not opened the will that day, or the next. It had not seemed to matter all that much with his Mother so close to death. Indeed a day later, the day after his birthday in fact, she passed away. For the next week he did not think about the will. He kept it on his person at all times. But he did not open it.

Only after a week did he finally find himself alone and thoughtful. Alone, away from everyone and everything he had opened and read the will. Something had compelled him to read it well away from the family home. He hiked for several hours before he finally felt ready.

He never said the exact contents of the will, only giving a summary.

Felix’s Father, Joaquin, was it is true, a man not always in line with traditional values. Just like Felix, or perhaps more correctly, just as Felix later adopted for himself, Joaquin saw a new vision for the Balduin Family. One not confined to secrets and shadows. One where the ancient line made itself known once more. According to Felix his Father too had been plagued with visions, images of the destruction and demise of their Bloodline. Though it must be said that even those closest to and admirers of Joaquin considered him to an excessively ambitious sort. Another facet his son seemed to have inherited from him. How much then this ambition played into the visions of both remains a rather intriguing question.

However one thing was certain, Joaquin had the intelligence and charm to back up his ambition. His goal, as he’d instructed in the will, was to do just as Felix had proclaimed at that meeting. To make the Balduins Royalty once more.

This goal, Felix later explained, was one in direct opposition to that of his Grandfather. Eustace, even then, despised the idea of change. Joaquin had always had the idea in his mind, and many times sought to explain and declare it to his Father. Yet it was not possible, for such ideas were unthinkable to the Balduin elder. So, as the dutiful son Joaquin stifled his ambition and did as his mother asked, he relented and without any issue took over as Head. Hiding his frustrations and annoyance behind a mask of conformity. He never did want to go against the wishes of his Father, and for many years didn’t.

In time he met Mariana, she brought him true happiness and for a while Joaquin seemed to be enjoying life, his dreams for once forgotten. Soon Felix and then Karina would arrive, creating for the Balduin Head a family of his own to concentrate his efforts.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

Despite it all his ideas remained, he still desired change. Visions, and images he had tried to ignore remained a constant at his side. He held out as long as he could but on his thirty second birthday he decided it was time. He could not wait any longer. He had to act.

He was done waiting. Come what may he would act.

Eustace of course was enraged, though Joaquin was Head he made no effort to hide his displeasure and disgust. A war of sorts broke out between them. Eustace unwilling to accept such risks over what he called his son’s madness.

For a long time they argued and several times almost came to blows over the matter. Once the darling of his Father’s eye, their relationship quickly became strained, to a point that they refused to speak or interact with each other. Elizabeth the only obstacle stopping them from all out destruction.

Something, or rather someone had to give in. Surprisingly, that someone was Eustace. He had quite suddenly and rather abruptly resigned himself to going along with whatever it was his son intended. He placed it on tradition. As Joaquin was Head, though he hated everything about it, Eustace was duty bound to follow his wishes. He would not go against tradition.

So it was, with Eustace finally conceding, it seemed that Joaquin’s idea would begrudgingly be accepted. The Family would finally transform itself in Joaquin’s image, whatever the other Bluebloods thought or attempted they would deal with and manage the fallout from such machinations.

Joaquin may have outwardly expressed happiness at this supposed acceptance, but inwardly he believed nothing and suspected more. His will made that clear. He never believed his Father’s assurances that he was done fighting.

It, Felix confessed, was the most difficult part of the will for him to read. A perfect if morbid description of how and when his death would take place. Even at that moment, rife with suspicion and fresh off of months of continuous heated debate and argument with his Father he did not want to think it possible. And yet somehow he knew. He knew his death had already been preordained. Alexander, his younger brother and constant companion had picked neither side in the Family divide. Steadfastly he’d remained neutral. Yet neutrals are there to be swayed, and it is no easy task to go against the wishes and orders of one’s Father. Especially a Father such as Eustace Balduin.

Felix’s father passed before he could ever truly put any of his plans into practice. He died when the Family jet he was in crashed on his return to their Bermuda home after visiting the island of his chosen new Kingdom. He and all eighteen of the other people onboard had been killed in the accident. Only fragments of the plane remained intact, the bodies destroyed completely and left piled into a great ball of ash. The crash was hastily covered up so as to avoid public attention. Such a tragedy after seemingly resolving all of their internal conflict appeared disastrous for the family.

Joaquin had predicted it all. From the flight, to the date, to how Alexander would be made the new Head and all plans for expansion abandoned. In his will he repeated time and time again how he didn’t want to believe it. That he would be soon able to burn and destroy the will and its suspicions forever. He never did get that chance.

Felix was unsure himself at first, once the rage and anger subsided and logic kicked in it really didn’t make any sense. The two men who had practically raised him, they could not have gone so far. Both Alexander and Eustace had never said it outright, but both had often insinuated that his Father had not been well towards the end. Was the will merely a confirmation of that sickness?

Despite his uncertainty he followed his Father’s orders. Given the extremity of those orders it took him some time. He had outlined what questions to ask, and how to read both Eustace and Alexander’s answers. Felix had found enough in them to go through with the task.

Joaquin again correctly if tragically predicted what lay in store for him. Surmising they would use poison as a means of dispatching the unruly son cleanly. Apparently it was the standard for the Balduin family. Even in one as illustrious and prestigious as theirs there were still the black sheep, now and again a rebel or troublemaker that needed to be eradicated. Joaquin did his research, if they were going to kill him then he had more than an idea just how they were going to do it. Even in killing there was the rule of tradition.

Which is how Felix was able to know and confirm what his Father had so outrageously claimed. All he had to do was follow the trail.

He left orders for Felix to exhume his body so as to prove his own theory correct. Reluctantly, and only after great deliberation did Felix go through with it.

Unbeknownst to the Family he flew back to Bermuda on a public flight before secretly entering down into the Family Mausoleum. There, after much deliberation he opened the coffin of his Father.

The body was there. Joaquin had suspected the worst from his Brother and Father. But he believed that come what may they would place his body down with the others. He was right.

Removing the bones of his Father’s hand he carefully set the lid back and headed back out into the city. He waited until he was back in Europe before visiting one of the world’s finest pathologists. There he had it confirmed what Joaquin had speculated. From the bones alone it was evident the traces of arsenic. Enough to kill a man.

The plane crash was only a story created to allow Mariana and her two young children closure. There never had been a crash. Joaquin was killed, poisoned while up in the air, in a flight that landed safely. A crash was far too unpredictable for Eustace. That and he needed to make absolutely certain no one else survived, particularly not those men closest to his son.

Felix only had two goals from that point on. One, to exact revenge on his Father’s killers, and any who proved conspirators in his death. And two, to fulfil his Father’s wishes and make the Balduins a House of Royalty on the world stage once more.

He had just completed the first. It was time then to move onto the second.