The Referee

The Library in the Void was a most particularly strange place. Many cycles were not enough for me to get used to that odd darkness. Eternal, yes, but also incomplete. Around and beneath me was nothing but a complete void of dark, and that my feet made contact with an invisible surface only heightened the eeriness of the matter. Most of all, however, was the fact that some objects appeared not merely unaffected by the darkness but also unbothered by it. Nary a shadow existed on the bookshelves, as if they were evenly illuminated from every conceivable angle without such a light making itself present.

Most unfortunate, this place.

It had been many years since I had felt the need to think. To truly think. Ah, sure, one ponders much while going on about their daily life, but my existence was such that life’s troubles hardly seemed worth concerning myself with. It was different now.

“Monsters roam these lands once more,” I said aloud, to no one in particular. The book bled as I flipped its pages, and a distant sound of pained screams that would have disturbed me once upon a time echoed in the distance. “I wonder now…Johan broke the rules of the sacred duel. Were he a being of this world, my authority would be to curse him for life. Yet as he is now an Architect, my curses offer him no danger.” Again the book bled as the pages turned, and it seemed like it would be a while until the needed knowledge would present itself. “There is surely a case in the history of Time that would show how to punish the man…lord, this is taking a while.”

Annoyance and curiosity both overwhelmed me at once, and a deep sigh vocalized my feelings. It had been at least thirty years in linear time since my search had begun, which to be frank was beginning to test my patience. “It will take at least eighty more years to find the correct records,” I said somewhat bitterly. Not so long in the great scheme of things, but I was starting to get a little hungry and it had been a long day. “Perhaps a break is warranted?”

It would be rather distasteful of me to use my powers to observe Valle of Cresna’s group, but as Johan had abolished stats there was hardly something else I needed to use the Eye for. Ah, one indulge shall not hurt. How were things going now, in the natural flow of time? Had they succumbed to despair, or were they valiantly thinking of mounting some sort of counterattack?

The answer, I was amused to find, was neither.

“Gentlemen,” Celle said, standing between the two seated men with her arms raised high as some sort of signal, “you understand the rules?”

Carr nodded, concentration plain on his face. “Crystal.”

Valle, sitting across from him, grinned in response, but even as his posture relaxed and the edges of his mouth softened, the intensity never left his eyes. There was no mistake—this was a taunt. “No complaints after I beat you, then?”

“Funny. I don’t recall you ever beating me.”

“I don’t recall you accepting a rematch.”

Carr leaned forward and said, with a wickedly arrogant tone of his own, “Any time you want, spoiled king. Show me what you got.”

“It will be my pleasure, insolent farmer.” Valle also leaned forward, and both their foreheads were nearly touching now. Neither man blinked, nor did they back down.

Everything fell silent in anticipation. Isabella, Fedal and the others formed a circle around them watching them and waiting for the first spark to fly. Nevada covered her own mouth to keep her loud breath from breaking this complete stillness in the air. Only the occasional sound of the waves outside disrespected this sacred ritual. Until—“Gentlemen,” Celle announced loudly, “DRINK!”

Thunderous cheers broke the silence as Carr and Valle each grabbed a bottle from the table—symmetrically set for the two—and turned them upside down, both somehow still staring at each other’s eyes during the process. Much alcohol fell from their lips and onto their own clothes, which made my fair referee soul wince at the unprofessionalism at play, yet no one in that room appeared to care. Soon the bottle was done, and both men had grabbed a second bottle, but here they started to falter.

Valle lost his balance and appeared as though he were to choke, but then firmly planted a hand on the table and valiantly threw his neck back to force himself to keep downing the poisonous liquid. Carr, meanwhile, was having a steadier if more difficult approach, unpausing yet drinking at a lower speed than his rival. Here, near the end of the second bottle, as both rivals took a deep breath as if to consider surrendering for a moment, they locked eyes with each other and saw they had both taken a pause.

I am not out yet, Carr thought, I can still win this.

I refuse to lose to you, Valle thought.

Both men remained still for a moment as the crowd raged on around them, and then suddenly displayed a burst of energy throwing back their necks and turning the bottle upside down in near perfect synchronicity. Then, putting the bottle down, both men shouted, “I WON!”

Celle regarded them carefully, thankful that the two were glaring at each other rather than her. Honestly, I have no idea how I’m supposed to be able to tell who finished first, she thought. But it seemed as though both men had forgotten about the concept of a referee at that point.

“You insolent peasant, my bottle was emptied and set down before you had even started your last sip!”

“Oh, excuse me your highness—actually don’t excuse me, acknowledge me! I drank it first!”

“I was already done!”

“You were not!”

The two maintained an angry stare at each other for a moment longer until Valle nodded at the drinks table once more. “Tiebreaker,” he said, sudden determination creeping into his tone.

“You’re on,” Carr replied, with the utmost seriousness.

By now the crowd had mostly dispersed, however, for this recounting of what I witnessed leaves out the many drunken pauses the two men took before they managed to utter such sentences. A more accurate recount would have involved the words “Dude” and “Hey” followed by an inebriated recount of the events. By the time the two had decided on a tiebreaker, their friends had mostly moved on.

“Throw it again!” Isabella shouted angrily. “I will catch it!”

Fedal took a deep breath. He wasn’t annoyed, exactly, but he was nearing exasperation as he grabbed a fistful of grapes once more and returned to his position. “Can I come closer at least?”

“No! You know the rules. We have to be this far for me to catch it with my mouth or it doesn’t count.”

There was another deep breath. Fedal had been sitting beside her a while ago, and when she asked for him to pass some of the grapes he had decided to jokingly toss it at her. She did not catch it, of course, and he thought it would be the end of it when it bounced off her face and onto her lap. Instead, she had handed it back to him and said, “Come on, I can do this—let me try again.”

A few moments later, and despite their brief pause to watch the drunken duel, they were back at it. At first Fedal had hesitated, but then upon noticing her smile he found it hard not to keep going. She’s had a few drinks, but she seems much happier now. I can live with this. He had been concerned since he found her, enough that his own concerns meant little right now. What of the unicorn and the like? To hell with it! Isabella was not doing well, and he was the kind of man who found it much easier to focus on his friend’s issues than his own. I don’t mind if she has a few drinks, but I don’t want her to focus on them. If she can have fun like this, maybe she can forget about Duartes, about the voices in her head and—

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Distracted by his own thoughts—and powered by the light drinks he himself had consumed this party—Fedal’s underhanded throw had much more power than anticipated and he noticed that, somehow, rather than tossing it as an elegant arch he managed to hit Isabella straight in the face.

“I was just about to compliment how you fenced in the team match,” Isabella said, her voice bearing the calm and high-pitched tone of someone who is about to lose it. “I really—really thought that. You know.”

“Uh—I—okay, I’m—”

A rather loud argument, though devoid of actual anger, took place over the next few minutes. Apologies and angry comments were made, with neither side truly meaning either, and by the end of it they were laughing, especially after Gilder showed up with a platter of desserts for them both—presenting them proudly as if the one-armed, nearly dead Max hadn’t been the one to cook it.

“This is really good,” Fedal said, his mouth still half-full. Feeling impolite, he forced himself to swallow, and then added with some concern, “Should you be up and about already?”

Max laughed. “Probably not, but I needed to get out of bed not to go crazy and I honestly really do enjoy cooking. Gilder has been a good assistant too, so it’s not like it stressed me out too much.”

“I hate cooking,” Gilder muttered. “If not for the fact Max is injured, I would just have stayed out of it but—well…I can’t let him do anything too strenuous.”

“It's not that bad,” Max said, laughing once more. It occurred to me that the man looked oddly jovial for how much his life had changed in the last few hours, but I dared not read his mind. He seemed in a good mood, and I dared not amplify his emotions by reading too much into them.

Instead I turned my attention to the other side of the room, where Valle and Carr were now engaged in their fourth tiebreaker—truthfully I believe they had both separately won different rounds but had drank too much to be able to fully tell. The two were hardly the focus of my attention, however. Rather, Celle had approached Nevada and this interested me greatly.

“You don’t seem like you’re having a lot of fun,” Celle said. She was leaning against the wall behind her, but she felt sober enough. “Is it fine if I ask why, Your Highness?”

Nevada was tense, no doubt, but being called ‘Your Highness’ appeared to soothe her slightly. She had not been called such enough lately, especially as Carr rarely showed her the respect she deserved—and Valle never seemed to bother correcting him. “I am fine,” she said. “You just have too much to drink and are misreading things.”

“The one thing you can always rely on a drunk person to notice is how much other people have had to drink.” Celle gestured at Nevada’s filled cup. “Doesn’t look like you had a lot.”

“Is that a problem? Maybe I just don’t enjoy drinking.”

“If that’s the case, that’s the case,” Celle said, shrugging. “But you seem a little tense right now.”

It was many things. That they were in the castle where her father had been murdered was one of them, of course, but there were other things bothering her too. At first Nevada meant to ignore this and keep it all to herself, as she always had, but something inside of her felt heavier than usual. Years of having gone by unnoticed at court meant she knew that silence was the best policy, and that breaking it now would amount to nothing but a mistake.

But Celle sounded friendly enough and her frustration was mounting. She already knows about my stats. Might as well be honest, if only a little. “Lord Valle speaks differently to me,” Nevada said. “He is much too formal.”

Celle laughed. “You call him Lord Valle and it surprises you that he’s formal, Your Highness?”

“That—!” Nevada’s voice died in her throat and she sighed. “There is some truth to that. But the man is just as formal as I am.”

“Someone has got to be the first one to drop that. Why not you? Just be more casual with him, see where it goes. If he can’t get his head out of his ass after that, that’s on him. Your Highness,” she added quickly.

Nevada raised an eyebrow and allowed herself a short laugh. “You really think you can use that language and make it formal by adding ‘Your Highness’ at the end?”

“No. But I think you are caught between enjoying the respect the title gives you and wanting to be treated like a normal person, so this feels like a nice compromise.” When Nevada looked at her in shock, Celle shrugged and said, “It is easy to forget, but—I was arguably the world’s greatest detective.” She laughed at her own declaration, then added, with a sudden seriousness, “I still am.” There was some uncertainty there, yet she remained firm. “I—I am sorry I couldn’t keep your father alive that night.”

Whatever Nevada had been expecting her to say, it hadn’t been that. The look of immense guilt and regret on Celle’s face appeared to take both of them by surprise, but it was the princess who said, “It—it wasn’t your fault. All of the Imperial Guards tried their best. You did too. I am thankful for that.”

“It wasn’t enough,” Celle muttered. “And I can’t ever make up for that. But I can find out who killed your father and see that they meet justice.”

“Thank you,” Nevada replied quietly. She paused, then asked, “Did we meet that night? I don’t remember seeing you there, but...I am ashamed to say I don’t often remember every face I see at those events.”

Celle shook her head. “That is hardly something to blame yourself for. We met briefly, I think. The disguises we were all wearing that night made it hard to tell.”

Nevada regarded her in silence. I thought she hated me, she thought. The crown gave orders to see her dead if she kept investigating and no one stood up for her. Not even me. I didn’t think it was a wise move at the time. Surely she knows that, yes? But…she’s just feeling guilty that she didn’t save my father. That she hadn’t done her job well enough. A consumate professional, Celle, and Nevada could respect that. There were very few words she could find about this topic, and so in desperation to avoid the awkward silence, she went back to the topic she had tried to avoid earlier, “I will try to be more casual,” the princess said quietly. With visible effort, she said, “I will try to be less formal, Celle.”

The importance she attached to her name made it obvious to Celle what she was asking for. “I will be glad to help…Nevada.”

Both frowned at the word.

“That seems weird out of your mouth,” Nevada said.

“Yeah. Realized moment I said it. It’s really weird, Your Highness.”

“I didn’t say you could stop,” Nevada replied, a false note of outrage in her voice as she smiled, “it will just take a while to get used to it. Keep doing it.”

“Is that an order?”

Nevada considered it for a moment. “Yes, it is.”

The two shared a laugh until a sudden sound distracted them. At first they were concerned, but soon it became clear that Valle and Carr had reached the part of a drunken night where they had their arms around each other’s shoulder while saying how much better their life was for meeting each other. “Bro—” “My good man—” “If not for you—” “Had I not met you—”

Celle chuckled. “Wow, maybe one day he’ll love me like he loves Valle. Not holding out much hope though. Seems like the competition is too tough.”

Nevada blinked twice, her face suddenly contorting in something between anger and disgust. She gripped her wine cup tightly enough Celle feared it would shatter, but the fury appeared genuine and yet unserious; it was a display of annoyance yet awareness had not left her. “I just realized,” Nevada said,“that I have been jealous of Lord Valle acts with Carr.” She turned to Celle slowly. “That rather upsets me.”

“Understandable.” She smiled at her and pointed at the drink. “Come on now—we just survived the worst, the world might end soon, the boys are acting like idiots…it has got to be worth a drink or two.”

I can’t be losing myself here. I have to remain rational, Nevada told herself. Still, there was something to be said about making stronger bonds with your allies. Valle and I are close yet distant. That needs to change for this alliance to work long term. I have to work on that. Suddenly, as the drink touched her lips—she convinced herself it was the drink but it was too soon for its effects to settle—a realization overcame her. I have become very good at creating fake relationships over the years, she thought, I do not know how to establish a real relationship anymore. This should be something to work on…for the sake of ruling the Empire. She told herself it was for that reason and no other.

“I was thinking of exploring the castle a little,” Celle said, hesitantly. “It sounds like a fun adventure—would you like to join me while everyone sobers up?”

Nevada hesitated at the idea of leaving everyone behind. It sounded more than rude, it would have been a terrible social mistake to do so at any of the parties she had attended as a princess. Yet the sound of Carr and Valle planting their arms on a nearby table to arm wrestle each other made the decision easier. “Maybe we should get Isabella to come with us,” Nevada said dryly.

When they looked over, however, Isabella had joined up with the others as they circled the sudden arm wrestling match and was using chalk to draw something on the wall. A tournament bracket, it seemed. “Me and you round one, hear me Max?” Isabella asked.

“I literally don’t have an arm.”

“I win by default, then—next round for me?”

Nevada drew a deep breath. “On second thought, she appears to be having fun. Let’s go explore the castle and leave them drunk here.”

“It would be my pleasure, Your High—Nevada.”