Felicia and Lucius were having dinner together a few days later. Their restaurant of choice was a recently refurbished restaurant purchased by the Wavefront Corporation built around a trio of chefs intent on proving their culinary worth. One old, a former chef of the Ashe family, and two young, brother and sister from Portacheval but learned of southern style cooking. Lucius liked the latter because his campaigns through Giordana had given him a taste for the spices, and he liked the former because the man was filled with memories of serving the young Ashe children.
Indeed, I would have seen to this man’s dismissal because he was the very chef present in the palace when Lucius kept there like a toy soldier in his youth, but the boy was getting reckless. There wasn’t very much time left before the subterfuge of his stolen identity would be at an end so he evaluated the risk low and knowledge of the queen-to-be high.
I would have further advised that such a location was not a fitting place to court another woman, but as he told me in later years he wanted to make her familiar with his true past, even if she didn’t know it. As for how his courtship fared, I know little of the specifics. I have neither his memories nor hers but this fateful day I know rather well.
They had naught but bones left in the bowl between them. Lamb bones picked clean of their marrow and but a small pile of tomato sauce covered in congealing fat that resisted the mopping touch of bread. Their gossip of the other students had run its course, and Lucius had little to say of recent murders in the city. At last she asked from deep inside her heart, “How did you get used to dying?”
Lucius hadn’t drunk enough wine to lose his wits, but after months of relative sobriety, compared to his time in the Misty Isles, his tolerance had waned. For a moment, he stared at the soft flesh of his left hand, dotted with fresh blisters as though he were a novice swordsman just taking up a blade once more. “I had to. Everything changed that night in Puerto Faro. We were overextended, in hostile territory. The uprising was far beyond what we could have dealt with in open battle, let alone when half the men were ambushed. I had to lead the men west, to Rackvidd, but not just on a march. We were harried and chased. We fought and fought and I had to do it from the front. I had no reputation for battle to rely on then. When I got in the melees, it wasn’t like fighting a duel. They’re horrible, bloody things. You get attacked from behind the moment ranks break. I was probably killed more times than I even realized. It’s easy to miss injuries once the healing has begun. And then there were incidents like the scorpion. When I lose a limb, the healing might stop short the way a regular man would scar over a stump. The stigmata has to be instigated to do more.”
She was leaned heavily on the table, her eyes fastened to him. “It’s one thing for a man to be brave enough to fight from the front. Foolishness can suffice. How do you intentionally kill yourself, though?”
Another had joined them in the room, the old chef. Lucius adjusted his attitude at once. “Well, I’m not really dying, for one thing.”
“A most god-blessed power you have, m’lord,” the old chef said as he circled the table, taking stock of what had been eaten and in what proportions. “I still pity that lad…”
“Jarnpojke?” Felicia asked.
“Yes…” the chef said, before his white brow furrowed. “Are you familiar with him?”
“You’ve spoken of him before,” she said.
“Yes. Yes, I have, but I always struggled to remember his name.”
“It’s a common name,” Lucius said as he refilled his glass. “Not the kind of name you find in palaces, but many a child at the bottom has it. You probably dismissed it as wrong, like you would dismiss a Louie or a Jon.”
“Frederika Ashe remembers him too,” Felicia said, watching Lucius from the corner of her eye.
“Maybe he died recently,” Lucius said.
Felicia grimaced. “Why would you suggest that?”
He tapped his chest. “I wasn’t born with this stigmata, and it’s very unusual. In fact, nobody else has even heard of a healing ability as strong as mine. Maybe the reason I got the power when I did was because the original user perished. Not even the angels know how the gods distribute these powers. Then again, mine seems to be stronger than his…”
The chef cleared his throat, “Perhaps the two of you would care for dessert?”
“Something with a cream topping, please,” she said, her mood brightening at once.
Dessert did not arrive however. The rigorous marching of iron boots echoed through the restaurant. Lucius set his drink down and ordered Felicia to the back corner. He faced the door, one hand on his blade, and was entirely unsurprised to see Theo Montem enter with four of the Warden Blades. An entire contingent of the town guard filled and surrounded the establishment.
He smirked. “Did I miss a shift? I swear I took this time off on the schedule.”
Theo smirked back at him. “Lucius von Solhart, I am placing you under arrest.”
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“For what? And under whose authority?”
“He hasn’t done anything!” Felicia shouted, but she didn’t approach. She knew Lucius might need to draw his blade and gave him the room he would need.
Theo held out a signed writ of arrest. “Conspiracy against the crown, for your speech at the Quartz Bowl. This is under the king’s authority, but a dozen different noble families reported your stunt and demanded action be taken against that slanderous tongue.”
“So, the king is arresting me? I’m to be taken back to the capital? And here I thought I was being kept away. He must appreciate my games.”
“There’s five of us, Lucius, don’t make this hard,” the Steel Blade, Lyam, said.
Lucius scanned the group once more. “Well, I suppose we did lose one friend, haven’t we? Don’t tell me Miss Ashlynn was afraid to come for this? I barely hurt her.”
“Hey now, I like foreplay but if you’re going to lead us on you’d better be planning to put up a fight,” the Blade of Night, Jon Brume said as he pulled one of his daggers.
Theo made no move to stop the man, but Lucius merely shrugged. “Did I give off the impression I was going to resist? I have nothing to fear from the king.”
There were many scenarios that Lucius had come to expect for the day Theo would simply try to have him killed, but he knew the man would be meticulous and would never rely on a brute force confrontation. To simply barge in with superior forces was the plan of the king, because it was a plan that had the least amount of time between delivering the order and either succeeding or failing. Theo, he expected, would ambush him. A cannon hidden in the back of a cart perhaps, or poison in his food. To simply march the warden blades up to him, and among them the most dangerous to Lucius, was not Theo’s style.
“You could end up in Donjon,” the Troll Blade said, his voice rumbling through the visor of his helm. He alone stood as if not poised to fight. He was armed as he had been in the north where he had served the Ashe family hunting the fire-worshipping beasts for which he had been named. He had been most useful there, and for the same reason was the most dangerous to Lucius as he possessed the power to prevent healing. Against trolls, it meant their moss-covered hides could not close up with scar tissue and it was believed that Lucius’ stigmata would be similarly inhibited.
The particular interaction between their abilities had not been tested however.
“If he wished to send me to Donjon, then perhaps then there will be a fight. But, if he just wants an audience with me he could have just sent a letter.”
“In chains?” Theo demanded.
“Until I rip them off,” Lucius responded.
The Steel Blade stepped forward, and Theo snarled at him. “What are you doing, Lyam?”
“Arresting him. That’s my job, isn’t it,” the knight said as he took his hand from his blade and produced a pair of steel manacles.
Then all watched as Lucius held out his wrists and allowed the irons to be fastened onto him. It escaped nobody’s notice that the steel merely covered his wrists, far less than he was willing to have hacked off just to make a point.
By the end of the night, everyone who mattered and most of the rest in Forum had heard that Lucius had been arrested. While most correctly assumed it was for the duel, theories ranged from conspiring with the enemy during his previous campaign, to rape. Little effort was needed to quell such rumors because those most offended by his display flaunted the fact that their complaints to the king had resulted in his arrest.
Lucius made no demand of saying goodbye to his family. Such a request would have been weak and he presumed he would be back shortly. He never imagined how long it would take.
It was seven days later when he was finally brought before the king in chains. There was little by way of audience. Guards and a view advisors whose faces he memorized, were in attendance although the grand hall had been used for the occasion. The king sat upon his throne and listened to the banal introductions. When the guard began announcing the crimes, the king interrupted. “I don’t need to hear those. I’m the one who wrote them. You’re making yourself an enemy of your peers, Lucius.”
The boy shrugged. “My peers, as you call them, are not equipped for the reality we’re facing. You told me that we must prepare for war. The academy can barely hold their attention for the most basic of educations. Their violent vindications are entirely turned inward. We can’t raise an army like this.”
The king gestured and a piece of parchment was handed over to him. He didn’t read it, just held it up. “One of the complaints I got was most curious. It wasn’t merely a request to lock you up or have your head cut off. It was a request that I detain you for your own good, that you had lost your mind and were a danger to those around you.”
“Most creative.”
“It’s from your mother.”
The room was silent and in that moment, Lucius resolved himself on his course of action. What he said was, “I’m not on good terms with her. She wasn’t happy I took a mistress.”
The king scoffed. “Of all the complaints, I’d say it holds the most weight. She bothered to come to me rather than simply disowning you. You’d have lost your rights. You’d no longer be eligible to lead armies. The only money to your name would be whatever you’ve stolen away while you were in the Misty Isles. Speaking of which, just how much of the Wavefront Corporation do you own?”
“Enough,” Lucius said. He scanned the room once more, but did not see the face of Frederika Ashe. “It’s not going to be a good look for you, my lord, if you punish me for fulfilling the terms of the duel you set out. Jules has been disgraced.”
“Yes, and he’s making an uproar that such a decree is illegal. He thinks he still has the backing of his family.”
“Now, why would Austin want to share that power?” Lucius asked with a grin.
Before the king could respond, the doors were opened with a bang. Acheliah strode in. She swept her gaze across the room as she crossed the hall. “Don’t look so smug,” she ordered as Lucius grinned at her.
“What brings you here, God-mother?” the king asked, his posture immediately poised.
“I have work for your hunting dog,” she said, and flicked her hand. The chains connected the manacles at Lucius’ wrists shattered. She turned and strode back to the door.
“I’ll need supplies,” Lucius said as followed after her.
She glanced over her shoulder. “The king will provide them.”
Lucius turned at the door and gave an exaggerated bow. “A pleasure to spend the king’s coin,” he said, and left with the angel.