TVisTV Book 3: Chapter 23 (RAW)

Chapter 23 - Raining On My Parade

Don’t let expertise fool you into seeing false boundaries or underestimating those with wild dreams.

- Naveen Jain.

Much as the business of the upcoming duel between Velens and Hughes weighed on her mind, Seraphina still kept a rather full schedule of “extracurricular” obligations. Which was why, on the very evening Velens had thrown down the gauntlet, she sat in one of the newly renovated offices of Bottleworth’s Confectioneries, interviewing candidates for her program of placing servant staff with noble households across the realm.

The candidates were all excellent. A rather young, scarred—but very promising—girl named Estala stood out the most. Seraphina frowned; the girl looked vaguely familiar, and the way Estala gazed at her with raw devotion was unsettling even to someone who had basked in the adoration of millions.

No, the problem was with the last candidate—a certain Thomas Buttersworth. Though he had not realized it, for the past ten minutes, Seraphina had been speaking to him with the Beast Lore Amulet around her neck. She had moved her mouth and feigned speech while projecting her thoughts through. To her mild surprise, Thomas had answered in kind.

Do you know what a Palisa Slug is? Seraphina’s thought brushed his mind.

The young man adjusted the ribbon at his collar, fretful. “With all due respect, I don’t know of what you speak of, Lady de Sariens.”

“I will give you another chance,” the young noblewoman said aloud, eyes narrowing. “Do you know what a Palisa Slug is?”

Seraphina nodded to her maid. “Miriam.”

Miriam crossed to a cupboard and opened it to reveal a neatly kept rack: an arbalest, a leather case of quarrels, a small pot of tallow, and a folding spanning lever. She took the weapon down with practiced ease. The wood was dark, its steel prod was thick, and brass inlay winked along the groove.

Thomas watched, color draining.

Without hurry, Miriam set the arbalest’s stirrup to the floor and slipped her boot through it, bracing the weapon’s nose against the boards. She unfolded the goat’s-foot lever with a soft click, hooked its twin claws to the bowstring, and seated the hinge against the tiller. Then she drew. The lever worked in two smooth arcs—one, two—ratchet teeth knocking faintly: tack… tack… tack. With the second pull, the string came back and settled into the polished nut with a crisp, satisfying clack that sounded, to Thomas, very much like a judgment.

She thumbed the safety bar into place, checked the catch, then unhooked the lever and stowed it beside the quarrel case. From the case she chose a short, heavy bolt, its fletchings dark. The quarrel slid into the groove; she tapped it once so the head kissed the inlaid mark at the rail’s end. Her hands never trembled.

“Lady de Sariens…” Thomas began, eyes flicking between Seraphina and the loaded weapon.

“Milly,” Seraphina said without looking away from him, “shoot Master Buttersworth if he lies to me again. I will not suffer it.”

The young noblewoman turned back to Buttersworth. “Are you a Palisa Slug?” she drawled, letting each word fall like heavy coins. Her green eyes picked up the lamplight and seemed to kindle with it. “Be very careful with your next words.”

“We prefer to be called—” he began, voice tightening.

“Lamassu. Protectors.” Seraphina’s smile was small and cold. “I know.”

Buttersworth shifted, the chair creaking beneath him. A tremor worked its way through his hands; his gaze flicked to the arbalest in Miriam’s hands and then back again. “How did you know?”

The blonde only shrugged indifferently.

“If the others find out,” he pressed, danger ghosting through his tone, “they will come after you. It is not yet our time to be revealed.”

“You have already come after me. Twice now,” Seraphina laughed softly, but the mirth never touched her eyes. “Such boldness, once the mask slips.” She tipped her chin toward the crossbow. “Those bolts are laced with Dragonroot. Enough to kill even one like you with but a kiss. Enough to leave you thrashing like any other man. I have no intention of ‘revealing’ you. In truth, I would prefer you remain hidden. Your purposes suit mine.” Her voice thinned to a razor. “Do try to grasp that it is your survival on the block… by your, I mean the entirety of your people, not mine. Should I wish it, the people of Aranthia could scour you out of your dens and burrows in a week.”

She drew open a drawer, the quiet skritch of wood on wood loud in the hush, and took out a slender file. As she spoke, she set to her nails with unhurried strokes. “Miriam is one of you,” she added without looking up. “A gesture of good faith, I think, keeping one of your number by my side, don't you agree?”

“Milady has the Sight, brother,” Miriam recited her rehearsed lines, never lowering the arbalest. The quarrel’s head, kissed with a sheen of deadly paste, glinted like a wet fang.

“Shush now, Milly. He didn’t need to know that,” Seraphina chided, a spark of feigned irritation and a real warning both. She turned her attention back to Buttersworth, smile returning and curdling at the edges. “As a little caution: if your kind continues to antagonize me, I will start a few pogroms here and there. I wonder how quickly a Palisa burns on the stake. Then things will really escalate…”

“You don’t understand what you—”

“No.” Her file paused mid-stroke. “You do not interrupt your betters.” She set the file down and leaned forward, elbows on the desk, the emerald of her eyes catching the room’s light. “And the thing is, I understand very, very well. You fancy yourselves arbiters of good and morality. Guardians of Order!” She wagged a finger, almost playful. “Allow me to introduce you to the only morality that matters: survival. You work for me now—because if you don’t, your people die. I have letters sealed and riders briefed on what is to happen should anything untoward befall me. Anything. Our destinies, Master Buttersworth, are already entwined.”

The Palisa Slugs would soon be looking all over in search of her agents that did not exist. No doubt, being unable to find them, they would think her intelligence network a shadowy thing indeed. Seraphina was bluffing.

His throat bobbed. “What do you want from us?”

“Oh, nothing so onerous. Well, at least not yet.” She reclined again, boredom delicately feigned. “Support. Information. My newspaper needs fuel for its fire of enlightenment. Later, when it is time to ascend the throne, I will want more direct service. For now, take my words to the others—to the Elders who rule your people and know that the fate of nations now lies upon your shoulders. For now, your next assignment, Master Buttersworth, is to go to the de Lumierre’s and enter their service. That is all… You may go.”

“Just like that?” He rose a fraction, hesitating, eyes skittering to the loaded bow, to Miriam’s unblinking stare, to the door that suddenly looked very far away.

“Well, you could start by being polite and calling me by my title,” Seraphina said, sweetness dripping from every syllable. “Try again. I can always find another Palisa Slug to carry my message.”

“I will leave at once, Lady de Sariens,” Buttersworth croaked.

“Good,” she said absently. She lifted the file once more, attention already drifting to the faint crescent of a nail. “And don’t fret. Your secrets are safe with me.” The smile she gave him then was bright as broken glass. “For as long as I find you and your kind useful.”

***

As if the sky itself wished to force a postponement, the rain had begun well before dawn—no gentle patter, but a hard, slanting downpour that hammered the slate roofs. The messenger’s cloak had dripped a small pond on the dormitory’s tiles, and his words had been most unwelcome: His Highness Velens would not postpone. The Crown Prince, it seemed, remained a poseur to the last—more enamored of spectacle than sense.

Seraphina sighed and set her teacup down. The china chimed against the saucer, a small bell struck in a storm.

“Aren’t you eating a bit much, Hughes?” she asked the boy at her table. A rain-dimmed window framed him; beyond it, the Academy lawns were already sodden and sullen.

“I need energy if I’m to go up against a Senior!” he said, almost cheerful, chewing like a man with nothing at stake but the crust in his mouth.

Strange boy. Did he fear nothing—or did nothing in that head of his rattle enough to know danger? Even should he won, he would earn the ire of a potentially soon-to-be sovereign. The bill would be presented later, with interest. Of that, she was sure.

“You do know Velens is a fair hand with a blade,” Seraphina said, keeping her tone light as she pushed down her guilt into her mental trash bin. “And as the challenger, he’ll try to push for a match to satisfaction. We have the right of refusal, of course. We could insist on first blood, or—”

“To satisfaction will be fine,” Hughes said blithely, that almost inane smile never leaving him.

Seraphina, against her better judgment, felt worry catch behind her ribs like a fishbone. “Velens favors his left hand. Hughes, are you left or right-handed?”

“Oh, I can use both,” he replied, tearing into a slice of buttered, partially burned bread she insisted on calling “toast.”

Like everything about her, she could make even the most mundane seem wonderful, Hughes thought to himself. The bread, or “toast,” tasted better because Seraphina had named it and brought it into this world. It was a crime that Velens had treated her so poorly. No excitement, he reminded himself, not before the clash. He would not underestimate, nor would he overestimate. He would analyze and overcome. Breathe. Let the emotions flow in and past me.

Seraphina’s fingers brushed the ruby of her earring. Ambidextrous. Less than one in a hundred—she had read that somewhere. The odds that both of them… Foolish. Coincidence, nothing more.

“You may ask one of my Knights to second you,” she said, studying him. “They’re better with a sword than I am. It’s unusual, to say the least, that you nominated one of the fairer sex.”

“I could think of no one better to be at my side,” he said simply, as if remarking that water was wet.

Color rose, swift and traitorous, to her cheeks. How could he say such things so cleanly? After a heartbeat, she coughed into her fist and found her balance again. “Again: as the challenged party, you will get to choose the manner of the duel.”

“I don’t own any weapons,” he said, washing the toast down with water. “So… any weapon will do, I suppose.”

“I do believe that you are not taking this seriously,” Seraphina murmured, getting slightly irritated. “Velens has trained with some of the realm’s finest masters. He may play at courtly foppery, but it would behoove you to remember that he is also a member of the Adventurers’ Guild. At just sixteen, he has achieved the Bronze.”

“I’m glad you’re worrying about me,” Hughes said, smiling that same infuriatingly open smile. “But I will be fine, Lady Seraphina.”

“I am not wor—” She bit the word in two. “In duels like this, people die.”

“Oh, I know,” Hughes said softly, and for an instant the levity left him. “Lady Seraphina, I do.”

Exasperation nipped her patience. “Milly, fetch my estoc. Please.”

Miriam froze as if struck. Please. Milady must truly be out of sorts, the monstrous maid thought.

I am most definitely not out of sorts, came the cool warning across the link they shared. Now hurry, Seraphina demanded across the link of the Beast Lore Amulet.

The maid gave a small squeak, nearly leaping out of her skin, and fled.

A few moments later, Eloise peeked around the door, a fine cloak around her shoulders, followed by a very sleepy-looking Desdemona de Savant. With her hair in disarray and her collar unlaced, de Savant was one of the lucky few who could manage the dishabille look.

“Good morning, Seraphina,” Desdemona yawned. “Must we truly do this for—what was his name again? Peter?”

“Hughes,” Seraphina said, frost blooming in the single word.

“You know my mother,” Desdemona went on breezily, “she wouldn’t approve of me witnessing a potentially violent event.”

“Violence, Desdemona?” Seraphina’s eyes did not so much as blink. “You?”

The challenge hung. A second later, Desdemona’s gaze skittered. “Well, we should all show support for a common friend,” she amended, smiling first at Seraphina, then at Eloise.

“You two seem… chummy,” Seraphina observed, coolly. She had expected them to still be at each other’s throats over Sir Gravens.

Eloise lowered her lashes. “We’re in the same class. We thought it best to reach an understanding. No need for enmity between us ladies.”

“Gravens, why are you half naked!?” Seraphina snapped suddenly, clapping a hand to her mouth as she rose.

Both girls whirled around. They looked at each other, their faces a bright red.

“The pair of you, honestly!” de Sariens chided. “No enmity at all,” the blonde girl murmured to herself. “How very noble.”

And how long will that truce of yours last? She needed those close to her to compete against each other to some degree. To vie for her time and concern.

Miriam returned at last, the door thudding shut behind her. She carried the estoc in the crook of her arm as one might carry a sleeping cat—carefully, respectfully, mildly afraid it might wake and bite. The scabbard was of a leather darkened to a near-black. No ostentation: a plain throat of blued steel; a chape hammered to a simple boot; a frog of thick, oiled straps studded with five discreet rivets. A weapon for work, not for show.

“Your blade, milady,” Miriam said, and offered it hilt-first.

Seraphina took it and felt at once how honest a thing it was. The grip fit her hand without argument: a spiraled wrap of dark leather over cord, flaring gently to the pommel. 

She drew the blade half a handspan, lifting it to her eye. No fuller, no gentle belly of an edge—just a long, unyielding taper of silverine steel with a diamond section as precise as a surveyor’s line. A maker’s mark sat shyly just above the ricasso. This was New Undertown steel. Dwarven steel with a hint of Mithril within it.

But to her, it felt light in her hand, too light as she fully sheathed it. Flimsy, even. For the young girl knew she could snap it across her knee. But then, most things felt flimsy to Seraphina these days. Her raw Strength spoiled her sense of what would break.

With Eloise’s help, she buckled the sword-belt low on her hips, angling the hanger so the scabbard would not tangle her stride. She adjusted her split skirt, buttoning the hidden placket that turned fashion into utility 

Hughes watched her the way you would watch a beautiful, but dangerous, beast. “A sword, it suits you,” he said.

“It suits the task at hand,” Seraphina answered. Outside, thunder rolled over like a drum beaten with heavy hands. “Well then, ladies. Hughes.” She gathered her cloak, raising the hood. “Shall we be off? We mustn’t keep the Prince waiting. I really do hope the weather finds its manners later.”