CHAPTER ELEVEN

  A Meeting of False Smiles

  GRATULATIONS! You have pleted the hidde [Battle Tutorial]!QUEST REWARDS: New ability [Last Stand], 200 EXP.Bram couldn’t help smiling widely at the floating blue window sihis was the first time the system had given him the boons he rightly deserved.

  ALERT! [Administrator Lv. 1] prevents you from earning job EXP.It py smile that was quick to vanish. “How will I progress in my job if you deprive me of my experience?”

  “Don’t be too disced.” Roatted him gently on the shoulder. “Perhaps there is another path to yrowth you’ve yet to discover.”

  ALERT! You gain rewards from looting the dead.“Should we check their pockets?” Rowan asked.

  Bram gnced down at the body.

  The blonde youth’s eyes were devoid of life as they stared up at the sky. His skin was growing paler by the sed while dark blood tio pool underh his body.

  “Better to let the dead lie in peace… We have enough griffins.”

  To distract himself from having to think about the retly departed and his role in their demise, Bram checked the status of the ability the system had just rewarded him with.

  ABILITY:Last Stand Lv.1TYPE:PassiveDESCRIPTION:One of noble blood should not easily fall. Wheh drops to zero, you gain a measure of prote from death and regain 1 HP. You are also immuo sorcery that deals instah tets so long as Last Stand is still avaible. COOLDOWN:24 hoursTo survive death’s touce a day, ‘Last Stand’ was quite a boon for the prince. Ohat would prove helpful should the worst-case sario occur.

  “It rewards you with what you o ensure your tinued growth while taking into sideration our circumstahis system is quite intuitive,” Rowan said in an impressed tone.

  “Not as intuitive as it should be,” Bram grumbled.

  He hadn’t fotten that the system without a name hadn’t reized his martial or bardic talents.

  “…It didn’t even reize my singing. I’m great at singing,” he pined.

  “I’m sure you are, though I haven’t heard you sing myself,” she replied teasingly, but pgly added, “You seemed talented enough in bat.”

  A curious look fshed on her face.

  “To be able to fight well with on or fist, to use your body so effectively, it speaks of an exceptional talent, and from one as young as you, ‘tis quite the achievement.”

  Bram’s cheeks redde being called talented. Not even his masters in the Delightful Troupe had called him this.

  “I was so desperate to find something that could match the other royals’ sorcery that I learned whatever I could. Many might cim I wasted my time chasing after my siblings in this way.”

  “You didn’t.”

  Rooio the four dead traitors.

  “You’ve proven that today.”

  “Tell that to the system then.”

  “Well,” Rowan’s fingers brushed the back of Bram’s hand, “perhaps it might be more ined to be supportive if we gave it a name.”

  With her slight touch, Bram’s frustration was instantly quelled, though this didn’t stop him from poking fun at his oppo.

  “How about… The Fool’s Guide to Sorcery?”

  “No.”

  “The Better Me Tool?”

  “That’s terrible.”

  “The Magic Trick?”

  “Holy, are you truly this horrible at naming a thing?”

  “They weren’t that bad…” Bram rose from the ground and then offered the trickster his hand. “Go on, you propose ohen.”

  Rowan’s face turned ptive while Bram helped her up.

  “Well, it seems our fates are now iwined with this strange sorcery at work inside of you,” she said.

  “Sure, one could see it that way,” Bram agreed while he recimed his sword from the ground. Once he returs cracked bde to its sheath, he added, “Not just our fates, but the fates of all the otherworlders we’ll summon to Aarde.”

  “The us call it the Loom,” Rowan suggested, “for ‘tis a device that will weave the destiny of mortals and immortals alike.”

  “The Loom,” Bram repeated.

  He didn’t hate the idea of naming the system for the very apparatus that Moira the Goddess of Destiny used whenever a child was born on Aarde so that the Fate Weaver could chart their fates with her weaving.

  “It fits rather well,” Bram admitted. “Though ours will be a Loom of Ill Fates where sacrifid opportunity e hand in hand…”

  GRATULATIONS! The system has been given the name [Loom of Ill Fates]. This event marks the starting line of yrand uaking…and the Loom shall watch your progress with great i.“‘Tis settled then,” Rowan said, sounding delighted.

  She fshed Bram with an impish smile. Ohat withered quickly as the sound of marg hoofs reached their ears.

  Rowan’s gaze drifted to the west. “We have pany…”

  Both she and Bram stood shoulder-to-shoulder as they watched a group of armed men on hartback appearing from the west. They rode swiftly and with purpose, their banners unfurled and billowing in the wind, the rgest of which was a golden griffin on a field of royal blue.

  “‘Tis the sigil of House Attin,” Rowan noticed. “I’m not familiar with the others. Are they enemies?”

  The sed banner showed a teal yew tree on a field of white, its branches spreading out nearly to the banner’s edges. This was the forest kingdom’s sigil. It was Bram’s sigil now too. While the other two—one of a bck stag, and the other, a pair of blue clouds—beloo noble houses from the north as Bram recalled.

  “My seneschal is in the lead, so no.” Bram’s haed on the pommel of his sword. “Still, it wouldn’t hurt to be prepared.”

  The prince’s gaze drifted down to the blonde youth’s corpse and the teal gambeson he wore. The sight of it set Bram’s teeth on edge.

  “There could be other rats hiding in my household.” Suspi fshed on his face. “We should remain vigint.”

  Bram felt Rowan’s hand on his shoulder. Her touch calmed the prince, relieving him of the bubbling rage that seemed ever-present underh the surface of his fool’s disguise.

  Speaking of disguises, Bram asked, “ you do something about my hair?”

  “You don’t want them to see how you’ve preteo be a redhead today?”

  “I’d like to keep my tricks hidden for a while longer.”

  “Very well.”

  She patted his head like one might do to a dog. Then Bram felt heat on his scalp, and a sed ter, a sticky watery substance slid down the back of his neck.

  “‘Tis finished.”

  “And now my back’s coated in red dye.”

  “There’s enough blood stains on your coat that it will hardly be noticeable.”

  Rowan giggled, and Bram couldn’t help chug too.

  He’d survived a fight to the death. It wasn’t the time to be a sourpuss.

  “Are you still able to fight?” Rowan asked.

  “Only if I must, but,” Bram eyed her coolly, “I seem to recall you promising to protect me.”

  “I should arm myself then.” Rowan walked over to the blonde youth’s corpse. She spent a long moment staring at his lifeless face before chastising words spilled from her lips. “Foolish Boy, you failed your prin life, but worry not, your blood shall serve him ih.”

  She raised her hand, palm fag downward, and bright crimson sparks fred out of her fingers. With her sorcery cast, the blood poolih the blonde youth’s body flew up to her hand, gathering into her palm as a mass of pulsing red matter that then reshaped itself into a crimson sword with a single-edge bde that widened and curved around the tip.

  “A blood fal,” Bram said, sounding impressed.

  Before the trickster could ent on the prince’s strange naming sehe riders who led the teal-cd soldiers arrived by the aute’s side, with the first of them climbing down from his russet hart so that his head wasn’t above Bram’s when he approached Atn’s seventh priwo others followed him, though, uhe first man, they seemed less relieved to see Bram in good health.

  “Wele, Ser Anthony,” Bram called iing.

  At the head of the trio was Ser Anthony Holmes, Bram’s only trusted retainer, protector, and also seneschal of Bastille.

  “Yhness!” he called. “Thank June, you’re safe!”

  The siy in Ser Anthony’s face, the worry in his voice, these served to reinforce Bram’s belief that his seneschal had not betrayed him to the White Rose or the north.

  The prince also noticed that instead of a sword, his seneschal carried a basket of red packets in his hand. These were healing gels, a medial salve made with alchemy that healed various wounds and ailments while also granting ahetid clotting effects to one’s injuries.

  Seeing them caused Bram’s heart to swell with appreciation.

  Ser Anthony k on one knee about five meters from his liege as if to give Bram time to aowledge his iions first.

  “Five my teness—”

  He was the only oo do so, and the btant disrespect of his panions raised Ser Anthony’s hackles.

  “My Lords,” the seneschal’s gaze narrowed, “you fet your manners!”

  His words fell on deaf ears, however, for the two men walked past the kneeling knight without the least bit of respect reflected in their gait. Uurbed by the age around them, they would have striddeo Bram’s side without pausing if the trickster hadn’t stepped forward and blocked their path to the prince.

  “No further.”

  Rowan’s ‘Blood Fal’ was at her side, and ready to be swung at the slightest provocation.

  Seeing such fident men shrink before her lithe frame made Bram smile while also instilling him with mueeded fideo face these nobles who barely hid their pt for him in their half-hearted greetings.

  “Yhness…” the slight-looking man with sandy hair bowed stiffly at Bram. “…we came once we heard news of your troubles.”

  He was Baron Archibald von Galen; an unpleasant man Bram had met twice since he became Lotharin’s governor. In their brief acquaintanceship, the prince likehe baron to a sly rat who ate the crumbs of his betters while sharpening the knife he meant to stab their backs with.

  Speaking of betters, the stout bearded man who arrived with Baron Archibald wrinkled his the stench permeating the air. He did not, however, seem too surprised by the se around him when he asked, “What roguery occurred here… Prince?”

  Bram got the feeling that Vite Henry Kleist had stopped short of parroting his ‘Ill-Fated’ title. This insight caused the prince’s eyes to narrow, though he didn’t chastise the vite. Despite the fidence he gained from Rowan’s as, Bram had yet to rid himself of past trauma instilled in him by the nobles of the Sn’s court. Dealing with these two lords who were quick to feign feeling offended as much as they were swift to subtly challenge his new authority would be challenging for him.

  To aid him in this meeting, he recalled the words Ser Anthony had oaught him back during the days when being bullied by other nobles had taken its toll on a younger Bram.

  “A noble of the imperium must have three faces,” the old knight had said. “One for the world to see, one for only your closest panions to enjoy, and—”

  “One I keep for only me…a faly I see,” finished a young Bram who’d then asked, “How will I know which face to use?”

  “If they show you siy, thehem the same,” Ser Anthony had suggested. “But if their smiles are forced…”

  As he recalled his seneschal’s words, Bram noticed it now; the false smiles these nobles presented him with. Knowing which face to show them lent ce to his voice.

  “As you see, My Lords”—He faced the hyenas while inwardly thankful that his legs hadn’t buckled underh him—“I’ve been attacked by traitors seeking to capture me… For whom and for urpose, sadly, they never said…”

  His gaze drifted from one passive expression to the other, noting how Baron Archibald’s brow was sweating a little too much.

  “Thankfully,” the prince’s molten irises drifted to the small back of his new protector, “my panion mao thwart my assassination.”

  It was only right for him to pce the ret battle on Rowan’s shoulders to hide the truth of his achievement. For it wasn’t yet the time to reveal his new fangs. her did Bram admit that he suspected the north of treachery. Su accusation required unimpeachable proof which he still cked.

  The two lords’ gazes drifted from the blood on Bram’s clothes to Rowan whose dress and cloak were in an pristine dition. Others might have questiohis obvious tradi, but not the lords who thought so little of their prihat they didn’t doubt that he couldn’t have sin his enemies himself. Still, they couldn’t believe Rowan had dohe deed either.

  “This slip of a girl killed these men…?” Vite Henry scoffed.

  “She did,” Bram reiterated, adding, “Quite easily too.”

  It wasn’t teically a plete lie.

  If Rowan had fought these men herself, they’d have been dead within seds.

  The two lords looked at Rowan with renewed i, and Bram couldn’t help notig the sparkle in their eyes nor the flushing of their cheeks as they beheld her beauty.

  Truly, she’s a beautiful butterfly, ohat stings like a mighty bee. Bram smiled inwardly. A bee whose stinger I’ll be aiming at your necks eventually.

  “You’ve been holding out on us, Yhness,” Baron Archibald said teasingly. “Where have you been hiding—”

  The baron leered at her as if he would devour this redheaded maiden whole with his unveiled lust, but then Rowan lifted her sword a little higher, aiming it at his crotch, and sending him c back.

  Just like a rat when fag a true predator…

  “Behave yourself, Baron!” Ser Anthony chided as he stepped over to stand beside the trickster. “This is Lady Rowan of House Wolfe who has entered into the service of our prince.”

  Bram saw trust in the gaze his seneschal gave her, and he assumed the trickster pretending to be a noblewoman had found a way to vince Ser Anthony that she was on the prince’s side.

  It wouldn’t have been difficult, he realized. Bringing me back alive would be enough for her to gain his trust.

  The others didn’t share Ser Anthony’s fidence, however. Shock, disbelief, and even fear fshed on their faces at hearing her name.

  Bram uood their sudden tension because he the noble name of ‘Wolfe’ and the tragedy which befell that house. So notorious was their downfall five years ago that the bards of the imperium had immortalized it in verse, one he’d sang himself on occasion.

  For the Wolfe who stood orong and tall

  Dabbled too keenly with blood magic.

  And birthing madness iheir hall

  Ensured an ending far tic.

  “Impossible,” Vite Henry sneered. “House Wolfe was left desote after Eorl Rond’s heir caused the catastrophe that cursed their nds… None of that family survived.”

  “I survived,” replied the trickster who’d stolen the identity of a dead girl. “And I remember all that happened afterward…”

  Bram wasn’t sure what Rowa but he could visibly see the vite repressing his disfort.

  In his mind, the prince recalled his ret lessons of Lotharin’s noble houses—their territories aionships—which he had inscribed to memory so that he might never be ignorant of their dealings and dispositions.

  Bram remembered how Vite Henry’s territory in Koble and the Wolfe’s former shire of Rhein—now called ‘Bloodhaven’ after the catastrophe that id waste to it—had been close neighbors in Lotharin’s northern region of Rhynend. He also remembered that the Koble Shire, the Kleist family, and their allies in the north had profited from the fall of House Wolfe and the loss of Rhein Shire. The rumors of how they seized its remaining unspoiled territory and monopolized the trade of former Rhein goods were riddled with dark whispers as well.

  Was this why she chose her new name?

  Bram wondered if her new persona was chosen to make the vite and his backers nervous or if Rowan chose the name of a dead house for venience’s sake. With the way the trickster smirked at the vite, Bram thought it might be the former, and if so, he couldn’t help but feel eted for choosing a partner skilled i of intrigue in a way he wasn’t.

  Vite Henry cleared his throat. “roof have you of your cim?”

  Rowan kicked the corpse closer to the vite’s feet.

  It was Baer.

  “Surely a sorcerer of your caliber reize the dition of this man’s body,” she said teasingly.

  Vite Henry gnced down, his gaze narrowing at the sight.

  “This…” he let out a sharp intake of breath. “This oner’s been drained of blood.”

  Narrowed eyes soward Rowan’s fal.

  “That’s…blood magic,” he deduced.

  “Blood magic?!” Baron Archibald’s eyes widened into saucers. “Then she must truly be a damnable Wolfe?!”

  Blood magic was a rare art in sorcery, and the fallen House of Wolfe was known to be quite profit in it. As a house’s brand of sorcery was akin to a badge nition, the sight of such potent blood magi this se could easily be mistaken as proof that the trickster was ihe long-lost daughter of the st eorl of Rhein.

  With her surprisingly detailed knowledge of House Wolfe, the others who weren’t privy to Rowan’s true ins had no choice but to allow doubt to fill their thoughts. They could only cede the possibility of her outndish story.

  “Her cims will o be verified,” Vite Henry insisted.

  “She must also be evaluated”—Baron Archibald turned a knowing gaze on Bram, the prih supposedly no magi his veins—“for her aptitude in sorcery.”

  “From the state of the dead”—Ser Anthony patted Rowan on the shoulder—“I wouldn’t be surprised if the Sn’s court named Lady Rowan the ‘Inparable’ of this year’s juring season.”

  He ughed. She giggled. Meanwhile, the two lords stared nervously at each other.

  Bram uood their sudden sense of trepidation.

  These two representatives of the northern nobles’ fa which resented Bram’s governorship have discovered that the once-weak seventh prince of House Attin now had fangs he might use to bite them with. If only they khe depths of Bram’s pns to use the resources of another world against them. These nobles would have felt more than simple trepidation from this meeting.

  “I appreciate how you came here out of worry for me, My Lords, but…” Bram grabbed the trickster’s slender hand, their fingers iwining. “…Lady Rowan and I have business elsewhere.”

  Before anyone could protest, he led her past the flustered lords and swiftly toward the aute’s open door.

  “I trust you see yourselves back to Bastille,” Bram said before he ehe carriage that was now manned by one of his teal-cd soldiers. “And Ser Anthony, please have the new an wash my carriage wheurn to the bastion. We wouldn’t want the stench”—his gaze drifted to the two lords—“to linger.”

  Quickly, the prince’s aute left the se of the crime, and with him went the personification of blood, death, and rebellion.

  GD_Cruz