“Gods,” Kethas shakes his head, “That’s work for more than one lifetime.”
“I’m not planning to do all of it personally,” Emlyn shrugs, “This is why generals have adjuncts.”
“How many did you have?” Ember asks.
“Usually around a half a dozen,” Emlyn replies, “All tasked with seeing to various things necessary to running my command. I had one who was responsible for my troops’ training regimen, and a big part of his responsibility was scheduling and ensuring that everyone got their training. I had another who was our head quartermaster, responsible for making sure that everyone was equipped. The third one handled all staffing issues, including transfers, rotations, promotions, leaves, and reassignments. The next two handled information gathering, both inside and outside our borders. The Third and Fourth Awsts always wondered why I was never surprised by their challenges. It was because those two were very good at their jobs. There were often a few more, depending on the task at hand. They might cover things like research into various topics, consulting with the mages or priests, logistics, or just finding out how my troops were feeling.”
“As for you,” Emlyn gestures to Ember, “You need to have at least two, and I expect you to go find them in short order, because you and I have more important things to deal with than duty rosters and supplier contracts. Once you get those two trained and things are running smoothly, we’ll look at what else we can shift off onto some adjuncts.”
Laughing, Ember nods, “I certainly won’t miss all the paperwork.”
“It’s getting late,” Atres rumbles in her ear, “You and I still have a few things to discuss. That conversation with your Goddess… How are you feeling… What about Argonath’s motives you found so amusing… How marriage works among your people… This thing about you becoming your Goddess’s champion.”
“That reminds me,” Emlyn nods, “I need to have the Temple archivist pull out everything they can find about Fey or blood runes.”
“Is that what Argonath thinks this thing is, then?” Ember asks.
“I’m not allowed to say,” Emlyn grins, “but I can’t stop you if you draw your conclusions.”
Kethas, about to take a sip, snorts, “Dancing right on the line there, aren’t you, girl?”
Emlyn, smiling, nods in acknowledgement. Atres grabs her glass and the bottle of whiskey before he hauls her off to a relatively private corner of the tavern. Plopping her on a bench, he spins her around so that her feet are in his lap. Before she can object, he starts removing her boots.
Once her boots are gone, he reaches over and refills her glass and hands it to her. “Sit there, sip that, and let me take care of you.”
Obediently, she takes a small sip as his fingers start to work on her feet.
After a few minutes, he looks at her, and it seems like she’s unwinding a bit. “Now,” he says softly, “how are you? I know that was a hard thing to talk about.”
“It was,” Emlyn nods, “As much as I miss my old friends and my family, I can’t say that I miss that time of my life much. Everything was such a mad, desperate scramble. It didn’t seem like it would ever end until it ended me.”
“It hasn’t, though,” Atres replies, “and I’m very pleased that you’re still here. Since you’re not really Nia, and I can’t use your real name, I need something else to call you. Tell me what to call you in your language. What’s a good pet name, hmm?”
“We have a few of those,” Emlyn blushes, “I can tell you what they mean, and you can pick one. Will that do?”
Giving her sultry smile, Atres nods.
“Fy anwylyd is my dearest. Fy nghariad is my darling. Merch hardd is beautiful girl. My father used to call my mother ‘leidr fy nghalon’, which means ‘thief of my heart’.”
“Hmm,” Atres considers, “What would a little thief be?”
“That would be lleidr bach,” Emlyn replies.
“Let me see if I have this right,” Atres says, “Fy lleidr bach… Yes, I think that will do, for now.”
Emlyn corrects his pronunciation a few times before he finally gets some of the nuances.
“Now, lass, tell me about how marriage works,” Atres grins, “among your people. And how does that work with four husbands?”
Blushing, Emlyn explains the different kinds of unions that the Cymry recognized, as well as some of the cultural associations, such as the various types of jewelry and forms of address.
“Hmm,” Atres shrugs, “That’s complicated, but if you’re losing a lot of people to warfare, I see the sense in most of it. So tell me, what about Argonath’s motives was so amusing?”
“He thought I would look quite… umm… fetching in your King’s Guard leathers. He wanted to put me on your recruiting posters,” Emlyn grins, “and plaster them up all over the city. He also thought that if he could convince me to wear them regularly, he’d get better attendance at his staff meetings.”
Despite himself, Atres throws his head back and laughs, “No wonder it amused you so.”
Emlyn nods.
“I could get you a set made up,” Atres grins, “since you’ve got a contract with us now. I think he’s right about you being quite fetching in them. You were quite lovely in your hunting gear. It showed you to good advantage.”
“Have them send the pattern to Milvara,” Emlyn says, “and let her make them. I’d rather not have a man measuring me for the inseam of some pants or fussing about how the jacket fits me when I fasten it. I’m still thin, but my muscles are starting to return. It frustrates Milvara because every time I go in for a fitting, things have changed, but I’m comfortable with her.”
“So champion of Morrighu?” Atres asks softly.
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“That remains to be seen,” Emlyn says, “I’ve spoken to one of her Four who explained a bit of it to me. The Test of Pain ensures that she will be able to lodge the fragment of her divinity that she created in me so that I can draw upon her magic more strongly than I can now. If I can pass that, then yes. If not, I will remain as one of her paladins.”
“You’re already quite powerful,” Atres says, “for a paladin. I’ve heard of paladins being able to place a Mark, but you’re the first I’ve ever known who could do it.”
“I suspect that there are a couple of reasons for that,” Emlyn sighs, “I have my own theories about it. When I was originally consecrated, it was before magic broke during the Gods’ War. Magic was stronger then, and a great many things worked better. Paladins were stronger then, and it didn’t take as long for us to gain abilities, either. Because I went through the process of removing myself from Rigan’s service without breaking any of my oaths, that old connection wasn’t severed like so many seem to expect. It was still there, but it was no longer connected to Rigan. My Goddess seems to have been able to assume that older, more powerful connection instead of creating an entirely new bond. Since Rigan held us captive for so long, we weren’t forced to live godless for most of that time, so we don’t have a lot of sins that we’d need to expiate or atone for, either. It’s also possible that the gods know what he did to us and see that as atonement enough for anything we might have done.”
“When you say that paladins didn’t take as long,” Atres starts.
“Everyone is shocked by my ability to heal myself,” Emlyn explains, “but this was an ability I gained a few days after my first consecration. It was one of the first abilities that nearly every paladin I knew at the time gained, usually within a few days of the induction ceremony. Now, I’m told by my cohort that it normally takes a year or more for that to happen. I placed my first mark on someone three years into my first service, but I’m told that now takes decades of service, if they ever gain that ability at all. Whatever happened when magic itself broke, it seems to have altered many things. I doubt that there are many left who remember what things were like before that happened.”
“Hmm,” Atres considers, “You might be right about that. Here, all that was centuries ago, so definitely outside of living memory. It might be worth poking around the records sometime when there’s nothing else to do to see if anyone recorded anything.”
He goes to work on her toes, one by one, and watches as her eyelids start to droop.
“No dozing off yet, fy lleidr bach,” Atres says with a sultry smile, “We still haven’t talked about what you and the Goddess discussed.”
He grins to see her blushing again, “Oh, lass. You may as well tell me.”
Stammering and blushing, Emlyn repeats the conversation until she reaches the part where the Goddess mentioned that the only rule was that all participants must be willing.
Palming his face, Atres grins, “You don’t have to go any further, fy lleidr bach. I can see where this is going, especially since Ember says one of her aspects is concerned with fertility.”
Grinning at her blush, he scoops her up and pulls her into his lap. “Do you have any questions about any of that I can answer for you?”
“Can you explain why she said that if I were going to send you away, to do it quickly?” Emlyn asks.
“Ah, that,” Atres nods, “Yes, I should probably explain that. For dragon-blooded males, when we take a mate, even one that isn’t dragon-blooded themselves, we form a bond with them. We can sense them through that bond, but it has other… effects. This is why bonded males can be around unbonded females without going into a frenzy, even if they’re not related to them. The bond we have with our mate renders anyone else… undesirable. It’s part of the magic that’s in our blood. When we find someone we care for, a bond begins to form. If it’s not reciprocated, it’s best to end it early, before we’re too bonded. Otherwise, it’s painful and takes a long time to recover from.”
“Why are you called dragon-blooded?” Emlyn asks.
“There’s some speculation about that. One story says that dragon blood was used in the process that created the first of us. Another says that the abilities we carry come from the dragons themselves. I tend to think that both of those might be right. What all the stories are consistent about is that mages created all the dragon-blood clans to be their servants. Some of the old stories say that we were created because it was more convenient for the mages to have humans with those abilities, because we’d fit through doorways and the like. The different clans were created with different abilities, depending on what the mages who created them wanted them to be able to do. Eventually, we grew tired of being servants and revolted. We’ve been free ever since.”
“That sounds terrible,” Emlyn frowns, “being manipulated at that level to suit the whims of some entitled asshat. We teach mages potent magic, but I don’t know if we teach them ethics. I’ve seen too many necromancers who felt entitled to end people so that they could use them as spell components. If I understand your story correctly, you were all slaves to the mages.”
“We were,” Atres nods, “Didn’t you say that your people practiced slavery?”
“We did, but likely not like you’d expect. Our version of slavery was never permanent,” Emlyn nods, “as it is in so many places. Unlike some of the neighboring kingdoms, we didn’t deliberately go about kidnapping people to become slaves. There was always a basic recognition of them as humans who should be treated properly, because our fundamental assumption was that five years down the road, they would be one of us – a full citizen, and no one with any sense would abuse their own. If we captured you in battle and no one ransomed you, we’d keep you as an enslaved person for five years. You’d be taught our laws, our ways, and our language, and your tattoo would be started. At the end of the five years, you were set free. You could take service with one of the Houses, find some other employment among us, or leave, if you chose. As far as we were concerned, you were Cymry-as Cymry as if you’d been born among us. Once you were freed, you were eligible to compete in the annual trials and raise your status. Many chose to stay.”
“How’d that work out?” Atres asks curiously.
“We considered it to be a kinder alternative than many of our neighbors. With them, if you weren’t ransomed back, you were executed or left to starve. If you looked back far enough, many of our Houses had been founded by formerly enslaved people,” Emlyn explains, “Even some of the Great Houses, like Cregoria, Stilba, and Gothan. I didn’t refuse those boys because of their House’s origins. I refused them because I knew what they were up to and I wasn’t about to allow myself to be used in that fashion.”
“What were they up to, exactly?” Atres asks.
“They were out to found a new Great House,” Emlyn replies, “but without giving me the rights that they should have for me to undertake something so monumental. The Ban Gwyr bond wouldn’t have allowed me to have as much control over things like the House’s finances as Ban Raieth would have. I didn’t want to end up with a big part of my tattoo blacked out, my status negated, because they did something stupid. I knew them and didn’t think much of them. Had some of their more sensible brothers come to me instead, I might have accepted them, but not that bunch. Then again, their more sensible brothers weren’t such a scheming, conniving bunch.”
“I can see where risking your hard-earned status wouldn’t be very appealing,” Atres nods, “You worked for it for quite a while. I begin to understand why you call them a bunch of miscreants. Anything else I can answer for you?”
“Why are attitudes here so different than those among my people?” Emlyn asks.
“Oh, lass,” Atres grins, “That’s a complicated question. I assume you mean the part about do what you want, yes?”
Blushing and ducking her head, Emlyn nods.
“I’ll try to explain it,” Atres grins, snuggling her closer, “Your people put a great store in bloodlines. If I understand your customs properly, this is even how you name yourselves, is it not?”
Atres waits while Emlyn nods again, before he continues, “The mother’s bloodline is easy enough to verify through birth. The father’s bloodline is passed on at conception, and that’s a bit trickier to prove. Here, in Tassatung, if you’re not nobility or royalty, bloodlines don’t matter so much, so people are a bit freer about that sort of thing. Your rules are what you were taught is right and proper. You were raised with your rules, though, and I’ll abide by them.”
“Why do that?” Emlyn asks.
“Because,” Atres smiles at her with a molten gaze, “when you do finally come to my bed after our one thousand and eighty-two days, I want you to be certain that it’s what you want. I want you to be free from any doubt, fear, or guilt. On that night, our bond will be complete. I will become yours, and I will make you mine.”
Transfixed by his intensity, Emlyn breathes out an “Oh.”
Boltir's Tip Jar
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Current Jar Total: 15 coppers, a silk ribbon, and a dwarf-sized thimble.
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Boltir’s Plea: "Did you hear that? 1,082 days! Atres is willing to wait three years to get into her good graces. That’s not a courtship; that’s a siege! If you think I could win her over in half that time with a well-placed limerick and a better quality of beard-oil, toss a coin in the jar. I need to buy some Cymry dictionaries. I need to learn how to say 'You have the eyes of a mountain sunset' without accidentally insulting her lineage. Leave a review if you think Atres is being too 'noble' and needs a little dwarven competition!"