Lord of the Black Mountain 1/?

One

“I would like to know what you thought this would get you,” Joris says, about thirty minutes after the attempt on his life.

His wife (husband? Joris decided to go with “husband.”) glared at him sullenly. The young prince was still in his sister’s wedding dress. The gown was pale blue with gold embroidery worked in floral motifs with pairs of doves flying amid branches of apple blossoms. The gown was torn and stained after their scuffle, and the veil was crumpled on the floor. The prince was sitting on the couch across from Joris, his arms and legs bound tightly with conjured spell-cords. He had a split lip and a black eye courtesy of Joris, and he was still struggling and straining futilely at the bindings.

“I believe I was meant to be married to your sister, not you, your highness,” Joris continues, amused despite this disaster of a wedding night. He’s pretending a bit, mocking the young man, his “husband.” He’s pretending that he doesn’t understand the situation.

“I’m not married to you,” the prince spits out. Then brashly (and melodramatically) he declares, “do what you will to me, my sister will never marry an undead monster!”

Joris blinks. “I’m not undead.” Whatever he was, it was something more complicated than simple undeath. He was the Lord of the Black Mountain, the Warden of Mir. The Speaker for the Five Cities Assembly. The Seweni didn’t understand his position and thought he was some kind of mage-king, which is why they’d originally approached the Assembly–and him– with a marriage alliance with this prince’s twin sister.

“I killed you and you got right back up!” The prince sounded outraged by this. Joris couldn’t help the smirk that tugged at his lips. His reaction seemed to enrage the prince even more.

“You stabbed me, and I’m immortal,” Joris corrects patiently. “Now, I’m hoping that this hare-brained scheme of yours was your idea, but my people are questioning your escort to make sure. I’ll send your parents a letter about this, and I’m sure the Assembly will want to re-negotiate the terms of our alliance with Sewen.”

The prince’s makeup mostly hid his flush, except for his ears and neck, which were bright red. “Will I be kept here as a prisoner?”

“You’re not a prisoner, you’re my husband,” Joris says, rising to his feet.

The prince seems to lose any control he previously possessed at that; he even attempted to attack Joris, despite the bindings on his arms and legs. However, he immediately collides with the barrier of force Joris puts up. Joris closes his hand, and the barrier closes around the struggling prince, and gently forces him to sit back down.

“We’re not married!” The prince shouts.

“Everything was signed, and we exchanged gifts and dowry,” Joris says.  “The people of Mir agreed to this alliance, and I, as the Lord of the Black Mountain, the Warden of Mir, and the Speaker of the Five Cities Assembly signed the marital contract,” Joris says. “You also signed the contract and stood with me for the blessing of earth and heaven before my ancestors. That either makes you a proxy for your sister or my husband.”

“I just tried to kill you,” the prince says harshly, his teeth clenched. “Surely that negates the contract.”

“You’d think that, wouldn’t you, but no,” Joris says, and turns away from the prince, to go to the door.

Three of his retainers were waiting outside the door, Anvar, Mayur, and Chisen, all members of his household guard.  He’d sent them out of the room after they’d burst in a few minutes too late to do anything about Joris having been stabbed. (They had been extremely angry and embarrassed by not having suspected that the “bride” was an imposter and an assassin.) “Lord Nemar?” Anvar asks, not very subtly trying to look around Joris and into the room at the fuming prince.

“Please escort my husband to the quarters set aside for my spouse,” Joris says.  Anvar snorts, and the other two guards look a combination of skeptical and amused. “Keep an eye on him, and don’t let him do anything stupid. More stupid than he’s been already that is.”

“Yes, my lord,” Anvar says, and has Mayur and Chisen go in to wrangle the prince to his feet and haul him out of the parlor. Prince Caris puts up some token resistance and gets a good shake for his trouble before he subsides and allows himself to be marched out of the room. 

“Once you’ve secured him, please send a message to Lady Pyr, asking her to meet with me at her convenience.”

Anvar nods, and the three retainers head off with the prince in tow. Joris watches them go, then shuts the door behind them with a sigh. The excitement of the past few hours was going to make it difficult to get any sleep tonight. He retreats to his study and spends the next few hours grading papers until he’s tired enough to finally go to bed.

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Joris wakes early the next morning. After a quick breakfast, he receives the initial report of the interrogation of his husband’s escort. Or more accurately, the escort and servants of her Highness Princess Teren Kelfin, the prince’s twin sister. Among the princess’ servants were two personal maids, a lady in waiting, and the princess’ spiritual conductor, a priest of the Sarmateon faith named Arden Thinan. Also interrogated was the Seweni emissary who had first brought the offer of alliance, Lord Daran Simuir, and his retinue. According to the report, the Seweni had been entirely ignorant of the prince’s impersonation and were currently confused and terrified at the outcome of the prince’s attempted assassination.

(Joris is not inclined to be sympathetic, no matter how pathetic the prince’s servants seem.)

After reviewing the interrogator’s report he sends the report on to Archon’s Office, appending his account concerning the events of the previous night. It takes a great deal of effort not to add any editorializations concerning the incident. This marriage alliance was a stupid idea, Soxa, he imagines telling the Archon. Why did I even let the Assembly talk me into this?

Of course, he did know why he let the Assembly talk him into the marriage alliance. The Seweni had approached them with an offer of an alliance against the Andal tribes that were spreading into their territories. The Andals were raiders, traders (more often than not trading what they raided from elsewhere) from the Northern Isles, and they’d been building colonies along the coast and further inland up the Sonnu River toward the lands of the Assembly for the past fifty years.

There had been originally been some conflict between the Assembly and Sewen. The Sarmateon faith held by the Seweni believed that magic was inherently corrupting and as a result, the Seweni didn’t trust its use or its practitioners. There was also the very significant issue that they tended to be aggressive in seeking converts and otherwise imposing their beliefs on others. Despite the initial conflict, the Seweni had ended more or less as allies and trading partners, though there were still some profound misunderstandings between them and the Assembly.

The Great Assembly had decided that a marriage alliance with Sewen would be good for the Five Cities, and Joris had allowed himself to be convinced to exchange letters and gifts with Teren Kelfin, Princess of Sewen. He’d only met her in person twice, but he had found her to be intelligent and well-spoken. He had also met Prince Caris on those occasions, and he had seemed polite, if distant. Joris had found himself to be cautiously optimistic that this marriage alliance might be successful.

Only of course for that marriage alliance to run straight into the Seweni fear of magic, and their belief that Joris was some kind of evil necromancer king. Joris was apparently the lesser of two evils compared to the Andal sea nomads for the Seweni royal court. (The twins apparently disagreed with this assessment, which Joris had found out the hard way.) 

Joris thinks about this as he writes the letter to the king and queen of Sewen.  He tries to be diplomatic, but it’s very hard to be diplomatic about being stabbed in the kidneys. Joris ends up going back for a fresh sheet of paper twice before he has something resembling a decent draft. He’s just finishing when a servant enters the room to tell him that the Archon of Mir, Pyr Soxa had arrived to speak to him. “Have her wait in the study and bring refreshments,” he tells the servant.

The servant bows, and leaves the room while Joris retreats to his bedroom to change into something a little more presentable than the bottom two layers of his wedding robes, which he had slept in. Grey, close-fitting trousers, a white shirt, a gold inner robe, and a black outer robe with a pattern of golden leaves. The outer robe was belted with a black silk sash. This was accompanied by soft black leather house shoes. He put his hair in a half knot fastened with a simple carved wooden hair stick with a few obsidian beads dangling from it. He gives himself a critical look in the mirror and decides that it’s good enough.

From there he went to the study, where the Archon sat at a table and was being served tea and cakes. “Soxa,” Joris says by way of greeting. “You received the report?” he asks, moving to sit opposite her.

The Archon was a small, elegant woman with a dark complexion and black hair with sharp and discerning fox eyes. Her hair was up in a twist and pinned in place with silver hair ornaments. Her outer robe was patterned with flying cranes amid silver clouds on deep indigo silk. She was giving him a thoughtful look as she sipped her tea. “I feel like I should apologize,” she says after a moment.

“Why?” Joris asks in amusement. “You’re not the one who stabbed me in the kidneys.”

“I talked you into agreeing to the marriage,” Soxa returns. “I think that makes me at least a little responsible.”

Joris snorts. “You talked me into it, but I agreed to it. The only person responsible is my ‘husband,’” he says. He hands the Archon the letter. “In any case, the assassination didn’t take. Tell me if this letter is suitably diplomatic.”

“I wouldn’t blame you if it wasn’t diplomatic,” Soxa says wryly as she takes the letter. She skims over it quickly. “This will do,” she says after reading it. “I’ve sent messengers out to the other Archons about an emergency meeting.  I’ve also written a letter to be sent with the prince and his escort.”

“We’re sending the escort, not the prince,” Joris says immediately.

Soxa frowns. “Lord Warden, I was given the impression that the prince was subdued without extensive injury?” she asks. “Did something happen that would keep him from being returned home immediately?”

“The prince is fine,” Joris replies. “Extremely unhappy that he’s not a widower, but otherwise fine.”

Soxa gives him a sideways sort of glance, part curiosity, part trying to see if he’s making some kind of joke. “That’s a very light statement about someone who tried to kill you in cold blood,” she says.

“It didn’t take,” Joris repeats. He pours himself a cup of tea and snags one of the cakes. Soxa looks like she wants to protest the flippancy, but Joris interjects before she can say anything. “I’m not saying we shouldn’t demand some kind of reparation for the assassination attempt. I’m saying that we’re losing an opportunity if we just send the prince back in hopeful disgrace.”

“Hopeful disgrace,” Soxa says, her tone edging close to a question.

“I think it’s not very likely that the attempt was part of a larger conspiracy. However, I think that Seweni’s sympathies will be for the prince who tried to save his sister from a terrible fate rather than against a foolish prince who almost ruined an important alliance. I think if we send him back immediately, we lose some leverage in negotiations and an opportunity to convince the prince that I wasn’t planning on bathing in the blood of his virgin sister, or whatever he was thinking.” He pauses a moment, then says in a light, joking tone: “Besides, I’ve never been married before, and I don’t want to get an annulment just yet.”

Soxa snorts indelicately at that. “I suppose I can see your point,” she admits. “I think you might be a little optimistic about winning him over considering, and I can’t emphasize this enough, he tried to murder you.” Joris was about to reiterate some variation of “it didn’t take, and I’m immortal” but it was Soxa’s turn to interject. “Yes, you’re within your rights to be lenient, to forgive the attempt on your life, but if he’d murdered an Archon or a member of the nobility or even a commoner he’d be facing exile or imprisonment and we’d be demanding reparations from the Seweni. I am thinking in those terms uncle,” she says, giving him a determined look.

“I haven’t been ‘uncle’ since you were fifteen,” Joris says, a little teasingly. Around that time she’d started calling him the much more formal and distant “Honored Teacher,” or “my Lord Warden.” At fifteen Soxa had been mildly obsessed with seeming grownup and mature, and it had been reflected in her terms of address. (Her younger siblings had teased her about it constantly. Joris had teased her about it.)

“Uncle,” Soxa says. “Old Man.” The last was said in a tone of faint scorn. He usually only heard the latter appellation from his more irreverent students. “You’ve been a constant fixture in my life, and you’ve been a friend of my family for centuries,” Soxa says. “I am absolutely allowed to want to nail your ‘husband’s’ skull to my front gate. I’m allowed to be angry that someone tried to assassinate the Speaker of the Five Cities Assembly, even if said Speaker doesn’t seem too put out about it because ‘death doesn’t take’ for him.”

Chapter Two

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Note: going to be posting this on Royal Road.