Short message from me this time, does anyone else get that amazing warm feeling when you look and someone's page and see that they added you to favorites? Just me? Besides for that, sorry for the wait, school just started up, the occasional catastrophic YouTube crash and writers block. So a short chapter this time, and it might be a while before I get another chapter up after this, sorry ladies and gentleman.

Oh yeah! My computer keeps telling me to correct words that are obviously spelled correctly or used in the right sense. So, if you see some weird wording I apologize because I must've overlooked it.

Read, review and ask questions when you have 'em.

Prelude to Negotiations

An emissary from the unknown Empire of Acheron, all people within Tristania thought about what this strange foreign man was going to be like, what he would look like, how would he act, is he like the rest of their bloodthirsty army. These were common questions asked by all. But the one person who thought about this man the most was one Henrietta de Tristain, queen of the small kingdom of Tristain.

It had been some time since the letter from Maxime Weygand had come and her answer had gone out, stating that the emissary was allowed to come with a small entourage of advisors, if needed. The day before a horse messenger had arrived and said that the convoy of the emissary would be arriving today, and an incredible amount of nobles had come from far and wide to the court of their queen, at her request or to act as intimidation, to see these strange men from across the ocean.

A small group of nobles and a familiar stood just to the right of Queen Henrietta; they were the Duke de La Vallière, his daughter and Henrietta's childhood friend Louise Françoise and her familiar, now chevalier, Saito Hiraga. Even if they didn't speak, their presence more than anything was a confidence booster for the young queen. To her left was her bodyguard, Chevalier Agnes and several of her musketeers, just in case these Acheronians wished violence during the coming negotiations.

The queen sat in her throne several meters across from the large courtroom doors; while sitting in her throne waiting, she noticed a man approach Agnes and say something quick into her ear, Agnes then approached and whispered to the queen, "Your Highness, a message from the palace guard commander; the emissary comes with a heavy guard and refuses to remove a mask that he wears, what are his orders?"

Henrietta thought for a moment before replying, "We are dealing with a culture that we know nothing about, if they wish to attempt to intimidate us, let them. We will show them we are not so easily swayed." Agnes nodded and told the man behind her to let the emissary and his guards in.

Several minutes' later three dull thuds could be heard on the opposite side of the large doors before they opened to reveal nine people that slowly moved in front of the throne, six were in two separate lines on either side of the group and wore armor over black tunics and carried large square shields covered in purple and a red swirling triskelion's, their helmets covered all of their heads except around the ears and a T-shape barely revealing the eyes, nose, and mouth. Their armor was layered around the chest and stomach and they each had greaves and vambraces on arms and legs. All of their armor was covered in hundreds of blue swirling marks making the armor look like it was reflecting water.

Two of the three people that the guards had in the center were dressed oddly by Halkeginian standards, the one on the right wore essentially the same armor as the guards except she wore a red tunic beneath her armor which was unstained in the way the guards was. She wore no helmet and instead had her white hair in a braid that came in front of her left shoulder and rested midway on her chest.

The woman to the left wore barely any clothes; a green skirt that stopped in the middle of her calves and no shoes or the sandals the others seem to wear, the top of the skirt extended and wrapped around her back and then her chest in two bands that covered each breast before wrapping around her neck, she was also blindfolded but moved about as if she knew every inch of the ground around her. Her waist length white hair wasn't braided like the other woman's as it hung unrestricted but was inlaid heavily with gold beads, but her hair was not the only thing with gold. The center of the blindfold held dozens of small dangling medallions that ran the length around her head, a belt made of medallions hung over the top of her skirt, and every step she made was accompanied with the slight jingle of metal on metal as anklets snapped together. She also held a staff slightly taller than herself that was topped with the head of a serpent.

The man in the center brought the most attention to himself; he slouched slightly and moved with an almost unnoticeable limp, his dark purple robes hung loosely around his frame and as he moved it swayed with each step, Henrietta could not see his hands as they were hidden underneath the robes as was the entirety of his head except for his eyes which could just barely be seen through the bright silver mask that he wore, it reflected a near perfect looking face of a young man.

They moved across the room at a decent pace and stopped as the forward most man in the lines reached the bottom most step of the small dais; a grunt like sound escaped one of the soldiers and the rear most men turned on their heels and faced the door they entered and the two men in the center of the lines turned towards the groups of nobles and servants on either side of the open space that they stood, a loud bang filled the air as their shields hit the ground and then their hands rested on the top rim. A slight murmur went through the crowds of nobles after the display, but was quickly over shadowed by the voice of the man in the mask as he bowed.

"Greetings, Empress of Halkeginia," The man's voice sounded like a mixture of age, years of arguing and the occasional sound of gasping for air. Henrietta noted with some disgust that the man's hands were missing fingers, his thumb, index and middle fingers were all that were left on his left hand, while his right only had the pinky and ring finger left, "I am Cronus… archon of house Parlathan… governor-general of the Albi-yon colony… and emissary of the Empress Larissa Kamaterina… the first empress of the Kamaterina dynasty."

He rose up from his bow and motioned with both hands, without looking away from Henrietta, towards the woman in green, "This is Ley Mother Phobos of the Ley Temple… overall leader of the Ley cult on Albi-yon." Mother Phobos bowed slightly at the hip her staff unmoving, Cronus then motioned to his left towards the other woman, "And this… This is my daughter, Arturia… also of house Parlathan, second in command… as well as master engineer… of the sixty-seventh legion." Arturia rested her right hand on the blade at her hip, clicked her heels together and gave a slight bow with a small 'hup'.

Cronus's voice just sounded terrible on most people's ears, but Henrietta bearing the mask of a queen tried not to let it bother her, although, she sought to correct one misconception, "Your greeting is well met ambassador Parlathan, but, I dare not claim the title of empress, only the one who unites all of Halkeginia under a single banner, such as our founder Brimir, can claim that. I am simply Henrietta de Tristain, Queen of Tristain." A slight chuckle went through the gathered nobles at the emissary's mistake.

Cronus turned towards his daughter, and the chuckle disappeared from the crowd as he spoke in his native tongue, with the way his voice sounded speaking the Halkeginian dialect, his speaking Acheronian made him sound like an animal growling underwater. Arturia's face turned a lighter shade of red as the man spoke and she looked towards the floor, when she replied she spoke more fluidly without gasping or sounding like a beast.

Henrietta noticed that the Ley Mother never once took her 'eyes' off of where she sat as the others spoke. Cronus waved his mangled left hand and turned back towards Henrietta's throne and bowed slightly, "My apologies… Queen of Tristain…" The slight punctuation on queen didn't pass anyone's attention within the throne room, he was about to continue when Louise of all people interrupted, "You will speak to the Queen with the respect she deserves, heathen."

The room was deathly quiet after that as everyone looked at the scion of the Vallière family, she stood with hands on her hips with her normal sense of confidence that Henrietta was always so envious of, but right at that moment all she could do was cover her eyes with a single hand because of Louise. After all she did just insult an ambassador from a nation that conquered Albion in three months, while the combined forces of Tristain and Germanina could not even hold onto the southern tip for two months.

"Child," The word sounded more like a venomous insult coming from emissary Parlathan, "When negotiators speak… It is best not to interrupt… After all, this is only an introduction… It is common to make mistakes then… To get them out of the way… As it were." His head tilted slightly for emphasis.

Louise sputtered for a moment, her face turning red before being pulled back by the hand of her father on her shoulder, Saito had an empathetic look of embarrassment on his face as Louise stood in front of him. The sound of escaping air from the emissary was either a sick laugh or him actually gasping for another breath, whichever it was Henrietta couldn't tell.

"As to what I was saying…" Emissary Parlathan continued turning back towards the queen, "In an effort to fully understand… How large the nation of Tristain is… I would like to procure maps of the local region…" He bowed as far as his body would allow, "If is not too much to ask for."

She thought for a moment as she looked down at the masked and cloaked man before her start to wobble from being in the bow for a few moments, she thought about the consequences of loaning maps of her country to this strange man and his nation, would he truly just use them to see what her nation is shaped like? Or would he use them to plan an invasion like that of Albion?

She let out a small sigh, "It is not too much to ask for," Henrietta turned towards Agnes, "Have someone bring up maps of Tristain, Gallia, Romalia and Germania. Have them taken to the room of emissary Parlathan." Agnes bowed quickly before turning and talking to a servant.

Cronus bowed even lower than he was before, to the sounds of popping joints, "Thank you… Queen of Tristain… This will help in the coming negotiations."

"Rather small country, is it not?" Ley Mother Phobos said aloud as she moved a hand over maps and papers she'll never be able to read, hmn's of confirmation came from the younger and elder Parlathan.

The rooms that they were lodged in for the remainder of the night had a small connecting parlor that the maps of Tristain and other countries were laid about on several of the tables that were pushed together into the center of the room. The maps were arrayed so they formed a semi-functional full map of the entire continent.

"So… fractured." The disturbing acheronian voice of the elder Parlathan resounded through the room. Two large countries dwarfed Tristain and sat on either side, one called Germania and the other Gallia. Tristain also has bad history between both, wars, skirmishes, political upheavals, even attempted ecological disasters. But what caught the emissaries eye though was the fact that said small country was still in existence, even though the borders have fluctuated since its inception, it still has not been absorbed by its neighbors. Tristain has always been Tristain ever since the one called Brimir died and had his lands split up amongst his sons and apprentice.

That fact unsettled the acheronian, why would he willingly split a strong empire into smaller pieces that could eventually be conquered by a stronger foe in time? And why did he give all of his sons and his apprentice entitlements to land instead of just giving his throne over to the one he trusted most? The culture of the Halkeginian confused all acheronian minds that looked at it.

While the two members of the Parlathan family continued to look at the fragmented map and mark certain spots with either black ink or red wax, the Ley Mother stretched her arms into the air before turning and walking towards one of the empty rooms, "Negotiator, since you have no more need for my services today, I will retire for the night, sleep well."

Two more hmn's escaped Parlathan throats as the doors of Phobos's room closed as if by unseen hands. Arturia suppressed a small shudder from a cold wind inside the closed off room after the doors closed fully before looking back at her father as he rose from his leaning over the table, he didn't stretch but his body popped anyway, "It is quite late… And I am still tired… From today's travels… I will retire as well… Sleep well, Arturia."

Arturia stopped looking at the map fully and bowed slightly at her father, "Sleep well, Archon." The elder man walked, more like shuffled in Arturia's eyes, towards the other room and had a guard close the door behind him. She thought a moment of the man that had sired her brother and then herself, all her childhood memories were of a strong man that never wanted to be a soldier, who always wanted to be in the middle of arguments and who almost always in the end had either one or both sides of the argument wrapped around his finger. Now that man was covered from head to toe in cloth and a mask of silver in a permanent restful face of his youthful self, what he appeared like underneath the mask now only the gods and the First knew.

She looked down at the maps on the table and looked over the area that her father had spent the majority of his time over, and had to suck down a laugh. In black ink he had marked every position of every major resource, which might have been outdated, and city that looked important which, again, might have been outdated, within Tristain. She honestly started to think he didn't even notice he did it anymore and just became a natural reaction to looking at maps.

After contemplating what her father did to the map she looked at all the red marks she made, and noticed that instead of cities or resources she had marked open fields, foot hills and mountains. Her emotions dropped from her face, like her father she too had marked areas of interest, and she assumed her brother did the same when he looked at a map nowadays.

She had picked out every area that an acheronian legion could have an easier time facing another legion. Going so far as to try and place heavier siege weapons on higher areas to get better range. She placed a hand on the table and the other on her hip before lowering her head in a sigh, if all the negotiations went smoothly she wouldn't have to come back to this tiny country and use any of those positions to destroy their armies.

She turned and grabbed a candle stick and holder before turning towards the final open room; reaching the door she turned back and looked at the head guard, "Rotate every few hours so none of you end up dead on your feet tomorrow, sleep well guardsman." A grunt of confirmation reached her ears and she closed the door behind herself and made her way to the side of the bed.

She set the candle down on a bed table and stared at the rather large four poster bed, more room than the legion's cots, and possibly more room than the empress's bed. She shook her head loose of a small tie to keep her hair in place, before reaching up and pulling on a strand of cloth that hung off her shoulder and loosening a small cord like belt and letting the entirety of her tunic fall to the floor, the wonders of acheronian fashion was that everything was loose, allowed the skin to breathe and fell away quickly when needed. Standing naked in the candle light she reached up and flared her chest length white hair away from her body before slipping into the bed.

She sat for a moment and enjoyed the cool feeling of the covers and sighed, her rest wasn't long before she cast both of the large pillows across the room to land in a nearby chair. She rolled around and pulled the covers free from their locked positions under the edges of the bed before find a good position on her side near the edge of the bed and covered completely by the soft cloth covers, reaching out swiftly she found the candle flame and pinched it out quickly before retreating back under the covers.

She fell asleep rather slowly, the bed seemed too soft and her mind was thinking back to the country of Tristain, when she finally did drift off to sleep it was filled with strange dreams of black haired boys, loud pink haired young women and even the current empress of Acheron.

Strange dreams indeed.