Chapter 8

The castle was in an uproar by the time they returned. Knights and guards alike were swarming all throughout the courtyards and buildings, their search having even spilled over into the city itself. Henrietta felt rather guilty over causing such pandemonium, but not regretful. This was the consequence of the choice she had made, but were she to be faced with the same choice all over again, she knew she would have made the same decision. These last few hours of freedom had been too sweet.

That was why instead of sneaking back into the castle, as Alex suggested, Henrietta chose instead to walk in directly through the front gates, back straight, chin up, as though she had only been returning from an evening stroll. She ignored the shouts from the knights and the guards saying that the princess had been found, that she had returned, and instead marched directly to the front doors of the castle, where Mazarin and Sir Wardes awaited.

The Cardinal had a severe look about him. His lips were pressed so tightly together that his lips had nearly disappeared into a thin pink line. His jaws were tight; his brow furrowed. The Viscount, as always, had a more neutral expression, cool and unreadable.

"Alex," Henrietta said, looking to her side, "it's best if I talk to them alone. Will you return to your room?"

The shapeshifter nodded.

"Thank you," Henrietta said. "For tonight as well."

Alex left, leaving the three of them alone together. Once he was gone, Mazarin exploded, "What were you thinking, Your Highness!?"

"Cardinal, peace," Sir Wardes said calmly. "You're making a scene."

"I'm making a scene?" Mazarin said incredulously. He gestured widely at the courtyard, at all the men who were watching them. "I am not the one who caused this! Have you any idea how worried we were, Princess?"

"I understand, and I apologize," Henrietta said. "But perhaps it would be best if we sleep on the matter and speak of it on the morrow? It's been a long night, and I am quite tired."

"No, Your Highness," Mazarin said firmly. "We must discuss this now."

"Then let us at least retire to my study," Henrietta sighed. "I'd like to sit down."

Grudgingly, Mazarin conceded. The three of them went into the castle and to Henrietta's study. There she gratefully collapsed into her chair at her desk, while Mazarin lit up the fireplace for them. Then he and Sir Wardes stood before her, and Henrietta could feel that this night was not about to end any time soon.

"Now then," Henrietta said. "It would seem that you have much to say, Cardinal. Let us dispense with the formalities for the moment and speak freely."

"Yes, Your Highness," Mazarin said. "In that case, what I would like to know is what on earth possessed you to run away from the castle on your own."

"I wasn't on my own," Henrietta replied. "I had Alex with me. As for my reasons, I thought it would be nice to stretch my legs, so to speak."

"That was foolish of you," Mazarin snapped. "It was far too dangerous. What if you had gotten hurt, or worse?"

"I was perfectly safe, I assure you," Henrietta sighed. "As I said, I had Alex with me. Honestly, Cardinal, you are making a mountain out of a molehill right now."

"You do not yet realize that is what worries me the most," Mazarin said gravely. "It is as I thought. I have no other choice."

"Cardinal?"

The elderly man straightened his back and squared his shoulder, looking Henrietta directly in the eyes. "Your Highness, I would request that you summon a new familiar."

Henrietta smiled at him, as she cocked her head curiously. "What are you talking about, Cardinal? You know as well as I do that a new familiar cannot be summoned until the previous one..." Her smile faded. "Oh."

"I urge you to think this over calmly," Mazarin said quietly.

"Cardinal," Henrietta ground out, her jaw clenched tightly. "Do you have any idea what you are saying right now?"

"Yes," Mazarin said somberly. "I am asking you to kill your familiar."

"No," Henrietta shook her head. "You are asking for more than that. Far more. You are asking me to violate the sacred trust between mage and familiar. It would be in defiance of the holy ritual passed down to us by the Founder himself. You ask of me, sir, to commit an act as heinous as murder. No, in fact, in this case you are asking me to commit murder, or be accomplice to it."

"I understand how you feel, Your Highness," Mazarin said. "Believe me, it is no easy thing for me to ask this of you either."

"Really?" Henrietta retorted. "Because I didn't notice even a hint of hesitation when you said it."

"Only because it is something that must be done, for your own sake," Mazarin replied. "The simple fact of the matter, Your Highness, is this: that familiar is unsuitable for you."

"The summoning spell summons the familiar most suitable for the mage."

"For the mage, yes," Mazarin agreed. "But you are not merely Henrietta the mage. You are not Henrietta the girl. You are Henrietta the Princess of Tristain. You have responsibilities and an image to uphold. But that familiar, just by existing, causes other nobles to speak more ill of you. Moreover, not even a day has passed since it arrived that you run away from the castle without so much as a single thought as to the consequences of your actions. It is clearly a bad influence on you."

"And just for that you ask me to kill Alex?" Henrietta demanded. "For hearsay and my own lack of discipline, you would have him murdered? That is ridiculous!" She turned her glare towards Sir Wardes. "Viscount, was it you that filled the Cardinal's head with poisonous gossip?"

"Do not blame Sir Wardes," Mazarin interjected. "He attempted to dissuade me from this course of action."

"Then I thank you, Viscount," Henrietta said. "It is a pity that you failed, however."

"I apologize, Your Highness," Sir Wardes murmured.

"Your Highness, you do not understand," Mazarin sighed wearily. "But perhaps the fault lies with me for not teaching you all that you need to know. Then attend. Your Highness, where do you suppose you stand as princess and, more, as future queen of Tristain?"

"Are we to speak of more rumors and gossip now?" Henrietta said irritably. "Frankly, I grow weary of it. I already know what the people say of me."

Mazarin shook his head. "Those are but symptoms and signs. It is what lies underneath that you must be made aware of."

"I'm sure you'll explain it to me, in that case," Henrietta drawled.

"Not long ago, you said to me that I am better suited to rule than you are," Mazarin said. "You are wrong. If that were true, I would have served you and Queen Marianne better in my capacity as regent. I would have been able to hold onto the power that your late and honorable father had so carefully consolidated for the crown. Instead, through my incompetence, I let it all slip away. And now you are in a most precarious position. For you see, if all the power in the state were to be quantified, we could roughly divide it into three parts: one for the crown, the second for the Vallieres, and the third for all the other nobles to squabble over.

"It is this last group that you must be concerned about. Right now, they are divided, each hoping to become the third great power of the state, and as such they pose no threat to you. But suppose they should come together. Suppose that they find a common purpose, a common enemy in the crown. Then your fate would be as the gods playing with dice. And this is but one of the reasons why you must take such care to preserve your good name."

"Have care, Cardinal," Henrietta warned him. "Your argument reeks of paranoia. I doubt that rumors alone will foment rebellion."

"Just as a wand left alone will not cast a spell, it is true," Mazarin nodded. "But is there not someone who would pick up that wand? Someone who would fan a spark into a roaring flame? Is there not someone who has, already, declared his intent to depose and supplant all the royal families of Halkeginia in order to gather the armies of man under a single banner and march on the Holy Land?"

"Cromwell," Henrietta bitterly spat out the leader of Reconquista's name.

Mazarin nodded. "Here is what I believe our enemies in Albion will try to do: They will send in their spies into our country, and they will seek to foment ill will towards your name. They will find support amongst those most discontented with the current power structure of Tristain. They will be that firm guiding hand that will gather the swarming lesser nobles into a mighty force. And then they will take the country, crown and all."

"If it comes to rebellion, the crown and the Vallieres will stand together and face it," Henrietta said firmly. "You said it yourself: together, we control two-thirds of the power."

"Their youngest daughter aside, the Vallieres are loyal to the country first and foremost," Mazarin replied. "While they will never betray you, so long as you do not turn out to become a despot, neither will they ever truly support you, not until you have proven yourself a worthy leader for the country. If they believe that Tristain would be better served by surrendering instead of risking ruin by engaging in civil war for the sake of a queen they do not believe in, then that is exactly what they will do. And fostering rumors that you harbor a demon in your own home does not ameliorate yourself in their eyes."

"And killing my own familiar would?"

"I have discussed that at length already with Sir Wardes," Mazarin said. "Most of those who have seen your familiar think it to be dying. Only a few know how much healthier it's become. It will be a relatively simple matter to excuse its untimely death as a result of causes beyond our control." Seeing the pained look on Henrietta's face, Mazarin's expression softened, becoming more sympathetic. "Sometimes, Your Highness, and especially for one in an exalted position like yours, there is no such thing as a winning move. There is only the lesser of two evils."

"Can I not just keep Alex away from public view?" Henrietta protested. "If no one ever sees him in public, the rumors can never be confirmed."

"But neither will they go away," Mazarin said. "And in this case, absence of evidence may as well be evidence of truth."

"I do not like this."

"And yet, Princess, you must make the choice."

"Yes," Henrietta sighed, and then a defiance came over her. "Yes, you're right. It is a choice. My choice. I thank you for your wisdom, Cardinal, and I choose to reject it."

"Your Highness–" he began.

"No, Cardinal," Henrietta cut him off. "Now it is time for you to listen to me. Everyone who was at the festival saw Alex as he took the shape of a man from a formless mass, so everyone there knows that he is capable of shapechanging. Now suppose, then, what might happen if I were to have Alex killed and summon a new familiar in his place. These other nobles will see this new familiar and ask themselves this: 'Is it a new familiar, or the old one in disguise? If it's the latter, why does our future queen seek to deceive us? For what purpose? And does she think us so stupid that we would be so easily fooled by such a simple trick?'

"You see, whether or not Alex is killed, these fears that you have that his existence will be used against me will not simply go away. In which case, I would rather surround myself with people whom I trust in order to stand against the coming storm rather than send them away. And I trust Alex, even if you do not."

"It is dangerous," Mazarin said. "You saw how it devoured that bird upon its summoning. It was unnatural. That creature is unnatural."

"A bird!" Henrietta exclaimed. "I am much bigger than a bird. Far less helpless, too."

"It was much smaller when it ate that bird. It has grown quite large since then."

"Fair enough," Henrietta said. "But if Alex wanted to hurt me, he would have done so on our way to Tristania. And you saw how when I asked him to help me out of my carriage earlier this evening, he did so, didn't you? Would he have done something like that if he meant me ill?"

"A poor argument," Mazarin countered. "In both cases, the familiar was surrounded by trained knights who would have obliterated it if it had harmed even a single hair on Your Highness's head."

"Then our outing just now," Henrietta said. "We were gone for long enough that not even you can deny that Alex had plenty of time to harm me, or even kill me, and escape, and he chose not to."

"I make no claims as to know what goes on in that creature's mind," Mazarin said. "It may very well be that it's simply not hungry at the moment, or perhaps something even more sinister."

"Or perhaps you are simply being too paranoid." Henrietta sighed. "You often complain that I can be too head-strong, Cardinal. I do not think you realize that I get it from you."

"What I would like to know," Sir Wardes said softly, "is how the two of you managed to escape from the palace without alerting a single guardsman. In our investigation, we found holes on the wall outside your familiar's room leading up to the roof, but the trail ran cold there."

"Alex can glide," Henrietta confessed. "He carried me on his back, and we flew right over the walls."

"Remarkable," Sir Wardes said. "I am curious as to what else it... he can do."

"Ask him, if you wish to know," Henrietta said. "Though considering what your first meeting with him was like, I expect you'll receive an unfavorable answer."

"True," Wardes agreed.

"Sir Wardes," Mazarin said with a disappointed look on his face. "Please do not tell me that you now condone Her Highness retaining this creature?"

"Forgive me, Cardinal," Sir Wardes replied. "But you see, I am a military man first and foremost. Thus, my first inclination is to review new elements as either an asset or a liability. I came to you to seek your advice because I feared this 'Alex' would prove to be the latter. Now I begin to wonder if he'll be an asset instead. Yet, I also understand why you are concerned, and I believe you have a point. And so, I would like to propose now the solution I meant to suggest to you before we were interrupted by Her Highness's... ahh... leave of absence."

"Let us hear it," Henrietta said.

"From henceforth Your Highness's familiar must be kept separate from you at all times," Sir Wardes said, "except when you are accompanied by a suitable guard to ensure your safety. I shall handpick a few of them for you myself."

"Yes," Mazarin said immediately, bobbing his head up and down, but Henrietta only looked around in mock wonder.

"My, having a protector to protect me from a familiar whose purpose it is to protect me. What novelty!"

"I understand that this upsets you," Sir Wardes said. "I can only beg for your understanding. If nothing else, I ask you to do this to put the minds of your retainers at ease."

"If it will do that, then fine," Henrietta sighed exasperatedly, then shot Mazarin an annoyed glare. "Now, if that is all, I would very much like to get to bed."

"Yes, thank you, Your Highness," Sir Wardes said as he and Mazarin bowed low, and he smiled. "Good night."

Once the Viscount and the Cardinal had departed from the room, Henrietta leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. She sighed wearily. She wasn't as tired as she had made it seem in front of her two retainers, but she was tired. It had been a long day, and she was ready to turn in for the night. But there was one last thing that needed to be done before that.

"You can come out now," Henrietta said out loud.

There were a few seconds of silence, broken only for the crackling of the fireplace. Then the window to her study creaked open from the outside, and Alex Mercer entered the room.

"How did you know?" he said, brows furrowed. "I made sure that I wasn't seen or heard. How did you know I was there?"

Henrietta opened her eyes and looked at him, and, despite her rising exhaustion, she smiled. "It's the familiar's contract," she explained, bringing one hand up to the center of her chest. "A mage can instinctively feel when their familiar is near."

That answer only seemed to confuse Alex more. "How?" he said.

"I don't know," Henrietta admitted. "It's one of the idiosyncrasies of the familiar's contract."

"Magic," Alex grumbled. "Figures."

Henrietta cocked her head. "You do not like magic?"

"I just don't get how it works."

"Perhaps I can explain it to you," Henrietta offered. "In the morning, though, after I've had some sleep."

Alex nodded. "Yeah, sure. Thanks."

"You're welcome," Henrietta said. "With that said, may I ask why you were eavesdropping on us, Alex?"

"I was curious what those two had to say," Alex admitted. "They don't seem to like me very much." He snorted. "Can't say I do either, though."

"Mazarin will come around eventually," Henrietta promised. "He can just be a bit pigheaded at times. As for the Viscount... well, admittedly he's a little cold, but he's a good man. He's Louise's fiance and a loyal knight. Once the two of you understand each other better, I think you'll get along rather well."

"Doubt it," Alex scoffed.

"Just don't get into a fight with him," Henrietta sighed. "No good would come of it."

"I know," Alex said. "I'll leave you so you can go to sleep now."

"Wait," Henrietta called out, stopping him just as he turned to exit out the window. "There is a matter in which I require your assistance."

Alex turned back around. "What is it?"

"It is about Jessica, and her father," Henrietta said. "I was ineffably rude to them earlier, and I would like to properly make amends." She opened a drawer in her desk and rummaged around through it until her fingers wrapped around something cold and metallic and around the size of her palm. She took it out, and produced a brass key. "Take this. It opens the treasury room on the east wing of the palace, the room with the large metal doors. Take a small bag with you and fill it with as many gold and silver coins as you can. Then deliver it to them. Could you do that for me, without being seen?"

"Shouldn't be too hard," Alex replied.

"Good," Henrietta said. "Then hold just one minute. I'll need to write a small note of apology to go with it as well."