Chapter 4; Queen-ling

The day before the Talent show, I got a bit more insight into why Warde wanted me to do something for the stupid thing.

I woke up that morning pretty late as I saw that Warde had already left for his morning classes. I decided to go down and see what was there from the breakfast leftover. I had taken to go down to breakfast late as to get my fill of food since they really didn't let me have full meals. I know, it sounds like I am a scavenger or hobo but I need my breakfast and if I don't, I get really moody.

As I was heading over to the mess hall when I saw something from the gate. I turned as so what looked like a gathering of students, teachers and servants. The gates opened and what looked like some guards entered surrounding a really fancy looking carriage. As the carriage entered the people gathered there began to bow. A guard or soldier went to the carriage doors and opened them and a young girl about Warde's age stepped and bowed back to the people around her.

She was pretty in the Disney princess kinda of way. She was fair skinned and had a pinkish blonde hair. After a bit of time as she talked to who I could guess was the school principal, I decided to continue my journey to the mess hall. Yet I realized that to get there I would have to go through the large cloud of people and go probably have cut her path inside or wherever she was going.

"This would be a doozie." I said to myself out loud, but then something hit me. I am a delinquent and not of this world, why should i give a crap! I continued on my way to the food and began to walk over people who were bowing down to who i could a assume was a Disney Princess. As I was walking over people, they began to whisper to each other about me and what I was doing. I could care less but as I was literally at the door to the mess hall someone called out, "YOU! Boy! Bow to your princess!" I turned and the guy pointed a sword at me. I made a very non comital bow and turned again and to the food that was going I wanted to eat. However I guess that the guard who called me out was not impressed by my bow and i heard him say, "Insolent peasant" and him coming closer.

"Better turn around." Gemi said.

"He is going for an over head swing" Mini instructed. I had taken to doing morning exercises with the gauntlets as they help me keep count and helped me keep to my morning work out. I turned and would have dodged the sword if a voice didn't shout, "Alabaster! Stop that!" He did and I exhaled a breath that i had stored due to natural habit of fighting. The girl got down from the carriage and walked over to me. I looked at her and saw that she was just as tall as me. Wonder how old are you? She looked at me dead straight in the eyes and I returned her look without faltering.

I felt the same way about royalty then I did self important kid believing they own all. They don't deserve the time of day from me. She stopped starring me down and began to look me over, i turned my head a bit, longing to get some of the food in the mess hall.

"What is your name?" the girl asked. The tone was not condescending but just curious.

"Jacs Therdan. Or Jackal" I said. She looked at me again and then gave a curt nod and said in a happy excited tone, "OK! Your going to be my guide"

What happened next kinda made me laugh. The guards, except one who was also laughing, all jumped up and began protesting against it. Even the teachers were arguing, saying things like 'that is not a student' and 'he is violent and not stable' which I really couldn't object too. I didn't say anything though because of my laughing my ass off. She had just decided to get some random guy who had only given her a name to give her a tour of a school.

"Stop!" she said and everyone silenced, "If I cannot trust a simple servant, how can I people trust me to one day rule the nation?"

"But Princess, he is not qualified to protect you. From the looks of it he can't even protect himself." a guard said.

"What are you talking about Abbot?" said the one guard who was laughing before, "If I didn' know any better, he was actually ready to attack you when you were striking."

"Hold your tongue Jeremiah!" Abbot said in retaliations.

"Both of you, hold your tongue" the princess said, "I shall be escorted around the school by Jackal here and that is final." she said and gave a wave of her hand. The guards looked at each other, then back to the queen and gave a bow. Then they turned and head back with the teachers doing what ever they were going to do.

"So, what do you do here at the castle?" she asked. Her voice had adopted a natural bubbly happiness to it which i guess was her normal tone.

"I am sorry to decieve you but I actually don't work here." I said truthfully.

"I thought not. So what do you do here then? A Stow away? A random traveler?"

"A familiar" I responded.

"What?! No way!" she said in the same way a teenage girl would if she heard a very juicy secret.

"Yup. I know, freaky ain't it. Apparently this hasn't happened for 140 or 150 years or such."

"Yeah. My grandmother knew that familiar personally. She said he was a charming young man." she said in a kinda wonder. She looked at me for a second and began to open her mouth but I knew the question so cut to the chase, "Nope! That guy ain't me so don't go expecting prince charming in here. I am pretty sure I am the opposite of charming." She looked a bit dejected but continuied and I decided that I might as well ask the question that was bugging me for a while now, "I have a question. Why did you choose me give you a tour even though you knew I wasn't a servant here?"

"If I can't trust a simple peasant how can I except my kingdom to trust me when I become queen." she said in a regal tone. I smiled, she was serious about it and it made me feel kinda stupid. Kids in this world are learning magic and preparing to become queens while I was worrying over my getting kicked out of another school. Kinda Puts Life into perspective.

"Alright then, I have a tour to show you. Let's get going!" I said and began to led her around the school. This wasn't really much as there wasn't a lot to see. You have the class rooms, the dinning room, the stables and the gardens. Even thought there wasn't a lot I made it seem cool by showing her things that another tour guide wouldn't do such as let her ride some of the horses and showing her neat tricks with some of the trinkets the teachers left lying around. Its was a little bit fun. Eventually we ended the tour at the stables cause she had liked the ride. At around the time classes ended our tour did and I led her to wear she would be staying for the duration of her time here.

"Can I ask a favor of you Jackal?" she asked me before entering her room.

"Sure. I don't see why not?"

"Do you know Miss Sasha Florenchi?"

"Yes, I have meet her."

"Could you please give this to her before the day is up." she said giving me a letter. I nodded and said "Of course. Have a wonderful evening" before walking off to go see how Warde was doing.

I figured he would be in his room finishing his homework before we had to do some practice and I was right. Sort of.

I walked into the room, and was greeted with an interesting sight. Ward was floating upside down, while what I assume was a hell-hound underneath him was trying to jump up and get sausage that was tied to Warde's pants. Walking in turned the room silent as if this was some sort of embarrassing sex scandal. There were two people who weren't really supposed to be here, Warde's sister and some older royal guardsmen. The guardsmen was the first to recover and asked, "Well hello, may I ask who might you be?"

"Oh thank god, Jacs get me down from this thing!" Warde pleaded. I sighed and said "Yes, sir. Why can't I ever find you winning or at least standing up?"

"Shut up and get me down from here!" he cried.

"I am sorry but I still haven't gotten an explanation of who this Jacs character is?" the guardsmen said again. Sasha got off the bed and gave the guardsmen a sour look and said, "Jacs here is a familiar." the guardsmen looked at me then at her, but she shook her head. He turned back to me as I was getting him down from the rock tree and then to Warde. Once I had gotten Warde down and gave the sausage to the hound I turned to him and clarified the obvious as he seemed to not want to connect the right dots, "I am Jacs, I am the familiar to Warde here. Can I ask who are you?" he gawked at this development.

"This is Hecator, our older brother. One of the queens royal guards." Sasha filled in, "Lucky you got here in time, I don't think he would have listen to me." she got up and brushed some dust from his clothes.

"Nope. Nuh-Uh. Not true. How much did you pay him?" asked Hecator. Warde looked indignant and yelled at him, "He is my familiar and he is way better then yours. I bet he could beat your familiar with out even breaking a- Ow" he never really finish his sentence as I gave him a quick slap to the back of the head. Hector gave a laugh and Warde turned to me looking confused, I bent down a bit and looked him in the eyes and said, "Remember what I said, I ain't your personal attack dog. I am here to teach how to get, earn and hold onto respect. I can't do it for you because then it won't mean anything." Warde put his head and his general flare cooled down, "My fault, I apologize." I smiled and straighter up, he turned to his brother and gave him a smile. It was a cold, 'I don't need your pity' smile.

I don't think his brother was reading it right cause he shrugged and looked at Sasha asking, "This is really his familiar?" she nodded and be gave a sort of sympathetic laugh, "Dad might just kill you."

"Not when I am through with him." I said giving Hecator a stern look. He smiled back at me and asked, "So your his familiar / mentor?"

"I guess." I said shrugging, "Which reminds me of two things." I pulled out the letter that the queen-ling had given me and handed it to Sasha. Then I turned to ward and asked bending down to see his eyes clearly, "Homework?"

"Done" he replied. I nodded and yelled, "Well then let's get to it." I grabbed my gauntlets from my pile of hay and he grabbed some books and we took off down the hallway.

It was dark when we came for back from our training session. Warde was close to falling asleep and I had to resort to carrying him on my back so that he could get his strength back. We had gotten pretty far today. Since this was a defensive spells day, I brought the Gemini Brothers so that we could practice. He learned to create the 'Wind Wall', which is really what it sound like. The object was to be able to create a wall aground enough to stop incoming boulders, which were supplied by me. He was really good at it. It disk break once or twice but that was because he was getting tired and it was one of those continuous spell where you must continue putting power into it. It was pretty cool to; since wind is kinda invisible there really isn't a way to it unless you loom really hard. The only way I noticed it was up was because of grass and leaves flew upwards and continued to do so in a sort of endless cycle; leaves go up then go down then back up.

This was really the entire training session which was kinda of a bummer but was also logical. All the previous spells were instantaneous, this was the first one that require a continued stream.

"I think I can stand." he said, trying to get down off of my back. I jumped a little, so that he had to cling back on and said "Not taking the chance. Once you get to the door I'll drop you." he groaned indignantly and I hopped a little to shut him up.

Once the door was in sight, I left him down and watched him walked slowly towards the door. Before, at the start of our after noon training sessions, he could barely stand after a days work. Now he could he walk a whole hallway without collapsing. Of course he had to hold the wall for stability but I can't hope for everything. He reached his door and tried lifting his arm up bit that only resulted in it giving a none committal twitch. I walked up and opened the door for him and he walked in. Not five seconds after he walks in, we are greeted with a squeal of delight and Warde tackle hugged to the floor.

"Wardzy" the princess said getting up from her little friendship attack. Warde looked horrified, but not in the same way someone would if they saw a ghost or something. He looked horrified in the sense that he wasn't ready for this, like getting to school and not knowing your finals were today.

"P-p-p-pr-princess!" he exclaimed as if still not believing it. His face that was before a bit red due to exhaustion, was now almost as red as a tomato.

"Argh, my lord. It's been so long! How have you've you been? I have already talked to Sasha." then she saw me and looked confused. Then her faced changes from confusion to bewilderment, looking from me to Warde who was still on the floor, trying to get our from under her.

"You're a familiar" I nodded.

"You did the summon familiar spell?" looking at Warde.

"Y-yes" he replied still shocked in amazement.

"You are his familiar" she finally concluded. Warde and I both nodded at the same time. She gave squeal of delight and then wrapped her arms around Warde's neck again.

I noticed something odd about that. Warde wasn't someone who let people touch him or give him hugs without reason or at all even. He would even shrink away from Sasha when she tried to tidy him up or, try to give him a hug. So why was he ok with it now? As I was thinking this I pick up both the princess and her living body pillow and got them on their feet. Warde was still red in the face but the princess either didn't notice or didn't take attention to it.

"What took you so long? I waited here for such a long time! What were you doing with Jackal?" she complained.

"W-ww-w-ww-we were, um, ah. We were, um, um-"

"We were training. Out in the woods." I said. What was going on with the kid?

"Really?! Are getting stronger? Aww, does that mean I can't call you the Womby Wind anymore?" she pouted. I would think Warde would indigently shout 'stop calling me that' or at least stammer out a solid 'No' but he just said, "Well, I'll let you call me that once in a while in private."

The realization struck me like a truck on road kill. I really couldn't believe what I was seeing, and as a precedence I began laughing out loud. Warde looked at me and asked as if he was picking up what I had found out, "What's up? Whats so funny?"

"Nothing, nothing. I'm just hoping you don't get CRUSHed again. She has a pretty good tackle."

I know that I sounded cheesy or even as if I confused my words but he got the idea. I saw his eyes winded and then glare at me, wanting to say, "Shut up. Shut up right now". I smiled at his reaction, getting off the wall I asked the room, "I am going to go get a snack, anyone want anything?" Sasha got up from her seat on the chair and stretched a bit before saying, "I'll go with you. I want to go to bed soon anyway." she turned to the two kids, "Good night you two. See you tomorrow." They waved and Sasha and I left the room, leaving them to discuss what ever they so pleased.

"So how do you guys know the princess?" I asked after a bit. She turned back as if looking back at them saying, "We have known her for years. It's been a tradition to give the princess play mates. Because both our older brothers are part of her royal guard, they thought it be simple just to have us come over every now and then to play with her."

"Just a question, do you know her name? Cause I have just been calling her princess and I feel bad about it."

"It's Louise. She take pride in that name, but she can be a handful." Sasha commented, giving a nostalgic smile. After a bit of walking, we arrived down at the kitchens where there were still fire blazing and people working. I looked at Sasha and she look a bit befuddled as well, it was probably an hour or so till midnight and they were working as if it were day. Luckily though, I saw a familiar face and called out just for some help, "Iris, hey Iris!" she turned to me and smiled waving, she turned back to a guy with a larger chef hat and he waved his hand dismissively. She nodded something to him and walked over to me and Sasha asking "Hello,Miss Sasha, Mister Jacs, what are you guys doing down here so late?"

"We were here to pick up some snacks but it looks like you guys are pretty busy. What going on?" I asked scratching my head a little.

"Oh, we are preparing for a small feast tomorrow."

"For what?" Sasha asked.

"Oh for the talent show tomorrow. Because the princess is here, we must make sure that everything is pre-seasoned and breaded and chopped and dried so tomorrow we can just mix them and cook them all together for her tomorrow." she gave a large sigh, "Oh its very exhausting work."

"Looks like it." I said looming around, "Looks like you guys got your hands full."

"Indeed, I guess we could just go back and tell them they are busy." Sasha agreed.

"No, it's ok. Just tell me what you want, I think I can get them."

"No, don't, you guys look like your really busy. We don't need it so please take a break or something." I told her. She really didn't look like she could stand for much longer. She still put on her smile and hid her exhaustion, "No, I'm fine really. I can do get you something just name it."

"Ok. How bout a bed?" she looked confused, "For yourself of course. You really should get some rest. You can't keep working to the bone like this. Don't you guys have sick days?"

"Of course we do, it's just that the princess is here so we must work hard to keep her pleased, so we can't really use them now." she said.

"Ok then, when this business with the princess is all over, promise me you'll take a couple days off to sleep or something ok?" I said putting my hand on her shoulder. I guess we were both very embarrassed as I felt my face redden a bit and I could see her face redden a bit too. She didn't meet my eyes but she replied, "Y-y-y-ye-yes. Ok"

"Ok well that's done for. Alright, Sasha lets head out. I hit to get some sleep if I want to perform tomorrow." I said hastily, trying to brush over my blushing.

"I forgot that you are a familiar!" she said in surprise

"Thanks" she laughed.

"So what are you are you going to do for the show?"

"Have to see it to find out." she gave a playful groan.

"Come on, tell me. Please"

"All I can say is that I am great with the piano." I said giving her a mysterious smile.