ARC IV – Albion and Reconquista
CHAPTER ONE
Disclaimer: Not Mine
oOo
Despite the urgency suggested by the Princesses' midnight visit, they hadn't immediately started packing to set off the next day. Instead there was a few frantic days of last minute planning, training and – yes, packing as well. Louises lessons on diplomacy, covert operations and history changed from being general, to highly specific to Albion. Dukes, Counts, their histories and alliances, the current state of Albion's civil war, the different ports and cities and towns and what they all specialised in. A thousand different details, and Louise had the nagging suspicion that there were still things being missed.
Brent had been convinced to do some training and planning too, with some of their assigned Tristanian tutors reading through and taking notes on papers for his next assignments. The tutors assigned to Brent had become vastly more effective after the iteration of a high-level water artifact that allowed the sight of the wearer (Louise) to be displayed in water. Combining this with other artifacts to transfer this view into detailed drawings, and the tutors were now effectively Brent's research assistants – trawling through numerous texts extracted through the university database for information related to the various assignments, and highlighting these for Brent to read. This effectively reduced the amount of time Brent required on the assignments by half, freeing time for the training required. Any mention of this possibly breaching academic integrity was carefully avoided.
Their need to hide her familiar's powers from the church was unfortunate. Any conventional force - army or navy, had as much chance as a butterfly in a bonfire against Brent. Fire bombs. Tactical nukes. Ion Cannons - the list went on. But no, as satisfying as it would be to lay waste to Reconquista forces, it would be followed almost immediatly by the pope launching a crusade against Tristain. Armies, Navies, sabatours, assassins... Brent could possibly defeat them... possibly. At the cost of burning the rest of the world down around itself. Better to avoid all that and resolve this covertly.
In theory, Brent could spawn as something fast enough to fly to Albion for each mission, but the sort of games that featured fast aircraft tended to be a bit short on anything that fell outside the 'Shock and Awe' category, making them unsuited for covert operations. Changing games after he'd arrived in Albion would just result in him respawning back in Tristain, unless he'd taken Louise there to reset his spawn point. So his first mission was to sneak into Albion, transporting her and a few Crown-chosen specialists.
Louise and Brent were quite familiar with the first of these - Agnes. She was a obvious pick - not only well versed in missions such as this, but well versed with Brent's abilities – as she had been training them since Brent had arrived.
The second specialist however... Louise fiddled with the sidestrap of her pack.
The second specialist was there for both his in-depth knowledge of Albion, and his personal ties to Albion's royalty. Having acted as bodyguard to Tristain's Albion diplomat, there was no one in Tristain with closer ties to the Tudors save the diplomat himself – who had unfortunately perished in their flight from the embattled island. The tale of their retreat was the stuff of legends, and it was small wonder that on his return he had been promoted to the captain of the griffin knights.
All these were traits to admire, and good reasons for him to be on this particular mission, however none of them were what passed through her mind when she heard that one Jean-Jaques Warde would be travelling with them. Instead, her thoughts went to the day they'd met. The ambitious, handsome young noble at her father's luncheon. The only one who had sought her out and calmed her tears after Elanor's beastly words. What she remembered were the many, many times they'd spend together. He'd often been her confident. Been there to calm her. He'd countless times showed his kindness, and his patience. The memories she held of him were precious jewels – some of the few times in her childhood she had actually been happy. By far the brightest of these memories was the news that they were engaged, set to wed on her coming of age.
But what would he even think of her now? They had last seen each other prior to his posting in Albion. Prior to her enrollment, and subsequent constant humiliations. He was now successful, and even better regarded than the knight she'd known him to be in her youth. He had always been wonderful to her, even with her repeated failures, but that was years ago. Had he changed? Was he still the same man?
She knew she had changed. She wasn't so much a child now. Nor was she such a failure, in constant need of other's help. Not with her familiar by her side. Now, she was being primed to be the primary agent of the kingdom. How would that change things between them? Would he feel intimidated, as her classmates were?
She fidgeted with the straps of her bag, bit her lip a little, and waited.
oOo
It was the morning of the mission. Brent loaded a tactical sim, then left to get ready. His avatar idled as he showered. Made breakfast. Prepared coffee. Even though he'd be stuck in his room all day, he still needed to be ready. Was this what working from home would be like?
As he sat down and grabbed his controls, Louise and... Agnes was it? Turn to face him. Before looking past him at a... Was that a griffon? Whatever it was, it swooped in to land, and a well-dressed man gracefully dismounted. Brent snorted. As though he needed some reminder that this was a fantasy universe.
The man approached, and Louise's face lit up into a nervous smile. Brent raised an eyebrow. She knew him? The man strode towards them, and she gave a curtsey before he brushed past her formal greeting and swept her into a hug.
'My little Louise. It's been far, far too long.'
All trace of her nervousness left, and she leant her head into his shoulder.
'I apologize for leaving you alone for so many years, but duty, as always, calls.'
He looked down at her, while Louise made a contented murmur.
'And not so little any more, are you? Well on the way to growing up.'
Louise made another happy little murmur, and looked up into his face, drinking it in.
Brent moved up, and the man unconsciously tensed. Brent ignored it – his avatars took everyone like that.
'A pleasure to meet you. I'm Louise's familiar, Brent.'
The elegantly dressed man gently let go of Louise, and made an equally elegant sweeping bow.
'Warde. James Warde. Captain of the Griffin Knights.
Brent smiled at him – though it didn't translate through the avatar of course. 'A pleasure to meet Louise's father at long last. Wait, no, your last name... '
Warde coughed, somehow even making that elegant.
'Indeed. I'm not her father. Rather, her fiance. '
Brent looked at the elegantly dressed man with new eyes. The elegantly dressed man, in a sharp uniform, who must be in his mid to late twenties. Then at Louise, clinging to him with stars in her eyes and a blush upon her cheeks.
'Dude...'
Warde raised an elegantly scupted eyebrow questioningly.
'She's fourteen.'
Warde narrowed his eyes, but before he could reply, Agnes interrupted.
'You can discuss this on the journey, if you must. For now, we need to pack and get moving.'
oOo
It was several hours later, and an ominecent hum pervaded everything. It filled the room. Filled the universe. Even if Louise had been deaf, She still would have known of the Hum's existance through the constant vibration of the metal walls and floor. If it had been just a little louder, it might have overrode the loud and angry voices at the front of the flying ship.
But Louise was trying not to think about that.
Metal floors... not the metal they had in Halkeginia, but some other kind. It was much lighter, and had the appearance of polished metal. It had a raised criss-cross pattern on it, and she focused on it, rather than the voices. How it had been created? Not magic, since Brent's world had none. Was it some fantasy metal, only existing in these games of his? Perhaps she could ask him. Once he wasn't.. busy.
His voice rang out, and Louise couldn't help but hear.
"She's FOURTEEN!"
Louise winced, fighting down her blush.
Brent had taken an instant irrational dislike to her fiance for some reason. At first there had been an awkward silence between the two, but Warde had moved up to the front of the airboat in order to clear the air. Judging by the heated words, it wasn't going well.
As the voices subsided again, Louise stared at the empty seats opposite her and fought down her blush, trying to ignore what they were arguing about. The seats had straps for some reason. Clearly to lock people in, but why? Was this originally a prison transport? The voices at the front rose again, and unfortunately Louise could still hear them.
'... a CHILD! ... PRE-PUBECENT. ... Completely FLAT! '
Louise's head spun and she glared up the front. Her lips thinned, and she narrowed her eyes. And focussed.
oOo
Back in Brent's room, Brent paused in his argument with the pompous predator as a new email popped up in front of him. Literally popped up, the browser opening in front of the game. And incidently, blocking both his microphone and headset.
It was a message from Louise...
'FAMILIAR!
I care not that I am considered a child within your country. I am not of your barbaric, backwards society. Nor is my fiancé. You will cease your attempts to convince him that marrying me is immoral. You will cease your attempts to convince him I am a child. You will cease your attempts to ruin the best thing that happened to me. Warde is a wonderful man, and if you convince him to break off our engagement, I WILL find a way to have your computer castrate you.'
Brent winced and gathered his counter-arguments. But Louise apparently wasn't done.
'I have seen the images you collect on your computer, so DON'T YOU DARE try and take the high ground here. You WILL apologize to Warde. And You. Will. Do. This. Now. Understand me? '
Brent grimaced, and spoke.
'I know that you're not set to marry till you're coming of age. But that's still only eighteen! He'll be in his thirties by then. And I've seen the way he looks at you! There's no way he sees you only as a child . He's groom...'
'I AM NOT A CHILD!'
The words screeched into his ears enough to hurt and Brent tore the earphones from his head.
Brent groaned and rubbed his ears, glancing at the screen, to see more words start scrolling down.
'I am NOT a child. I am not the one who has trouble studying. I am not the one who's had to be dragged kicking and screaming across the finish line. If anything, the child here is YOU. '
Brent sighed, groaned and rubbed his ears, glancing at the screen to see more text scrolling down. 'What's with the childish tantrum then? ' He muttered. Quietly.
'WHAT? '
Brent winced. Apparently not quietly enough...
He breifly considered leaving for a minute. Letting Louise cool down. But... He glanced at the monitor – with the popup window still covering everything. He should really get back – argument or no.
The text started scrolling again as he sat down and replaced his headphones. 'Not your society, not your morals, not your buisness. Apologize. Now. '
He winced. Sometimes being the bigger man sucked. But... 'Look, I'm sorry your fiance's a creep. But I'm the one flying the plane you're in. Can I get back to the game now? '
There was a stony silence from the text program. If a program like that can give stoney silences... But after a long moment, it disapeared, and the third person view of his Hercules reapeared.
He had a few seconds to reorientate himself and look around... but not enough, apparently, to spot the dragon before it shot past his plane. Or the fireball that slammed into his cockpit. Or prevent the respawn screen from floating in front of his face, as the wreckage of his Hercules shot towards the jungle below.
Through the headset, Louise started screaming.
Authors Notes
So wow, more than five years since my last chapter.
I honestly didn't think there'd be another for most of that. It's always bugged me that I didn't finish this though, and I do have a few more things to say, so here we are.
A few notes on the arc we're leading into. Although this particular chapter fought me tooth and nail, and took about half a year to put together, on and off, the rest of the chapters will be more light-hearted, with it being more of a classic adventure / romantic comedy. I can write those types of chapters a lot easier, but these introspection and plot heavy chapters really fight me. In the interests of finishing this fic before 2030, I'm going for light-hearted for this arc.
On reviewing my notes for this fic, I also found two almost-complete back-chapters. I vaguely remember them as inadvertently being the reason I stopped writing the fic in the first place. At the time, I felt the last arc had focussed too heavily upon studying, so were writing these chapters to add more to the Tristain side, all the while realising that as back-chapters, a lot of people wouldn't even read them. This kind of killed my motivation, and I never got around to finishing them.
Long story short, if you're interested in seeing these, drop a comment and I'll actually get around to finishing them. After the current arc is done, anyway.