Normally, knighthoods did not come with lands. At least, not freehold lands. Usually, whoever sponsored one's knighthood would agree to lease land to them, and the knight would be in charge of that land, collecting taxes, administering the commoners and so on, in exchange for paying the lease. When the knight dies, usually their descendants would stay on as their sponsor's administrators, becoming wealthy, educated commoners.
However, due to the revelation of a certain evil conspiracy, some lands had been seized by the crown, for their owners had committed treasonous acts, and thus had done goofed. As the Marchioness Dieke had been executed for her crimes, the Marquess Dieke had long since run off with some woman and was considered to have abandoned his lands and title, and there were no surviving Diekes of the line of inheritance (allegedly, rumors of many bastards aside), the crown was able to hand out these lands.
Maria was the recipient of one of those lands that had once belonged to the Marchioness. It had tenants, a few farms and other sources of income, three villages (two of them at opposite far edges), it was relatively close by and within a brief ride to the capital, and it even had a manor.
She should have realized.
"Hello children," she heard the third prince call out. "I'm afraid I won't be able to visit as much anymore." There was a (literally) childish uproar, but the disappointment sounded real. "Now, now, I'll still visit, because I love coming to see you, but you see, someone has agreed to take you all in and foster you properly. Your lessons will still continue, especially yours Shana, and Lady Katarina will still visit–" There was a cheer. Lady Claes probably waved. "– yes, Lady Katarina is wonderful. But I'm afraid Miss Campbell will no longer be able to visit you anymore."
Maria twitched as the children howled and screamed. She heard some start to cry.
"I'm sorry, but it just won't be possible. Now, say hello to the noble that has agreed to foster all of you. They're a knight. You know, the kind who go around saving princesses and fighting bad people. That sounds exciting, right?"
There was sad, sullen agreement. She distinctly heard at least two children still crying.
"Will you come down, fair lady?"
He was smirking, she could hear it.
Maria opened the door and stepped down onto her new estate.
"May I present your new foster and protector, Lady Maria, Knight of Sorcier."
There was a brief stunned silence. But, as children generally aren't stunned or silent for very long, joyous cries suddenly rang out.
They got louder when Maria matter-of-factly kicked the prince in the shin.
"Argh! What in the abyss, woman?"
"That's for making my children cry," Maria said coldly. "I am protecting their hearts, as specified in our agreement. You wouldn't have me go back on my word, would you?"
Katarina was nodding. "You deserved that," she agreed. "Honestly, that was mean. Children, who wants to see the prince pay for his mean joke by giving everyone horsey rides!"
"Yay!"
"Don't I get a say in this?" the third prince said.
"No. That was very, very mean of you," Katarina said, giving him a disappointed look.
Fortunately, the prince bowed and accepted his punishment. After all, if the kind and forgiving Katarina said he deserved punishment, then he really deserved it. Maria decided to give Lady Claes an extra big batch of sweets at lunch.
As the children mobbed her and the boys settled who would get the first horsey ride, one of the girls said, "Miss Maria, are you going to be our mommy from now on?"
There was a thick, expectant silence. Many of the children looked at her with hungry eyes.
Maria knelt down. "I don't think I'm fit to be your mother," Maria said, looking the one who had asked her in the eye and trying to be gentle. "I don't think I'd be very good at it. But I'll take care of you, I promise."
"Will you stop the bad men from taking us away?" another child asked. Many shivered.
"You will never have to worry about bad men again," Maria said. "Forget they even exist."
"Are you really a knight now?" one of the boys said. "Are girls allowed to be knights?"
"Where's your shining armor?" another asked.
"Why can they call you Maria and I can't?" Lady Claes asked.
Maria patiently answered everyone's questions as the prince was requisitioned for horsey rides. Well, everyone's but Lady Claes', who knew very well why not.
…
With her probation lifted, Maria was once more allowed back out of the Academy grounds unescorted, with the reminder to not use Dark Magic except as a last extremity.
"You have a sword now, use that," Prince Alan said. "Just make sure it's something you can Light Magic back together."
Maria worried for this country, she really did.
And now she can't even leave! She had an estate and dependents now! That's not something you can just pick up and take with you!
She had debated moving the children to the manor. In fact, she'd gone in and looked around inside. The children escorted them, pointing out things of interest. They had been told not to go inside, so naturally they were familiar with every square inch of the building, including some hidden compartments that the princes hadn't found when they were searching the place for evidence. Sadly, there was no evidence to be had, merely chests full of valuables, caches of money, some rare materials that were probably for dark magic research and even a huge, ravenous crystal lizard in a pit.
"So… you said everything left in the estate is mine, right?" Maria had said.
The prince had merely sighed, adjusting his grip on the child who was currently riding on his shoulders.
It was a nice little clump of coldblood they had found.
The children had been quite agreeable to moving in, but after one of their caretakers (who Maria was paying now, if with money from the prince meant for Wards of the Kingdom) pointed out that they would have to help in the sweeping and cleaning of the thing– with the look of someone who found looking after the children, while rewarding, was about all they could do, no more!– the children had changed their minds, especially when another pointed out how far the walk to the privy would be at night… in the dark… coming and going.
Maria didn't have much use for it either. The furnishings weren't to her taste (there weren't enough statuary and none of the portraits were of anyone she gave a scab about), it was much too big without at least two score relations and servants to keep it from feeling like an abandoned relic, and while she could probably use the strong room (she had, moving the valuables they had found while the children had lunch) and some of the furnishings (she had run away from the room she identified from the memories she had seen as Rafael's, not trusting herself to not lie on the bed and do something disgraceful), the rest were… well, gaudy noble garbage she hadn't missed leaving behind in Cainhurst.
When next she saw Rafael, Maria offered to let him burn the manor to the ground while they invited everyone who knew of his vengeance to a party to watch. Rafael had started staring at nothing, obviously seeing some glorious sight with the eyes lining his brain, and he'd begun to smile… but then he shook his head.
"No," he said. "It's your now. I can't take it from you."
"I'm giving it to you," Maria said.
"And I'm letting it go," Rafael said. "She's gone. That place isn't hers anymore. It's yours. I know you'll use it well."
Maria had nodded and stopped making plans for a party.
"Also, can I just go and take a few things from my room I forgot?"
"I found the sketches," Maria said.
His Flustered bar began to fill. "Ah… they're not mine?"
"So I can keep them for myself?"
Rafael stared at her. "Why are you keeping them?" he asked, sounding incredulous and slightly breathless.
"They have artistic and aesthetic value," Maria said. "May I say, you have excellent taste. I've already chosen some I like very–"
That was all she got out as pushed her– gently– against a wall, slammed a hand down next to her head to steady himself and brought his head down to hers.
Really, why was he embarrassed she found his many concept sketches for sculptures? They were quite nice. They would certainly make for nice statuary to decorate the place.
…
Maria was glad to learn that the blacksmiths in nearby Estus was just as good as the one in her home town. Better, in some ways, since living near the academy had given them, and the apprentices and journeymen who worked for them, experience in odd orders for the Ministry, most especially the Magic Tool Department.
A simple powder grinder wasn't too difficult but it would apparently take some time to make the gears, and the mortar would need to be cast. Fortunately, they had a bell founder, and while he raised an eyebrow at the odd design, he pronounced it doable, if not quick. The short sword to go with her saber would be done before the rest, given how simple it was. She longed to commission the rebirth of her old friend but held herself back. Prudence said she should see several samples of their work and how they interpreted her diagrams first. But the longing, the desire was there, to have her old friend in her hand one more…
The local alchemist guild was also helpful in sourcing materials she needed. She was surprised but happy to learn that the price of Sulphur had dropped recently. Not as cheap as she had gotten it in Noir, but apparently some lunatic had somehow singlehandedly drained a swamp recently, and the new route through where it used to be, once it had dried, made getting goods shipped by river into central Sorcier much more practical.
It was a wonderful windfall, but Maria had to wonder what sort of lunatic would just drain a swamp out from around the blind corner? No one with an accomplishment of that description had been present during that… judgement thing… and ridding the world of one more noxious, odious swamp was clearly something worth at least a knighthood.
She hoped this fool wasn't mistaken for 'Lady Maria'. Getting her reputation inflated like that is the last thing she needed.
She also found the local armorer and tanner and commissioned them to get started on some proper hunter's garb. As good as her traveling clothes had been, it wasn't as reassuring as the feeling of having a couple dozen pounds of boiled leather plates, stout boots and heavy gloves.
Maria also commissioned three new hats. Just because she could!
She wrote to her mother about the new children in her care, begging her for advice and denouncing the cunning of princes in equal measure, telling her mother she loved them and if she had any suggestions for a large building too big to sleep or live in conveniently.
Maria at least found a use for the nearly year-old surplus of practical exam uniforms in her possession. It was good sturdy material after all, and she had many children to clothe now.
…
The man at the Biomagic Department of the Ministry stared at Maria. "You actually have a ravenous, matured Crystal Lizard?"
"Yes," Maria said, "would you care to outbid the Applied and Experimental Alchemy Department, the Mythic Weapons Recreation Research Department, the Exotic Materials Research Department, the Draconic Research Department, the Royal Menagerie, and the Magic Tool Laboratory for it?"
They also had to get it from her estate themselves AND pay for any damages extracting it caused.
Though she had run away from it once, for it had been a glass cage from which she let blood and stared at the possibilities beyond the horizon, Maria had to admit… it was nice to be nobility again.
