A Katarina Vacation Arc Cousins Interlude
"We need to sabe cousin Katarina!" Matthew cried. "She's obiously in a bery unhappy situation!"
The young generation of the Adeth household sat in Matthew's room, around her large, round, communal table that they'd spent many a morning, afternoon and night together talking, eating, arguing, having knock-down, drag-out hair-pulling fights, crying and making up afterwards… you know, life. It had seemed really big when they were kids, was comfortably sized for them as they approach young adulthood, and was a little tight but nostalgic nowadays. Katarina, after being repeatedly reassured that she hadn't ruin Matthew's prospects, that her cousin didn't hate her, and that this wasn't her first facial injury, had allowed herself to be placated and gone off to help the gardeners take care of the exotic fruit. This left her cousins free to have this meeting, with their servants ordered to keep an eye on her cousin.
"It's a bit hard to take you seriously when you're lying back and have that bag of ice on your face," Iosefka said.
"Noted, doctor obvious," Matthew said, trying to glare at her cousin from her reclining position and around the bag of ice on her face. It wasn't very effective. And she wasn't very good at glaring anyway, nature having gifted her at birth with the kind of face to which smiles came naturally. The glare came out more like a childish pout.
"Now, now," Marie said from where she was cuddled against Olga, who had a long-suffering look on her face. The only reason Olga wasn't wearing Marie like a hat was because she sported bucklers as opposed to Aunt Henriette's greatshields. "Remember why we're all here."
And just like that, everyone refocused. Olga at least seemed glad that for once they were having a meeting that wasn't about her and her difficulties, where she could do more than be morose. She looked very determined in fact, and for once her glaring eyes seemed very appropriate for the proceedings.
"Cousin Katarina is clearly trapped in a loveless engagement with the Third Prince, who, as she's said, is simply using her as a shield to keep away other marriage proposals," Olga summarized, eyes blazing angrily. While she'd found Katarina a bit overwhelming and almost exasperating, she was family. Very clearly family. "He's been convincing her she was unlovable because of her looks since they were both young, which probably explains her obsession with her eyes and why she considers herself a villainess. And it's clear he somehow misrepresented this to aunt Mili and somehow threatened Katarina into silence. From her reaction at breakfast, she clearly wouldn't have gone along with it, no matter how much political capital it gained House Claes."
"It's intolerable!" Adella exclaimed angrily. "That ANYONE would do such a thing to a woman…"
"You hear all sorts of things about nobles who live near the capital," Watson said darkly, stroking the fuzz on his face. He'd been trying to grow a mustache for years but so far, a little fuzz on his upper lip was the best he could manage. "Arranged marriages and fighting over men and women and inheritances… there's a reason stories about evil stepmothers and stepsisters still go around. There're a lot of unpleasant people near the capital. It's part of why Uncle Henry seldom likes to go there."
"I thought it was because he didn't want Aunt Mili to think he was intruding if she was avoiding the family?" Marie asked.
"That too," Iosefka said.
"Well, now thab we'be stated the problem, whab are we going to do?" Matthew said. "Because we habe to do something!"
"Send the Third Prince an anonymous, very strongly worded letter?" Marie suggested.
Everyone gave her a flat stare except Olga, and only because Olga's head couldn't turn around that far.
"We need to start somewhere before we escalate to name-calling," Marie said, almost defensive.
"He's a prince. He's sure to have spies, informants at every level of society, and private forces ranging from infiltrators to assassins to his own personal knights," Olga said. "As soon as we make a move, he'll know it's us. We need support. We need to be too big for him to just dismiss or silence."
"We need to not be in Hasard Duchy so we'd actually matter," Iosekfa pointed out. "It's not like we can make our disapproval properly known when there's a half-month travel gap, one month round trip."
Everyone looked at Olga.
"I hope you're not expecting me to attend the academy and organize resistance against the prince all by myself," she said. "I'm good, but not that good. And even then, it'll mean starting next year. I don't know about you, but I'd rather not wait that long."
"We won't," Matthew said. "I'll be speaking to fabher and mobher, and Aunt Mili as well. I wanb to try going back to Morpork wibb Aunt Mili and Katarina."
"You're leaving?" Marie said, alarmed. Her grip tightened around Olga, but her twin didn't complain. She was shocked too.
Matthew tried to nod, grimaced as the bag of ice made that impossible, and held up the bag to repeat the gesture. "I'd hab needed to anybay. The only knight cobenants represented here are the major ones, the Suns and Darkmoons and Sentinels. They're… not for me. Near the capital, I can learn about the other cobenants, maybe find one I can belong to. I've heard of the Rocks of Havel…"
"You don't need a covenant to be a knight," Marie said, but only half-heartedly.
Without a word, Olga reached up and gently squeezed her sister's hand. Marie resisted the urge to hold on to her twin and never let go. For the first time in her life, she cursed the fact that despite being twins, her sister had been born with magic from one of the usurped elements… and she hadn't been. Otherwise they wouldn't need to be driven apart, they could both have attended the Academy…
And now Matthew was talking about leaving too. It wasn't fair! Why couldn't magic be like in the time of myth, something that anyone with enough intelligence or belief in the stories of the gods could learn? Why did it have to be so fickle that it would appear in one twin but not the other?
Marie ruthless crushed the self-pity with all the experience of someone who'd been putting someone else's needs before her own for years. It being Katarina instead of Olga was no different.
"But I'm unlikely to find the right cobenant right abay," Matthew was saying. "So what else could I do but stay with my cousin Katarina and make sure people don't take advantage of her? Or call her ugly without getting a shield to the face."
"Actually assaulting his person is treason," Watson said. "So you'll probably have to take pointers from Aunt Leona and Marie and work on how to get wine on him while making it look like an accident."
Olga blinked. "Wait, what now?"
Marie snorted. "What, you don't think I was actually being clumsy all those times I spilled my drink on those girls insulting you, did you?" she said with a mock pout.
"Eh? W-why didn't you tell me?" Olga said, her face taking on that adorable flustered look she did whenever she realized her family was standing up for her.
"So you'd have plausible deniability, of course," Marie said. "And really, you should have figured it out sooner. We never offered to pay for their laundering."
"I never got the hang of it, so I just asked them to dance and stepped on their toes," Watson said. "Absolutely ruined my prospects with them, but no great loss."
"Ah!" Katarina said, giving the surprised head gardener a hug. "Thank you! Thank you so much."
Missing her fields had finally gotten too much to bear. With permission from Uncle Henry and the head gardener, they'd allowed her a small plot of land. There wouldn't be time to grow much, but she could raise seed potatoes, carrots, garlic and onions! With good weather and a little luck, and she'd be able to make French fries, potato chips and fried carrot sticks for everyone before they had to leave.
Ah, she hoped her mother didn't scold her too much for this. It was only a little plot, after all…
Whistling, Katarina took her borrowed hoe– apologizing to her favorite hoe for cheating on it. You had to stay loyal to you hoe, after all, and it would take care of you!– she began turning over the rain-soaked earth and hopefully get it ready for planting…
