A Katarina Interlude
After a breakfast that was a bit rushed—thought Katarina was proud to say that she ate with impeccable table manners—Katarina followed Cousin Mashu to meet the Diplomatic Corps person who'd officially be explaining what she was to do. She'd tried to fill up on food so that she wouldn't be distracted by hunger later, but sadly she wasn't able to eat much. After ten pancakes, twenty strips of bacon, twelve hashbrowns, fifteen sausages, several cuts of ham, and an apple, they'd needed to go or else there wouldn't have enough time to meet the person and have them explain what she needed to do.
Lord Hammond was nice enough, but he seemed sort of distracted and… well, didn't seem to be very smart. Or at least, had problems concentrating on what they were talking about. During his explanation of what she was supposed to be doing, which was as bland as 'do you best to translate what they're saying, he go distracted by how they needed not to make it seem like they favored the Xiarmen, or how they shouldn't offend Etran, or how they should take La Sable's negotiators seriously…
Katarina got the feeling that if the diplomatic corps was a school play, Lord Hammond would be cast as a tree. His explanation on what he was supposed to do was… well, far less helpful than what Maria had told her.
As she was rushed to the room where the negotiations would happen by Lord Hammond, with Cousin Mashu in tow, Katarina reflected that she should have grabbed a second apple.
Contrary to what she had thought, which was everyone being in one big room and that all the negotiations of the international assembly would happen around a big round table, and everyone would be talking about all the things there, and she'd be sitting to the side somewhere to translate. Instead, it seemed like the negotiations were taking place in several rooms, with representatives from two different countries talking and coming to some kind of agreement, or getting around to some kind of agreement. She was going to be the requested translator for negotiations between Xiarmah and Sorcier. Ethenell and Sorcier, and La Sable and Sorcier.
Or at least, that's what Lord Hammon said.
"Now, the Ethenelli, La Sablicans and the Xiarmese—" uh, no Lord Hammon, they're called the Xiarmen, didn't you know that? "—have both asked for your services as a translator, which is likely some sort of ploy to make it seem they have closer ties to Sorcier than they actually do, so you must not seem like you are favoring them. "
"But… I thought we did have close ties to Ethenell and Xiarmah?"
Lord Hammond ignored her—or perhaps simply didn't notice—as he continued talking about how Sorcier must 'maintain the balance of powers' and 'prevent a continental hegemon' and 'could not be seen as supporting any side'. None of it had absolutely anything to do with translating, as far as Katarina could understand. She was tempted to just ignore him, but there was a feeling inside her that made it hard to ignore the man. It was like… like she was taller than him, somehow, or standing on top of a building while he stood on the ground…
"Ah, I think I understand now, Lord Hammond," Katarina said politely. "Don't worry, I won't do any of the things you said I shouldn't do—"
"Lady Claes, I cannot stress enough how important this negotiation is. The slightest mistake could be set back decades of work!"
"What kind of work?"
"Work! The hard work of the dedicated men and women of our diplomatic corps!"
"Yes, but… what kind of work? Like… well, what work do you do, Lord Hammond?"
"I'm afraid my work is highly confidential, Lady Claes—"
"There you are!" a voice suddenly said, making lord Hammond jump. An annoyed-looking man was looking out from one of the rooms in the hallway they'd been walking down. "Hammond, aren't you done yet? Where's that greenblossom tea, man! You were only supposed to show Lady Claes where she's supposed to be, not bore her to death!"
Hammon jumped at the call. "C-coming, Lord Bernard!" He ran off as Katarina stared blankly after him.
"Hammond, is that Lady Claes?"
"Er, yes, Lord Bernard—"
"Hammond, why is she standing in the hall instead of being brought to me?"
"I-I was impressing upon her the importance of—"
"You had one job, Hammond! Now go and get back here with that tea!"
"Y-yes, Lord Bernard! I'm sorry, Lord Bernard!"
Yes… Lord Hammond was definitely a tree.
Lord Bernard was much more direct.
"While members of the foreign delegations have asked for your assistance in translating for some of their members, due to confidentiality concerns, you will only be participating in their negotiations with Sorcier," Lord Bernard said. "To that end, I must swear you to confidentiality about the details of the negotiations. You will not be allowed to discuss the details of the negotiations until a week after the end of the current International Assembly, or longer in the case of specific parts of certain negotiations. Do you understand, Lady Claes?"
"Um, just to be clear, who counts as authorized?" Katarina asked.
"We would really rather that you not discuss the matter with anyone Lady Claes, even if they are authorized, lest your discussion be overheard but unauthorized persons."
Ah. That sounded smart. "All right, I understand Lord Bernard."
"Splendid. Now, repeat after me as you pronounce the words of the ancient Eyulah…"
After being sworn in, which had actually made Katarina nervous because of how utterly serious Lord Bernard had been, she had been handed a schedule of the negotiations that would be happening that morning, showing which rooms she had to be in when, and told she would be informed about the next day's schedule.
Katarina was taken to a small but richly paneled room. There were no portraits or anything like that, but there were pretty vases with pretty flowers, and sunlight coming in through nice windows with nice curtains. There were two tables in the room, both facing each other. At one of the tables, the Xiarmah delegation sat, their papers and scrolls set neatly on the table in front of them. Katarina almost waved at Lei-Lie and Lin-Lin, but the two of them were busy looking over some papers, and it would have been rude to interrupt them.
Instead, she sat down on the seat she'd been assigned at the end of the Sorcier table and took her notebook and pen out of her little purse, opening the former to get ready to write down numbers to clarify what she was translating. The man she sat beside looked at her warily, looking at her notebook with suspicion, and the candies that had fallen out of her purse with confusion.
Katarina smiled at him. "Candy?" she offered.
"Ah… thank you?"
"You're welcome. If anyone wants candy too, I have more, don't be shy."
All right! Katarina took a deep breath and put on her determined face. All she had to do was translate when one of her fellow zom—er, one of the undead said anything at all, right? She took flattened down her notebook again, and readied her fountain pen—one of the many things invented by Duchess Iris—to write down any numbers that needed to be clarified. Then she popped a candy into her mouth for luck—ooh, honey lemon! Anne, you're the best!—and got ready to translate!
Then she had to explain to the man who came over why she had a notebook open, because apparently they were worried about hertaking notes about the negotiations and those notes somehow getting out…
But after that, she was ready to translate!
When the morning's negotiations were finished, the Diplomatic Corps was nice enough to have someone guide Katarina back to the more familiar parts of the castle. It was a good thing too, because with how she felt, Katarina was sure she'd probably have gotten lost. Again. Oh, she'd have found her way back eventually, but then she'd have missed most of lunch! And she really wanted lunch. Today had just been so… ARGH!
It was a testament how Katarina felt that the little purse full of candy from Anne was still mostly full. How could she eat candy when… ARGH!
Two rounds negotiations, one with the Xiarmen, and another with the La Sablicans. Normally she wouldn't have remembered the details of big, complicated adult talks, but the negotiations with the La Sablicans had been about something that had made the farmer in her sit up and take notice: wheat tariffs, and by extension, wheat prices. The La Sablicans wanted Sorcier to lower the price of wheat , while Sorcier wanted them to lower the tarrif for transporting wheat into the country. To Katarina, it seemed perfectly clear that if you lowered one, you lowered the other, but the La Sablicans kept insisting that the tariffs remain the same.
It was just enough for her to remember that most of the discussions were basically like that. The La Sablican's wanted to lower them to lower the price of lumber being imported into the country, but didn't want to lower the lumber tariffs, they wanted cheaper linen but didn't want to lower the tariffs for those, cheaper swords but didn't want to lower the sword tariffs…
About the only thing the La Sablicans were willing to lower was the wages of skilled Sorcieri workers like accountants, smiths, craftsmen, masons, secretaries and other such hired by the La Sable government, while also wanting Sorcier to increase the number of people who took jobs in La Sable…
Katarina was fairly certain she could spot the flaw in that reasoning.
And then…!
To say Katarina was in a foul mood was probably a gross overstatement, but she certainly wasn't feeling good. After listening to the morning's talks, she felt… dirty. Impure. Tainted by something gross and vile, like that time she'd accidentally received two copies of a Sophia X Nicol hentai doujin when she'd only paid for one at Comiket, and she'd had to run to the circles table to give back the extra copy to cleanse herself of the feeling… only somehow worse, because she didn't have a thin-book afterwards.
The negotiations with Xiarmah were less memorable. Something about silk… and there was tariffs there too… but people actually talked about changing those, and then they'd mentioned changing something about spice imports…?
Katarina was so lost in thought that when she looked up, she was shocked to realize she was standing outside the room her parents had been assigned in the castle. Ah, well, at least she knew where she was. From here, she'd be able to find her way to her rooms, or meet up with her friends for lunch, then get changed for the afternoon ladies-only tea party that was going to happen…
Instead, she raised a hand to knock on the door, only remembering at after she'd done so that The Book (seventh edition) said that nobles didn't do their own knocking on doors, and she should have told the servants to announce her and do it for her. Oh no, was she in trouble?
As she was in the middle of contemplating running away, the door opened, and Katarina found herself face to face with Mother. "Ah, Katarina dear. You're back. Is something the matter? I thought you knew better than to do that now?"
Katarina flinched, expecting a long, sternly lecture about etiquette, but Mother simply turned around, bidding Katarina to enter. "Well, come in. Your father and I were just— ah, conversing."
Father was sitting on the room's sofa with one of his legs crossed over his opposite knee, smiling as he always did. "Ah, Katarina! What a pleasant surprise! I'd stand to greet you but, um, I'm a little tired right now. I work very hard this morning."
"Yes you did, dear," Mother said with a fond smile. "Very hard and very long."
Oh, ew! Okay, Katarina, just pretend no to notice the smell—argh, she noticed the smell!—and don't look too closely at whether Father had his pants on properly…
Mother sat down next to father, casually— Argh, Mother, Father! Your daughter is in the room! Don't hold hands, that's so lewd! "Now, are you well, Katarina? You seem… distracted."
"Ah, it's nothing Mother," Katarina said, not sitting down. Technically she could, Mother didn't need to offer her a chair, but right now she kind of didn't want to touch anything. A part of her really wanted a good bath. "I actually should be going. I just got back from translating for the negotiations and—"
She stopped, grimacing as the memories of the event played out again in her minds like some kind of cheap filler flashback after coming back from a commercial break to spare the animators from having to do more animating.
"Katarina? What's wrong, daughter?"
"Ah, nothing Mother, I'm fine!"
"You most certainly are not fine with you suddenly stop talking and make that face." She'd made a face?
Katarina opened her mouth to tell her mother she was fine one more time… and couldn't. It was too much like that…feeling, the lie on her tongue. It made her feel guilty, made her want to take a bath…
Suddenly Mother was there, wrapping arms around her. "There, there," Mother said. "Tell me what's wrong, Katarina. What's making my daughter make that face?"
Hesitantly, Katarina began to talk.
"—and I just feel so… gross," Katarina said, "and I don't know why! I didn't even do anything! I mean… " She grimaced, looking down at the table so Mother and Father wouldn't think she was making faces at them, "I didn't even get to translate all that much." Lei-Lei had only spoken briefly, but it had been a quiet word to someone on her side of the table, and Mircala… well, she'd been about to propose something, and Katarina was even in the middle of translating for her, but her mean-looking bully-oujo-sama type of a boss had interrupted her, telling her to be quiet in that bully villainess voice Katarina knew she herself had.
She hadn't even needed her notebook to write down numbers!
"Oh, Katarina…" Mother said, sounding sad. At some point, Katarina had stared sitting between her parents. "That feeling? That's what politics feels like."
"EH!-? But… I don't even DO politics!"
"I know, my little Katarina," Father said. He sounded sad too. "But you were in the same room as politics all morning. Even if you didn't actually do anything… you were there, and just letting it happen."
"That was politics?-! But… it was just people talking and acting stupid and not getting anything done! Even though the right thing to do was so obvious even I could see it! All anyone seemed to care about was souls!"
Father nodded sadly. "Yes. Politics."
(+10 Insight)
"I could be far worse, Katarina dear," Mother said as Katarina swayed slightly at the terrible revelation. "You were only in the same room as politics. If you had to do any politicking yourself, the way the queen or a princess married to one of the princes did…"
Katarina's eyes widened in horror.
(+108 Insight)
"Ah! You mean… Selena and Mary and Susanna Randall feel like this all the time?-!-?" Her poor friends! And she had never noticed! Ah, she was a terrible, no good friend for not having seen how terrible they must be feeling!
A strange expression came over Mother's face as Father laughed for some reason. "We've raised such a good girl, Mili," he said. "Always caring for other people."
"Yes…" Mother said, sighing fondly. "She doesn't' even think about how, since she's the fiancée of a prince, she'd have to go into politics herself if they ever married and especially if he somehow became king."
…
(+Insight Integer Overflow Error)
For the first time in a LONG time, Katarina considered trying to get out of her engagement, with or without finding her good friend—who did politics, no wonder he was so blackhearted!—a capture target who was his type. Just to be safe.
