Maria sighed in relief as the door closed behind her. She had finally been dismissed for the night to rest as the king retired. Or at least, retiring to his room. From the large pot of what Maria recognized as green blossom tea, he intended to stay up a while longer. She nodded towards the two Royal Guard to either side of the door she'd just come out of, as well as another pair opposite them, and received a slight inclination of their helms in turn. Due diligence prompted her to ask, "Did anything notable occur?"
They all stared at her silently, before one briefly shook their head. Maria nodded. "Good night, then. May you be bored all night."
"Please," she heard one of them mutter. The others didn't speak, but it was amazing how much a faceless helm can radiate agreement without moving.
Maria turned to return to her rooms. The path was hardly straightforward, but she made sure to note the way, because she did not want to spend half the night trying to get to bed and only have an hour's sleep. Even hunters needed rest, after all. Unrested hunters were dead hunters.
Case in point, when she passed through a heavily guarded door that separated the part of the castle where the royal family slept and worked, she found Sophia awkwardly sitting on a decorative chest, snoring slightly as she napped, still wearing the same dress.
Maria stared at her then glanced at the knights arrayed on either side of the door, who all still stood impassively. Then she sighed and walked over to her friend. Resisting the childish urge to pinch Sophia's nose shut, Maria knelt down and gently shook the young woman's shoulder. "Sophia," she said, not bothering to lower her voice. "Wake up."
Sophia's head lolled, and her mouth made sounds that were completely unintelligible.
Maria resisted the urge to roll her eyes. "Sophia," she said, not changing her voice. "It's Katarina's wedding day, and you're late for the assassination."
"Don't marry him, Lady Katarina!" Sophia screamed, and promptly fell off the decorative chest she'd been sitting on. "W-w-wha?"
"Are you all right, Lady Sophia?" Maria said as the armors of the knights vibrated slightly for no discernable reason. "Did you hurt yourself?"
"Wha… Maria?" Sophia groaned as she pushed herself up from the floor. "Ugh, I had a horrible dream… Lady Katarina was blind so I had to read novels to her, but then she was kidnapped by this monster and being made to marry him…"
"How terrible that you think I would not be able to protect my squire from being kidnapped. Your lack of faith in my ability is mildly hurtful."
"Look, I don't know why you weren't in the dream, all right?" Sophia said as she pushed herself to her feet. "Anyway, I was waiting for you. We need to talk."
Maria sighed. "Now?"
"It's a workshop matter. Can't wait."
That got Maria's attention. "Was there an incident at the launch site?"
"No, thankfully not that kind of matter. But we need to talk about it tonight, because you're going to be busy tomorrow, and I have a feeling this isn't going to be able to weight."
Well, there went her being able to sleep early. She wasn't too tired, but she'd have to awaken earlier than she normally did tomorrow, as well as still needing to check on her squire…
"Fine. Let's go to your room to speak of this, then," Maria said.
The two fell into step down to the lower parts of the castle, even as Sophia shook her head. "We need to get Selena too. I've already told her to wait for us."
"I would have thought she would be with Prince Ian," Maria said mildly.
"I'm sure she'd like that too, but the two romantic virgins are doing the masochistic thing and holding off until they're married."
"Given how they act, if they do otherwise Selena would be visibly pregnant during the wedding ceremony, which would make the occasional difficult for her. especially the part where she lies down so that Prince Ian can thrust the Sword of Avowal."
"Because he already—ow!"
That last was because Maria had slapped her upside the back of the head.
"Please don't be obscene and vulgar, Lady Sophia," Maria said mildly.
"You're no fun," Sophia muttered.
Fortunately, there was a moving platform they could take to move downward. Maria made sure she was in the middle of the platform before they stepped on the pressure pad that activated the mechanism. She managed to keep her balance and composure as the platform descended, even though the floors moving upward made her feel like she was plummeting. Once more, murderous mythic architecture prevailed. Unlike some cage-like moving platforms that had a door one could close so that one did not fall, this one was merely a circular stone platform atop a very tall moving pillar, the means by which it moved Maria admitted ignorance.
"You know, one of these days I should really try jumping off and seeing where that hallways goes," Sophia said, pointing towards an opening along the wall that they moved past without slowing down.
"Don't, you'll fall and die," Maria said.
Selena Burg, it turned out, had her own room that, if Maria remembered correctly, was very near Prince Ian's. It was, in fact, in the same hallway that the room where Katarina had originally been assigned was. She wondered why Mary's room wasn't in the hallway as well… and whether Susanna Randall's room was in the hallway as well.
When Sophia knocked on her door, the young woman looked annoyingly energetic. Given she had probably spent most of the day on Prince Ian's arm, Maria had to suppress a surge of envy as she wondered how Rafael was doing.
"Oh, hello, Lady Maria," the duke's daughter said with near-Katarina cheer. "Lady Sophia. I took the liberty of calling for some small refreshments for our conversation. Unfortunately, the kitchen had no more I Scream to spare—none they admit to, in any case— but they had some small sugar cakes, and red currant jam."
Much of Maria's envy was kicked into a pit by the Unbreakable One at the offers of refreshment, as well as Selena's cheerfulness. They all took a moment to consume some sweet pastries and additives, and while it was no sweet, sweet blood, drawn warm from the vein, filling her mouth with the fiery heat of life…
…
Uh, well, the pastries and jam were quite delicious and roused Maria back to some wakefulness.
"Now, what is this about, Sophia?" Maria asked.
Sophia took a deep breath. "Earlier today, I was approached by someone claiming to represent the Merchant House of Argent Silver. They said—" the skepticism was strong, "—that they had heard rumors of our nightflowers, and approached me with a proposal to act as a distributor for them outside of Sorcier."
Maria frowned. "Did they approach you before or after tonight's display?"
"Before," Sophia said. "Either they've seen one of our previous displays—which is likely, since it's right up there in the sky—or have simply heard how popular it is and hoped to monopolize the only source of it with some sort of exclusive contract."
The words made ice bloom inside Maria.
"The fact they approached you implies they know more than what they could learn from seeing one such display," Selena said. "I've heard things from people who've seen displays but haven't been able to contact us yet. Many seem to think it's some kind of application of fire magic. Only those have arranged a display know that it uses alchemical components, and they are unlikely to discuss that fact, if only because most of their circle of associates would not be interested in the particulars."
"However foreigners found out about nightflowers, we cannot allow them to act as distributors," Maria said grimly. "The alchemy involved in the nightflowers is relatively simple. If we allow any samples out of our sight, someone could easily analyze the composition of the black powder within. If the one doing so were a trading house with the resources and reach of Argent Silver, they could easily out-produce and outsell us."
"It wouldn't even be hard," Selena said. "All they need to do is watch the alchemical components I've been procuring for the workshop. Knowing what the three primary components are, it would only take some experimentation to find out the correct proportions."
"So… what do we do?" Sophia asked.
"We can't let nightflowers be out of our control," Maria said. "The same powder is used in the gehrmans. Even without the gehrmans, black powder by itself is a dangerous and deadly substance that can easily be used as a weapon. Given our crown contract, allowing anyone else to have that knowledge might be construed as treason on our parts."
"So we refuse? Next time she talks to me, I say that we decided against it?"
Maria frowned grimly. "As much as that might be the simple solution… Selena is right. Someone studying our procurement patterns might reasonably be able to deduce the primary components of black powder. However, we don't have enough information to know for sure. And I can only think of one method of gaining that information."
Sophia nodded. "All right, tomorrow I'll point them out to you. You can get them alone and Maria at them until they tell you everything they know."
"… Sophia, what do you think I would do?"
"I don't know, but I'm pretty sure you can do it!"
"She can't, Sophia," Selena said. "Maria's the king's bodyguard, remember? She'd never leave him unless given leave, and I don't think that's likely to happen outside of the king being secured in his apartments."
"What if we lure them to you so you don't need to be away from the king?"
"Sophia, I expect this sort of nonsense from Lady Katarina," Maria sighed. "You usually have a completely different sort of nonsense."
"Hey!"
"What do we do, then?" Selena asked.
Maria fixed the pale young woman a stern look. "Sophia will likely be approached again by the Argent Silver factor tomorrow. We need to you ask them to elaborate on their proposal without committing to anything. Find out everything they know about nightflowers, and see if you can assess if they've managed to deduce how they're made."
Sophia's mouth dropped open, and if she wasn't already as pale as humanly possible, she might have blanched. "But… tomorrow… Lady Katarina…!"
"Sophia," Maria snapped sternly. "Grow up! This is not only a matter of our business's trade secrets, it also involves the livelihoods of several of my tenants, as well as a necessary component of the secret weapons for which we have a crown contact to produce! Stop thinking like a child and be rational. If I could do this for us, I would, but I can't. It needs to be either you or Selena, and of the two of you, you are already known to the merchant factor."
Sophia recoiled as if Maria had slapped her. For a moment, her mouth flapped open and close, before snapping shut in a grim line. "Fine," she said, sounding very put upon, but ending with a sigh. "I'll kite her along. What do I tell her, though?"
"The truth?" Selena said, glancing nervously between the two of them. "We want to learn more details about their proposal before coming to some kind of conclusion. That should give you a good reason to ask all sorts of questions."
Maria nodded. "Selena is correct. Simply act like as you usually do: aiming for the maximum profit with minimal effort on behalf of the workshop. If the factor has studied you, it would be the exact behavior she would be expecting. And it is likely she has, since she chose to approach you rather than Selena,"
Sophia huffed, but nodded. "And you? What will you two be doing?"
"I will have to obscure our procurements," Selena said, "and find out more about the extent of Argent Silver's presence in Sorcier."
"And I will have to report to the king that an important component of the gehrman's might possibly be compromised," Maria said. "And possibly face his displeasure."
"Sounds like a plan," Sophia sighed. "You know, when I invested in this workshop with you, this wasn't the sort of thing I signed up for."
"Did you expect we would be unchallenged forever? You know the simplicity of the alchemy involved."
"I know, I know. That doesn't mean I have to like it!"