“I cannot tell Prince Kestil about any of this.”
Jay leaned back, one eyebrow raised in mild surprise as she stared at her Seraphim lover. Severina had been quiet for the past ten minutes, barely saying more than a few words as Jadis explained her otherworldly origins. The rest of the women in the room were the ones to ask questions. While Jadis had explained Earth to the rest of them before, it was still a strange and alien idea to them, so questions always came up whenever the topic was broached. Jadis happily answered everything her lovers asked to the best of her ability, since doing so also helped explain things to Severina. It wasn’t until a lull in the conversation, after she had finished explaining the concept of a high school, that the blonde uttered the stern statement.
“I wanted to talk to you about that, yeah,” Jay said as she considered Sev’s blank expression. “I didn’t want to hide my origins from you. I trust you. I love you. So, I had to tell you.”
Severina’s cheeks blushed bright pink at Jay’s words, but she pushed on.
“As much as I love you, I’ve also got to be upfront with you. I’ve had some hesitation about telling you all this because, well, I know you’re loyal to Kestil. And I don’t trust that man any further than I can throw him.”
“You could probably throw him pretty far, actually,” Bridget pointed out.
“Uh, right. Yeah, not the best metaphor, but you get what I mean. I know you trust him, and I’m able to work with him a lot better than his asshole brother, but I definitely don’t trust him.”
“You are right not to.”
Jay paused, her mouth closing as she processed Severina’s statement. Seeing the incredulous expression on her face, the Seraphim raised one hand and gestured expressively.
“Do you think I am blind? I know what sort of man Prince Kestil is. I work directly with him as one of his inner councilors. He is a cunning, even ruthless leader who knows well the worth of a spy and the use of a dagger. If he were to learn of your origins, he would do all in his power to wring every scrap of a secret out of you to gain an advantage in his bid for the throne.”
Standing up, Sev turned and faced Jay directly, looking down at her with a sternness that strongly reminded Jadis of her mother when she was disappointed in her grades.
“Do you think I cannot tell that you are holding back? You have barely spoken for ten minutes about this ‘Earth’ you come from, and you have already casually revealed dozens of enchantments and inventions that far outstrip anything that we have here in the empire. Cars? Com-Puters? Online webs? You speak of instantaneous long-distance communications as though they are so ordinary that they are barely notable! And yet you have not once even skirted the topic of weapons. As advanced as your former home sounds to be, do you truly want me to believe that your people have not made any innovations in weapon enchantments? Do you believe Kestil would not notice such a gap?”
“Technically none of it is magic,” Jay corrected somewhat meekly. “We don’t have magic on Earth. Just pure technology.”
Severina glared at Jay, her wings ruffling as her arms folded over her chest.
“That is even worse! You hold the secrets to building devices that have the power of magic, yet have no magic requirements? The implications are staggering! Aila, tell me that you noticed this fool’s paltry attempts at obfuscation, if no one else!”
“I noticed,” Aila admitted. When Jadis gave her several offended glares, she shrugged helplessly. “You aren’t a very good liar, Jadis. It’s easy to tell when you are avoiding a subject.”
“I assumed that she would tell us what she was hiding when she was ready,” Eir admitted.
“I figured she was just avoiding the shit she didn’t know how to properly explain and was trying to not look dumb,” Kerr added as she scratched her nose. “She never had any military or combat training before coming to Oros, after all.”
“Yeah, I was guessing she just wasn’t taught anything about war,” Bridget explained with a half shrug. “Her You-Ess-Aye nation sounds peaceful and sort of quaint. Not a lot of cause for her to know about warfare.”
“Weapons weren’t even on my mind, honestly,” Sabina chimed in. “I mean, why worry about weapons when there are so many other interesting things Jadis has to tell us about! But yeah, now that you point it out, it’s odd that she never talks about weapons from Earth.”
“Didn’t she say there are ‘police’ where she’s from and they carry around weapons?” Sorcha asked. “I mean, I pictured town guards, so, spears. Maybe swords. Probably. But they drive around in those car wagon things, so maybe a lance makes more sense?”
“I think, um, Jadis said that wars still happen. She, ah, just never talked much a—about them, with us,” Thea quietly commented.
“I don’t care… About Earth weapons…” Alex stated matter-of-factly.
“Okay! Alright. I got it,” Jay raised her hands up, palms out. “Right. I suck at hiding things.”
“Exactly,” Severina scowled. “Right now, all of nobility believes that you and Sabina are no more than highly creative and ingenious inventors. I cannot imagine what might happen if Prince Kestil were to learn that you hold mountains of information from another… plane of existence!”
“I can,” Jay said, her tone more serious than it had been a moment before. “Look, I don’t know how everything works. I wasn’t a scientist or an engineer or an expert of any kind. But I know just enough about the basics that I know I could fundamentally change Oros, and not necessarily for the better. I’ve been avoiding telling any of you about weapons because I don’t know how to tell you about them without giving you some truly dangerous ideas.”
“We’re all used to handling weapons,” Kerr scoffed. “You don’t have to coddle us like day old pups. We’ve been fighting and killing right by your side, you know.”
“No, you don’t understand,” Dys shook her head at the therion’s casual dismissal. Turning her attention to Bridget, she pointed at the orc. “You think my home nation of USA is peaceful, and it is, but you are massively misunderstanding the situation. I mean, I am hugely oversimplifying things here, but my country has weapons that could destroy the whole world. I don’t mean that figuratively. Literally. Just one of those weapons could kill millions of people. We aren’t peaceful because we’re harmless. We’re peaceful because we have the power to destroy practically any other nation in existence. And the only reason why the USA doesn’t rule the world is because a bunch of other nations have the same world-ending weapons, which keeps everyone in a sort of constant state of ‘maybe we’ll all die one day because someone in some nation pushes things too far’ so we try to be peaceful. And not all that successfully.”
“That… cannot be true,” Eir said more than asked as she stared at Dys, aghast.
“We have a thing called a Doomsday Clock,” Syd told the appalled elf with a comforting pat. “A bunch of experts literally check in with each other regularly and give the world updates on how likely they think it is that we’re all going to die by our own hands.”
“Look, we don’t all walk around everyday thinking about how close we are to destroying ourselves,” Dia clarified with a sigh. “We do lead pretty peaceful lives, at least where I’m from. I don’t think any nation is ever going to use one of those weapons in war again, because everyone recognizes how terrible they are.”
“But it’s a box that we opened a long time ago and now we can’t ever close it,” Ida continued where Dia left off. “I don’t want to be the one that opens that same box here on Oros. I hope no one here ever comes close to finding it.”
“You know how to make one of those weapons?” Aila asked, her blue eyes filled with concern.
“No,” Jay admitted. “But I know enough about how they work and what goes into making them, like their fuel, that I have no doubt that someone as smart as Sabina could figure it out, if I pointed them in the right direction. Just look at what she did with airships. Advancements that took people back on Earth decades to accomplish have been made by Sabina in a matter of months.”
“Who knows what might happen if I explain an actual weapon to her,” Syd said as she gazed into the half-elf’s eyes.
“I wouldn’t want to make a weapon that destroys the world…” Sabina said weakly, her voice barely above a whisper.
“I know that,” Dia assured her lover with a hug. “But everything you make is going to be seen by the rest of the empire. You aren’t the only enchanter out there. We’ve already irrevocably changed the world by introducing airships, and who knows what’ll happen as other smart people like you start picking the enchantments and designs apart and making their own variations. You built an engine, Sabina. A magic powered engine! There are so many amazing and terrible things that can be done with one of those that I haven’t even begun to tell you about.”
“And there are many in the emperor’s service who are likely already figuring out further uses for such a contraption,” Aila nodded as she stared off into the distance.
“I cannot tell Prince Kestil about any of this,” Severina repeated as she sat down heavily next to Jay. “Gods. Please, Jadis, never speak of these things again, not outside of areas warded against spying like this room.”
“I don’t intend to,” Jay agreed. After a heavy pause, she let out a small laugh. “You know, I’m still kind of surprised though.”
“About what?”
“You work for Kestil, don’t you? You even said you convinced your family to switch their support from Prince Hraustrekr to Kestil. I figured that meant you trust him. So, I sort of thought I would have to convince you to not tell him about any of this.”
Severina sighed, her shoulders slumping as she leaned into Jay’s side. She took a moment to gather her thoughts, a pause of silence that everyone gave her. No doubt many of them were still processing the implications of what Jadis had told them about Earth technology. Eventually the Seraphim patted Jay’s knee while letting out another heavy sigh.
“Politics are always more complicated than they seem. I do trust Kestil, in the way that a man such as he can be trusted. I am well aware of his schemes. Even the ones that he doesn’t want me to know about. Knowing him, there are more secret plans that even I have no knowledge of. However, I support him because I believe that doing so is in the best interest of the empire and, more importantly, the children of Valtar. That does not mean that I do not acknowledge Prince Kestil’s flaws.”
There was a second more of hesitation, one in which Jadis was sure Severina was debating with herself over how much she should say considering her position. Jadis wasn’t going to push her lover to reveal any secrets from her work that she felt were confidential, but she did hope that the Seraphim would offer up some sort of explanation as to why she so sincerely supported a man who she herself admitted to not fully trusting.
“Prince Kestil is committed to peace. I know he can come across as somewhat… shady. But his intentions are ultimately good. He wants power, yes, but that doesn't necessarily mean that he intends to misuse it. His ultimate goal is to strengthen the empire while maintaining peace and prosperity for its people.”
“And his brother isn’t trying to do that?” Jay asked.
“Prince Hraustrekr is an expansionist,” Severina finally plunged ahead. “He has always been so. The reason why half of Volto is currently occupied by Demons is not because we don’t have the manpower to drive the Demons out, but because Prince Hraustrekr is purposefully redirecting military support elsewhere.”
“Why would he do that?” Sabina gasped, her expression horrified. “There are so many people who have died in Volto!”
“Because it makes them weaker,” Dys answered before Severina could say anything. “The Demons are doing the fighting for him.”
“If the majority of Volto’s soldiers are dead, there will be no one to stop the empire’s armies from occupying the whole nation,” Aila murmured. “He could take the country with barely a fight.”
“There may be no fight at all,” Severina continued. “The empire will likely be seen as saviors by the people of Volto who survive the demonic invasion. Especially since the Hero is an imperial citizen. When Wilhelm and his party eventually drive out Samleos’ horde, I doubt many will object to the change in leadership. Not that there will be many people left to say otherwise.”
Severina’s words mirrored everything Jadis had been told by Kestil himself in their private meeting. The first prince was weakening neighboring nations to make them easier to conquer later, or so went the accusation. Kestil had not been able to give Jadis any proof then, but it made sense to her that Sev would share the same reasoning. Jadis didn’t doubt that Severina believed what she was saying, but proof had always been the sticking point. If the Seraphim had a smoking gun she could point to, so to speak, then Jadis understood why Severina was so against the first prince.
“Do you have any evidence against Hraustrekr?” Jay asked soberly.
“He has already done it,” the paladin spoke coldly. “The Rubaline Dominion has been completely overrun by Demons. Their army is scattered; their cities turned to festering pits of corruption. Those who fled and survived will not have homes to return to once the war is over. But the empire will triumph. The Hero will drive out the Demons and the land that is left behind will be claimed under Hraustrekr’s banner.”
“But the Demon Lord is the one who launched all of the surprise attacks,” Sorcha pointed out. “You aren’t trying to claim that he worked with the Demon Lord of all things, are you?”
“No,” Severina shook her head. “Not even he would go that far. But Hraustrekr is the commander of the entire imperial military. When the invasion began, he could have sent armies to support Rubaline. He could have coordinated with Queen Rubal XIV to counterattack the invading Demons before they dug in. Instead, he directed the armies to take up defensive positions along the border while sending only a paltry force into the Rubaline Dominion. A force that contained many of the generals who supported Prince Kestil, I will point out, almost all of whom never returned.
“I have no direct evidence. For all his faults, including his damnable temper, Prince Hraustrekr is not a fool. He has left no trail to follow. No conspirators to question. All of his actions can be explained as reasonable caution. His duty to protect the empire and its people comes first. Protecting neighboring nations is a secondary concern, one that most citizens and even the emperor would agree with. But the man is an opportunist. Hraustrekr has intentionally withheld aid where he has been able to do so without coming across as a coward, all as a setup for what comes after the war.”
Severina’s cross-shaped eyes locked with Jay’s as she spoke her next words.
“The demonic invasion is a temporary inconvenience to men like Hraustrekr. What matters is the time between, where he will expand and grow and seek to dominate the entire continent and beyond, if he is able, with no thought to the lives that will be lost in the process.”
“Does that mean you serve Prince Kestil because he is the lesser of two evils?” Jay asked quietly.
“I do not believe either prince is evil,” Severina shook her head. “Prince Hraustrekr is misguided. Not evil. I have faith that Valtar would not let those of my people who continue to support him do so if his intentions were truly irredeemable. However, Prince Kestil is not an expansionist. He does not share his brother’s goals. I support him because I believe in the years to come, he will save lives, not waste them. There is little we can do about Volto, and the Dominion is already lost. But what of Dunnottar? The southern city states? The Verdant Sea? There are more nations on the central continent that will still exist once the demonic invasion is over. I do not wish to see needless war come to pass simply because Hraustrekr believes he has a greater right to rule over those nations than those who already do so. If Prince Kestil ascends to the throne, he will not wage pointless wars.”
“And yet you don’t want Kestil to know about any of the weapons I have knowledge of,” Jay pointed out.
“Kestil does not wish to invade our neighbors,” Severina said dryly. “That does not mean he would not be tempted into such actions if he had overwhelming power he could put to use against other nations. I have never claimed that the man is a saint.”
“This shit is so exhausting…” Syd moaned as she put her chin on top of Eir’s head. “Can we go back to talking about skills or something?”
“The mood has grown dark, hasn’t it?” Eir said as she reached up to stroke Syd’s cheek.
There was a murmur of agreement around the room. Severina, for her part, leaned more heavily against Jay. She had spoken her piece, more than she would typically voice under normal circumstances. Her information regarding Hraustrekr was not new, but her support for Kestil was better understood. Jadis couldn’t blame the Seraphim for feeling a bit emotionally exhausted.
“Well, if we are looking to change topics, I know of one we could discuss that is of a far less serious nature,” Aila spoke up while turning the pages in her journal. “There are a multitude of rituals that we need to perform. More than I think we can reasonably accomplish in the time we have left before departure tomorrow. We will need to coordinate who is performing what ritual and when.”
There was a long, drawn-out silence that filled the room, broken only when Kerr made a rude noise with her lips while stretching her arms overhead. Flopping to the side, she lay across Ida’s lap far enough so that her feet were poking into Jay’s side while her head was in Sorcha’s lap.
“Can’t we just have sex and call it a night?”
After a second, Aila closed her journal.
“That sounds good to me.”
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