Valle

By my count there were three days until we reached the next port whereupon we would stop to resupply the ship.

Two things were immediately obvious. One, if Princess Nevada were to turn the group in, she would likely be caught by Johan after making her presence known. Two, the princess was burning with enough righteous indignation that she might do so anyway, believing it to be her divine duty. Fools, all of them. Wielding justice is no excuse for marching toward your ocean of mistakes. Carr disagreed, however, as he too refused to budge from his position and made diplomacy remarkably hard.

If the princess remains unconvinced, letting her loose in the city would be a critical mistake…but she bears no fangs, only barks. Would it come to it, a solution would be to simply kidnap her for real. She was easy to overpower and they were aboard a ship already. Absently, I played with my sword hilt, baring one inch of steel from the scabbard and glancing at the spoiled princess. This would be an option too…

I let the sword fall back into its sheath. It would be unbecoming of the Champion of Cresna to behave in such a shameful manner—royalty or not, the princess was innocent and her blood would not spill by neither mine nor Lord Johan’s hand. I think ill of the princess and Carr for stubbornly clinging on to their justice over their reason, yet here I am doing the same. Honor aside, was there a reason for letting the princess live? Yes. If she dies, we would have actually committed treason and this could be problematic in the future. What about merely kidnapping her for real, was there a pragmatic reason against it? Yes. This would make her an uncooperative asset. This will not do.

Cresna.

It wasn’t a beautiful city—part of the Terra Inglesa from the Lusobritanio Empire, it maintained much of its inglesa roots with beautiful theatre and music, but it was also damp and dreary, and it seemed like fog shrouded the city more often than not. Hardly rich, its influence on the Empire proper was small and had only recently increased thanks to father’s shrewd dealings and my duelling prowess. Hardly an important city.

But it was my city.

And Johan had made clear he intended on taking out his anger from our duel on the city itself as well as my family. Meaning I could not allow him to wield the power of the Emperor for the sake of the city I so dearly loved. If I hadn’t attacked him then…no, I would have shamed Cresna if I let his steel touch them without fighting him first. I would not let this happen. Johan would ideally be kept from the title of Emperor, but should he gain that power…I would need to be able to fight him back as such.

“Lord Valle?” The princess asked. “Would you do me the honour of helping me brush my hair? It shames me to ask you of this, but as I have no servants…”

I smiled at her. “It would be my pleasure, Your Highness.”

Even if Johan is to become Emperor, so long as I have the princess’s favour I would be able to have many rebel against his orders. He would try to seize my lands, arrest my father and storm the city…but with the princess at my side they might raise their flags in rebellion. What sort of devil had possessed me? Not too long ago I would have laughed at the idea of breaking import laws and obtaining wine out of season. Now, I thought of treason as if it were a simple course of action.

I stared at my palm, scars plentiful since the duel against Johan. Hand of mine, would you wield steel in the name of treason? Would you incite a civil war to protect Cresna? Would you bathe in the blood of the innocent just so Cresna would be safe? My fist clenched in response. If I were to simply abandon the city, I could minimize the amount of lives lost. Yet it seems that my own foolish justice is not willing to allow me such action.

“I am the Champion of Cresna,” I muttered to myself. “I will not allow its walls to fall no matter the cost.”

I hate politics.

I just wanted to be in the arena and duel everyone else. I wanted to learn enough fencing from Carr so that I could defeat her in a fair fight. To bask in the spotlight and adoration, to unleash the full extent of my practice—it was all I needed! Yet this web of deceit had entangled me and I had no choice but to play my part.

First, I would attempt at keeping Johan from becoming Emperor. The route for this plan was sketched out, yet sketchy it remained. We would need to defeat a mysterious team of swordsmen in a gambling match—I had always wanted to duel against Max—and use the gold to purchase our access to the scene of the late Emperor’s murder. There, we would rely on Celle to solve the murder quickly and decisively enough so as to incriminate Johan…keeping him from the throne.

If it’s a team match, then even if I were to win all of my matches there is no guarantee we would win. I was reasonably certain Carr would win his matches as well, but the point differential concerned me—with the score carrying over from bout to bout, if our third fencer—either Fedal or Isabella—were to lose in a particularly spectacular way, even Carr and I winning would not be enough to make up for the score…

Not to mention there was a chance Celle simply couldn’t solve the murder. Genius detective she was, true, I had vaguely heard of her reputation—though only of her real name—and she lived up to it. But without her [Investigation] how far could she really go?

As for the other possibility…

Time to get Carr and the princess on the same page. “Princess?” I asked, while brushing her hair.

She turned around to look at me—it was an effort not to tangle her long hair while she did so—and said, “Yes, Lord Valle?”

“I know that the way these ruffians have conducted themselves is appalling. Yet I must speak above my station: their intentions are just. Lord Carr is more a victim of Lord Johan’s treachery than anyone other than Your Highness herself, he does not fight for him, as I’m sure you have understood by now.”

“His hatred for him is clear,” she admitted, albeit reluctantly. “Yet his actions—“

”—Make him indebted to the crown. Look at him, heavens, listen to the man talk. Does Your Highness see a merchant in him? A shrewd territory lord? Nay! He will not pay the crown back in gold or silver, but in steel. Allow him to pay back for his mistakes.”

“But to side with a treasonous group would be akin to treason itself!” The princess exclaimed. Nevada’s voice was filled with a sort of innocent purity that truly believed what she said. “How could I do such a thing?”

Should I admire the princess’s innocence? Her ability to see things so purely? And if so, should I concern myself that it annoyed me instead? “Your Highness, treason is a crime against the crown. Should the crown issue a pardon, the issue resolves itself.”

“I could not issue a pardon for their crimes against me,” she answered, a sort of innocent justice in her tone. “I wield no power to do such a thing.”

And you have no intention of claiming it even if we kill Johan. “I’m sure that whoever the next Emperor would issue a pardon—”

“I am not so sure,” she replied. “We don’t know for sure.”

I really didn’t want to use this next point, but there was little time to waste right now. “Estella, the current World Champion will partake in the Battle for the Crown. Should Lord Johan not partake, it goes without saying that she will win.”

“I’m afraid I do not follow—”

“I have known Estella from childhood. She’s from Cresna.” This pained me to confess; it was a secret for many reasons. Among them, it meant I wasn’t truly the strongest swordsman to ever come from Cresna. But I am its Champion. I earned the title and I defended it thus far. She never challenged for it and I would not yield had she done so. “And she owes me her life. A while ago, we…” I paused. There was no need to share this much. “She owes me her life, in any case, and this is what really matters. If I ask, she will issue the pardon.”

Princess Nevada looked down. “This is a delicate chain of events you are proposing, Lord Valle.”

“These are delicate times we live in,” I lied. They were the most violent times, soon to become worse. “We must engage in some diplomacy.” I had opted not to use my [Diplomacy] skill on the off chance Her Highness would see through my attempt at influencing her and it would all backfire. My natural charm would have to do. I took her hands in mine. “Forgive me for saying so, Your Highness, but working together with Lord Carr would be our best shot at succeeding.”

Her hesitancy was partially understandable. The story as she understood was that Gilder, the corrupt forger, had attempted to swindle her and steal her gold without giving away the ship when Lord Johan’s sudden appearance forced him to hide her inside the very ship. Carr and the others were his companions, but not entirely aware of the degree of his treachery. In her eyes, I duelled Lord Johan out of a sense of justice and then demanded her release out of a sense of honour. It wasn’t too far from what had happened, though my version did paint me in the best light possible. I need her to like me. For the sake of Cresna. For Father. For the people.

*“*Would you allow me some time to consider this, Lord Valle?” She asked. “It…it is a lot to consider.”

And you’re so out of your depth, Your Highness. “Of course. May I trouble you again tomorrow?”

“Of course.”

Princess Nevada was never trained in political affairs. Imperial succession wasn’t hereditary and her best use was an intended marriage with an Inglês prince, but war against Inglaterra broke out and all such talks were discarded. Even her bastard brother was likely better at court intrigue than her, but what choice did she have right now? Johan had forced her hand. Play the game or die.

And playing she was, albeit poorly. I could respect that.

“I will see you later tonight, Your Highness,” I said. “I must attend to my blade training.” I called it bladetraining because I had no desire to explain the difference between fencing and [Swordsmanship] to her. Still, she seemed to find odd that I trained at all—but she nodded and smiled as I left the room and made my way to the training area. One more idiot to convince, I thought.

A few doors down the corridor I found the empty room we had turned into a practice area. Fedal was sitting in a corner, clinging on to a towel as though it was the only thing that kept him still breathing. In the centre of the room, Carr and Isabella were engaged in a particularly quick exchange of attacks. It was a drill, I realized, not a live match. Isabella stepped forward, lunged, recovered then retreated two steps back, then Carr did the same. Stop-hits during their steps back, of course.

“When did you get this good?” Carr asked, between lunges. “You seem to know just about every counter to everything.”

“Probably around the time I cracked those red spheres,” she answered in a frank tone. More playfully, she added, “Aren’t you going to ask about that?”

“Not really. I figure you’ll tell us when you want to.”

“That’s very kind of you. Completely wrong, but very kind nonetheless,” she said.

“Hey!” I exclaimed. “My turn. Switch up with me, ‘Bella.” I hadn’t tried calling her that yet. She nodded absently and didn’t appear to react too negatively to that. Good. “Thanks,” I told her as she left.

Carr and I started our practice. I wasn’t entirely healed yet—some of the wounds Johan gave me felt like they could still reopen at anytime and they hurt at night or when it rained—but I had recovered enough to engage in footwork. With my [Photomemory] I remembered every move Carr showed me and replayed them in my head time and time again, repeating the motions by myself so as to learn them faster.

To my surprise, it still took me a while to become adept at proper footwork. My legs hurt after the first week, and it was only by the second week that the motion didn’t seem entirely too alien to my body. Yet progress was being made. “Keep it up,” he told me. “Rapier work is different from épée in a lot of ways, but the footwork is your main lesson here.”

Despite that, he taught me many parries that appeared functional enough and some moves that I heavily suspected weren’t part of regular épée practice. An hour later, after our usual practice was finished, we turned to speak of strategy. This was of heavy interest for me, as it was something I had done by myself my whole life: by lowering my [Swordsmanship] to match my opponent’s stats, we were within the margin of error and strategy became important. No one else thought these situations important enough to warrant much attention, so my studies on the matter had been a mostly solitary affair.

Until now.

“I never lunge at full speed from the start,” Carr said. “At that point if they get used to your speed it’s going to be hard to sneak a hit in as a surprise.”

“So what’s your usual approach?” I asked. “I don’t just go slow-fast. I like to zig zag. My usual approach was to go slow-faster-medium-faster-even faster-slow-fastest. Or something along those lines. I think that making sure the speed doesn’t escalate in a linear fashion is really important.”

“Oh, I agree with you,” Carr said. “Rhythm is really important. More important than raw speed, if you ask me.”

“So long as you can keep up with the speed to begin with,” I said.

“So long as you can keep up with the speed to begin with,” he agreed. “But if you two are within each other’s range, rhythm is the most important thing. Even a slow attack can catch them off guard if they are prepared for a fast one. If you follow the same rhythm the entire time you become predictable…but changing up rhythms mid match is actually really difficult.”

“Is it that difficult?” Fedal asked, still leaning his back against the wall and drinking water. “Changing rhythms, I mean.”

Carr nodded. “It’s a bit of a mental hurdle for most people. Try this: count from 1 to 2 back and forth. Just go ‘1-2-1-2-1-2’ for a bit. Then, switch up to ‘1-2-3-1-2-3.’ Can you do that?”

“Yeah,” Fedal answered slowly. “What next?”

“Now switch up between those two patterns back and forth. Can you do that?”

“Yes,” Fedal replied immediately.

“Now tell me, is there a delay between those two when you switch them in your head?”

“I—I think. Oh my god, there is,” Fedal said. “That’s so weird. I hadn’t noticed it at all but now that you say it…”

Carr nodded. “Yeah, that’s pretty normal. People usually have trouble switching from one rhythm to another…or to be more specific, they have trouble switching it seamlessly. Everyone can switch up rhythms, but there is a bit of an awkward pause where you lose acceleration and the length of that pause varies from person to person.”

Carr had demonstrated this principle to me earlier; he asked me to take two steps forward, then one step backwards, and then switch this pattern to three steps forward and one step backwards. Finally, he asked me to attempt to alternate between those two. At first I managed this without much trouble, but when he had me switch between both patterns at random rather than a predictable switch, I felt myself delay between the two rhythms. This was a curious human limitation and I recommend everyone to try it—it’s very informative about your own limits.

“Is there a way to cheat past that limit?” Fedal asked.

“Some people are just naturally good at switching up rhythms without a delay. Case in point,” Carr gestured at Isabella, who raised her hand and smirked. “They can switch up between different rhythms in a match without hesitating from the start.”

There was nothing natural about the way she cracked those cursed [Red Levelling Spheres] but it was not the time to bring that up, I thought. “And for the rest of us mortals…” Fedal trailed off, looking up at Carr expectantly.

“There’s a ton of options. This isn’t a problem with a single solution. One solution is to just have the footwork so ingrained in you and your reflexes so sharpened that your transitions are just fast no matter what.” Carr pointed at himself. “That’s basically what I did. But there’s a few other things you can do to help trick your brain into transitioning from one area to another more effectively. For example…music.”

“Music?” Fedal asked eagerly.

I decided it was time to cut in, lest this lecture go on for another hour. “Sorry to interrupt—but Carr, can I ask you for a favour?”

“You saved my life from Johan, I will do anything you ask,” he replied promptly.

“Stop being a petty bastard and deal with Princess Nevada properly so none of us have Imperial guardsmen at our throats,” I said, coldly. “If a word of apology may save our lives, I feel like you are responsible for uttering them, even if you mean them not.”

Carr hesitated, but only for a second. “Fine. I…I had decided to do that a while ago. Celle said something that got me thinking. I…I will do that. Just let me—”

The door swung open and Celle burst into the room, a wide smile on her face and struggling to get words out between a lack of air and an overabundance of excitement. “We don’t have to worry about landing the ship in a few days anymore,” she said, grinning. “This should also help with the murder case—we’re back to the murder scene.”

“We’re—excuse me?” Carr asked. “We’re aboard a ship right now.”

“Back to the city, at least,” Celle replied, as if she hadn’t heard him. Her excitement clued me in as to what must have had happened.

“Are you saying we—we found the Arcship?” I asked. The Floating Ocean City…the king of ships, the large vessel that let you dock your ship to it. The den of entertainment, duelling, gambling and luxury that only the most important of nobles and duellists could attend. And we had just ran into it in the ocean by pure chance? “This is perfect!”

Isabella grinned. “To be clear, I’m positive this is a trap but I’m still so down with going there anyway. Always wanted to go to the Arcship.”

I was really starting to like this crazy person. That said, it did not escape my attention, even if it had escaped everyone else’s, that her blade had traces of fresh blood on it.