Villainess [1]: Arnold Gives a Warning

Red Pill [0]: Clones, Secrets

On Friday evening, two men in three-piece dinner suits, both in their late 30s, had exchanged pleasantries during their evening repast in front of the maids and manservants in the dining hall, but now they remained silent after they cleared the table of empty plates and glassware and silverware and pushed the cart on castor wheels past the double doors. On one end of a table was King Conner Blaise of the Kaden Kingdom, and on the other end was Marquess Arnold Fleming. Both men used to be rivals back in their Academy days and brief enemies after their graduations, but now they were old friends suffering under a mutual headache involving Conner’s son and Arnold’s daughter in yet another incident at school over a commoner girl.

After the servants had left, the King’s butler strode in and approached the king’s chair, bending down and whispering something into King Blaise’s ear that made him lean back in his chair and say, “Make sure that boy stays in his room. I don’t want him causing another scene.”

“Will do, your Majesty,” he said and left.

Then Conner leaned over the table and put his elbows over it and rested his forehead in his palms, then ran his hands through his black hair and said, “Did you talk to her?”

“I did,” Arnold said with a flash of his red eyes.

“What did she say?” Conner said.

“She denied everything, of course,” he said.

“And what else?”

“Excluding the expletives,” Arnold said, “she said that your son called her a ‘witch’ by using my wife as an example. That’s putting it lightly, your Majesty.”

“I know,” Conner said.

“Did he tell you?” Arnold said.

Conner shook his head and said, “I’ve found out through different means.”

“And those are?” Arnold said.

“Come with me,” he said, “and I’ll show you.”

Both men stood up from the table, and the Marquess said, “Where to?”

“To my study, and expect company, too,” the King said and led the way past the double doors and down the main hallway towards the end of the corridor, where it turned into a side hall leading towards another set of double doors on the right hand side. And at the last of them, he was just about to push the double doors open when his butler rounded the corner and hailed him. “What is it, Jeremy?”

Jeremy said, “He’s calm but seething.”

“If you can lead me to his Highness,” Arnold said, “I can straighten him out for you.”

Jeremy raised his hands in a placating gesture, saying, “There’s no need for violence, my Lord Marquess.”

“Who said anything about that?” Arnold said. “A good chat would suffice.”

Yet before he could respond, the King said to his butler, “Stand by while we’re here. And if Donny comes asking for us, don’t let him in.”

“Will do, your Majesty,” Jeremy said.

The King then opened the doors into a private study, where Captain Rory Sydney of the Royal Guard sat on the solan sofa reading a copy of the Memory Times, still in his day uniform with the sheath of his broadsword pressed against the cushions. The Captain, still in his early 40s, was their upperclassman in their Academy days and was now looking up from the Memory Times as the King’s butler closed the doors. And behind the sofa, thirty-one ghost girls looked up from their newspaper-reading over the Captain’s shoulder, all of them with the same face and sharing the same red eyes as the blond Marquess, all of them now talking amongst themselves in unheard whispers.

“Did you know,” Captain Rory said, “that Viscountess Durham has been proposed to yet again? Things must be slow if the Memory Times is resorting to tabloid stories.”

The King smiled and said, “Glad you could make it.”

The Captain folded the newspaper and set it down on the coffee table and stood up, bowing his head to King Blaise and Marquess Fleming, then said, “Where’s his Grace?”

“I sent a messenger bird to Duke Woodberry earlier this afternoon,” the King said. “I’m sure you’ve heard, Captain, about this afternoon’s incident?”

“I’ve heard enough,” Captain Sydney said, “to know that his Highness has made a complete fool of himself and doesn’t know it yet, but he will soon.”

“More like an ass of himself,” the King added.

“Add a hole in it,” the Marquess added, “and you’ve got the whole picture.”

The three men laughed (as did the ghost clones), but it was a brief and mirthless one, and when the laughter went away, so too did their smiles. As such, the King looked up at his friends and said, “Gentlemen, what I’m about to show you must stay in this room, till this whole matter is resolved. Do you both understand what that means?”

Marquess Fleming and Captain Sydney nodded that they did, and Marquess Fleming added, “Does it have anything to do with the incident this afternoon?”

“It does,” the King said and approached a bookcase beside the fireplace and counted a row of books at eye-level before placing his hand on one and pulling it out. Then something metallic clicked behind the bookshelf, and he shifted the whole case away from the wall on a hidden track and turned it like a hidden door from the wall face. Beyond it was a large picture frame surrounding the edges of an enchanted mirror, so he turned to his friends and said, “I was going to show my son this mirror later this year, but as it is now, I don’t want him to know about this.”

“You saw what happened?” Captain Sydney said.

“Only the aftermath,” the King said and put his finger on the reflection, rippling the reflected image of the private study, then said, “Dear mirror, show me what happened this afternoon at the courtyard fountain in Lassen Academy.”

At once, the mirror flashed, revealing Marquess Fleming’s daughter, Lady Janet Fleming, arguing with the commoner girl, Miss Rosalie Edgeworth, at the fountain for a time. The thirty-one ghost girls all crowded around the mirror showing Marquess Fleming’s daughter, their spitting image, confronting their mutual nemesis.

(“That’s her,” one clone said.

“She’s rather lively, isn’t she?” another clone said.

And the other clones said their own responses, while they watched on with pitiful gazes.)

Then the King said, still with his finger against the reflection, “Both of you, put your fingers on the mirror, and you’ll hear what they’re saying.”

They did so, and they heard Janet rebuking Rosalie for setting her up over and over for the past month, saying that she was sick of her bullshit. Then Rosalie grinned and was about to say something . . .

When the mirror went blank, obscuring what was said and done during the interval, before the image and sound came back on with Janet holding Rosalie’s wrists and cussing Rosalie out in front of three female students watching in shock behind the fountain. And all at once, the three men zeroed in on the tear in the skirt of Rosalie’s uniform dress, as Rosalie screamed for help, saying that Janet had gone crazy and was hurting her. But that’s when they all heard Prince Blaise yelling for Janet to let go of her, and a moment later the idiot Prince came running over and grabbed at Janet’s wrists, making her wince and making Marquess Fleming grit his teeth in a murderous glare.

“I know it’s hard,” the King said, “but try to bear with it a little longer.”

And the scene continued with a lovers’ quarrel between the idiot Prince and Janet Fleming, in which Janet accused Rosalie of setting her up time and time again, yet the Prince defended Rosalie against her accusations and denounced Janet’s honor in connection with her own mother. His words, cruel as a knife getting twisted in an already-bleeding stab wound, left Janet in tears and Marquess Fleming in a rage. He tore himself away from the damning mirror and clenched his hands into knuckle-white fists and kicked the edge of the coffee table, then paced around like a madman seeking revenge.

“I’ll throttle him!” Marquess Fleming said.

“Don’t do anything hasty, my Lord Marquess,” Captain Sydney said, coming over to him. “He’s still a minor.”

“I know, but damn it all!” Marquess Fleming said. “Had I known he’d turn out like that, I never would have allowed an engagement between my daughter and that stupid boy!” Then he paused and looked at King Conner Blaise bowing to him and said, “I’m sorry, your Majesty.”

“There’s no need, Lord Marquess Fleming,” the King said. “I apologize to you on behalf of my son.”

“Thank you, your Majesty,” he said, “but apologies aren’t enough. What will you tell him?”

“My son?” the King said.

Marquess Fleming nodded and said, “About the engagement, yes.”

“Let’s not be too hasty,” the King said. “We don’t want to make things worse for Lady Fleming.”

“That’s not good enough,” the Marquess said. “I won’t bring it up, unless my daughter brings it up first, but you need to do something about his Highness’ conduct.”

“I’ll talk to him,” the King said, “but in the meantime, don’t let a word of what I’ve shown you out of this room.”

The Marquess and the Captain both nodded.

With that, King Conner Blaise added, “Captain, investigate Miss Rosalie Edgeworth’s upbringing. I want to know who her parents or foster parents are or were and whether or not someone is backing her.”

“You think it’s political?” Captain Sydney said.

“I’m not sure,” the King said, “but Miss Edgeworth wields far too much influence as a mere commoner.”

“What about the mirror going blank?” Marquess Fleming added. “Do you think that’s connected with all this?”

“I don’t know,” the King said, “but that mirror is a family heirloom. I’ve never seen it go blank while touching it, till I looked into what happened this afternoon.”

“Your Majesty,” Marquess Fleming said, “do you think my daughter’s in danger?”

Yet the King said, “I don’t know.”

“If she is, my Lord,” Captain Sydney said, “then I’ll have one of my sons look after her during school hours.”

Marquess Fleming said, “Do you mean Sir Kevin Sydney?”

“I do, my Lord,” the Captain said.

“Aren’t they in different classes?” he said, then to the King: “Will you have her transferred to another classroom?”

The King nodded and said, “Duke Woodberry and I will talk to the school board this Saturday and have Lady Fleming transferred to the class Sir Kevin Sydney’s in. I’ll also have Duke Woodberry get his son to keep an eye on Donavan and see what’s going on with him.”

“And?” Marquess Fleming said.

“We’ll see how things go from there,” the King said.

“That’s not good enough, your Majesty,” Marquess Fleming said. “Not good enough for my daughter.”

“Then tell me,” the King said. “What is good enough? Putting my son under house arrest? Having him expelled?”

“I’m not talking about your son,” he said. “I’m talking about my daughter! What will you do to protect Lady Fleming while she’s at school?”

“Calm down, my Lord,” the King said.

“Then what will you do?” Marquess Fleming said.

“Duke Woodberry and I will discuss it with the school board—”

“Then I’ll be there with you and Duke Woodberry,” the Marquess said, “and I hope you’ll have answers for me then.”

“Don’t be hasty now,” the King said.

“Have you any idea,” the Marquess said, “of the rumors going around about her? Or have you forgotten that unchecked slander can kill?”

“That’s an old wound,” the King said.

“Your son still has a mother!” Marquess Fleming said. “I won’t just stand by and let my daughter get subjected to the same ‘slander’ that killed my wife!”

“Trust me, Arnold,” the King said. “It weighs as heavily on myself and her Majesty as it does—”

“Then do something about it!” the Marquess said.

“Then what would you have me do, Arnold?” the King said. “You tell me!”

“For one,” he said, “you could have one of the school guards accompany my daughter at school. There!”

“That’s against the school’s policy,” the King said, “of having no preferential treatment for any student.”

“Then make an exception,” he said.

“That’s not how—”

“Oh, for God’s sake, do something, or I will!” the Marquess said, then stalked towards the double doors and pulled them open and left the room.

Moments passed in silence.

“It could have been worse,” Captain Sydney said.

“I know,” the King said and plopped onto the sofa and buried his face in his hands. “My God, tomorrow’s going to be heavy. Thank you for suggesting a repast before we came here, anyway. We tried, at least.”

“Look at the bright side, your Majesty,” the Captain said. “At least he came unarmed.”

Which got the King chuckling.

Then the King got back up, and he and the Captain pushed the book case back in its place over the mirror, till a hidden latch clicked it back against the wall. Then the King pushed the book back into the neat row of books on the shelf when the butler knocked and peaked his head in the doorway.

“All done?” the butler said.

“Yes, we’re done here, Jeremy,” King Blaise said.

The two men then exited the room, and the butler shut the double doors behind them. Then the King and the Captain and the butler walked back down the hallway in silence for a time, till King Blaise brought up a different subject to quell the heavy mood, which centered on . . .

Meanwhile, the thirty-one spectral clones of Marquess Fleming’s daughter walked through the double doors, lagging behind the trio as the clones discussed their next plan of action. One clone in particular, the most outspoken clone of the group, suggested they try to gain access to Janet Fleming’s dream again, but her doppelgängers said that they were tired of chasing their living avatar around Lassen Academy in her dreams. Then another clone observed that this current incarnation of Janet Fleming likes to run a lot, as if she was good at playing tag, but the outspoken clone just smiled.

“So what?” she said. “We’ll just have to catch her and make her understand.”

“Easier said than done,” another clone said.

“She’ll be worth it,” the clone said.

Yet another clone said, “How do you know?”

“Because she’s alive,” the outspoken clone said. “As long as she stays alive, she’ll be worth it.”

End of Villainess [1]