32

The Two Types of Conquest

Granther is the seat of education to some of the most powerful lords in all of Evandis, Versia, and sometimes even beyond. From the noble houses of Evandis, to the children of representatives in Mante, to relatives of the Lord of The League, and the noblemen of Rauvin, there is no place greater in the entire continent of Artella to educate the minds of future rulers in diplomacy, governance, leadership, and even warfare.

Today, there was a military exercise underway, and they sat around the command tent feeling completely useless.

‘This is absolute absurdity,’ cried Lord Derian, the next in line to house Steelthorn. ‘What’s the point of having officers if one man can fight them all himself?’

‘He’s the king,’ Andredis said, the son of Chief Senator Harrian of the Republic. ‘What can we do?’

‘No, he isn’t. Not yet.’

‘Why not just let him have at it?’ came the voice of Esedis, the cousin of Fifth Lord Isanthol, pouring another goblet of wine from the jug. ‘We get the victory without ever lifting a finger. What’s not to like?’

‘But it’ll be a hollow one.’

‘A victory is a victory; it doesn’t matter how you achieve it.’

‘No.’ He sat arms folded in severe annoyance at the central table, where the maps were laid, and with those wooden figures placed on top. All that effort gone to complete and utter waste. All that planning so the future king can wave his ego around on the battlefield.

House Steelthorn became famous for its warriors. He shouldn’t be upstaged by some pompous twit.

They wouldn’t understand. Why would they? All the League nobles know is how to lose wars. Being on the winning side for once may have been a nice change for them.

He wondered how much resentment some of these nobles still hold for Evandis. They have been at war before off and on, and last time, they did lose quite badly. A significant loss of territory and a humiliating surrender leading to the dissolution of the previous hierarchy and forming a new one under the surprisingly young First Lord Davik. Where an uncountable number of lords once sat in debate was soon whittled down to only five.

It certainly made decision making more expedient. And they were willing to remain cordial with Evandis, leading to their application here. Then again, Artellian alliances tend to be about as strong as wheat toast, so who knows how long it will last.

Their conversation broke to a halt as a gust of chilly night air swept into the tent.

The grey-skinned, gargantuan form of Lord Bhramsta ducked in through the doorflap, looking clean and unsullied, if not somewhat disheartened.

‘Lord Bhramsta! Nice of you to finally join us. Strange to find you anywhere but at the heels of our beloved prince,’ Lord Derian said, each word oozing with so much sarcasm it almost became physical. ‘What’s the matter? Have you finally become sick of him?’

‘Um, no actually,’ he said, unsure and with the hesitance that comes with a certain level of embarrassment. ‘He… sent me away.’

‘Are you serious? You? The next Knight Captain of the Dawnshield Knights?’

‘He said I was… getting in the way.’

‘Now that’s just perfect.’

‘Come on! Is that all the fight you have?’ The young prince dashed around the battlefield, flicking between soldiers as the grasshopper does from leaf to leaf.

He would rush in and tap one on the neck with his wooden blade, rendering them out of the match. Sometimes he would strike a little too hard and they’d fall, so the healers would have to come in and check nothing was broken.

They moved so slow it bordered on being ridiculous. The soldiers may as well have been moving in treacle. If they were holding back just because he was the prince of their entire kingdom, he'd make them sorry about it.

He dipped between two soldiers, their practice blades missing their mark by a huge margin, and he tripped one and charged the other with his shoulder.

Was he always this strong? He remembered the times back in Orrick, back at his old school; top of his class in every physical activity. The training here seemed to exemplify that. It made him feel like a one-man army. At this present time, that was literally the case.

A horn blew from atop the right sided ridge. A voice rang out.

‘Time! Red squadron has failed to take the pass! Blue squadron wins!’

Victory was his, of course it was. Would anyone have expected anything else? Such good work deserves a reward. First, a nice bath was in order. Second, how about another conquest? Maybe one of a different, much more fun and satisfying kind. One that requires some wine and a bed for two.

There are two types of conquest, after all. He wanted to get both in one night.

One vial of vorken blood.

A handful of dried aysper leaf.

A dash of powdered atterrock.

Leave above a flame till boiling, stir well, filter the contents, cool, and deposit the liquid in a vial.

It seemed so simple, looking at it written down in the leather-bound almanac.

She poured in the blood, shaking the vial so as to get as many of the dregs out as possible. She took the aysper leaf, counting the exact amount used in the demonstration image, as “a handful” is unhelpfully vague. She sifted through the atterrock to remove any bits that were less powdered than what she thought they should be.

She set the flame, letting it light in her hand, then coaxing it into the burner, where it swayed with the draught; she closed the window to prevent any further cool air entering. She set the copper cucurbit above the flame, letting the heat bring the concoction to a light simmer. How heavy did it want the boil to be? Did it want it light where the contents only somewhat jittered in the pot, or did it want it heavy where the cucurbit would rock violently on its stand? With minor reluctance, she settled on the middle ground between the two, and the mixture happily bubbled within the small copper pot.

Then came the stirring. It said, “stir well.” How well? She decided to blitz it. She was left with a bubbly, thick ichor of a dark, sickly green complexion. The almanac told her it shimmered with all the colours of the world. The last time she checked, the world was not the colour of wet moss... mostly. Maybe it would look better once it was filtered. She let it settle, then poured the sticky, dark goo through a sieve. She must have blitzed it well, as there was little in the actual sieve after the contents went through. She felt kind of proud of herself. Then she felt silly for being proud of something like that.

She let it cool. She let it cool for a while. In fact, it was stone cold. But she never does anything by half measures, no matter how long it could take.

Finally, she deposited her creation into a vial.

It was still seaweed green.

Well… Maybe Azveldar’s Almanac is wrong.

She drank it. At least, she tried to anyway. Vials are usually around the size of a finger and the width of a thumb. What she managed to drink was around a third of that, before she ended up spitting it onto her worktop.

According to the book, the potion was supposed to go down as smooth as the mist travels down the mountain on a gentle spring morning.

What she drank was about as smooth as an avalanche during the apocalypse.

And that was it; she did everything perfect. Despite that, it still didn’t work. Why?

This was supposed to be the elixir that Sorcerer Azveldar used to bring himself peace and clarity before he began his meditations and mental scryings. It brought about the litany of spell tomes of which all mages base their knowledge upon. It may not be exact to the potion he actually used back then or nearly as potent, but it’s still a rather advanced potion that aids study. Any Vesterwys educated mage should be able to make it. Yet it still gave her so much trouble.

‘Damn it all!’ She threw the remainder of the potion across the alchemy lab. It bounced off one of the tables, came loose, and spilled onto the carpet.

She fell back into her chair, ran her hands through her hair, and leaned back.

What should she do? Try again? This was her third attempt. What would be the point in another failure?

Something caught her ear. It was approaching from outside the room, down into the corridor.

It was a tuneless, jovial whistle. The whistle of someone with little care and no responsibilities.

The source walked past; a young lion walking with head held high, hands behind back, fur still wet from a recent visit to the bath house.

He stopped just before he walked past and swiftly turned in.

‘I didn’t believe we had an alchemy lab here,’ he said, leaning against the doorframe.’

‘We don’t. I made this one myself,’ she said bluntly as she summoned a flame in hand to re-light the burner.

‘You’re a mage?’ He sidled up next to where she was working and leaned back against her worktop. ‘Didn’t know we learned magic here.’

‘Not nearly enough. I wanted to go to Vesterwys, but I’m here, so I have to settle with what I have.’

‘How about we leave this stuffy lab. Take a nice walk around the campus grounds Just you and me.’

‘Not interested, thanks.’

‘What?’

‘Too busy. There’s so much magic I have to do, and no one here is going to help.’

‘Don’t you know who I am?’ he asked, both stunned and rather impressed at the sheer audacity.

‘Honestly,’ she said as she emptied the flasks and began cleaning them, ‘I don’t really care.’

‘What’s your name?’

‘Clera, of house Brocton.’

‘Brocton?’ He heard that name before. It was mentioned by one of the many chancellors that seemed to want to make his acquaintance. There was one he remembered that stood out from the rest. A rabbit in a large hat. ‘You must be the daughter of Chancellor Brocton! I take it you’re next in line to be the Chancellor of the Arcane.’

‘I am.’

‘That’s a pretty prestigious position.’

‘Again, do you think I care? Maybe some of us were born for certain roles, but not all of us want them. I don’t care. I want to study magic, not legislate it! I…’ Seeing the way he reeled from the outburst brought her back. Perhaps she had been a little too harsh. He didn’t deserve it. ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. It’s just there’s so much I want to study, and the tutors here don’t want to help.’

Arval wouldn’t know. To him, passion was whatever he was interested in at the moment, and he lost it for her. What was a young, attractive rabbit with short, dark hair now just seemed like kind of a bitch with too much focus on uninteresting things like alchemy.

‘Fine then. I suppose I’ll leave you to your studies.’

People like her have far too much drive. Never interested in just money, status, or pleasure. Nevermind. There’s an entire campus out there for him to have his fun with. What’s this one girl? Hardly worth the effort.