House Solugarr

Hauling three bottles of Deadsift brandy, wrapped in a towel and placed in a wicker luncheon basket, Barathiel walked out of the palace through a little-used exit into a paved pathway leading up a hill where the Lyoneid family mausoleum stood.

He sipped the brandy under a green marble column with his back propped against the entrance way steps.

His eyes set on the southernmost bridge leading from the city of Nevespora onto the palace grounds. The moon arced above the archway support on his right. By the time of its wane behind a capstone figurine, Barathiel had gulped down the contents of the first bottle.

Although his stomach felt tight with an ache that never settled, he opened up his second bottle. The brandy smelled hideous beyond what the laws of nature allowed the human nose to sense without the assistance of sorcery.

A burning sensation flared in his nose followed by a wave of nausea Barathiel could barely keep in check. He held the bottle at arm's length for a good minute. The potency of the Deadsift brandy in that moment when first exposed to air often proved deadly for anyone who dared to take a gulp.

He jerked his head to see what stirred along the wall behind him. The sound of a robe flapped in the wind and rustled along the floor tile but faded as Barathiel could make nothing discernible out of the shadows behind him. He shook his head with considerable agitation.

"You play games with me, Renua."

"I recognize that name," came an unexpected reply from his left.

It was Lieutenant Graes. The palace guard continued speaking in a helpful tone, "in fact, Renua Lyoneid's crypt is in there, in that building right behind you."

From the direction of the palace, following Barathiel's previous course, the palace guard Ettias Graes walked up to the mausoleum making very little noise in boots that should have given a hard pound to his steps.

Barathiel turned his goblet downward and he returned the cork to the bottle.

"Making your rounds, lieutenant?"

"As such I am," the guard replied.

"I haven't seen your captain this evening, Graes."

Graes' eyes lowered cooly on the liquor bottles. His lips puckered into a smirk.

"An Elven courrier was in need of an escort to the palace."

Barathiel nodded.

"I figured as much. Bierdé would take the task for his own amusement."

"My captain is entirely enthralled to the race of them."

Barathiel raised his chin askance at the man's gossipy tone.

"Would have been me taking on that assignment by the right of it. Likely a fetching good maiden," Graes recovered.

"Elven maiden," Barathiel shrugged his shoulders, "is there any other kind but fetching? Still, not like you can marry one of the warriors. They are all sworn to serve Sunwelder."

Barathiel wanted to continue that line of thought, but a belch more forceful than he intended crept up his throat.

Graes' eyes gazed back at the bottles by Barathiel's side.

"You should at least be eating something with that to help hold it down," he suggested.

Barathiel raised his hand up flat asking for pardon.

"Excuse me, Graes."

With a moan, he stood up in a rush, lunging towards the green of the hill slope. Bent forward, held up by his stiff arms, Barathiel vomited the contents of his stomach down the gentle slope.

Graes turned his head.

"How can you stand the smell of that shit, advocate? Your constitution must be more stout than one would gather just by the size of you. I'll never challenge you to a wager of ducats and shots, that is certain."

Barathiel's eyes quickly read the guard. His thoughts grew suspicious. Graes did not appear to recognize the scent of the contraband liquor, but as Captain Bierde's right hand, he would know how to keep his concerns well guarded.

If Graes guessed the brandy was the notorious necromantic concoction Deadsift and if he recalled it in connection with Barathiels mumbled rant calling on Renua Lyoneid, the guard could deduce the purpose of the drinking session he witnessed by the mausoleum on the hill.

The crime of high necromancy, calling on the dead for castings concerning Fortune, Fate and Destiny, the three lies the Sœurarchy declared them, one could hang for that.

Barathiel took a chance. He offered lieutenant Graes his goblet.

"Have you ever tried absinthe, Graes," he asked.

The lieutenant balled up his face in a sour pucker.

"Oh no, not me. I'm not drinking that shit."

"Are you certain," Barathiel offered once more.

"If that is what absinthe smells like," pointing to the contents on the ground, "I'll take the piss."

Barathiel looked up and smiled.

"I like my drink bitter and I like my drinks sour," he answered. "It gets me in the righteous state of mind to hate all of creation forthrightly."

"Prettiest wife in all the Midvries, and you think you have a reason to hate anything. Such a pity."

Graes thumbs twitched at the cusp of his belt. He continued on when Barathiel did not respond.

The Ninci man merely stared up at Graes dumbfoundedly.

"Ignore that if you choose. I did not come up this hill to preach at you. I know very little about it, the narcotics, so I can only imagine.

"I'll stick to ale, thank you very much. Advocate, I bid you to the good graces of the deities. Oh, and please, when I come back later on my rounds, try your best not to be dead.

"I don't want to be in the position of having to explain to the Duke why I let his most favored nephew poison himself to death."

With a curt nod, Graes turned to his left and continued walking along the path that circled the southern perimeter of the palace grounds.

Most favored. Barathiel spat out when Graes disappeared from his view. Nincians such as himself, expats from the traditional seat of the Imperium, were barely tolerated in the court of Lyoneid, where D'jestre came and went as they pleased.

Barathiel turned back to face the bridge. Now certain he was alone, he could relieve the social graces that kept his drunkenness in check.

All the while, loathing himself for the necessary distraction of an intoxicated state of mind contravening his otherwise well-planned subterfuge.

"Where are you, you old, spiteful wizard? You dictated the terms of our meeting here, this very eve. Are you not anxious to see your designs to their completion?"

Across the palace grounds of parks and forest and groves, Barathiel kept his eyes on the southernmost bridge where couriers and minor dignitaries were allowed to enter.

Under the chromatic pendragon signet flag of the House Lyoneid, smaller swallowtail bungee flags along the bridge concourse honored the maiden house of Duchess Taudra Lyoneid.

Emblazoned on them, a single cinnamon rose in a field of honey gold. House Solugarr, Barathiel's own.

He slipped his hand into his jacket pocket and clutched at a small brass ring wrapped with interlaced platinum and raven ribbons of hair. His thoughts dissolved to a time, now remote, when this very day became inevitable.