Chương 33: Chapter 32: A Vertical Adventure

++Ties of nobility did not have a great appeal to me at first, but I quickly warmed up to the idea of them. This was, of course, timed perfectly with society moving past them by the generation, because my luck has always been sour. ++ - From the writings of Isabel Vornholt, 'The Great Lich'. 1, 891 A. E"I've heard things about that boy, Agrian, I know you have too, don't talk like the only issue here is Isabel's age!" My mother had found her voice, and what she was choosing to say with it was…disturbing.

"Bah, I know the stories you're talking about. They're just stories!"

"They say he's killed women before."

"And what does that mean? Nothing, Elizabeth, nobody has proven anything and he's never been anything but the perfect gentleman in polite society."

"And behind closed doors?" she pressed.

"When he's alone in his house, with no witnesses, and our daughter?" My father was clearly not completely immune to reason, because I could hear him pause at that. Granted, not for long.

"Isabel is a smart girl, and she'll be a smart woman by the time she marries him. A smart, magically powerful woman."

"She'll be alone in a house that isn't hers, in a land she doesn't know, surrounded by people loyal to their master—her husband—over her!" I heard an edge to my mother's voice. Apparently my father heard it too.

"So that's it then?" he spat.

"You regret marrying me, is that what this is—" he cut off, and it took me a moment to realise she had just kissed him. Not an especially pleasant thing to picture for me, I was not especially interested in sexual contact, and that went double for when it involved the sets of genitalia that had created my current body.

"I have never regretted marrying you," my mother said at last. Her voice sounded almost reverent.

"I love you Agrian, you are the most important man in the world to me." It was slightly repulsive for me to hear this, while thinking back to the strike. Once again I could not help but sit in awe as it sunk in that this was what my father had planned for me, this was my intended future. A thing that was hit, and then declared love for the person who hit them.

"I love you too," he sighed.

"Before I met you, I was…you know."

"I know," my mother assured him.

"After the war, the things I saw in Estia, the things I did…" I found my attention slipping there. I should have been listening more, every word was a clue after all, but it was very hard for me to keep focused when hearing a man complain about how massacring innocents made him feel sad. I had massacred millions of innocents during my reign of terror, and nobody ever heard me crying about it.

"You changed me," he said at last.

"Helped me become a better man. Perhaps Isabel… perhaps if the stories about Cyrinda are true, perhaps Isabel can do that for him too." I doubted it, mainly because my mother had not really done much for my father, either. He still hit her when he was angry, there was no getting past that. And I had no interest in playing the sacrificial goat to see whether someone could maybe stop hurting people. Unfortunately, I did not hear much else of interest from my parents.

Their conversation quickly devolved into grotesque physical affection, which I took as my cue to leave. Shimmying back along the ledge was slightly harder, since I had tired myself by clinging to it as long as I already had, but it was nothing that a quick updraft of magical wind from below could not fix, taking part of my weight and easing the rest of the strain. I was back at my room in short order, slipping in through the window, then closing it behind me.

It was only as I finished crawling over the windowsill that I saw my first oversight. It was Victoria. She had somehow made her way out into the grounds, and was currently staring up at my window with a broad grin on her face. The girl turned and fluttered away before I could even consider calling down to her. With a muttered curse, I went to find my younger sister before she could do or say anything problematic. This did not take me very long, for once I was the one enjoying longer legs in this chase.

I ended up locating her in one of the lower levels of the estate, which she was likely forbidden from just as I had once been, and clearly found ways to gain entry into anyway, just as I had once done. The girl seemed to have been waiting for me, because she shot up as I entered with that same grin on her face as before. This tale has been unlawfully lifted without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

"Isabel!" she grinned, like she was familiar with me.

"Hello!" I knew that Victoria did not recognise me much, if at all, but she seemed to be very fond of me already. Curious.

"Hello Victoria," I replied, uncertainly, "it has…been a long time since we spoke." In fact, I did not think we had ever spoken. I had certainly exchanged words with her in the past, but she had been so young at the time that it was hard to think of that as a conversation. My younger sister surprised me, then, by rushing over and throwing her arms around me. The shock of it sent me back a step, with my own hands hovering around her as I fought the instinct to obliterate her.

"Argh! Off, get—do not touch me you creature!" Victoria heard my rage, and she seemed to find it impossibly funny.

"I've been waiting to meet you for years!" she cackled, her words starting to get muddled up as she spoke too fast for her young tongue to keep up with.

"I love you!" I was growing more used to children by now, but still not enough for this.

"I see, well that is very nice to hear Victoria, but you—must, unhand me," I was trying to keep a straight face and avoid losing my composure, but this little goblin was making it very difficult. Her hands were gripping me like rusted hooks, and she had now begun to rub her face against my belly. She must have had a cold, because the girl's nostrils were practically waterfalls of liquid snot. Utterly repulsive. I hated human bodies and I hated meat, longing for my own, real body of pure, sterile bone.

A disgusted shiver ran through me.

"Victoria, let me go," I snapped at once as my whole body started convulsing without seemingly any input from my brain. The girl sharply stepped back at that, her eyes going wide as she looked up at me. Wide and wet.

"I'm…sorry," she looked down at her feet and I felt a stab of something squirming in my guts.

"It is…fine," I had to work not to growl out my response.

"I just do not like being…touched like that." I shivered again, and tried not to look at the moist patch near the centre of my dress where the girl's disgusting nasal fluid had been left. Victoria started heading off, which was not ideal. I still needed to know what she had seen.

"Wait," I called, and she halted, looked back at me hopefully.

"You…saw me before, did you not Victoria?" The girl was quiet for a moment, then grinned again.

"Climbing in through the window," her voice was a low whisper, conspiratorial. And she knew what she had seen.

"Are you sure?" I tried.

"Mhmmm!" She nodded furiously.

"What were you doing out there?" The truth was not going to make things better, obviously, so I thought fast for a suitable lie.

"I like climbing," I said. There was no need to overcomplicate this, I realised. She was six.

"I like climbing too!" Victoria grinned.

"How high can you climb?"

"I…can climb a tree?" It was not the sort of question I was used to answering, but Victoria seemed to have no problems with my response.

"Me too!" she giggled.

"Do you use magic to climb?" Now that was interesting.

"Can you use magic?" I asked her. She scowled.

"No, not yet. But Doctor Brown says I could learn one day." I was surprised to see how pleased I was at the mention of Doctor Brown. And at my sister's talent for magic. Apparently it ran in the family. That explained my parent's ludicrous reproductive rate, at least.

"That is good," I nodded reassuringly.

"Listen, Victoria, I need you to—" —"I like having you here," she cut in suddenly.

"Without you here, mother is the only other girl, and she's an adult." I hesitated at that.

"Do you…often feel alone?" I asked. Victoria frowned, looking like she was torn between answering and not.

"Yes," she admitted at last.

"Qaigor is a boy and he's stupid, he always tries to break my toys and father says it's okay and that he's just playing, but I know he's not, I know he wants to break them, and mother always tries to make him stop but she never can." Oh dear, she seemed to be seeing me as some sort of emotional crutch. I did not want to cause friction by just denying the girl outright, but I also did not want to listen to all of her babbling. I decided on a compromise.

"You need to show him that you cannot be trifled with," I suggested.

"He breaks your toys because he knows he can get away with it. You must do something to show him otherwise." Victoria frowned.

"He's five, father and mother say I can't do anything to him, he's my brother, I'm meant to protect him."

"Father and mother do not need to know," I pointed out. My younger sister's face lit up at that, and she moved in to hug me once more. I was quicker in backing away this time.

"Back, you animal!" I snapped. Victoria was stunned, then, to my relief, started giggling rather than crying.

"You're funny!" she exclaimed, before pottering her way over to the door.

"Wait," I called, watching as she froze like my voice had just bolted her to the floor.

"Victoria, what I said—about things mother and father do not need to know…that goes for me climbing through that window, yes? They do not need to know about that either." Victoria's smile brightened, and she nodded again with that insane speed that small children seemed to do everything with.

"Okay!" she rushed out of the room with another giggle. I felt strange, watching her go. Taking a seat, I thought about the conversation. Both mine, just now, and the one I had listened in on between my parents. I was to be married, it seemed, but not for a while. That was a concern, but not an immediate one. What I was far more interested in right now was these odd feelings I was having about my new family. Agrian the Younger had told me blood brought the duty to care for one another.

I had never really felt that it did, but then my experiences before now were… limited. What I did know, however, was that I had my own beliefs and convictions. I believed that those willing to strengthen and improve themselves deserve to rule, that magic is the stuff of life and power, that I was the greatest being that had ever existed and ever would. And I believed in repaying my debts and holding to my oaths. For a being as great as I considered myself to be, how could I do any less?

Unfortunately, the ties of family included those family members I did not actually like as well. Father. That irritated me. And yet Agrian had been clear, he protected me—risked his life for me—because of blood. And I had sworn that I would return that favour. I would return it for my younger siblings as well as for him. I had experienced one childhood in this house, and knew that my parents were far from qualified to be raising well-adjusted humans.

Perhaps I could start repaying my obligation by making sure the youngest Vornholts now learned some valuable life lessons. Perhaps I could make them worthy of calling themselves my family.