One hot afternoon, Savitria and Aunt Royan and I sipped cold tea in my gazebo after a rough court session during which I had Elvin Kushad dragged off to the Cold Palace. It was absolutely satisfying! Aunt Royan especially seemed to derive some sort of manic pleasure from the fact, and I heard from Ao-ye that she'd run to the Cold Palace about nine times to simply boo Elvin Kushad. But I didn't call her out. The Four Delegates had a tendency to be unforgivably childish. Even Dan Kushad, sometimes. And so far he was the most sensible of them all.
I'd been to see Father and Mother at the palace they resigned to, where they were constantly troubled by pesky Mo' Sen. Father never asked me about court matters, and I never told him either. But apparently, Ao-ye considered the matter of Elvin Kushad skulking in the Cold Palace a very important piece of information that the Former Emperor by all means had to know. Father had not said anything about that either. He'd simply looked deep into my eyes and patted my hand and told me he felt useless for not being there for me when I was growing up.
On the other hand, Mother and Aunt Royan and Savitria had their heads together, cooking up a nasty plot that involved me! My mother is innately playful, and those two female delegates are incurably childish. The combination birthed an embarrassing topic: king-consorts!
I escaped from that palace with my face as ripe as a tomato. And Savitria and Aunt Royan pursued me to my gazebo in hopes of continuing the discussion!
"Your Majesty, after all, you are not young anymore. Aren't you twenty two? You should consider having a king-consort." It was Savitria speaking, "there are many nice young lords in Canolita. Isn't Marquis Illrerad on e? And you are also familiar with him."
Hhamir? The heck.
But I wasn't even thinking about it. Whenever I thought of king-consorts I always envisioned one dark skinned silver haired man with half his hair tied up in a coronet. With full body armor. But last I heard was that he was no longer Savitro Zhan--shuaa, but Hakorhi--shuaa.
I missed Iria. As well as everything Hakorhi.