⩩ ONE DAY AGO ⩩
The door banged shut and Sirius' face morphed into an instant grimace. His amythest eyes narrowed at the presence of Marquees Vaelin curling his ginger locks behind his ear and painting against his woodwork door.
Sirius raised an inquisitive brow.
"Albert is the slimiest most stubborn bugger I have ever encountered and I literally live with centaurs and mermaids."
Sirius rolled his eyes and let go of his paperwork. Interactions with Vaelin Thorn worked on two major prerequisites: 100% ignorance or 100% attention. Sirius leaned back into his chair, and decided to go for the latter. Whilst giving Vaelin's haphazard-self a once over, he spotted a band-aid over his forehead.
"Whatever evil presence blemished your blessed face?" Sirius mocked, tapping his forehead where Vaelin had the band-aid. The ginger head walked in with an exaggerated sigh.
"Little Becca thought it would be spectacular to start a food fight at dinner and decided her weapon of choice to be a candle stand," the exhausted father tsked.
"You're so indulgent," Sirius deadpanned. These weekly renditions of chaos further cemented Sirius' will-to-have-children to a concrete 'no.'
"It's called being tolerant. She's two. Your frigid heart wouldn't understand," said Vaelin with an open glare directed at the Duke.
In all honesty, Sirius would never want to see himself being hit in the face by his own children, for he is awfully unsure of whatever he'd do next. Who would he throw off the window first— himself, for making such a god-awful decision of indulging into unprotected procreation or his children, for being born as demon spawns?
"Has she woken up?"
"Not yet. Did you deal with the family?"
"They wouldn't budge. I think you need to go there and talk to them, face to face."
Sirius sighed into his armchair, quill twirling through his fingers like thoughts in his mind. His brows furrowed with concentration as he stared out of the closed window in front of his work table. They were inside his study, overwhelmed with stacks of papers and bookshelves shadowing the already dim-lit area.
Vaelin picked up a stack of papers from a dusty chair and carefully placed it on the floor, consequently taking a seat. From his seemingly flat coat pocket he pulled out yet another stack of papers and pressed it on his lap.
"Here's the family papers, fake identity papers and the deed to the household," his fingers went through one-fourth of the paper stack. "And the rest of it is what you requested. The background check. I think we're really onto something. You were correct."
Every man liked being correct and Sirius was no different. Although, whilst most were seldom correct, Sirius was almost never wrong.
In an instant, he got up and stood beside Vaelin with his hands held out. The Marquees shoved a good three-fourth of the paper stack in the Duke's arms.
"That's late King Candell and late Queen Destin," Vaelin pointed at the coloured sketches drawn on the first two pages. "The resemblance is uncanny! It's a mystery how those folks never knew!"
"If you can count on the Durus for one thing, it is ignorance, Mr. Thorn."
Sirius flipped through the pages, eyes running over the sketch. He had seen the real paintings in the Empress' Castle when he was roughly eight and the details had since chipped away from his mind. But the dim haze of his memory was sharpened to perfection upon sighting the sketches Vaelin had provided.
Hair as dark as midnight and eyes as blue as the starry sky, face squared and stiff with fine lines of age and elegance. He was the Late King, Candell Borealis, who died from consuming poison when the Castle was sieged twenty-one years ago.
Sirius flipped the page and was greeted by a sketch of Late Queen, Destin Borealis, who passed alongside her husband. Brown curls of hair framing her dainty face in elegance, bejeweled to nobel perfection. Her sharp and narrow eyes stared at him through their emerald gaze, almost lifelike on the plain paper.
They looked aged.
"We're missing one," Sirius noted, flipping back and forth between the Queen's sketch and the sketch of Ori's present-day mother. "There was a brother. The crown prince."
Vaelin shrugged, "Was there? I did not find any records of him. No mentions, no recollections. Are you sure?"
"I am certain." Sirius remembered visiting the Duchy's picture galleries with the former Duke, his father, when he was new to the place. He would take young Sirius on evening strolls around strange faces, making him memorize important figures who'd later help him establish better connections.
Though, after his father's death, the legacy of his path was buried with him and the knowledge of the kingdoms before was burned in front of the Empress' Castle. The pictures, the books, the letters, the scrolls and the servants who served the Duke. They all went in flames, whilst Sirius watched.
"Hm- I'll ask my source to dig deeper."
Sirius nodded.
Before the Magical Empire of Nobelai was formed by the Empress and her Church, the lands were split into many a human kingdoms. King Candell ruled Borealis and gained reign over Aldoria by marrying their first Princess, Destin Aldoria. They were the strongest of kingdoms amongst all its neighbours due to their strong alliance with eachother.
Their codependency was also the downfall of Borealis. For when the rebellion was still a spark, all neighbouring kingdoms instantly blocked trade routes and barred friendly relations with the two kingdoms. Everyone waited for the fall of Borealis with baited breaths as flames of the rebellion engulfed their strongest competetor.
But, they did not expect to be swept up in the evils schemes of the ambitious new ruler.
After the Empress had segregated her lands to make each human reach their truest potential, the God, following through with his Oracle, bestowed upon their new-found empire, "Magic."
The great Empress made efficient use of the 'Magic' and conquered all the neighbouring kingdoms of the land. Within a decade, Nobelai became the most flourishing of Empires with magic laying foundation in its very core, available only to the most privileged.
Until five years ago, when the Royal Court decided to let magic flow on the streets, in the form of artefacts, to attract tourist "attention." Which Sirius considered to be an absolutely ridiculous of a claim because Nobelai never lacked foreign attention. But, the judgement was rigged because the Empress wanted it.
Sirius had no idea why.
He had no idea of how the Empress monopolised on magic, single-handedly. He had no idea of why Borealis recived the, "Oracle." He had no idea of when the Empress would go on another killing spree and obtain the whole world.
But it would be soon.
Hopefully not before he ends her for good.
"It is her, Vaelin, we need her," Sirius muttered, now going over sketches of the Ori's alleged 'mother' and 'father.' He did not know much about the mother, but he was certain that she would have been a high-ranking court maid. The father, on the other hand, it was a miracle how he had walked twenty years on the streets without being discovered.
The Great White Knight of the late Queen Destin, former Duke of Aldoria, and the man famed for vanquishing a whole dragon lair, Benedict Ernest. Every history book that was not altered to the Empress' whims had poetic renditions of his bravery. There were epics written and directed in his very name. His loss in the Great War was a startling shift and he was heavily mourned by all who remembered him.
"He's great, isn't he? Too bad he cannot even lift a finger again. He is as good as dead."
Sirius jerked his head up and eyed Vaelin for further explanation.
"You're quite oblivious of matters privy to your Duchy, Mr. Lancaster," Vaelin mocked, supporting his elbow over the armrest and his chin over his palm.
"Well excuse me, Mr. Thorn, for I have bigger matters to deal with than spend all day with my eye fixed in a telescope spying on enchanted deers and making notes of their authentic mating ceremony."
"Hush," Vaelin waved his hand to disregard Sirius' jab. "They have a fandom of their own. People need that information to— you know, WriTe EduCateD StUff. And they pay well."
Sirius shot his grinning friend a disgusted look.
"Back to the point, shall we?"
"Yes, yes, yes," Vaelin drawled as he stood up and headed to Sirius' table. He pulled open the bottom most drawer and fetched out a map of the Duchy. It was magical artefact, used for accurate mapping and teleportation.
As he unrolled the paper and upon the its flat surface rose glowing bricked buildings, households, trees and parks that spanned all over the Duchy. Vaelin pointed his finger at the marketplace, overhead a certain blacksmith's shop.
"Dwarves?" Sirius looked up to Vaelin's nod. The presence of magic had brought most humans to their truest potential but it also ended up mutating some humans and even animals into creatures of foreign existence. They were dubbed as, "Creatures of God," for not all men retained magic the same way. It was also the reason why everyone's Arcane Mark was different and special.
"Arcelia, a blacksmith dwarf. She hosts quite famed underground duels. Even some of the famously squeamish of Argentis were found extravagantly betting on her players. It's a whole thing, I heard, she doesn't rigs the matches but she has an eye for potential. The one she bets on never loses."
An epiphany struck Sirius. "Ahh, the Aeris-Durus Schism?"
Vaelin clicked his tongue and snapped his fingers with excitement. "Precisely!"
"Arcelia must have been using Sir Benedict to hog profits and since he was an unregistered citizen, he could have only posed as a Durus. The egotist Aeris could not have been comfortable with losing to a Durus in a battle of blades so they used the Schism to put him down."
"He was sabotaged, it was an insider, they say. It was quite a miserable sight. He was overpowered and mauled. I have no idea how he's as alive as he is now."
Chills ran all over Sirius' hands. To think someone as great as the Dragon Slayer was reduced to such a life of misery. All because of the Empress.
"Well, it is Sir Benedict we are talking about." He voice was barely above a whisper. His conviction was hushed.
No wonder the lass was so obsessed with being a Knight. She was raised in the shadows of greatness.
"Mhm," Vaelin nodded, tapping the blacksmith's shop over its glowing three-dimensional structure on the map. "You know, I know when she's holding the next competition."
Sirius shrugged as he rounded his table and settled back in his chair. Vaelin, taking it as hint, rolled up the map again. "I do not bother the means through which my people earn a living. You know that," Sirus reminded. "I will be going to meet her family this evening, I hope the—"
"You know, after the Schism, it is Ori who has replaced Sir Benedict in those duels?" Vaelin cut in with a smirk lacing his thin wide lips.
The Duke swore under his breath, rolling his eyes in the name of the Empire. "When? When is it?" He demanded, quite authoritatively. "We cannot let the lass end up in anyway like Sir Benedict. He was Sir Benedict, for heaven's sake, does she even think beyond the tip of her sword's blade?!"
"Not the reaction I expected," Vaelin mumbled under his breath before digging his hand into his coat pocket. He pulled out a black and gold embellished invitation and held it out for Sirius to take.
The Duke snatched it with two fingers and read over the contents. "Three days later... that's too soon," Sirius dropped the invitation on the table as Vaelin rolled the map back into the drawer.
"Yes, we cannot let our guard down after what happened yesterday. The instigator faked their Arcane Mark just like us," said Vaelin with a grimace.
"And the two obvious leads to the case, Ori and Matthew, are down. They would be trying to keep a watch on them," Sirius agreed. Whosoever considered the Duke and the Marquees a threat would not take their eyes off them too soon.
What was the Empress thinking? Did she know already...?
"Unless..." Vaelin began, urging Sirius to look him in the eye. His soft brown eyes stared a message into Sirius' brilliant amythest ones.
"Unless we give them a reason to look," Sirius caught his friend's drift.
"At an entirely new picture."
"I need to talk to them, as soon as possible. We need their loyalty," Sirius concluded, now scanning over the his messy tabletop for the little silver counter bell. He rang it thrice to summon Albert and get his carriage ready.