Eventually, Hanna stood over Barul’s corpse, her face like stone. “It is done. The duel is finally over. Barul Sword-Slayer has passed, and he broke multiple rules while getting himself killed. Lord Talarys will receive Barul’s collateral—Alsia will serve Lord Talarys for as long as both are alive.”
The elders snarled in anger and shock.
“This is ridiculous! The duel was over before this happened,” one elder shouted. “Barul accepted your ruling.”
Well, apparently that stupid idea worked on somebody. Even if it was in extremely bad faith.
“It doesn’t matter what Barul said. What matters is what he did,” Hanna said. “My rulings are final, elders.”
Rys saw the bands of the spiritual contract tighten around the elders. They had agreed to accept her rulings and ensure the delivery of the collateral. If they refused, then they couldn’t speak of the duel at all.
Except, of course, Rys had no obligations whatsoever.
“I don’t think—” the elder cut himself off before he broke the spiritual contract. “To clarify, are we certain that Barul knew that was the case? If he acted out of ignorance, then I question the fairness of your ruling.”
The old man looked so proud that he had found a way to question Hanna’s decision without breaking the contract.
Spiritual contracts sucked. The elders knew their way around them, and their spirits were so corrupt that they didn’t even think this was against the spirit of accepting Hanna’s rulings. They would say they agreed with Hanna’s decision, then raise a thousand arguments that poked holes in it. But because they were only questions, they didn’t count, even if their efforts were in bad faith.
Rys needed to intervene.
“Let me get this straight,” he said, injecting arrogance and swagger into his voice. He even smirked at them for effect. “You want to be certain about what a dead man knew? There’s a reason a referee’s rulings are final.”
“Stay out of this, foreigner. This is a Kinadain matter,” an elder said.
“No, it’s my matter. Barul tried to kill me. The rules of the duel were to not do that,” Rys said. “If I can’t trust something that simple, how can I trust a damn thing else from you?”
The eyes of the elders practically popped out of their skulls.
Hanna nodded. “Lord Talarys is right. It doesn’t matter whether Barul attempted to deceive me or deluded himself that the duel really was over. His behavior impugned my honor and that of the Circle of Brethren. Allowing it to pass unpunished will invite retribution.”
Given the Circle of Brethren consisted of Saints, Rys wondered if Hanna meant divine retribution or the sort delivered by people. He didn’t know much about religion among the Kinadain.
“You do not get to decide that!” an elder shouted. “You are an upstart Sage claiming the authority of the Circle as your own. We are the elders of the dains, and we dictate the future of the Kinadain.”
One down. Rys felt the astral bindings of the contract snap into place around the elder.
A second elder sighed. “The contract, of course. No matter. Barul’s death and our refusal to speak on the matter will ensure that you cannot do anything against us. Let us consider this a draw.”
Two down.
“I will never allow somebody who tries to control us to have any power over the Kinadain,” the third said. “This duel is a mockery of everything the Kinadain stand for. I refuse to accept it.”
That made three.
Rys clapped his hands. “Right. Then you’re all going to stand down as elders.”
The elders stared at him in shock. For the first time since Barul’s death, Hanna allowed herself to smile.
“Are you a fool? We just said—”
“I don’t give a shit what you say,” Rys said. He chuckled. It hurt, but the sound made the elders flinch. “I thought you were supposed to be the scheming elders taking control of the Kinadain, but I got a trio of arrogant fools. Maria supports me. Hanna’s word as referee and Sage isn’t restrained. And, of course, I can say whatever I feel like. I didn’t agree to any contract.”
The last few words turned out to be the magic ones, as the elders realized they had been played from the start.
“This was planned,” one said.
Hanna smiled brightly at them. “Yes. It wasn’t intended to end like this, but we’ve known all along that the three of you are working with Compagnon. This is the end for all of your schemes.”
All along? Hanna was embellishing a little bit, as she had only agreed to help Rys recently. But she clearly enjoyed tormenting the elders.
“You can either leave now, and quietly accept your retirement and inability to speak of this,” Rys said. “Or, you can fight it. Like a certain someone did.”
All eyes turned to Barul’s corpse.
“You will regret this,” an elder said.
Then they left on their ponies.
“I wish people had to pay me every time they say that tired cliché,” Rys said. “I could at least buy some nice wine with their bitter tears that way.”
“I’m surprised you let so many people live to say that,” Fara muttered.
Hanna approached both of them. She sighed. “Well, it’s over. Truly over. I’ll need to work with Maria to ensure the next steps go smoothly. Other elders will try to oppose us, so we’ll need to use the evidence you gathered to destroy the reputation of those three.”
“That will scare the others into compliance,” Rys said. “Do you plan to become elder now? Of at least one of the dains?”
“No, that would be impossible. Elders are elected by the dain. That’s how we will oust these three,” Hanna explained. “Alsia will need to take their place. As Barul’s younger sister, she has the political backing to unite three leaderless dains. Once she is elected elder, she can handle Maria’s contract. She isn’t a Sage yet, but I will contact the Circle and have them promote her using my recommendation.”
Rys stared. “You can do that?”
“It’s how most elders become Sages,” Hanna said. “They train to become Sages and are often promoted upon request by other elders when their village elects them. But sometimes the Circle refuses, forcing a dain to merge with another or elect an elder without the Circle’s blessing. The latter almost never happens.”
“And you’re confident Alsia will be elected elder of three separate dains?” Rys tried not to sound insulting, as he knew nothing about the specifics of the situation.
“She’s a future Saint candidate,” Hanna said flatly. “Hence my wariness about using her as collateral. But Barul chose this path, despite many chances to back down.”
“I take it you don’t like this result?” Rys asked.
“Barul is dead. Alsia is being forced into a position of enormous responsibility, while being sent into your service. Your influence increased by an order of magnitude today,” Hanna said. “Even if you keep your word, I know that the future will be different. I can only hope that it’s a better future. Your actions so far have been positive. Maybe I made the right decision.”
Hanna left, taking Barul’s body with her.
Once she was gone, Rys nearly collapsed on top of Fara. “Fuck, this hurts a lot.”
“Rys!” she shouted.
The Lilim burst out of the mansion, their eyes practically glowing with lust.
Fara whirled on them as she carried Rys inside. “Don’t touch him!”
As his consciousness faded, Rys focused on the soft fluffiness of Fara’s tails. They wrapped around him as she pulled him inside.
Chapter 25
Fluffy black tails covered Rys’s vision when he awoke hours later. Instinctively, he reached for them.
Fara squeaked. A cute noise, several octaves above her usual cool tone. Her tails retracted and brought her into view. She pouted at Rys.
“You could have warned me first,” Fara muttered as her tails curled up behind her. She combed the section that he had touched. “They’re se
nsitive.”
“Given you wave them around everywhere, they can’t be that sensitive,” Rys protested.
He was lying on a pile of blankets in one of the receiving rooms close to the entrance. Fruit, water, and coffee sat on one of the nearby tables. A bowl of apple slices sat next to Fara. Their peels were nowhere to be seen.
A half-peeled apple sat next to Fara, which she picked back up and resumed peeling with a decorative paring knife.
“The outside is fine. The outer tips of our fur are bristly and protective,” Fara explained. “But you plunged your fingers right inside. Is that how you treat your women in bed?”
Somebody was feeling frisky.
“I take it you prefer some foreplay.”
Fara rolled her eyes. “What woman doesn’t? There’s also a psychological factor. Nobody has touched my tails except my sisters, and my mother a long, long time ago. It’s like you kissed me. So warn me next time, okay?”
“Got it. I’ll wake you up with some tail combing,” Rys said. He tried to sit up and felt his chest light on fire.
Immediately, he resumed resting. Fara gave him an annoyed look.
“It’ll take me a little longer to finish up here,” she said. “And you’ll need a lot more healing than this if you ever wake me up by shoving your hands in my tails.”
“Shouldn’t the Lilim help?” Rys asked.
“I can heal you. Those hussies can stay away.” Fara let out a huff.
“Feeling jealous, are we?”
“Do you want me to leave you here or finish healing you?”
Rys smirked and nearly made a joke about how she clearly wouldn’t have made a good nurse. It died in his throat as he remembered her confidence issues, and how she was forced to become an enforcer. With healing skills like these, he wondered if she couldn’t have become a healer of some sort for the foxes.
“Go ahead. Make the pithy comment,” Fara said, her eyes narrowing. “I know you have one.”
Hoping he didn’t regret this, he said, “I can tell why you didn’t become a nurse. Threatening your patient like this.”
Fara rolled her eyes. “If that’s the worst you’re saying, then it’s fine. I’m not made of glass, Rys.” She prodded his chest, causing a small spark of pain to flare in him. “But you are, right now. I thought you were dead when Barul stabbed you.”
“He missed my heart. Not that it would have mattered if he had struck it,” Rys said.
“Of course, you don’t need a heart. It shriveled up a couple thousand years ago,” Fara remarked, but a smile floated on her lips. “But honestly, try a little harder not to die. Unless you’re hiding a revival Gift like Grigor’s.”
“I wish. No infernal would give me one of those. I’d have become unstoppable,” Rys said.
They fell into a comfortable silence. Fara continued to pump magic into his body through her tails, slowly repairing the damage in his body. He nibbled on the slices of apple she cut up.
They occasionally made small talk, but it ended after a few sentences.
At no point did Fara ever bring up the obvious topic. It seemed she really was playing hard to get.
“I take it I need to bring up what you said in the Labyrinth,” Rys said.
“Oh?”
“You said you love me.”
Fara grimaced. “Not quite. I said I loved the way you make pithy comments.”
Rys stared at her. She refused to meet his eyes.
Eventually, she sighed. Her fingers traced his jawline. He caught them with his hand.
“Is it wrong if I want to take this slow?” Fara asked, her voice barely even a whisper.
“You seem to have made up your mind.” Rys held her hand, tickling her palm.
She giggled and pulled her hand away, then held her hands together. “Maybe. But I’ve known you for weeks, Rys. If this was going to be a casual fling, I’d have fucked you weeks ago. Then I could find out if you’re really this ‘Incubus King’ that the Lilim are giggling about.”
Oh, no. They still called him that after all this time?
“That face suggests you know exactly why they’re calling you that.” Fara raised an eyebrow at him.
He grimaced, but decided to be honest. “I was trained by the Succubus Queen. Sex is another form of power. The succubi are proof of that. They control lust, desire, and love. I made use of what I had been taught, and the succubi adored that side of me. It allowed me to oppose Lacrissa’s attempts to bring me to heel.”
“So the former pet of the Succubus Queen became the Incubus King.” Fara shook her head. “This is exactly why I want to take it slow. You say things like this and I wonder what I’m getting myself into. A little emotional preparation isn’t a mistake, is it?”
“Maybe.” Rys suppressed his desire for Fara and let her choose.
He could take her, and he doubted she’d complain much, but at what cost? Having power meant knowing when to use it. Fara was a willing ally. Rys had no reason to abuse her trust.
“Don’t look at me like that.” Fara laughed and her tails brushed against his side.
He raised a hand, and she nodded. He brushed them and she sighed, her eyes glazing with lust as his fingers ran through her fluffy bundles.
“You’re going to be genuinely dangerous with practice,” she moaned. “See? We can still do fun things, but… This is a big decision. Neither of us are going anywhere. I’m not going to blink and find that you’ve turned into a decrepit old man, and the Rys that I loved only exists in my memories.”
Fara’s fingers brushed his cheeks, and she smiled at him. Sadness tinged that smile. It was a smile that spoke of difficult memories from her past.
“We both have centuries ahead of us. I think we can take a few months before I learn what an ‘Incubus King’ can do in bed.” Fara paused, then tilted her head. “And it’s not like you’re not fucking Maria on the side.”
Rys tried to defend himself, and said, “That hasn’t happened. Maria is—”
“Totally under your thrall,” Fara said. “Even if you aren’t screwing her now, I’m not stupid enough to believe that you’re going to leave her alone. A man who plans to take over the world will only have one woman? The whole ‘Incubus King’ thing?”
Fara crossed her arms and gave him a look that dared him to doubt her.
“And you’re fine with that?” he asked. “Because you seem interested in more than what Maria is.”
“I can define my own relationship with you,” Fara said. “And Maria’s a big girl. Very big. But mystic foxes are polyamorous, even if I’m only interested in you.”
“Is that a cultural or racial thing?” Rys asked, curious.
“Hmm. Hard to say. I suspect both. Younger and weaker foxes tend to flock to older, stronger foxes. And it’s a one-way street. A man has multiple women, or a woman has multiple men.” Fara smirked. “The nine-tailed fox who united the clans and formed the Six-Star Alliance that unites us was infamous for how many men she went through. The Imperial Court had a government agency dedicated to raising men for her, because she went through so many when she stayed at the court.”
“She was in charge for that long?” Rys asked.
“Centuries. She left over a marriage dispute. We’re still monogamous, just with men or women on the side.” Fara shrugged at the questioning look she received. “Taira—that’s the name of the old alliance chief—was supposed to marry Ren, who was a clan head. But she wanted to marry a younger fox that she brought back from Gauron. Instead of marrying either, she vanished.”
“I’m getting some serious Lacrissa vibes from her.”
“Taira was mostly lazy, self-serving, and capricious. Not very devious. I met her when I was young, before she left.”
So an Asa then.
Rys imagined Asa in charge of an entire race and shuddered. Horrific.
“In any case, you don’t need to worry that I’ll chase away any women thirsty for Incubus King cock,” Fara teased.
�
�Please stop calling me that,” Rys said. The name made him cringe.
Fara laughed. She made no promises.
By the next day, Rys had bounced back. Between his own healing and Fara’s he felt good as new.
Which meant it was time to handle the aftermath.
“Glad everything worked out,” Vallis said when they met in Rys’s study. “I met with traders at Port Mayfield. A representative from one of Tarmouth’s merchant guilds was there. The evidence about Compagnon rigging the artifact trade was pretty damning.”
“Any reaction from Tarmouth?” Rys asked.
“Time will tell, but the representative was pretty angry.” Vallis shrugged. “I didn’t think Tarmouth got involved in local disputes, though. Compagnon must be upsetting some major players. Maybe this traces back to Gauron?”
“Maybe.” Rys drummed his fingers on the table, then checked his knowledge Gift. “Compagnon aren’t big. This might be simpler. Tarmouth control all trade out of the archipelago, right?”
“Yeah.”
“What if they’re worried that Compagnon will try to break their monopoly?” Rys asked.
Vallis groaned. “Great. So should we be helping Tarmouth? I don’t know if we should be getting involved with a trade dispute between major players like this.”
“Like I said before, I’m not refusing an ally.”
“Fair point,” Vallis said. “Maria’s busy with the Kinadain situation. Grigor ended up escorting her and Hanna to the dains, just in case. We can expect a visit from Alsia within a week or so. Until then, I’ll try to hold the fort with Margrim’s help.”
“Keep an eye on the Malus League,” Rys reminded her. “Now that Compagnon is weaker, we might find our neighbor growing more interested.”
Vallis frowned, as if something occurred to her. Then she nodded and left Rys to his personal business.
The week passed uneventfully. Rys began designing his final castle design now that he had inserted an additional slate into the castle size module. He didn’t let construction begin yet, as it would be noticed.
Rys hadn’t shown his full power to people yet. He needed to bide his time. Once Compagnon was dealt with, he could cut loose. But openly reconstructing his manor in a huge display of magic was too much for now.
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