Verena looked at her father. “We are going to try for the emperor’s birthday?” she asked, her heart sinking.
“Many lower court nobles do not bother trying for that one.” Mislav looked at his son and daughter. “We might make it in.”
“We have never tried for it before.” Niklas looked doubtful. “You know Mili and the others are not going to want to go.”
“I am leaving them locked in their rooms.” Mislav glanced at the closed doors. “It is just going to be us and the children.”
Astera raised an eyebrow. “That is not going to go over well, Mislav. You know they look for every excuse they can get to dress up.”
“I have a reason for going to this one, Astera. I do not have time to deal with my older daughters’ recalcitrance.” Mislav had the stubborn look on his face Verena knew all too well.
“You are going to turn Ver into a target again, Father.” Niklas glanced worriedly at his youngest sister.
“She knows how to hide from them. She will be fine.” Mislav looked at his daughter. “I want a word with you before you go to bed tonight, Ver. I will not keep you up late, since we are getting up at midnight. But I do have a very important question to ask you.”
“Yes Father.” Verena wondered what her father wanted to talk to her about now.
“Do not mention to Milisen and the others what our plans are. In fact, do not even tell the children what our plans are so they do not inadvertently tell Mili and the others.” Mislav looked at Niklas and Astera.
“Yes Father.” Niklas and Astera nodded. Verena agreed as well.
Verena went out to the garden as usual. Ethian wasn’t there yet, but she hadn’t expected him to be. It was time for the council meeting after all. She sat and read and waited for him to join her. He arrived with Fallon in tow a short while later, sooner than she expected. “Short council meeting?”
“Tomorrow is a high feast. Council meetings are always brief before high feasts.” Ethian was grumbling and he sat down on the bench with a scowl on his face.
“He is in a bad mood because he hates high feasts.” Fallon nudged his brother.
“I do not like them either, especially when it means getting up at midnight the night before to go stand in line for hours just to find out if we can get in or not,” Verena grumbled.
“Are you going to be at tomorrow’s high feast?” Ethian asked.
“Father wants to try for it this year.” Verena frowned. “I do not know why. He has never attempted it before. He says most lower court lords do not bother with the emperor’s birthday, which is patently not true. If it is a high feast, everyone tries to get in. He is making us get up at midnight to attempt a feast which none of us want to go to. He will not tell us why either.”
“Will your sisters cause problems?” Ethian looked at her.
She shook her head. “We are not including them tomorrow. They are staying locked in their rooms all day, a fact that will make me even more of a target than usual.”
“Is that a problem for you?” Ethian asked.
“Only if they get outside before me.” Verena shrugged. “Father will not let them so I should be safe.”
“If you are certain.” Ethian looked at his brother. “I think I will have Fallon come out with me day after tomorrow, just in case I need to send someone for a doctor.”
“I agree.” Fallon was just as concerned about her as Ethian was, which made her feel protected and safe here.
“If you think it is necessary.” Verena and Ethian bent their heads over his paperwork, and they accomplished quite a bit in their short time together.
Verena finished out her day and waited until her sisters were locked in their room before going to see her father. “Verena, I want an honest answer out of you. I know what Prince Ethian told me about how he saw you in the garden, but it was not the truth, was it? He is the reason you have an escape route from your sisters.” Mislav looked grave.
Verena thought about prevaricating, but she’d made it a point to never lie to her father. “Yes, Father, he is. He and his brother Prince Fallon are the friends I meet in the garden every day. They shelter me in the Imperial garden, with the express permission of Their Imperial Majesties, and I stay there from the time I go outside until the time I come back inside for lunch.”
“You have permission from Their Imperial Majesties to be in the Imperial garden?” Mislav was surprised by that.
“I have even met Their Imperial Majesties.” Verena was still in shock over that. “I was as nervous as you might expect someone of my low status to be speaking to them, but they were kind to me and gave me their approval for being there. Prince Ethian and I have been meeting there since early in the spring.”
“What are your feelings towards Prince Ethian, Verena?” Mislav asked.
Verena sighed. “I love him, Father. I know it is ill-advised given we have not ascended yet and are not likely to for many years. But I cannot help it.” She hid the fact that she knew they were going to ascend as soon as they got rid of Milisen and the others.
“Verena, this stays between us. Niklas already knows, but Astera does not.” Mislav looked at her seriously. “We will ascend as soon as I send Milisen, Nefari, Ismat, and Zdena to your uncle on Henebore. We have more than enough money to reach the upper court. I have been waiting until I could get rid of your sisters, so they did not cause a scandal for us.”
“We have enough to ascend? Then why do you keep saying we do not have any money?” Verena asked. Then she nodded. “So Mili and the other three do not keep pestering you to spend it all on them.”
“Precisely.” Mislav nodded. “I know you are not going to say anything or demand finer clothes and jewelry than we already have until we ascend, when you will need it to fit in with the other ladies in the upper court. I have already been making plans for that as well.”
“Do you think Prince Ethian will want to marry me?” Verena asked.
“I hope so.” Mislav smiled. “You are beautiful, you are clever, you are kind. All three things our current empress is. You have shown those qualities to him in your conversations I presume?” Verena nodded. “Then he knows you are the kind of woman he would be interested in, for I am going to assume he has similar tastes to his father as he is a man who is very much like the emperor in personality. I think you have a very good chance, Ver.”
“I know Prince Fallon approves of me. He has said so.” Verena felt compelled to point that out to her father as well.
“That is even better.” Mislav seemed very pleased with that information. “No one gets close to Prince Ethian without Prince Fallon’s approval. If you have that, I am certain you are good with Prince Ethian.”
“I hope so, Father.” Verena wanted nothing more than to be good with Ethian and Fallon.
“Go to bed, Ver.” Mislav smiled. “We have a long night ahead of us.”
“Good night, Father.” Verena went to bed. She curled up and dreamed of a wedding to Ethian. It turned into a nightmare where her sisters appeared and attacked her on her wedding day.
Mislav woke her at midnight. Verena showered, dressed, and did her hair. She knew she could have called a servant for help, but she had grown so used to doing everything for herself that she did it swiftly and efficiently and was out in the main room by the time Niklas and Astera arrived with their children. The children looked miserable.
“Are we ready to go?” Mislav asked.
“Yes Father.” Niklas didn’t look any happier than Verena felt, but he was so used to following his father’s orders that he wasn’t questioning it.
“Why do we have to go so early?” Harun grumbled.
“We are going to a high feast.” Mislav looked at his grandson. “It is important to remember that this is to honor our emperor for his birthday.”
“Okay.” Harun was clearly unhappy.
Mislav turned to the servants. “They do not come out of their rooms. You may take them their meals, but they are to remain locked in until I let them out.”
“Yes, my lord.” One of the servants acknowledged the orders.
Mislav led his family out of the suite and down to the great hall. A large group of people was already gathered, but as Mislav had said, it wasn’t as packed as it usually would be. He put the family on the list, and they all stood and waited. As time went on, the number of people increased drastically until the antechamber was as packed as it had been for Founding Day.
At six in the morning, the first two hundred names on the list were called. Verena heard her father’s name shouted. So did he. He led them forward and they were shown to a group of seats. The feast wouldn’t start for another five hours, but at least they could sit down. Harun put his head down on his arms and promptly fell asleep. Albrecht, though he was tired, sat up and watched people as they came in. He was paying attention to the courtiers like his father and grandfather were.
Verena wanted to imitate Harun, but knew that would not be tolerated, so she sat and conversed with random people and tried not to show how tired she was. She kept an eye on the high table, watching for the Imperial family to enter. At around eleven the Imperial family appeared and took their seats. Kaelea was wearing a new coronet, Verena thought, and wondered what it meant.
The food was served to the high table first, then the rest of the upper court, before being served to the lower court nobles. Verena gagged over the soup. It was sour with chunks of meat and vegetables in it. She ate it all but did not like it. The entertainment was a rather enthusiastic musician trying to encourage people to dance. Some of the younger lower court nobles got up and danced. When they were too tired to dance any longer, they all sat back down, and the musician surrendered the floor.
The second course arrived, and it was some kind of vegetable dish. Verena didn’t have any context for what it was. She couldn’t even identify what it was supposed to be. She ate it and found it foul. “This is turning out to be a miserable feast,” Astera muttered. “The food is utterly disgusting.”
“I agree.” Verena was already looking forward to the next morning in the garden with Ethian.
The second entertainment was a poet reciting grand poems in honor of the emperor. This went on for a long time. Finally, he wound down and there was a great deal of polite applause. “I wonder if the emperor was as bored as I was,” Niklas muttered.
“I have no idea, but I cannot see why father wanted to be here today.” Verena looked at her brother who shrugged.
The third course was the main dish and it was some kind of meat and starchy vegetable with two bread rolls. The only thing that tasted good was the bread. Verena ate it all because it was required. She was down to a quarter glass of wine already. They came by and refilled her glass.
The next entertainment was a group of acrobats that performed some very daring maneuvers that Verena found mildly entertaining. When they finished, they were greeted with some more enthusiastic applause. The final course, the dessert, was served and Verena decided the meal was a complete waste of ingredients. Dessert was a mushy looking bread and custard concoction. She caught sight of Ethian’s expression and it looked like, before he got his mask of neutrality back on, he wasn’t impressed either.
“Did they hire an incompetent chef?” someone asked off to one side. “Tonight was almost completely inedible.”
“That dessert certainly looked like it came out of an amateur’s kitchen,” someone else agreed.
“Do you think the upper court got something better?” a third lord asked.
“Did you see Prince Ethian’s face? I am willing to bet they got served what we did,” someone else replied.
Dishes were cleared away, and people began to circulate. Verena stayed close to her brother as her father circulated. They stayed until the Imperial family left. At that point, Mislav took his family out and back to their suite.
Verena went straight to bed. She didn’t want any more food. She didn’t want to sit up and read. She just wanted to sleep. She shook down her hair, changed into a sleep suit, and went to bed. She slept through the night and if she dreamed, she didn’t remember it in the morning.
The next morning, Verena woke up at her usual time. She dressed and went out into the main room. “Did you enjoy the high feast yesterday?” Mislav asked quietly.
“No. The food was awful, there was only one entertainment that was mildly interesting. I was tired, the chairs were uncomfortable, and I did not see the point for us being there.” Verena was not in a good mood. All she wanted to do was escape the suite and see Ethian.
“Well, go out in the garden and enjoy your morning.” Mislav smiled at his daughter.
“I plan to.” Verena sat down at the table.
Niklas and Astera appeared. A few minutes later, Milisen and the other three left their rooms and settled at the table. They glared at Verena. “What are you four upset about this morning?” Mislav asked.
“You went to the high feast yesterday and you did not take us with you.” Nefari glared at their father.
“And where did you hear that?” Mislav asked as the food was served.
“The servants told us where you were.” Zdena scowled. “You took Verena but not us.”
“I see.” Mislav glared at the servants. The servants paled and hurried from the room. “You four would have delayed us to the point where we would never have made it on the list. I was not going to put up with that. I had business to take care of yesterday and I was not going to miss the high feast because of your petulance. I left you behind and took those who could be trusted to be ready on time.”
“You did not even give us a chance,” Milisen protested.
“I already knew what would happen.” Mislav regarded his daughters coldly. “It happened during Founding Day. It was only because I threatened to lock you in your rooms for the final day that you behaved yourself and we got in. I did not want to deal with that yesterday.”
“You did not miss much anyway.” Niklas frowned. “The food was awful. The entertainment was terrible. It was an all around miserable day.”
“Did Verena find a suitor?” Zdena asked nastily.
“No. She stood by me while father circulated. She was as miserable as the children.” Niklas looked at his sisters with a cool expression, as if daring them to counter his statement. They glared back at him.
“I am not looking for a suitor for Verena until I deal with you four.” Mislav gave his older daughters a hard look. “She is going to remain single for a while.”
“What about the rumor I heard that you already had an offer for her?” Ismat asked.
“I turned him down.” Mislav said it like it didn’t really matter.
“You turned him down?” Milisen asked incredulously.
“I turned him down.” Mislav sipped his wine. “I told him he could marry one of you four since he has slept with you so often. But I told him I was not marrying Verena off until I had the four of you settled. He declined the chance to wed one of you ladies and withdrew his offer.”
Milisen scowled at Verena. “It is not fair that she is getting marriage offers and we are not.”
“It is perfectly reasonable considering you have made yourselves ineligible for a noble marriage.” Mislav was being merciless to his older daughters this morning and Verena knew where this was going to lead.
“If you had not slept around, you would already be married,” Niklas added. Verena finished eating.
“Enjoy your morning with your friends, Verena.” Mislav smiled at his daughter.
“Thank you, Father.” Verena got up and headed for the door. Astera stopped her and asked her a question. Verena answered her and went outside.
Verena took a deep breath and started towards the evergreen garden and the entrance she used for the Imperial garden. A blow to her back sent her sprawling. A kick to her ribs drove all the air from her lungs. Her sisters were absolutely silent as they began beating her.
Verena escaped them and ran for the Imperial garden. She made it inside just before her sisters could grab her again. The Imperial guards drove them off at gunpoint. Verena started towards the bench but collapsed as her legs gave out beneath her. She didn’t move from the ground and was still lying there when Ethian and Fallon arrived.
“Verena?” Ethian ran to her side. “What happened? Was it your sisters?”
“Astera delayed me, and they got out before I did.” Verena heard her own voice. It was very weak. “They got several blows in before I could get away.”
“Fallon,” Ethian shouted over his shoulder.
“Already called one.” Fallon sounded just as concerned as Ethian.
Ethian sat and held her hand while they waited for the Imperial doctor. “Starflare, what happened to this young lady?” the doctor asked as he arrived and ran his scanner over her.
“Her older sisters beat her.” Ethian looked at the doctor.
“They did more than beat her.” The doctor sounded very concerned. “She has broken ribs, internal injuries, several deep tissue bruises. She needs to go into the med lab. I can’t possibly treat her out here.”
“I will take her.” Fallon picked her up carefully.
Fallon carried her into the palace and through several winding corridors to the Imperial doctors’ med lab. She was laid on a bed and the doctors got to work. Regenerators were fastened to every square inch of her body, bruise salve was spread on areas of exposed flesh, and other things she didn’t understand were done to her. An hour later, the regenerators came off and she was pronounced healed.
Fallon escorted her back to the garden. Ethian was still out there. “I could not follow you in without giving away our relationship.” He seemed very apologetic about the fact.
“I understand.” Verena did understand. It was dangerous for her to be seen with him.
“I can pass it off as finding you in the garden.” Fallon shook his head. “Ethian could not. You would be linked to him simply by virtue of being female. That is what happened to Lady Ragna.”
“Who was Lady Ragna?” Verena asked.
“She was a woman of the upper court who would not take no for an answer and kept insinuating herself everywhere I was.” Ethian grimaced. “She gave the impression that she and I were seeing each other even though I repeatedly told her no and even had the Imperial guard chase her off a few times. It got her killed.”
“I am aware of the precariousness of our situation, Ethian. If even one person got the wrong idea, I would be dead before dinner.” Verena regarded him solemnly.
“Now you see why I took you in instead of Ethian.” Fallon nodded his approval of her acceptance of their situation. “I am not the crown prince. Who I associate with is less scrutinized than who he spends time with.”
“We have another couple of hours before lunch.” Ethian grinned up at her from where he sat. “Want to help me with some paperwork?”
“Always,” Verena grinned back. “Interestingly enough, the paperwork is the highlight of my day.”
“I will remember that.” Ethian laughed. The two of them got to work.
Verena went back to the rooms after she and Ethian parted. Her sisters looked very confused to see her healthy and uninjured. “You four seem baffled by something. What is wrong?” Mislav asked.
“They expected to see me beaten and bloody when I came in.” Verena decided to get her sisters into trouble. “You can still see the blood on my dress from where they attacked me.”
“They attacked you?” Mislav asked sharply.
“She is not injured. There is no proof.” Milisen quickly jumped to defend herself and the others.
“There are no injuries because my friends paid for the doctors to attend to me.” Verena pulled out her pad and sent an inquiry. It came back immediately with her list of injuries. She passed it over to her father. “That is how bad it was.”
Her father read the list silently. “The four of you, go to your rooms right now. I thought you would have learned that angering me just got you locked up like common criminals.”
“There is no proof,” Nefari protested.
Mislav handed Verena back her pad. “I just saw the proof. Go. Now.” Her sisters got up and slunk into their rooms. Mislav locked them away. “I am very glad your friend paid the cost of the doctors. I shudder to think how that would have set us back.”
“I am glad they take such good care of me as well, Father.” Verena was glad she had Ethian and Fallon to take care of her. She shuddered to think how far that would have set them back if she’d had to wait and let her father tend to her injuries.
“Can I see?” Niklas asked. She handed her pad over and he read through the injuries and the costs of the treatments. He frowned. He lowered his voice. “Father, these are Imperial doctor costs.”
“You are certain?” Mislav asked.
“Positive. Some of these treatments are more advanced than what the court doctors offer.” Niklas looked at his sister. “Your friends value you very highly indeed if they are getting Imperial doctors to treat you.”
“You are not at risk because of this, are you, Verena?” Mislav asked with some concern.
“No, Father, we thought of that. I am not at risk.” Verena reassured her father quickly because she knew he could see how badly this could go as well as she could.
“All right.” Mislav sighed with relief.
“You have some interesting friends.” Astera looked at her curiously.
“Very interesting,” Verena agreed without explaining further. She loved her sister-in-law, but she was a gossip, and she didn’t want anything to get out. Niklas and Mislav knew Astera’s tendencies as well and wouldn’t be telling her anything either.
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