The Red Glaive

Flumina went first. Niko watched excited from the box he shared with Caius, Videl, and Telfer. Ariel’s sisters and their husbands sat in their own box. While their third sister sat alone in the farthest box. Ariel had refused to come along saying he had other important matters to attend. It was strange, but he always seemed to be wandering off. He supposed Ariel liked to keep his private life away from everything else, but having someone like Adelaide in the family sure came in handy. Never in his life, did he expect to see a Lords’ Exhibition, and this one was already speculated to be the best one in years.

Dancers, both men and women, walked into the stage confidently wearing magnificent headdresses made of impossibly colored long feathers. Feathers for the Leviathan who was said to take the form of a feathered serpent. Women had their feathers horizontally across their heads while the three men had their feathers arranged vertically going all the way down their backs. All of them had shells around their ankles.

One of the men, feathers a gold color, walked forward, fell upon his knees, and placed a small dish before them. Niko gasped recognizing the dish, he had only heard of this particular performance in old texts, an ancient dance said to channel the Beast. According to ancient histories, the king of Flumina had angered the Leviathan who responded by flooding their lands. Desperate, the king beseeched the Beast to rid them of the deadly water that had once brought life. After many days, the Beast answered the king by heating up the air around them evaporating all the water and making the lands livable again. It was why the weather in Flumina was always warm and humid.

With a shout, a line of drummers sitting behind them, began to beat against their ornamented drums. The dish came alive with a flame, pulsing with the beat of the drums. Then the dancers began, stepping, making the shells rattle to beat. They spun, their feathers spinning along with them. At one point a thin layer of water gushed from the stage kept in place by what looked like hydromancers on the edges off the stage, it splashed as the performers danced in it.

This dance was said to be a representation of those events. The Fluminans honored the Leviathan for not seeking further retribution, but also thanked the Beast for intervening. It was something that was done in secret, far in the floating temples of Flumina. Now Niko was witness to it!

He glanced to his side, only briefly he didn’t want to miss a thing, both Caius and Videl were watching rather boredly. Telfer, at least, showed some mild interest. He wanted to tell them how magnificent it was what they were watching, but at the same time he didn’t want to miss a thing. It would have to wait until after.

One of the men, then one with gold feathers representative of the king, fell to his knee before the small dish of fire. Lifting the plate high his head the flames raged into an inferno casting light into the audience. There were no glaives, sages, or pyromancers on that stage. The flames seemed to blaze on their own. In an instant, the music and and the dancers all stopped. The flames vanished and the dancer lowered the dish.

The crowd in the lower tier clapped politely, while, from up above were the regular folk sat a rowdy set of cheers erupted. Niko nearly joined them but stopped himself. He didn’t want to embarrass Ariel’s sister.

How could these people possibly contain themselves so easily? Either way, Niko was glad. He’d almost forgotten the events that had transpired at the shrine with Elyon the day before. Almost. . .



Adelaide yawned as the dancers finished their dance. There was only so many ways one could spin before it grew tiresome. She sat leaning against Alwyn. There was something wrong. He had said he wanted to speak with her, though that had just descended into a passionate tryst. They hadn’t really spoken since then, though he did give her a sack filled with pearls that he had picked up in Flumina. She’d have to figure out what to make with them, though she could think of a few good spells that used crushed pearls.

Alwyn was distant. Even with her body nuzzled up to his, he merely stared ahead at the repetitive display. His arm was rested on the back of their seat but it didn’t wrap around her as it usually did.

Adelaide glanced at her sister and her husband. Baron Ridley Heron was a made baron much like their father was. That young, either a great deed or unfortunate disaster had granted him the title, and since he still had all his limbs it seemed like it was the former. He didn’t have the lands that Alwyn did, they owned a small patch of land less than half the size of their own fathers’ land, yet they seemed to be doing alright by hunting and processing wild boars.

Baron Heron held Aget tenderly, his arm protectively around her waist as Aget watched the dancers clear the stage. There was an affection for each other there completely unfamiliar to Adelaide. There was no reason for Adelaide to feel jealous, she and Alwyn had so much more than Aget and her Baron.

Down on the stage, a song was sung so terribly Adelaide had to turn back to face it. Nalia Armthal stood there, singing her little heart out. No body had bothered to tell her that the Exhibition was for people with actual talent. Being Lord Armthal’s niece had its perks it seemed.

Adelaide frowned watching her.

Nalia had bedded the prince. Anyone who was anyone knew that, despite how much the king had attempted to keep it silent. Now she was back, hoping to win the prince back, armed with a love spell Adelaide had sold her. . .

She doubted it would work. Still, the spell she had crafted for Aeria’s glamour managed to fool the best glaives and sages in all the land.

Even without the spell, Nalia Armthal was a conniving bitch. Even now, her poor signing act was a ploy to gain the prince’s attention. She didn’t expect to be spectacular, she wanted to be seen by the prince himself and this was the best way to do it.

Her terrible song didn’t last long, she bowed, her eyes locked into that one particular box before walking away.

Adelaide couldn’t see the prince’s reaction. More than anything she wanted to see Lady Kireina’s reaction. She was, after all, the prince’s causal betrothed. Not that really meant anything until it was officially official.

Still, watching her walk into the theater with the prince, Adelaide had never felt so inferior. And this woman was supposed to be older than she was. She was so pretty it disgusted her.

The Durus dancers were also rather boring, in fact more boring than the Flumian dancers. Being from Durus, all Adelaide seem to remember everyone talk about was the dirt and the rocks. Even her own mother had instilled in her a devotion to the ground they stood on which was said to be the body of the Colossus. She supposed these dancers were doing something to honor him as a way to represent Durus as a whole, but next to the other territories, they just seemed. . . .uncultured.

Increasingly bored after just a few minutes, Adelaide’s thoughts instead wandered back to Kireina. What did she know of this woman? She didn’t know her like she knew Nalia. The Lady had never made a trip to the capital, but her closeness to Prince Valerian made her uncomfortable.

Aeria, sweet, sweet little Aeria, believed this man to hold feelings for her. Adelaide wanted nothing but to believe her, after all, Aeria had never spoken of a man in that manner. She wondered if perhaps, maybe the prince wasn’t as honorable as Aeria had made him seem. He had, after all, declined to tell her sister who he really was. Then there were all those rumor’s from before that were still whispered today about the prince and his womanizing ways. Now there he was all cozied up with the Intoner.

Lord Whittal was showcasing his spearmen by having them flail their spears onstage. That at least caught a bit more of her attention because a most of the men were shirtless and their well muscled chests gleamed with sweat. Lord Whittal’s eldest son Reading was on stage as well, and he had a body that rivaled Caius’.

Her hand instinctively reached up and ran across Alwyn’s chest. He paid her no mind. There was a little there, not rock hard as the men below. Adelaide smiled deciding that it was enough.

The spearmen left the stage and with them Adelaide’s attention.

Glancing back down at the box, Adelaide’s mind returned to the Intoner of Glacies. Her father was the prince’s Patrino a guardian of a sort to the prince. Other than the fact that she was disgustingly beautiful not much was known of her within the court. She wondered how much of a threat this woman was to her little sister. Or perhaps it was the other way around?. . .

Maybe the prince was to marry this woman, then intended to keep her little sister as his secret mistress. Many kings had their mistresses. Even King Veritas was said to currently have one, who? No one knew exactly. That was a rumor that would forever remain that way it seemed. Perhaps thats what the prince wanted too? Some no name, low born lady to warm his bed each night he grew bored of his Queen. That thought made her heart ache for Aeria. This was her first love. She would never be relegate herself to come second in this man’s heart.

Adelaide glanced at Alwyn who was focused on the Durus knights preforming stances on the stage. Those were fully armored so there was nothing interesting to see. Did Alwyn have mistress? He had always told her that he didn’t expect her to be faithful so long as he didn’t expect the same of him.

Why then, did she suddenly not feel like sharing?



How was it possible for Aeria’s feet to still hurt? She’d been sitting for a solid hour and yet her poor feet still throbbed. Even more impossible; how did Adelaide walk in shoes like the ones Aeria currently wore All. The. Time!?

She did her best to ignore the pain by focusing on the performances but her gaze would constantly drift to that box Valor sat in just below her. He was so close, she could probably just go down there. Would his Storm Knight stop her? Even if he had given her his endorsement already? Something told her such an act would be very much frowned upon. She doubted Fides would allow to do it to begin with. He stood guard over her door very much how the Storm Knight down below watched over Valor’s box.

Then the pain in her feet distracted her from Valor, then she’d try to drown out that pain by watching the performances, back down to Valor and on and on it went.

The Flumina dancers had been spectacular, though their dance had been somewhat chaotic there was something primal in the way the drums resounded that Aeria enjoyed. Then Lady Nalia had come to ruin the rhythm with her terrible song. The horribleness of her voice only served to remind Aeria of the pain in her feet. The Durus dancers had come out in pairs and danced flawlessly about the stage, their musicians playing soft music on woodwind flutes, harps, lutes and all other kinds of instruments. When it came to music, Durus always had the best music.

Finally, after the Durus lord paraded around a few his military units, Glacies finally began as women in bright red skirts walked onto the stage and got into position. Once the music began they began to move in a way Aeria didn’t think was possible. They looked absolutely weightless as they seemingly floated in in a line. In their hands, each woman carried a branch with yellow flowers and a blue handkerchief held to the side, without movement. They looked like gliding statues.

The music was soft strings as they broke their line and split into smaller groups of three, spinning in tight circles while gingerly waving their handkerchief. Then back into line, the women, still floating coiled into a tight ball, raising their flowers above them, before expanding outwards. Aeria wasn’t sure what to make of it. More than anything it left her unsettled.

They bunched up near the back of the stage, then out of the darkness behind them, two pale blue eyes blinked into existence. The Intoner’s black lion emerged from the black of stage, the dancers parted for with their strange gliding moment. The lion walked to the center of the stage then sat down. Glancing down, Aeria saw Valor leading the Intoner to the stage.

He didn’t step on the stage himself but once he let go her hand and the Intoner was safely on stage, people clapped. That quickly died down when Lady Kireina got in position in the center of the stage.

The theater was dead silent. Lady Kireina swayed softly before the music started softly with a foreign instrument Aeria had never heard before. It sound was sharp yet at the same time gentle. The gliding dancers from before had long since vacated, and there were no musicians on the stage. Was the music coming from the Intoner herself?

The Intoner opened her mouth a sound, both gentle and sharp, emerged. There were no words, just that haunting song she sung. The flames that softly lit Aeria’s box dimmed and Aeria felt a chill going down her spine. It was like the air back home in the night just before Frost came and froze over the earth. It gripped her and didn’t let go.

The Intoner continued, increasing the volume of her voice the music she produced perfectly in tune with her voice. Then, like a pitched wail, she held a powerful note and the flames in Aeria’s candle, and all the candles in all the boxes, burst into blue fire. Aeria felt her magic well up inside her, only she wasn’t doing it. The Intoner was welling up her magic for her at a much faster pace Aeria could ever manage in a relaxed state. So much of it, with absolutely no control to get rid of it.

Worse, it only got worse.

The two large torches at the ends of the stage, now burning blue, licked at the curtains and where the fire touched, ice was left behind. The Intoner’s song increased in pace, her strange music growing almost frantic. She was screaming her pain and her fury beautifully yet terrifying, Aeria’s magic filled within her but she couldn’t wield it, the Intoner held it captive. There were tears welling up in her eyes she couldn’t stop it.

One final, long held, note and she and the music ceased. The blue flames reverted back to their orange glow and Aeria breathed out without realizing she’d been holding her breath.

Lady Kireina bowed to a roar of cheers and applause. Aeria stood feeling her magic slowly ebb away.

Valor was already at the edge of stage waiting for her and when they entered their box she fell into his arms. Aeria turned and walked to the door, Arsene flying after her. She didn't want to see anymore.

Fides stood at the door. “Do you need something my lady?" he said his hands clasped behind his back.

Aeria wrapped her arms around herself only feeling the cold metal bodice of her fancy dress. “I want to leave.” she said.

“I don’t think that’s wise.”

“Please.”

Fides glanced at her pleading, then nodded. The hall outside was virtually empty. A few men sat the bar too drunk to notice them passing and Aeria was glad for it. When Fides went to fetch her carriage Aeria sat down on the steps outside despite the dress. A few passerbys gave her curious stares but she didn't’ care. She felt drained despite having done nothing the whole night.

It was too much, all of it. To see all these ladies so vastly better at being ladies than she was, each one a better suitor for a prince than she could ever hope to be. Then to see some of them parade themselves before him, with abilities she could never hope to posses. He was right there below her, yet he couldn’t be so far away.

She could never be like them, the best she could do was be herself. But that just didn’t feel like it was enough.