London Games 1329-30 * Claramae and Adam

[King Adam Aberdeen I]

Relieved he had made Bess succumb to the finalities of intimacy, he lay upon his back looking to the sky. With a roll of his head, he eyed Bess. “Claramae was v’ry formal whilst Ah baen there… and tis seems such a fine woman is tied in knots within her fine attire… and she seems nay the one whom she portrays…” He looked back to the clouds idly discussing Claramae’s attributes and concerns. “How kin a wom’n such as she keep sae much bottled up inside… How kin she dae wot she daes…?”

She lay on her belly with her back up to the sky Adam looked at. While the sun warmed them he considered people that were far colder by nature. "Claramae's been tha' wa e'er since Ah met her up in the Orkney Isles. Vera calm tae a sense o' seemin' the livin' numb. Placid, mannerful, ne'er o'erwhelmed nor under. E'erythin with her is precise. Ah know tha' she is noble bred, born, n' reared n' does nay abject to tradition. She seems tae work with it in an odd way ,n' aspires tae be raised without bein' anythin' less than a lady. How can any o' us dae wot we dae." She validated the last statement in gentle way. In a sense, she was defending the woman while agreeing. Yes, she was harrowing but as it was the Parliament had given her performance the both in wartime and peace an amazing performance. No one objected to her policy, ideals, or implentations. Whatever it was Adam had wanted, it was gotten through the vote, not duress. As it was, her other skills were what made her so frightening; the ability for a room of people to drop dead while she was nowhere in sight. Killing with no blood even with weapon in hand. Little things she'd heard, but never had to see. Gods willing they'd never have to.

He liked the Ambassador, and trusted her more than any would even consider. He reflected upon their visit together in London at her home.

“Claramae, tis grand tae spend mae time ‘ere at yer behest…” He removed the brown jerkin jacket, the damp shirt revealing a previously unseen torso, muscular to be sure as the clinging shirt would reveal. Unbuckling the sword belt, he hung it where she had pointed. “My Talons shall be seen to and quarters assigned?” His brogue had disappeared and the English was now quite clear and oratory.

Walking around the room, he would gaze as tapestries hung upon the walls. “Quite a collection M’Lady…”

"You are welcome, my lord. It is favorable to be present in your company." While not ignoring his speech in the least, she did not pay mind to the rain-soaked body of the Mo'r Triath. It would be unseemly to take glances, but this wasn't a problem. The Baroness' eyes were as efficient a pair of tools as the hands folded before her. She regarded the window while he did away with the rain-soaked implements of his position.

"Your men shall be given suitable lodging. His lordship's retinue is welcome in my household." Never less than decorum exemplified. Social grace exonerated from error. So, too, was the home before him. Still, it seemed devoid of no character where as the woman before him was objectionable. Was she the shell of femininity or merely the transcendence of the true provincial nobility? If for her class one compared marriage to breeding, she was akin to a thoroughbred.

"Thank you, the tapestry in your quarters was a favorite of the first Sir Laurence, my grandfather, come from looms of the crusades. The later editions on the North Wall were the benefit of the Baroness O'Cathasaigh's taste. She presented them to my father on suggestion, from Ireland, by way of Dublin. He was taken with them, and tis later said he returned for her, and procured them invitation to return to English court."

He turned from the tapestry and came face-to-face with Lady St Laurence, his hands immediately capturing her waist, to prevent knocking her over. “Exquisite…” his sea-green eyes looked into hers. Frozen in time, her charm had captured him… if only momentarily. Backing up, his hands dropping from her waist. “My apologies M’Lady… I did not know you were behind me.” He swallowed hard… and the rain began pounding on frail window panes, imitating his heartbeat at that moment. “Your paintings are exquisite…”

Was the solid ruler of the new Gaelic Nations wavering? Was it her charm that lured men to a dangerous line of life? Was he speaking of her, or the paintings? She was no Beathag… and no dainty flower waiting to be picked. Yet somewhere in between, she could be, if she so desired to… But he also knew how wickedly persuasive, or deadly, she could be. It was good to know she was an ally, instead of an adversary.

He simply cleared his throat. Adam knew, somewhat, of how Claramae was… but not in totale. He definitely respected, and liked, her. A relationship of sorts had been established in Turas Lan… now he was thousands of kilometers away from home… and at her residence. Only his faith in her prevented him from dying by her hand!!

Lady St. Laurence was cool and smooth. The Mo'r Triath's eyes swam from the tapestry unto her. It was handled by remaining quiet, merely settling her hand loose on the top of his without affording the sensation of palm to palm. He is easily besotted, yet not unfaithful. Quizzical, obvious. Not unreliable for being so transparent... the thoughts in her head cycled with a mathematical accuracy while he tried to understand the depths of her dangerous femininity "It is nothing, Your Grace. I thank you for keeping me upright." If she were in a mood for the droll, she could have suggested it was kind of him to help her recall where her waist was on her body, but that was not prudent nor her sort of humor.

The Leader of the Gaelic Nations was, as many other a man had been, encased in a moment founded on sublime silence. In silence, one observed. In silence, one was also observed, subject to be the new curio in a regent's cabinet. The dress she wore was tapestry-like in the nature of the fabric, heavier, on account of the rain. English weather was finicky, like Scotland, like Skye. A native acceptance of pouring rain was currently all the pair had in common on a personal note, minus the securing of governance. As thunder cracked across an un-named moor, she went over to a portrait particular. "Thank you, your grace. My family's acquisition of art lends itself to a continuance. Some of the rooms are dedicated the artistry gathered in my earlier travels. It has not yet been sent to Turas Lan, and now that the legacy of my forebearer's is secure, it shall stay in place. You may review it at your leisure."

The painting above of a woman sat in portrait favored that of the woman below seated on a sedan. The O'Cathasaigh coat of arms suggested it was the baronial estate of the former Lady of the manor in Ireland. Daughter's face was mother's face. Daughter's hair was not quite mother's hair, for she had her father's brown where as her mother bordered near jet black. The eyes were distinct in the ocher brown, save Claramae's were lighter. Still, the neck of a swan, the shoulders a fine line, the skin cream colored with peach and a definitive poise were transmuted between oil paint and the living. Just as was a pearl necklace with a golden 'B' dangling on the chest.

“It amazes me how similar you and your Mother are…” his fingers traced the face in the picture, then with a glance to her, he smiled and noted the necklace. Dare he look too hard for it be recognized as a stare. But as time would find him, he did, regardless of the results.

His mind veered from Lady St Laurence to the tapestries he and Bess looked upon of his own mother.

"Where doth your mind go, sir?" Shaking his head in reply. "My Lord, shall we journey on to see the manor? If you wish to indulge in tapestry, I shall show you the finest of the collections..." [/b][/i]Adam smiled and held out an arm to escort her upon the tour. “I would love the tour… I never use to enjoy art… t’was something my Mother fancied though… her and the Harper… But that fancy soon captivated me when I saw fortune foretold in them. It was my Mother’s way of keeping secrets for me to find later in life. To tell me stories of Bess and I long after she was dead.” Then his mind shifted from the present to the unraveling of the Aberdeen saga.

As Adam lay beside Bess upon the shore, his mind veered once again to the past… from the Lady’s home to the present… then to a moment in time, when the Mo’r Triath and his newly appointed Ambassador were in Parliament in London. England was now a conquered power, gobbled up by the Gaelic Nations… made a Duchy and a governor was to be instilled to manage the handover from King to Parliament.

Standing in the pulpit of London’s Parliament, before the new congress of the land… a round of applause, whether faked or eager resounded in the former palace of the King. “Be it all known here today, I have selected a new Ambassador, and Governor of the Duchy of England. May I now take the time to introduce her…” then came the gasps from the audience. Some were not elated to know they would be ‘ruled’ by a female after so many years of the male Plantagenets. “M’Lady Claramae St Laurence…” his hand swept toward the lady, he now called friend… and his secretive guardian against those that promised him harm.

The audience then began to applaud… and soon after men began to rise… providing her with a standing ovation… by the time she made it to the pulpit, the thunderous applause filled the hall. Adam’s hand went to her back as he guided her to the podium… He had withstood rumors of a philandering husband… an owner of a courtesan… now he would be accused of emplacing yet another of his adulterous affairs… unless the head could be extracted from the snake’s body before accusations were released.

Adam stood next to Claramae with pride. She was a strong woman… intelligent… knowledgeable in politics and the lands… resourceful. He, and Bess, felt that Claramae would be the best choice for governorship of England. Now he would have to show his support fully.

"Where doth the mind go, good, my lords, and all it contains within? Our times thus change, and I stand before you neither o'er proud of honor nor boastful of accomplishment, merely in service. To be of service is to attest to the highest call of subject unto regent, as God sees fit to place. So then, I am merely, and so humbly of service..."

Two Lords:

"I wonder how serviceable the lady is warming the Mo'r Triath's bed"

"Power is very seducing, Rodney."

"Seems she can weave her own spell suitably well. I don't think he pumped the words into her with his prick. No, that seems to be her own head. St. Laurence was a very intelligent man, and his wife was a beauty who was no fool. Having no sons proved a bane for them. No good comes of smart women."

A lady of blood is offended at even a nuance of impropriety. The Lady St. Laurence never gave a tirade in the Lord's presence, never swore, never drank nor over indulged, and was to the letter of every unwritten law pristine in her display. So pristine, in fact, that her status as a Lady of independent means was circumvented to include: the fall of Baron Laurence from society on the passing of his wife, his inability to arrange his daughters affairs, the death of a subsequent additional benefactor, and the belief that she was by now certainly too old to entertain the idea without losing a great deal of substance. A man could neither be assured of her traditional dowry or her acquiescence to the man being the head of the home, as Christ is the head of the Church.

"We shall hold Parliament, my lords, as befits what it is we know as people of England, as well as encompassing the Mo'r Triath's enlightened view structure. In order to be heralds of the future, let us be bastions of knowledge, guidance, and what is good of our tradition." She punctuated the word good, as if to spearhead what was unwanted, unfit. In a crowd full of questions, naysayers, and great pretenders she could spot the eye of Rodney Brisbane without so much as narrowing her vantage point.

The path before the new government was like an extremely difficult problem in chess. Politics, too, was a game as intricate as chess, but in chess there are a large number of starting points unlike in politics. Some starting points permit a systematic development while some other starting points require an aggressive course of action that moves forward, risking the player's power. In politics the Mo’r Triath was taking a course of action in which one moves speedily towards the target, disregarding the need to strengthen the power at the center. But secretly, the Mo’r Triath was also hedging his bets for strengthening the center. If it is possible to move speedily towards the target aggressively, disregarding the centre, that would be excellent, but disregarding the center could be devastating… a regard he did not abandon. An extremely risky course of action not only in politics, but also in chess, one he was willing to take due to the size of the target.

Although there are similarities between the two, politics is more complicated… Chess is a game between two players only, politics involved everyone. Although the nature and the power of the pawns are different, it is in accordance with the wishes of the player who leads the side that the pawns move. In that sense all the pawns of a side on the board behave like tools of its leader. In politics, all pawns are living persons. Although the leader has a certain amount of power to lead the pawns, there can be times in which the pawns act disregarding the leader's wishes and in accordance with their own wishes. It was this aspect that he would involve the Lady Claramae… for what better person to move the pawns, rooks, and Bishops than her.[/color]

The pieces were set on the board, and so may the games begin.

[King Adam Aberdeen I]

And so for several days, the Mo’r Triath and the new Governor of England spent valuable time together, both professionally… and personally. Dinners, speaking engagements, balls, and Parliament would find the pair inseparable. It was fodder for rumor, but Adam and Claramae knew the opportunities some would take.

It was that opportunity a small group would take into consideration when contemplating return of the King. Underpinnings were being established and plotted for the expulsion of the Scot threat to English rule. Shadows moved, whispers spoken… all the while, plans were being put into motion.

Adam knew there would be factions lying dormant hostile to his policies and rules, but he had been in danger before… especially from a man he knew most dangerous to life and to his freedom… his own Father; but none would hinder his public speaking, nor cause him to be a hermit outside his castle. He was aware of Claramae’s capabilities and put his own life in her hands… but to the extent of her accomplishments he was oblivious… nor did he even want to know.

"You have considered my lord the oddity of your idea; in respectful pardon, sir, it seems more of idealism than firm logic." Claramae started to speak the thoughts on her position to Adam, because that in the end was what her main prerogative was. In some later history, they might well be compared to Henry and Cromwell, only there was no religious fanaticism of Catholic or Reformist nature to combat with. Here, it was the nature of tradition, the obviousness of placing a creature with breasts in such a state, and where it came from in the first place. The conversation began at the first supper. Line by line, she'd add perhaps at a ball:

"I am in disagreeance with such a tactic," while it featured her as the Lord's idealic centerpiece was not the particular, merely the govenorship feminine. "Yet will serve in an admirable, honorific, and gracious way as m'lord would see fit. Yet you ask for an undue amount of trouble to promote a radical agenda. All things can be done, yes, but with a preferable general ease. Recall this to yourself in other things. What is present can not be altered now for it would please your chamber lords too much nor give you the firm command you need. Therefore I will endeavor to be a fixture in your policy.."

“Then it is final… we agree to disagree…” Adam had truly considered all options as to the governorship, and there were none he truly trusted with his life, save those dearly close… of which none were suitable to govern England… Beathag was quite capable of governorship… His wife was higher than England in his mind and he would no longer have her in London, than himself… Dmitrii was trustworthy beyond any doubt, but he was no leader, except upon a field of battle; and Eamonn, as his life was endured to the man already, was a leader, but not in politics. Aislin? Definitely a grand leader, and able to politick with the best… but she best served the Nations as the Head Physician and Researcher she had become…

That left one… one who Adam trusted with his very life… Not one he had known for very long, nor one he knew truly well… BUT !! It was an odd, indescribable attraction… not one of lust, though he was sure it would be grand… not one of prominence, though she was nobly lineaged in England… not one of strength, as she was petite and demure; though her true strength lie elsewhere… nor her expertise as a political leader, as he had witnessed many better political leaders… Just what caused Adam to place his deepest trust outside the marriage and family? To hand his life to such a person? “M’Lady St Laurence…” as he called her in public… “I am assured that you can, and shall perform the duties to the utmost of your ability… and that England shall prosper under your guidance…” His words uttered in a normal tone, in the intelligent English he manipulated so well, leaving the brogue at home… With a lean, he whispered in her ear… “I am most assured you shall handle the affairs of England, considering the Nations as a whole…”

Oh she smelled good… the hint of lavender oil captured his senses… and he sat erect, snapping himself back to reality.

There was a time in Portugal in which she had cautioned a Prince of the blood against insighting a riot before the court, for he was not the Crown Prince set to inherit nor were they lacking ample Princes, thus he was disposable. With time, however, the Prince of the blood tempered his hot-blood and dug into his logic. With the Lady Laurence in the background, he rose to the foreground, and to this very day he was in posture to come after the Crown Prince, and served as one of the King's foreign advisors. Her presence was obvious yet blatant. It was within social expectation therefore her unorthodoxy became an admirable quality of wisdom in a graceful courtier. Yet making a governor of a close associate was mad, let alone the fact of bequeathing the place to a female. Claramae considered the fact her background work would suffer to the importance of the eminent foreground. She discussed this with Adam during festivity hosted by no less than the Earl of Essex. The woman was on the arm of the Lord Griffin and paying no heed to the swirling hive of women who peered over their wine while all walked through the Earl's orchards. "My recommendation Sir, would be in eventuality that the position may pass to another of proper election, whilst I subside to running the governance of your holdings in the appropriate fashion: omni-present with an unspoken set of tools."

She waited for his response to the elongated discussion, coming in pieces as had hers.

Their discussions came and went in phases… each phase afforded privacy amongst the municipal… It was as if these two had conspired together all their lives, yet it had been less than a year. Still the private conversations remained private, and announcements to the public was expertly delivered as they deemed necessary, to keep secretive substances secret. “I will take it under consideration Claramae…” he winked and patted her hand. “Now if yu deem substantially that England should be governed electorially, and that would benefit the Nations as a whole… then at that time, bring it to Court…”

There were few who enjoyed things past pleasantries, including the personal depth behind her logical insight. She had walked in tandem to powerful men for many years; an offered arm was no more than extension of a line to which she was a vertex. As days became weeks, Adam had often sought to find a way to speak with her that did not always have him lacking and didn't offend her as he sought to satiate what was natural. It wasn't the rumor of an affair he wanted to make truth. Merely to understand how a person was made, why it was so. One time he ventured the subject and he was left with this piece of thing to seed his mind:

"Take you the likes of Lord Maubrey's wife, the Lady Maubrey. Her name is no more of Connacht than I can claim mine is of the Germanic states, yet it goes without utter question what is purpose, objective, and how that is completed. Day after day she was given unto shaping and formation both physical and mental. While she had the disadvantage of a lack of choice, the basis of ourselves is not so different. There are many things any number of persons won't or simply shan't ever do. There are any number of things persons won't or shan't ever know, so if a need arises for others to do or know, then the like of myself and others are of use. "

Apparently Claramae had more insight to Lady Anwen than he… and the wife of his mortal enemy, his Father, was in Turas Lan… He questioned not how she knew, for she had her own means… He was content to just listen and store away for another day… Of course the odd look would betray him. He knew she was educated as was he… but her intelligence far outweighed her size… and his own… God, he loved this woman… in ways none would understand… save the woman he was married to… A platonic relationship none would believe nor consider, for it was more interesting to fuel a rumor than accept fact.

Was it more frightening that these people were made at all, or that there was a need for them in the first place? When he'd ask her why she continued when it was evident she had more than enough means, she would say: "I keep my word and vows as any other would. The war, my lord, is not yet won."

“Then still we search for peace and freedom… no matter the price M’Lady…” The walks they took together, the balls they attended, the secretive whispers, the sudden disappearances… all fuel for a rumor of adultery of the Mo’r Triath… But those that knew the Mo’r Traith would know better… and those that didn’t, nay mattered in the first place… No one could know the truth… that Adam had placed total confidence of his reign over England… and his validity of life… in her petite hands.

[King Adam Aberdeen I]

On the day after the last conversation, the Mo'r Triath would awaken to an invitation from one of the Governor’s oldest companions. His name was Master Maxamillion Voltaire, but in the same custom as his mistress he preferred his formal name to his first. His countenance was aged, older than Adam's for signs of steely gray hair permeated the thick darkness that was pulled back by a velvet ribbon. Still, despite the lines etched against side of eyes or deep into the brow, there was no question that he retained the household's standard of poise and use. "Madame wishes, should it please you, to show you the means by which she will govern in matters not of public business."

Adam bowed to the man as he made his presence known to him and listened intently. “It pleases me, M’Lord… Anything Lady Claramae wishes, I am at her disposal while I am here…”

Whatever in creation did he mean by that polite turn of phrase? Questions were answered for him by either example or another polite turn of phrase that the Lady made expressly blunt for his benefit. At the man's hip was a rapier. He knew the weapon, perhaps, but knew it was not used in prominence across Europe. It was the Italian - Germanic solution to the heavy swords of the Middle Ages, relegated now to underground circles. Each detail was to be taken note of, and this was something Claramae was imparting to her sovereign. "Recall everything but speak of nothing. Your memory will pattern a great many words. You will see."

Adam’s travels, in the times of acquisition and acceptance of alliances and furtherance of his causes, took him to many lands… including speeches for freedom and democracy in Italia, the Papal States, and the Germanic Republic. Dmitrii Zurban, his Weaponsmaster, also introduced the Mo’r Triath to weapons of those lands… including the rapier; a weapon now seen more and more in Turas Lan.

Upon meeting with Claramae, he bowed and took her hand, kissing the back of it as he often done. His ears now listened attentively… Then as she spoke, his sea-green eyes narrowed… a hint of confusion… a tidbit of curiosity… but regarded her words carefully. Nodding, he leaned to her ear and whispered… “Ah pray the Mo’r Triath’s memory does not fail him…”

Oh so sweet… if it were possible, his eyes would roll to the back of his head and he would linger in the scent. Damn this woman… He was a male… and he had been far from his wife far too long… and this lass was so beautiful… He rose back to stand erect… and smiled. “Yer wish is my command, M’Lady Governor…”

It would be vengeance, a beautiful incarnation of vengeance that tempted a man to think on things he ought not. Fortunate for him, she would not give him reason to be derelict to the vows he made before Heaven and noble company to cherish his wife, forsaking all others, no? Many men of Europe had a hard time with this, nor did anyone forsake all others. A woman might leave behind her choice of men to be the alter of hymen upon which all in Europe is levied. But a man? A man would have his legitimate children from one womb and his pleasure with other passages. The Lady St. Laurence would not sacrifice personal honor and sanctity for any crown. Even the seeming limitless have their limitations.

"I see you have brought your rapier today. You are fluent then, with the weapon? It should pique your interest even more then, based upon what I shall show m'lord. Let us away across the grounds…" While he was in a state of reverie spurned by heady florals, she took her hand back while awaiting his presence beside her as the requisite pace was set across the pristine lawns to the showcase of prior statements. He was not the first man to be taken, nor would he be the last. In due time, a subsequent dose of fear would cure him of his lusts that he would be praying God grant him his wife all the sooner. "The particulars of the business are as important as the generalization. I found that it is best to equate both sides to make a good mixture suitable to public interactions and beneficial to private. The Barons of St. Laurence had once supplied an ample procession of knights to London for the king. A militant barony, our wealth unaccustomed to other barons is garnered in fealty from bonds of war and training militants. Another portion of it comes from the breeding of Friesians, and another from investing in the arts. Mitants, horses, art. Should any ask you your Lady Govenor's capital, it is best to refer to it by the Baronial male sense for archaic sensibility." Archaic. He would favor that more than 'traditional'. "All three are important factors in the secondary tier of the estate, which are the secretive arts and society which you employ. I am second in command to your Court Spy, Master Sorschal. He was my student, and we were both students of the Master of London, and one of the Grandmasters in the Order of the Rose. Look you, if you please."

Glancing down at the new gift that now hung at his hip. “Fluent?” a cant of his head… “Sufficient…” His interest was always piqued when it involved a new arena of information. Saying nothing, he simple bowed slightly, his hand sweeping past them in a “you first” manner. Walking side by side, his hand upon the hilt of the sword, he listened intently… all-the-while, he took in the beautiful scenery of immaculately manicured lawns… and only did he look at her when she spoke of Alendral…

She acknowledged one of the three labyrinths on the property, making a left when he didn't anticipate it through a section of the tree lined pathway he didn't anticipate while missing neither a step or breath. While twisting, turning, and doing so again it seemed they went east... or was it west?

Adam walked with her, until the passage was too narrow, then he would walk behind her thru the openings of the labyrinth. So many turns, so many twists… he was now a bit disoriented… Still he followed Claramae….

At the center of the labyrinth was one of the tilt yards. Here, knights practiced the joust, swords, horsemanship, and other such sundry practices. The sound of schooling was not far off as amidst the groomed bushes was a school for the squires. "With my installation into my father's place, I intend to continue in the old traditions. So I will furnish you with a customary number of men for London, and any subsequent campaign now of the states. Now some of the knights are more unique than others, as are certain members of the staff, cabinet, and such. Come this way please."

Amazed at the workings she had right under foot, Adam nodded… “The offer is most gracious M’Lady…” Unique? He said nothing, just locked the information away for later. Nodding he took up the pace along side her…

The prowess of hits to dummies - what if these men were his on a field of battle to command? Further onward, they would encounter Master Voltaire in a room with a vaulted ceiling. When had they passed underground! Or were they still above it?

A glass dome let in proficient light as the man took on perhaps ten students in rapier lessons. For his age, he moved too fast, too quick, and were it not practice, those who didn't learn would have died. "The rapier is not taught to all, these are the elected to learn the arts of their former masters, and I am only teaching them a requisite number of things. Manners, and a specialty. The Order of the Rose implements a system of fosterage similar to any other in education. Warrant, it is rare the order starts as young as some. It is more important for our noviates to hold patience, diligence, and intelligence found in traditional education than in our specific sort first hand. I was of a comely age, fifteen, before I returned to London from Dublin and my mother's ancestral home. A man who had sought to be my suitor once became my benefactor and teacher. The halls of the King are more deadly than any can imagine. Look there..."

Adam stood in the room, looking up to the vaulted ceiling… then back to Claramae… his eyebrows raising a bit, the smirked lips showing interest. And as she spoke… he listened…

She pointed to the room in which a man who trembled was waiting. Did he not recognize this man, a Lord of some sort, a member of parliament, an alleged supporter? His hands were bound, his feet bound, and he was forced erect. "Now the sublime practice of inquisition need not always be done upon the rack or in iron maidens, or such things that disfigure. This will be the first of many things you shall see. This is how London has truly been orchestrated for many years."

He might have recognized the man had it been elsewhere… Adam simply shook his head, his hand now held the hilt of the sword… more for security than readiness. “Maybe so, M’Lady… but shall London continue to be orchestrated in such mannerisms? Doesn’t my ideals try to verge away from what was done previous? Does not the Gaelic Nations stand for liberty and freedom from oppression?” His mind went immediately to the old man in the dungeon, the first time they took over Blue Castle… “Do we not exhalt the oppression if we do this?”

<<"Recall everything but speak of nothing. Your memory will pattern a great many words. You will see." >> Words resounded in his mind… He was seeing… and it was hard to believe that Lady Claramae St Laurence could be a weapon… He had a Court spy… he even used Alendral to such lengths… Could this woman be such as this? He thought he knew her… but did he? Did anyone?

"My Lord, pardon me to say, but the world is orchestrated upon such mannerisms. What you seek to do is just, but will always require those who will go where you will not in order that you will never have to. There need always be dark to contradict the light. God created light from darkness, so the Bible states." She countered him with an ambiance of necessary foreboding, a visual proof. "If you are to believe that there are no tools of darkness 'pon the side of good, than that would be akin to believing in perpetual childhood. I am showing you this because I do not believe in your ignorance, nor will it serve you to be ignorant as to what your English constituents are capable of. King Edward survived by the skin of his literal teeth if only because his court hands were better than those of his nobles. You may take it for what you will."

The realist in Adam knew she was correct… even he himself had leaned to the dark side in times of need. Though that remembrance irked him, he had used some of the darkest tools imaginable… Though he would voice his opinion when it did some good, he simply listened and nodded.

She bid her pardons with a courtesy. Dressed as if she were to attend a luncheon, she passed from his presence over toward the room. While no student of the rapier could see this room, he could from his vantage point watch. If he came closer, he would listen to the following:

"I have caught your informants and found your man attempting to poison his Highness' supper."

"His Highness is dead."

"Correction, his Highness favors another title. Mo'r Triath. As it were you, you attempted to be done of him, did you not?"

One step… two steps… he had made the decision to witness what he despised… A choice only HE could make. Once in the room, his senses tingled… the odor of fear… pain… human excrement… and he listened... and watched.

She opened a case on the table of razor sharp, whippet thin blades. Finding a place upon the back of the man's neck, she pressed in against the blade's grain. He began to whimper, as she was moving the systematic places of motion in his neck. "Your head shall be fixed permanent in one direction at this rate. You are already paralyzed. Move but a little, you could sever a vein. Like your life, the direction of your body now requires my guidance, my lord, and again, you sought to kill his Highness."

"Y… yes..."

"Of your own devices or on behalf of another."

The silence was palpable. She pushed in against the blade on the left side, and he cried out as she cut but one ligament! Pressing against another, this one longer, not as short as the other. "Your head will go the opposite direction, forever tilting if I utilize this, and you shall look quite the fool - if you do not die before I should show you what your poison would have done to his Highness."

He bit into his lip. If he should live, would not his master finish him anyhow? "The last advisor of this court..m'lady...he finds him..in the way....but Edward was as so much himself. Ple..please.. my neck..."

"You are losing feeling now? Ah. The blade is pressed against a nerve. Should it cut, it would paralyze you. It self sinks, with breath. Speak in haste...."

"God be not the devil, please..mercy! He will try again some other time!" He surrendered names, dates, in so far back as to incriminate him with attempts against the former crown. She held a finger in her hand as well, having taken a knuckle and breaking it as he lied. By comparison, the rack may have been merciful! She was breaking sections of bone, paralyzing in increments with a sinful knowledge of anatomy. When his begging turned to a moment of rebellion, the softness of her hand became the iron gauntlet that crashed down against his bound wrist and broke it. The scream of a grown man in pain reverberated in the enclosed space of inquisition and its witness. How her man appeared from dark air was as much a mystery as how one of the blades was able to be slid in and out of his chest, not killing him, but making him twitch. His neck flopped back, not broken, but twitching with damaged nerves. He'd recover motion...in time.

With each word, action, and scream of pain, Adam stayed adamant to the cause… No muscle flinch nor expression would give truth to his distaste. Matter-of-factly, he was stone-faced and emotionless. It was as if he could perform the same tasks with the same coldness… His sea-green eyes wavered about the room as the man admitted some information and lied about others… and cokeed his head when learning of the attempt. Had he himself been the victim of such an assassination attempt? With the new information, he now accepted the actions the assassin underwent…

"Vittergaust was a physician, the personal physician for the Earl of Canterbury. The Earl of Canterbury once defended His former Majesty's interests. Overtime, his case became akin to Vittegaust, his first apprentice Gottschalk, Gottschalk's pupil Alendral, and Vittergaust's beloved Claramae. Something in England betrayed them, bound them together to figure it, and for awhile they were that way. Vittergaust taught one, who taught the other, and he taught them all." He bowed slightly, "Forgive the intrusion, Mo'r Triath, you merely wore a baffled look." Neither he, nor his mistress blinked an eye at the screams that made the walls want to turn in and collapse.

They listened further:

"I dislike idiocy, my lord, more so those fool enough to tread where they ought not and become caught. In that I have no mercy. It is merely circumstance that allows you life given you are of no use dead, nor does it serve to make tasteless carnage."

Proper to a fault, or was the fault in how cold the propriety was? No warmth, no breath to testify life in the woman depriving a man portions of his by the minute. He would live with disfigurements despite what would mend. In fact, her hand went clear across his face with the following piece of advice: "Stay out of His Highness' halls, or I will become a fixture in yours. Your rank allows you not to refuse me, nor would you. Either your reputation will be ruined or those at your table die if ever you seek to do the same at my lord's. Grasp this firmly. You shan't forget."

Left to bleed, to twitch, to bleed, to bruise, the man sobbed as the lights in the room went out.

-.-.-

"You are quiet My Lord Aberdeen," Voltaire had stood next to him for the later portion of the inquisition, moving forward only to offer a pitcher of water to a waiting pair of hands for the Baroness to be rid of the associations of dark vice. "The plot was the Lord in question was to poison you at last night's supper. A great many of his ring is captured, what remains of it will be obliterated, in short order."

Adam looked to Voltaire and nodded… and in his sea-green eyes, a coldness that would send chills up a spine… and his voice, soft but no warmer… “Necessary and unavoidable…” then he would look back at the approaching woman…

At that moment came the entrance of Madame de la Mort, Madame Death…

"Master Voltaire, there is still more he is not telling, but nothing will come of him now. His tongue is being held hard, which means the remainder of what seeks our Lord to be dead is no less than what sought to be done of any sovereign or his closest, and a chief project this last year. Prepare my desk so I might pen a missive to Master Sorschal, and a set of men to away into the city and surrounding country. They shall know where to look, and it is a matter of absolute annihilation. Nothing is to remain. Neither man nor trace, for that matter, and upon the last wave I will join them in a command position."

"Pardon again, my lord. Business borders on respect to be paid. Shall I summarize?"

His heart stolid to a point, his void of emotions… the coldness that now his persona… Sea-green eyes look to the Governor… “Necessary and unavoidable…” he repeats, this time to a different audience.

“My dearest friend and Governor… I see that you must do what needs to be accomplished to keep the Nations’ goal within reach…” His hands go behind his back as he looks past her at the bound man, then around the room, and finally back to her…

“Aye, summarize… maybe my feeble mind has missed something of importance…” Adam was far from stupid, or unintelligent… but ignorance to some things did not qualify as lack of intelligence… merely ignorance of the facts.

Beyond what he had witnessed, he knew Claramae was an intricate woman… an unwavering loyalist, remorseless to a point, his Governor, and most of all… his friend…

[King Adam Aberdeen I]

The Govenor was no less than a loyalist, unforgiving in her methods, and even a friend to the Mo'r Triath. What was stranger still? Few knew of, or seemed to question for that matter, the amount of men in her life. A lady's entourage should have the correct number of women. For her age and independent status, the Lady St. Laurence kept only Bromheilde as both maid and companion. Were there others? While the household lacked not in appropriate hands to hold the stone together, what of the main companions. It was now time to review that, since he knew the methods by which she kept the empire he would not admit to holding.

"Shall I further explain the venture, my lord?"

The question came again. With it, motion as he was bidden follow her from one place to another. Master Voltaire seemed the right hand as in so much the Christ sat on the right hand of the father. Other figures were Alendral Sorschal, Michael Vincere, Tallion Apollius, and a dead man's name on the wind called Vittergaust, and a mad disease called Gottschalk. Was she the mistress of many, or a deadly confidant? A sister with claws to unleash?

Adam was a stolid individual when it came to Claramae… Had she rubbed off on him to a sort? In the months of companionship between them in England, the Mo’r Triath had become a familiar title amongst the English. No longer was the King so important. The woman definitely had a mind of intelligence that was working on all classes of the people.

But still there remained those loyal few who wanted to reinstitute the Kingship… to place the Mo’r Triath’s head upon a pike at the gates of London town. If in the months of his presence, he was oblivious, to any attempts; though he was aware of those factions that were able, and ready, to do such acts.

Standing upon the walls of London, looking eastward… then to her… then back over the landscape of the city itself. “Lady Claramae, will yu be accompanying me back to Turas Lan? I must return to my family… my people…” he looked back at her. “I feel confident I leave England in a most capable Governorship. You know I shall be available should yu need me.” He stood watching her reaction.

"I believe the business of Parliment extends deeper than the legal matters of the country. In short, I believe there are wasps in the burrow that need to be smoked out. Too many sharp edges behind lace. Too many obvious edges, on that same line. I believe my private affairs that are also the private affairs of your rule are crossing with the obvious nature of keeping your head upon your shoulders. Yes, my lord, I will be returning with you to Turas Lan for a little while yet. I do not believe, however, I shall give back my Govenorship just yet. It may prove highly useful in this world and in the hidden one of my own."

She believed that without saying it, he was King. He was Emperor. He was a newfound Caesar Augustus with a kinder disposition. He had the ideas paramount to Nero's, only as wild but not as vile. He was all the things he would not affiliate himself with for fear of its anti-democratic idealism. London Town had been a festering blister but a year ago, and now was thriving as it never had. New architecture, new money, new inventions, and new ideals were placing the lack-luster, foggy capital into its new prime. Still, the word Mo'r Triath in the mouth of an Englishman was no different than saying 'your majesty'. Roger Mortimer and his royal harlot were fixed in the plotting, too. If a harlot could be Queen with no country, surely one day he'd learn to call himself what he ought to be.

Adam listened to what Claramae said… and disturbed would be putting it mildly. He knew that dealings beneath the table occurred often in any position of leadership, whether directly or indirectly… and in his position, he was sure that some wish his head separated from his body and hung upon a pike… but he smiled at the thought as he looked at Claramae… knowing full weel she was his protector… “I am glad… Bess would love to see yu once more…”

"The High Household will benefit from your presence. Let alone the deterent it will provide against conspiracy. " After a little while, she would say, "Give me but a little and I will find you enough cause to execute publicly those that are not anhilated in private." The presence of the Mo'r Triath, amongst the many men she kept in close company with, was suprising in how steady it was. There were many things in which she found him unpolished and other things to which she found admirable. It was on this wall overlooking London that she opened to him ever so slightly. "When we return, should it please your Lordship to heed me, if not answer a request you may deem personal, stay the hand of Alendral Sorschal. He will go mad as he is. He will grow ill and pitiful, piteous and fever-pitched. He will have no cause to listen to me now. I believe he has grown angered at my distance these many months in the handling of many cases. I do not blame him. Still, despite what work should not suffer for the incompetence that will grow of his thrust of self so far forward, I seek not to lose one who is likened unto..."

“Claramae… they say behind every great man is a strong woman… but I am lucky to have two…” he smiles… “So does that mean that my reign is twice as strong and I, twice as great?” he teased, choosing to burn to memory her comment but relegated to speak upon it… “As for Alendral… I shall deem him valuable to you… and as such, commit him to your wishes… How might I use him, if not to assign him to you in Turas Lan?” he looks out over the city… then pausing, looks back at her. “I shall not miss London without you here… but there are those in Turas Lan that will be glad to see you home…” If looks could be heard, she would know that he left her dealings to her judgment… and would delve into her reign no more than he would wish her in his… Some things are just not said… she has her world and he his…

[Master Claramae St. Laurence]

"My Lord I am not certain as to be complimented or to take offense, this deems me at once a woman of power and holds a sound similar to the tales of the bed chamber." Dry voice returned his quick quips. A regulated, orderly sound that could be a laugh or a discrete clearing of the throat. It was hard to tell with she. One could deduce in that he knew her what equivocated to 'well' enough, that this was a show of humor. It passed quick though, too quick. What may have lightened her face to the extent of revealing the maid in an already ageless woman was punctured. Instead, her brow turned in. While it brokered no lines of emotion (for none was hardly shown enough to make difference) the change was so evident that it would have startled him as much as the appearance of a full smile. Expression was alien on Claramae; a reminder so distinct to the human condition that many in her company believed she was born devoid of the ability or had learned to supercede the necessity for it.


"Master Sorschal is not an item of value, he is a man of great intelligence with skill he sees fit to utilize in your ventures. Take note, sir. It is he that holds together your Ebon Talons. In your realm, I ascend to complete his tasks as much as he might do on behalf of myself. If he is over burned more so than he is in the quest to keep your lovely realm in ignorance of the horrors that holds, he will become that horror. Do you fathom what it is I say, my lord?" The door to the inner-workings of the weapon-come-Govenor had not been closed to him. He would need to proceed with caution. Or did he find a reason to feel anything in regards to her that was human, now, as the shock subsided? "If not, I shall be forthright in saying that if you do not take a care to what he is doing, or learn to look to some degree enough at the world revealed to you while you've eyes to do it, you will not be able to see that your weaponry is breaking."

Poor, poor Adam. Or was that blissful, simple Adam? Ignorant certainly. It was not a revoking of freedom nor his interference in the depths that was called for, it was merely a call to look at what was before him. While all was not said to him in one sentence it was enough to ascertain that the human mechanisms in his unusual, enviable innovations had no respite since the War, and in fact saw what went on as merely an extension of what for them never ended.

"Claramae, you can not continue to do this to yourself."
"It is no different than what occurs and what will always be, Sorschal."

Sorschal was the name on one of the bedrocks of life. His voice could be conjured with hardly a whim to entertain the idea, his image burned into the back of her eyes from years before so that she saw his youth juxtaposed with his maturity. How does one ask for help without stating the cause but demand a reason while sounding neither desperate nor too detrimental? It was a hard line to walk. Yet they did. A pair once. Then not, and then again. Yet now divided. The dealings of the New England were intimate mates with the business of the pair's person. Even now they rolled over from the damask satin sheets to the mud to wallow. A waif was f**ked hard by the lord-pimp that purchased her; seeming spent, the waif rolled to her belly only to be remounted. The picture was grotesque but it was one of the only things Gottschalk had ever said that proved right to Claramae. New business finds a hook with old business, and cares not how many bastards it makes, nor the mess made in the coupling.

The fat, horror fed bastards of the union were gaining a foothold enough to eradicate what she would not tell Adam, for that was not his place. It was his place, however, to keep his servants, no matter how elevated their place, alive.

"I beg your pardon and leave, my lord." It was granted by the asking, it seemed. She gave him a curtsey and turned to go inside. Once it was done, she turned with no seen haste into a chamber, sealed the door, and grew heavily ill.

Just as the contents of her stomach had emptied its last, a mouse ran across a rafter but proved to be too large of a man to play pretend. Ah, it seemed the 'new business' had come to call.

Before the door of the past could reveal more to Adam, the present was calling as the pieces on London's board of chess flew to vivid life again.

"How now, who is within?"

One of the servants had seen the door seal, and heard what seemed to be sickness inside. Soon, there was the sound of feet scuffling, items smashing! "Guards, guards!" Poor porter. He began to bang upon the thick wooden door for admittance. He would not have wanted to see inside to find the contents of a chamber pot overturned onto the Governess' feet, a twisted dance ensuing in creeping fluid as she doubled back from a blow to her vunerable stomach. Recovering, the Lady stood erect with all of the palor and ticked elegance of a clockwork doll as her head went to the left, then right, to appraise the situation. "Better trained. A distraction." She recited, the way lessons are taught in route memorization to children. The attacker had a name: Gustoff. He was going to make it very hard to come past the door. By now Adam heard the commotion, if not witnessing it through a window as her body, then his, then shadows passed by. In time they established a rhythm. What hits were exchanged were brutal. What cuts with weapons, fierce.

If he wished, he would experience it for himself. Gustoff had an associate named Gildern, whom waited like a sitting cat for Adam to notice him...

[King Adam Aberdeen I]

Adam stood by the window looking out over London. A simple man by many means… an uncomplicated man, but not simple of intelligence… Ignorant but not stupid. He knew of the underworld of such as Claramae’s… and of Sorchal’s… He had even utilized it when necessary… as did his adversaries… But, at times, he wished to put it from his mind… to leave it to experts. His hand caressed his chin in thought. She was right… as usual…

How could he run a nation of thousands, even millions, without such caricatures of villiany? He looked to Claramae’s door to which she had excused herself. His intellect argued with itself. To employ such monsters… to utilize such executioner the way he does… yet treachery lies at every corner.

And yet treacherous deeds would present themselves once more as, behind closed doors he heard the scuffling of an attack… he neared her door to hear more and yet… beside him in a corridor lie a man in wait… “What is the meaning of this? Who are yu?” Adam’s hand moved to the dagger at his hip.

He had been bitten by the scorpion. The poison was the alluring, frightening world to which Sorschal and St. Laurence belonged. Hard to leave, even harder to stay, but if you left would you want to be deprived of the adrenaline rushing like river water in your veins? The accomplishments were vast. Ah, yes the price to pay was steep but the riches were worth the reward. Obdience. Fealty. The appropriate amount of subservice. The executioner doubled as the face of his new nation. He had another that was a pillar upon which Skye Isle stood.

The Mo'r Triath was either a fortunate ruler, or a fortunate fool. Treachery summoned in the evening but causing the Govenor to withdraw her hidden claws and calling the ruler to task. "The Lady Govenor is busy," said he whom bowed mockingly, "Should have heard her wretch, was a terrible sound. Hope she doesn't die of the poison in her wine. Or was it the water? Perhaps they left no stone unturned. Maybe they wish to exhaust her first, or speed it? Ah, who knows with these sorts. Perfectionists. It takes one to kill one."

Inside of the room, hits were exchanged but nary a table was knocked over. Sounds of skirmish inside would not doubt match those outside. The question would be this: What would be found now on either side of the door?

Attentive to the noises behind the door, Adam would keep the man in his sight; his hand at the ready… “Ah kinn see that she is busy… and yae? Wot dae yae stand ‘ere faer?” Adam leaned closer to the door, glancing back at the odd man. “Ah bae sure dat the Lady Gov’nor kinn handle ‘erself… If’en harm coom tae ‘er… All England shall pay faer such devices…” Adam was a bit confused as to what he should… or should not do… this was not a realm he dared to question…

The man before him was the second to compliment the first who hosted an interlude with Claramae. In the hall, the citizen practiced a very lasse faire attituded. With an heir of contrite diplomacy he relayed his side of the matter with efficient, practiced ease. "The Govenor is in a fight, both with arms and with self. By one of which she will surely die." If one listened closely, they could hear the sighns of fatigue, a struggle for air, rebuttle of still and the courtesy an opponent gave as one threw up the bile of the stomach. "It is a good row, not clean." He intended the pun. "If all of England pays for the device of harm unto her, whom pays now for you? Are you so caught up in particulars that you do not know your own death when you see it?"

Adam found himself toe to toe with a dragon, and unless he played as St. George, surely this would not end well.

Adam stood cautiously in the hall, confronbted by the stranger… No emotion, no expression… flawlessly blank… void of all sentiment. Difficult to say the least under the circumstances, but his life and Claramae’s depended upon it. Adam neared the man slowly, the sea-green eyes scanning his surroundings, yet never leaving the man himself. Within hearing distance of a whisper, Adam speaks softly… “As goeth the sheep… sae goeth the maiden…” he pauses… “but nay the princess…” and as the step forward was made, the spinning of his form allowed his dagger to be withdrawn and leveled at the man’s chest at a downward angle, and with the second step, the blade turned and was brought across the man’s throat before he knew what had occurred… Adam’s green eyes stared blankly as the man stood gurgling… blood choking him fom the gapping wound left by Adam’s blade. The man’s eyes were wide as his knees buckled, slamming into the floor as he looked up to his murderer. “Tis Ascalon, that doth evil fear…” he muttered to the man… and before him, the man fell dead upon the stone floor. St George had slain his dragon…

Upon the door he pounded, as if he were to break the oak and free the princess… The pounding would resound thru the halls and vestibules… “Claramae… CLARAMAE… Open the door !!!” his voice boomed above his fist pounding the door... Surely those conspirators, formerly partnered with the dead man, would hear that the Mo’r Triath remained alive…

Absolute emptiness. To be devoid of any expression, giving rise to neither one thing nor the next. No possibility. No assumption. If a void was brought to you, in turn, you became the same. Could Claramae see Adam, she would have given him praise. Alas, the two were rather busy. The tit-for-tat audience outside of the door ended with a corpse on the recently repaired floor. Pity. Ah well. Blood could be concealed or removed if one was able to ken the compounds necessary in doing so. He was left with no air to take in a sound of protest! When he did try to speak, the piss-poor phrasing only was hissed out to push more blood onto his clothes. So St. George slew the beast but inside the maiden in question was not as defenseless as the lesser lady tied down to the altar.

"Anon, my lord!"

Her voice resounded over the din of clashing steel. The sound of sickness was prominent, too, but it didn't slow the dance of violence. Was she sick, or her adversary? When he had broken the door himself with a misplaced blow, Adam was privy to the inside where in he saw a destroyed room with shards of beauty raining around the violent grace in their motions. A swipe of dagger, a thrust of rapier now. At times the weapons abandoned for hand to hand. The man would cough aside gobs of blood while she held a hand across her middle.

Frustration turned into anger as he could not budge the door. The sounds inside further frustrating him. Would she be killed, with him merely feet away? Taking one of the statues in the corridor, he began to pound at the door’s weakest point. The echoes of loud battering upon the door, it soon began to crack… then with one fell swoop of the marble statue, the door hinge cracked and splintered. Adam pushed upon the door and it fell at a right angle to the opposite hinge. Stepping thru he witnessed a room destroyed and the clash of steel. The woman was dancing with a man in ballet of sword and dagger.

In the end, he would sock her in her stomach, causing her to double over. Using this to her advantange, she speared her shoulders lower than his naval, tossed him into the air on them, and down across hard shards. He was ultimately run through by a piece of a pretty glass mirror. "How now, my lord, and how shall I serve you..."

She was barely perspiring nor out of breath, and it amazed him. With a chuckle he answers. “As yu always have M’Lady…”

She plucked up her weapons, sliding them with little care for their mess into the folds of the gown where they belonged. The rapier had been an element of decor, but now was hers to keep. "You should not be here now, come… let us not tarry" Amidst the broken things and gore, the scent of question took on the unknown illness or reaction to that thereof; he hadn't time to ask on her state of being as she took hold of his hand and pulled him alongside her. Evading Death with a turn of the invincible came with the occasional price.

The inhalation of air to speak was interrupted as she took his hand and spoke of departure. He simply had no reason not to follow her. ‘Should not be here?’ he wondered. Step after step, in tune with her, the Mo’r Triath was being led by his Governor… or was she his listed assassin? Or both? Had he saved her, or had she saved him? All this and more coursed his brain… logic now was fleeting.

"I can not yet attest if this is but one room baited or an entire wing undone. I will need to move my men hence, until such time we will live in Rosefielding House again." She commanded him without much hesitation when it came to his safety. Indeed, the fever-like flush on her face increased but one wondered how she acknowledged no pain at all. What sort of breeding goes into the making of a woman like this, aside from the long list of family that made one thoroughbred in the human race? How do you create a weapon? Gustoff and Gildern couldn't speak for themselves, but they had too much of an intimate idea. It was not yet a subject she was ready to address, besides, his head needed to stay on.

As they fled the area, Adam followed close behind her. Softly, he spoke… “Maybe tis best I return to Turas Lan… and leave yu to what you do best… I feel that I am but a hind’rance…” he neared her, taking her arm and causing her to pause… “I do not want yu harmed M’Lady… yu are too valuable to me…” followed by a pause… “Too valuable to Skye…” His sea-green eyes looked at her… Eyes that held no soul… only emptiness now… and it stirred fear in him.He was definitely in an area that toiled caution… out of his league for sure… Adam feared for her life, as well as his… Assasination attempts multiplied while he remained in England… but installing Claramae as Governor was a good move, he thought.

"My value extends insofar as the ability to perform my services," she countered to him. Empty eyes were in fact filled with instinct that strangled the common life that was there. Ah, fye, fye! A monster lived inside of the elegant, decadent woman. She pulled Adam along now at a quick pace, directing him to the back of a horse. Cicero danced with impatience while awaiting his mistress to mount his back. "If dire consequence should befall my life pays forefeit to yours. You are the head of the states. No matter my position, my lord, I am the hand that fends you."

Claramae insisted Adam take the first ship back toward Turas Lan, or at least beyond England until such a time she could recall him back. It would not be the first time, nor would it be the last... "My lord, take the next ship hence home, immediately. Arrange for its passage without delay. Whatever is here , need not deal with you. Do you understand?" Claramae urged him to continue forward despite all that he had seen. It was with the intention that he see no more nor endure an onslaught her insistence was heavy. "If I am going to be at the fore of your ideals, than you will need to learn a movement in the back of a painting when you see it. I will teach you these things, but you need to continue another day."Her importance to the state was superficial by comparison of his imporantance to the people.

Adam nodded… “I shall depart at once… my ship remains ready at all times…” he looked at her as she damn-near drug him along… “How shall we communicate…? What of you?” his questions were disregarded as she shuffled him to an awaiting carriage… He slammed against the back of the seat as the door slammed and the driver quickly started the horses.

"What of me, my lord? I am at the fore of your great work. That is my place, or somewhere vanishing into the back. We all must have our place."

All the way to the docks, he rubbed his chin, fiddled with his ring and the luckenbooth he still wore… He HAD to trust her… that was no doubt… she would contact him when appropriate…

He would find somewhere in the commotion a communication had been shoved in to his hand. When would he realize he had it? It read: "Forgive the intrigues, my friend. Until we meet anon." C

Therein, would be the start of something different.


To Seek Aid From a Friend, If Such is So

A friend is often privy to things the common person wouldn't know. What if, by chance, friend came with the the knowledge of a personal shield between all that would harm you and all that would keep you aloft in the world? If you had a friend such as this, what would you do for them? Oft the Lady was repaid for her service in ungodly sums of money, jewels, estates, title, and political amnesty. For all of the trouble in the last pair of years, things built on man's importance proved fickle. Lands collapsed, reigns ended. She had done things in the last pair of years she would never admit to doing in polite nor private company. She had fled an occupation, watched as cases became trickier to solve, and the walls close in. She had seen an order built and wept in private when it began to die. Still, fate had been kind to give her close persons to rely upon. Sorschal was with her. Michael, her husband now. Percival, her half brother to reveal that she was not all that was left of an otherwise ended house, and by choice. The Order brought with it an unusual collection of faces. There was a woman whom after learning to leap upon a wall like a cat sat upon it to discuss with her the nature of the times for many hours. A Greek proved to not afraid of her, and she'd even learned to respect women of the bed sheets.

To conclude the list of mention, she had also been thrust out to the fore, when she expressly desired to be in the back. She hoped now being the Governor of England and amidst his shadow keepers would hold benefit. The Freesian galloped down the lane with a rider whose body was riddled with pain. Inside of the gloves her hands barely found the strength to hold on to the reigns. Side saddle was for the sake of appearences only. Stretching a leg about the saddle's horn so her skirts did not reveal themselves pulled muscless in the thigh. Calves tensed while the upper thigh began to go numb. Cicero was not pleased by the intensity he was pushed to in order to navigate the muddy side roads leading to the upper wall from behind the House. Yes, the way was shorter, but frought with deep mud patches and ice. At times, she made him prance to avoid a slipper decent down the Cullins. At others, she pushed him. By the time they reached the high reaches where a Lord was known to survey his holdings… the effect was stark. Her hair was devoid of pin, her body devoid of cloak to shield from the falling snow.

His back was to her. As well it should be, but would not remain. He would remember the way in which she called to him: "Adam, we need your help. If not, there will be nothing left of any of us in ebony hall..." She doubled forward. No pardon, no use of title, no manner exact to manners.

Months had past, yet the thought of her would not… Life continued… but behind the scenes, he knew trouble brewed… but she had told him… "If I am going to be at the fore of your ideals, than you will need to learn a movement in the back of a painting when you see it.” Still, no personal word from her, only signed and sealed reports, her seal, as usual, from the Duchy of England… until…

Until, one day, as the Mo’r Triath made his usual rounds outside the city, flanked, as always by the Gold Talons, she rode upon them… Recognized as Lady St Laurence, she was allowed to ride past them, to Him… And as she spoke, he turned around sharply, a bit surprised, and gave her a big smile, which disintegrated upon seeing her expression and listened to her words… “My help? What am I to do lass?” he spoke as he took her reisn of her steed. “How can I help you? You of all people…?”

The Lady Laurence rendered immediate movement of the guard. Among themselves, they often spoke about how the likes of an Ebony Talon could shift the stance of a man in the same fashion as those who were solid in the Court. Among them, the work of a choice few people invoked equal amounts respect and fear. Imagine their surprise when it was her that wore the face of fear. One arm wrapped about her middle while the other held the saddle horn. Using it as a post, she pushed herself back to sit straight in the saddle. Inward, she reflected on their last meeting. He could not account for her whereabouts in Turas Lan. He received his reports on the state of the Duchy regularly, as well as sealed documents reflecting the state of parliment in Blue Castle from one particular set of eyes. Still, it would be hard to say if if it was her, or one of her associates.

On this day, this one day, a guard was brought down. To come to the point was to pull away the smooth top in order to show the fraying edges of the picture. The canvas of the painting she'd mentioned was coming to pieces. "We are against enemies of the Order that will become enemies of the nation if we do not stop them. Nothing has been said of it, and for it we are all nearly dead. Our noviates, our barely honed advance students, even the masters. I need your permission, my lord...." she winced, gritting her teeth together, "to draw from the other ends of the Order. The White, The Gold. Whichever may spare ends. We have sought to make of this to Sir Kendrew, but have no time to reach him. Your wife, I could not burden, nor give fear to. So it falls on you now."

He could see her in pain… and his heart ached so… His gloved hand pressed upon her leg… “Alight… stay the eve to rest… We can make camp…” He knew she made sense… She knew the darkness that lurked behind… but Skye was just recovering from a major war… a campaign of freedom, not even a winter prior… Eyes met eyes as he looked to her, and she to him…

The horse stamped impatient, and its jolting body made the work of a rough artist's hands scream out in pain. Her mouth opened into a silent o, but all that manfiested was a single word. "Please.."

She was outwardly cold-hearted, intelligent, precise, and oft demanding… He was emotional, learned… with a soft heart… like his Mother… but it was her plea that made tears form in his eyes… Quickly looking at one of the Gold Talons… “Gae with Lady St Laurence… see that she gets what she requires… Charge all tallies to my account…” he looks back up to Claramae… “Lady… fair thee well… an’ coom back tae me…” Eight little words… and a squeeze to her leg would let her know how he felt, and his worry that accompanied her plea. He would simply step back and allow her to go her way.

The lady upon the horse was so moved by his immediate expression that she could have descended from the back of the horse to kiss the hem of his tunic. In spirit, her eyes did this where action would have miserably failed. It took everything she could muster in order to remain high in the saddle. What would it be like to fall, like some maid in an old tale, in to the arms of a man? Some are destined to be the fair headed brides of lore while others, like herself, were given dark hair and strange things to do. Claramae looked down to the hand on her leg. It was so alien, once, that so many would vye for the chance to offer her touch. In her current state, she reached for his hand as the snow fell around them. "I will. God save you, my lord…. and..friend."

Her touch was as if she had called down a lightning bolt from on High… Sea green eyes looked up to her and blinked. Silent lips were still, yet those emerald eyes spoke volumes… If he let her go, he was unsure if she’d return… He had ordered thousands of men into battle, in certain death… for freedom… for his views… for the Nations… and now he would revoke the order for her to battle if he could… Would she listen to him if he did so? Probably not… for now she would again slip into the background of the tapestry… Reluctantly, he squeezed and released her hand… a friendly handshake from appearances… but between them, something far more special.

[Master Claramae St. Laurence]

(To Seek Aid From a Friend, if Such is So, appears in Shadow Was, Conclusion 1329-1330. It illustrates the depth of friendship between a servant and sovereign, and the length of trust.)

England..1330-1331

The Lady Laurence had tossed her sovereign into a carriage, thus aboard a ship, with little care for his words. All that mattered was his life above her own. His sanctity above that which preserved her life as worthwhile could not compare with the God-head on earth sitting on the throne. No, he did not call it a throne.He did not refer to himself as a crowned head. Yet his children were princes and princesses. He was a reluctant King with a rumbling world at his feet. He always had been.

London grew on top of the ashes of the old conquest, as did England. In the wake of the campaigns ruin of York came a thriving enterprise than what could have been remembered. From a tense London came an open place where gold flowed on the street if you were the sort to manipulate a piece o'eight about your fingers. She quelled the occasional uprising while managing the Parliment. Claramae Vincere St Laurence was Govoner, her husband was the Commander, her brother, the Inspector. Were it not for this unique arrangement, who knows what would have befallen?


The smoke came out of a chimney on the rooftop three over from the one she sat upon. A wind blew, but it was a warm spring wind with the balmy promise of a rain coming in from the East. Lady Govenor dangled her legs over the edge of a sloping portion while hands were fixed on thin side edges. The back was as if one held string at the top of her head, taut. So she sat with no company to speak of save the promise of rain, the wind,and thought.
"It is coming..I know it."

[King Adam Aberdeen I]

Such had been his life with Claramae... She called him Sovereign and herself Servant... In Turas Lan, he stood before Parliaments... some urging him to wear the Crown, his denial of such authority as he urged the Parliament to be stronger... to quell their own skirmishes and form a nation that could be considered among those of world power. But back in London, she had saved him from the throes and afteraffects of assassination.

If any woman, other than his wife, captured his interest, it was her. Both were strong women, intelligent in their own capacities and experience... The platonic relationship of the past few years had been rumored as courtly love and passion... and both of them displayed denial by their refusal to allow the accusations to inconvenience them. Still, he would kiss his wife goodbye once more and venture to the new Ducy of England, specifically London town...

As he stepped off the ship, there were those who greeted him with open arms... others would seem to protest his arrival. But what discerned him most was the Lady Claramae’s absence. Her subordinates offering apology after apology, yet the Mo’r Triath knew she would make her appearance when she was ready.

The carriage made an unscheduled stop. Opening the door, the driver smiled at Adam. “MiLord, MiLady St Laurence is here... this is her place of contemplation...” Then he led the Sovereign thru doors, hallways and stairs to the roof. “There MiLord...” the man whispered and pointed. Adam simply nodded and made his way over toward Claramae...

The smoke came out of a chimney on the rooftop three over from the one she sat upon. A wind blew, but it was a warm spring wind with the balmy promise of a rain coming in from the East. Lady Govenor dangled her legs over the edge of a sloping portion while hands were fixed on thin side edges. The back was as if one held string at the top of her head, taut. So she sat with no company to speak of save the promise of rain, the wind, and thought. "It is coming... I know it."

Adam stood behind her and he cleared her throat, knowing full well she knew he was there... “M’Lady, wot bae coming...?” he smiled as she turned around. “Ah dae hope Ah nay bae inconviencing yae...” Then without her asking, he too sat upon the precipice beside her, his hand laid upon hers. “Ah missed yae sae much, Ah thought Ah’d coom and find yae...” he smirked. “Bess sends her love and regards...”

She never bawked custom - such custom often dictated greeting the leader of state when his boat touched the shores of England. Having never failed to deliver before, now was the first time that the Lady of utmost manner didn't materialize as expectation demanded. Or, perhaps, it was only the first time that she did not make a physical presence in the country of origin. In Scotland, the St. Laurence woman was hardly present (at least that any could speak of). England stretched body and resource beyond all reason but she gave no reason for him to doubt that it could be managed. She was not in the business of fostering disbelief.

The rain, the wind, and thought turned into a human voice that turned her petite face down to face Adam Aberdeen. He talked of emotions that rose in her absence. He talked of his wife sending her love, and the need to seek her out. With rare aplumb did he coax the barest edge of a smile from the thin razor line the mouth made. "They will say things of your arrival with such words as this, my liege, at least we shan't fail to be amused." She turned her gaze outward toward the spring wind over London. "A change my lord is what comes. Merely not just a change of season but a change of circumstance that will be but one of many tests to your new empire made of the islands." Without asking her his hand was atop of hers, but she thought little of it. Adam Aberdeen had always been, along with his wife, overly physical beings. The world that governed their thoughts was not the world into which she'd been born, but one she learned to appreciate.

Ordinary custom was not a forte of Adam’s... he was the sort of person who did things upon a whim... If he wanted to ride on a horse to an event, he would; rather than take the royal carriage... If he wanted to sail around the island at a moments notice he would... Why? Because he could; and because he did not want to be slave to a rigid schedule. Hence is why he was back in London.

“Aye lass, baet Ah dun care wot people say... tis nae like they ‘ave naet said them before... As long as it nae impunes yer honor ‘r character. If’en we are the most notorious love affair, then sae bae it...” he chuckled, squeezing her hand a bit and chuckled. “Lass, Ah ‘ave nay seen yae in such a mood, tis unsettling tae mae... Yer contemplations seem deeper than e’r before...” his hand moved from hers to her back as he attempted to relieve some tension there.

“Aye, change bae coomin’... Ah dun know what, baet Ah bae sure t’will nay be goot... Sometimes, the honor Robert bestowed seems more troublesome than tis worth it... but in m’travels, Ah see a betterment for the lives o’ the peoples... nae laenger are we th’ downtrodden... Nae laenger dae we bow tae Kings who wish tae rule o’r us....” his arm wrapped around her waist a bit. “Sae wot ‘as yae so disturbed M’Lady?”

Had people observed the pair, they would have seen tender words, touches, smiles, and chuckles, coming from the man... obviously attempting to lighten his lover’s day... but as far as he knew, they were alone... his Gold Talons downstairs with St Laurence guards.

The pair were alone, the guards falling to outer rims to protect the elite pair poised on high. No one looked up as high for figure of person as the Lady Govenor sat, joined by a man who had learned to have little fear in her presence. Intimate conversation and gesture still took some adjustment to fully stomach, but he was not a horrid man's touch to know. She could not place if he was a brethren in the same battle, a friend of like mind, or simply someone that was good to know, but in any aspect it served. "A challenge to the supremacy of your place. It will begin now, and come to a head in the time to come. You will put no stock in what I tell you now, Lord Aberdeen, but you should consider taking the latent English throne to sit upon, even if it is from a distance. That sort of power is tadamount to success. You must become the King in the absence of many lacking Kings, and to rule as you see fit, yet with that title. There is advancement of the people, and a success that could not have come if you were not the Mo'r Triath. As for what disturbs me of England, the first challenge that will come in honest to your supremacy you will not even truly see. It is a matter of things that I once brought to you, upon the mountains of Turas Lan. Do you remember?"

Adam was a bit confused… she spoke as if she could see into a crystal ball. “All challenges come to a head sooner or later…unless it is quelled a’fore hand… is there no way to cease it before it starts?” His head would twist upon the shoulders to look at her. “Bess has approached me with the idea of kingship… and now yu… Am Ah sae blind as Ah dae nae see… wot is before me? Ah know in Parliament, and in the presence of other governments, they pay me little heed… unless I find a way to force the issues… mabbe I should take wot King Robert placed in my path…” he looks away as if in far distant place… then glancing at her again… “Yae ‘ave taught me much… and showed me things that Ah dunnae wish tae see… but tis reality nonetheless…” then he looks at her quizzically… “Matter of things? Such as, for mae mind seems tae fail me a bit…” It wasn’t his mind failing, it was the complexity of all that accompanied such power as a Mo’r Triath… or a king… His hand once again lay atop hers… “Tell me oh wise one…”

Her life was split into facets, those facets in to even more angles. She saw life as a mathmetician, constantly calculating logic or utilizing geometry to make sense of the projection point. She listened to him speak of using what Robert left to him, before she turned her head to say, "It was your path before Robert left it to you, Skye is your destiny, my liege. It would have been a land unto itself had not Scotland went asunder, and now Scotland is yours by royal right. You fit the appropriate lineage. It matters not how the years passed of it, only that you have it. By God's Grace are the people fortunate enough to have seen good works done with it. I am fortunate enough to have seen such, lest Skye would not be home. I would have sat in Germany on this day."

The man took a deep stuttered breath, nodding to her words. He reflected upon the findings that he and Bess had discovered. The weeks, and months, they spent sleuthing the questions of the tapestries… and hidden signs throughout the Griffin and MacRauri castles. The signs left behind by Ladies Davina and Murieall… and the desires of the late Lord of the Isles, Lord Alan… and the murderous attempts by Lord William to gain the Brooch of Skye and the power it wielded. Adam touched where the brooch usual sat upon his chest, then he looked at Claramae. “Then Skye, an’ Ah, are fortunate tae ‘ave sucha asset.” And he smiled that charming smile of his.

Maybe if she was in Germany, though, old peril wouldn't rear itself like this. The streets churned under her, not from horse hoof or people's walk, but further below still. If she had taught him anything, it was that there was a world beneath the world for his consideration. "Remember the nature at which you left? I told you that I thought it not safe for you, because certain parties came for you? You were only rich collatoral. It is myself they are looking to harm, and Sorschal. It is a game that has gone on far longer than you have known me, but it is a game that holds everything up in Europe that we all know. Let us say they seek to cut London's strings so the marionette falls upon the floor."

The words pinged around inside his mind as a child’s toy off a stone wall. With quirked lips, his head turns toward her. “Collateral? Dae they nae know, Ah would nae be worth the trouble… Ah would nae reveal nothing o’, or about yae… If’n mae life woot save yaers, th’n, Ah would bae glad tae offer it…” he just smiled. “If’n Ah would fall, yet another would take mae place… and yae would dae wot yae dae all the same.” He cants his head. “Once a seed bae planted… and it takes hold, th’ roots o’ freedom is deep and anchored like a’ oak’s… Ah ‘ave planted the seed… and we are in fertile ground… and now tha’ the people ‘ave tasted freedom, and fought an’ died faer it, it nay goes away…” he paused… “No King, who ever ruled a country with a iron hand, only ruled it because his people knew naet freedom… they survived because they were secure… life or death, nae else… Baet, wot Ah ‘ave, as Mo’Triath, allowed the people to taste was nae wot others gave… it is freedom they tasted… and th’t bae the roots…” he just shrugged and smiled… “An if’n Ah bae wrong, then kill mae naew, as Ah ‘ave nothing else tae live faer as any type of ruler…”

"Have I taught you everything that King should know, the place should be for his Chamberlain or his most trusted advisors. Perhaps it is because you keep me within your advisors that I have such a place." He looked at her with inquiring eyes. Did she give him more riddles or a straight answer? It was, as always, a matter of perspective. "Your wife is a wise woman, you are not blind, you are only resistant and she does not wish to resist. The power you shall have as King and Queen will be limitless, as Mo'r Triath and Mo'r Oukselo, you are reaching the end of a generous tether. It is yours to take, that path. Reality is not often what we wish, but what time will press on us wanted or unwanted."

When he put his hand on hers, she wanted to withdraw it. Indeed, she did, but only to draw his hand into his lap as she leaned upon one, illustrating with the other. "These rooftops, the ground under them as you know contains a world within a world. That world is still a part of me, though I stand as a figure in the world around you. People in your employ are equal as being a part of the other world, and we still stand in peril. The other world will make..is making waves..to help in undoing this one. There is still much confusion, much reassembly, in the loss of the English king." She turned to face him, doing a strange thing. She took his hand in her own. "My world will hack away at yours for this, but I will do everything in my power to keep it so that you know not where to look to see it, so it thus not troubles the mind of my leige"

“Aye, m’wife is truly a wise woman… a jewel in the crown o’life…” he glances sideways at Claramae… “Yae shall always ‘ave a place by mae side as an advisor… for if nae faer yae, Ah would surely have died laeng ago…” Regading the comment about the Kingship, he smirks… “If’n Ah don the crown, are yae sure t’will nae be mae hangman’s rope, Ah bae puttin’ on?” He listened and heeded the intelligent woman’s comments. “Then ah shall accept the crown… baet know this, tis bae reluctantly…” then he smiled…

Shaking his head, he looked out over London… “This can bae a great city… and aye, tis frighten mae j’st a bit… for it could easily rival Turas Lan… It has a nearness to the mainland th’t Turas Lan has nae… baet Turas Lan is settled where it can be the trade center of the future… it has all the north lands, and even if the great sea…” then he got this starry look in his eye as he smiled wickedly. “Too many scientists claim our world be flat… baet our Norse ancestors proclaim differently…” then he looks at her… “Wot would it bae for Skye, should we sail past the edge of the world…? Wot would it bae if’n a new land lie to the far west where the sun sets??” Oh yeah… him and his starry sea-green eyes??!!

"I am going to build you an England, my lord, that rivals Rome or Athens. I am not only possessed of lofty ambition, but infinite resource I intend to use." She read the constellation mapping itself in his eyes. She couldn't help but to smile at his zeal to persue knowledge against the status quo. "Then my lord if Skye seeks to prove the roundness of a sphere for heaven and earth's sake, then you will join the great sailors and explorers. Skye might have among its folk a Marco Polo. Yet look not too far west yet. Looketh in the direction of Damascus instead, Jerusalem, and the land of Emperors."

Adam would contemplate her words with a moment of silence. Leaning back, a pair of hands splayed to the left and right, his back now inclined at less than 90 degrees… yet sea-green eyes looked out over the city below. A moment passed and he looked at her and exhaled… his thoughts would be his own… and the eyes returned gazing out over toward the horizon.

“Many are apprehensive of those areas…” He looks to his friend and confident. “The Muslim are losing ground in Spain… It would seem that the Kingdoms of Castile, Navarre, and Aragon now seek to unify and is bargaining with Portugal to amalgamate the Iberian Peninsula completely.” He shrugs a bit, still leaning upon his hands. “…and the Berber King continues to oppress his people. Egypt continues to be embrawled in a family crisis…” he remembers what Maahes had told him of his family distrust of one another. “I know nothing of the East… save the books I read of Marco Polo… and what Lady Kaori has spoke of…” then he chuckled.

“IF I were King… I would seek Skye to be a trade-oriented country… to push the Gaelic renaissance into full swing… to be ready to accept trade thru the Middle Sea, so I could trade East and West… to make ourselves as competitive as the powers of England, Spain, and France…” then he lowers his head a bit… “Lo, I am a mere Protector… Foreign Kings sees Scotland as a subsidiary of England… the former whipping dogs of Edward…” He looks at her again… “Do you think I can be a good King?”