Of Love and Valor

42: Where It Happens

"Good morning," the Orenfior greets Zelphinon and me as we enter his home. Unlike the last time we served as part of the Fiorzhanim, he is waiting for us in the foyer with two other guards and a scribe. "I am glad that it is the two of you. I told Ruokharismet that I would accept no one else today."

"For what purpose do you thus honor us, Your Excellency?" Zelphinon inquires, slightly dryly.

"Today you will accompany me to the Yrivvior's Hall of Public Audience. I have been summoned there for one particular meeting but am choosing to be present for all of his dealings today, which it is my right to do."

"Thank you, Your Excellency," I say, somewhat breathless. Is this meeting what I think it is? Excitement and nervousness threaten to overwhelm me as I wonder what the Yrivvior is like. Never in my wildest dreams have I imagined being anywhere near the supreme ruler of Yrivvenna.

"You are not curious, Azerai, as to what this meeting is about?" The Orenfior seems rather amused by the notion.

"Should Your Excellency see fit to tell us, I would be grateful, but I knew not how to ask."

Based on the Orenfior's gales of laughter, this remark was uproariously funny. "Baffling. You speak so confidently when you present your unconventional military tactics, and yet you will not ask an obvious question."

"Will you tell us the purpose of this meeting then, Your Excellency?" Zelphinon asks with mild irritation.

"The Yrivvior has seen fit to interview the emissaries from Kedar-Jashun today, and I can think of no better personal guards for such a meeting than the two Orenzhanim that most offend that loathsome zaikarit. No offense meant to anyone else, of course." The other Fiorzhanim present smile thinly at his comments—I do not think they were present for his interview with the emissaries from Kedar-Jashun—but Zelphinon and I both flash genuine smiles for a moment before returning to professional stoicism. "Ah, you do appreciate jokes. I had wondered. It seemed, based on the bugs-in-jars scheme, that you, Azerai, must have a sense of humor, but I was by no means sure about either of you."

"It's not exactly a quality they try to hone in any Academy I've ever attended," Zelphinon mutters, eliciting more laughter from the Orenfior.

"Better every moment. But let's not waste time. The Yrivvior is a very busy man, and perhaps the only one who will take your habitual formality as a matter of course rather than jarring and stuffy. I don't have to tell you to be on your best behavior. Take rear. Let us be on our way." Zelphinon and I obediently take the rear guard positions as the Orenfior begins his trek—on foot, rather than in a palanquin or some other conveyance, to my surprise—to the Yrivvior's elaborate and ostentatious dwelling.

The journey is not far, and I think perhaps this is the reason we travel on foot, although we also walked to and from the East Gate, which is a further journey, the last time Zelphinon and I were assigned here. Indeed, it takes longer for the Yrivvior's personal guard, the Viorzhanim, to verify that we are Approved Visitors and not Suspicious Persons than it does for us to walk from the Orenfior's mansion to the Yrivvior's palace.

Upon entering the enormous, ornately carved and decorated front doors, we are ushered swiftly down a few opulently furnished hallways and into the Hall of Public Audience, allowing me no more than a few glances at the wealth and splendor in which the Yrivvior abides, but that is more than enough to form an impression. Such vast disparities, between the ruler and the ruled. How much of this could be put towards bettering the lives of the common citizens while still allowing him to live in comfort and relative luxury? I wonder. This is the life that Thariyae's parents aspire to for her. They want her to marry the Yrivvior's son. Is such a thing feasible? The Verathriya mansion is not dissimilar from the mansion in which the Orenfior dwells; to hear Thariyae tell it, her family's home is furnished much more sumptuously than the Orenfior's dwelling, although I think that a matter of taste rather than a matter of means.

This Hall of Public Audience, however, is not something I can compare with anything I have ever seen before. My family's dwelling in Kennakara, which I thought simple but elegant and comfortable, seems a squalid hovel by comparison. The floor is an elaborate, swirling mosaic that, to my untrained eyes, might well be comprised of gemstones. Elegant, highly polished and intricately carved wooden pillars soar to meet an arching ceiling fitted with rounded windows that let in sunlight from outside. Silk tapestries hang on the walls above low tiers of seating for the salori and their attendants. A long, beautifully woven rug leads from the main entrance to an elaborate chair that gleams with gold and precious stones.

In that chair, clad in the most magnificent robes I have ever seen, sits the Yrivvior, gazing at us inscrutably while stroking the point of his long, carefully groomed, black beard.

Upon seeing him, I bow so low my head nearly touches the floor, an obeisance the other Fiorzhanim also perform, to a lesser degree. The Orenfior, however, approaches the Yrivvior like an old friend.

"Couldn't take the torment of endless meetings another day without me, eh?" he greets our ruler irreverently. The Yrivvior seems mildly displeased but takes this as a matter of course.

"You know full well the reason you are here," the Yrivvior replies, his cold dark eyes surveying our group. "You have taken new guards."

"They are here specifically for the meeting for which you have summoned me. I think you will find their insights invaluable."

"They are rather young to have insights of any value, I should think."

"They are highly recommended by the Kazmiohni—" here he gestures to Kazmiohn Ruokharismet, who is seated near the Yrivvior's left hand and who I had somehow overlooked up until this moment, "—and I would not have brought them here without first testing them myself."

"Intriguing. Well, we shall see whether there is any occasion for them to speak. Such a thing would not fit with the usual protocols."

"I have every reason to believe that these particular supplicants will have little heed for the usual protocols, as I have already told you."

"And yet you insist that I meet with these...guests."

"What they seek only you can provide, Venerable Yrivvior." This the Orenfior says tongue in cheek, and the Yrivvior actually rolls his eyes.

"Take your place there—" he gestures to a currently empty section of tiered seating "—and let us have no further nonsense. You are rather early for the meeting for which I summoned you, but I will not have you disrupting my schedule. As punishment for your presumptuousness, you will have to sit through all of my other appointments for the day."

"You are most gracious, Your Imperial Majesty." The Orenfior's use of the formality he told us would be required here is still very much a joke, and to my surprise, there seems to be a hint of a smile on the Yrivvior's face as we follow the Orenfior to our designated places. At his insistence, Zelphinon and I sit in the front row, where we can see everything and will be the first to fight should any danger present itself.

"And now you will be in the room where it happens, and if you miss anything, it will be your own fault," the Orenfior whispers to Zelphinon and me as one of the Yrivvior's servants announces his first supplicant of the morning.