Tess stood staring into the mirror in her room in the floating castle, taking in the sight of herself in the dress for tonight's celebration. The dress was a shimmery black, long sleeve, and stopped right below her knees. After two years practically living in her armor while covered in dirt and grime, it was hard for her to believe the girl in the mirror was her.
"You look so beautiful," her mother gushed as she stood beside her looking in the mirror. "This dress just shows how much of a beautiful young woman you are."
"I don't know," Tess replied with a lack of confidence. "I mean this is supposed to be a celebration. Shouldn't I wear something a little brighter?" Tess then gave a little tug on the frills at the ends of one of the sleeves. "And maybe a little more mature?"
"This dress is mature," her mother replied. "They add a playful touch, while the dress overall accentuates your beauty."
Tess looked at her mother in the mirror. Despite being older, her mother was still gorgeous, and the bright rose colored dress that gently hugged her body showed her womanly figure.
"I don't know, shouldn't a more mature dress show off more of my figure?" Tess suggested.
"Are you trying to show off for someone?" Claire teased from the side, wearing a black dress that did show off her figure above her waist, before flaring out slightly and stopping a little above her ankles.
Beside her was Caria, wearing a green dress that stopped mid thigh, with a pair of black tights. She was making a failing attempt to keep in a snicker at the comments.
"N-no," Tess stuttered as she blushed with embarrassment.
"Tessia darling," her mother said as she gave her a side hug. "There are many ways to show maturity with your appearance, and this is one of them." She then stepped in front of her, and placed her hands on her daughter's shoulders. "This dress shows your beauty, and I'm sure Arthur will see that. If not, then it's him that needs to mature. Now I need to get going, I need to join the rest of the council for when we all come out."
With her mother walking out, the male members of their teams walked in as Tess kept looking in the mirror, turning to get a view from different angles, before sighing.
"What?" Caria asked.
"It's nothing. I guess I can agree with my mother about the dress, but I really did want something to...show off in," Tess replied.
"Seriously? I was just teasing. I agree with your mother, Arthur will be able to see how beautiful you are," Claire said reassuringly.
"I don't know. I mean, until I kissed Arthur back in school he kept treating me like he did when we were kids. I feel like if I ever want our relationship to progress I need to be the one to make it happen," Tess admitted.
"So you want to what? Show off your body so he wants to bed you?" Darvus commented, earning him a smack in the back of the head by Stannard, and a punch in the stomach by Caria.
"No, I just want him to see that I'm growing, maturing. I don't want him to keep seeing me as just the teen girl he left, I want him to see me as a woman."
"Are you trying to make him want to propose or something?" Thomas asked innocently.
"No, yes, I don't know," Tess said in frustration. "I'm pretty sure to a certain degree I get how he thinks, and I doubt he would want to get married before the war was over. I just..." she sighed. "Arthur grew up a lot, and I want him to see that I did too. That I'm not a little girl anymore, that I'm a woman now."
"Ok, please don't hit me," Jerry said looking at Caria and Claire, before looking back at Tess. "But it does sound like you are trying to at least get him to think about your body."
Tess groaned. "I don't know how to explain what I want any better. I know he would think of my personal honor as a woman, and wouldn't try to bed me even if I stood in front of him naked. And yes I want to one day marry him, but I don't want to pressure him into that either."
"Women are too damn complicated," Theo commented from the doorway.
"What took you so long?!" Claire scolded.
"Wait, where was he?" Tess asked.
"I sent him to get Arthur for you so he can escort you to the party," Claire replied.
"Yeah well, a lot of good that did. He wasn't in his room," Theo replied. "But I did find someone else." He then stepped aside, and Ellie walked into view wearing a golden yellow dress.
"Hello everyone," Ellie greeted as she curtsied.
"Everyone, this is Arthur's little sister Eleanor," Tess introduced as she curtsied back. "Ellie, I don't suppose you know where Arthur is?"
Ellie shook her head. "I heard a bunch of noise coming from his room while I was getting ready, but he was gone by the time I was done."
"Where could he be? He should know that he should be escorting Tess tonight," Claire thought out loud.
"Yes, let's just forget how his sister said there was a bunch of noise coming from his room," Jerry commented as he rolled his eyes.
"What if an Alacryan spy attacked him?" Stannard suggested.
"If someone was strong enough to capture Arthur the whole castle would have known about it. No way Arthur would have gone down without a fight," Tess stated dismissively.
"Well maybe he's supposed to be with the council like your mother?" Jerry suggested. "What's this party even for anyway?"
"I heard a retainer was defeated," Theo said.
"My brother did come back hurt," Ellie added.
"Do you think Arthur defeated the retainer?" Caria suggested.
All eyes moved to Tess, since it was clear Ellie didn't know.
"I don't know. When I asked him about his injuries he only said he got careless," Tess replied. She had suspected that there was more to it than he was just careless, and she had trouble even believing that. She knew Arthur wasn't perfect, and could make mistakes, even in combat, but to have been hurt so badly that he slept for an entire day was pretty hard to believe.
"Well if this party really is about one of the retainers being killed, then I'm sure they'll reveal who did it soon enough," Claire stated.
With that they all joined the procession of nobles up to the top floor of the castle, which was used as a ballroom. They proceeded up the spiral staircase, following behind an angry looking bear, who helped the line move a little faster. After less than thirty minutes they had arrived. The sun was setting, creating a beautiful backdrop of red and orange, as light emitting artifacts glowed while floating in the air. A small orchestra played various wind and string instruments as nobles of all three races dressed in their finest attires mingled.
"It's so beautiful," Caria said as she admired the scene.
"Yeah, they really went all out," Darvus commented as he grabbed a champagne glass from a server walking by while carrying a tray of glasses.
Claire glanced back down the spiral staircase, and could tell there were still plenty more people coming. "How about we get some drinks and enjoy the view on the balcony while we wait for everything to begin," Claire suggested.
Everyone agreed with this idea and began to walk outside. Darvus saw his parents and took Caria along with him to greet them, as Stannard saw Gideon's apprentice Emily and went to talk with her. Thomas saw Gideon building a plate of hors d'oeuvers and went to talk to him, as Jerry followed just for the free food. A young elf boy with long blonde hair came and greeted Ellie and she ran off with him, as Boo followed as he fought the urge to scare him off since Ellie seemed to want to go with him. Tess, Claire, and Theo all felt something was awfully familiar about this boy, but couldn't place why.
Claire, Theo, and Tess stood by a tall table and enjoyed the beautiful view. Subconsciously Claire leaned into Theo as he put an arm around her, and Tess wished Arthur was there to enjoy it with her.
"Hello everyone," a familiar male voice greeted.
The three of them turned around to see Lunaris and Kathyln, their arms hooked together. Lunaris was wearing a black and grey suit with red accents, and a white mantle with a gold trim, while Kathyln wore a shimmering white dress.
"Kathyln, Lunaris, it's so good to see you," Tess greeted.
"Now don't you two look like a cute couple," Claire coo'd as she admired how well their clothing complemented one another.
Lunaris bowed his head to Tess and Claire, and gave Theo a firm handshake, as the girls greeted each other with a gentle hug.
"So will Curtis be joining us? Or did your father refuse to allow Lilia to attend?" Tess asked.
"No, Curtis said Lilia was scheduled to arrive back tonight and he wanted her to have a relaxing time with him. As for our father," a small smile formed on Kathyln's face. "I believe he's learning quickly not to fight Curtis when it comes to Lilia."
"How so?" Claire asked.
"Curtis pretty much gave our father the silent treatment since the announcement. He completely ignored him even when he was talking right to him," Kathyln replied.
"Why does your father seem to have a problem with Lilia? I thought he was friends with her father?" Tess asked.
"The Helstea's might be rich, but they aren't nobles. Despite what our father said, he wants Curtis and I to marry into noble families."
"Wait, is that why you're dating me?" Lunaris asked, over exaggerating a hurt tone and expression.
A small warm smile formed on Kathyln's face. "No, but it does make things easier for us." Lunaris leaned in and the two shared a short gentle kiss.
"That's got to be hard on Lilia," Claire commented with a saddened tone.
"Curtis does his best to hide this from her, but it doesn't help that our father introduces him to young women from noble families nearly every time they see each other, even if Lilia is there." Kathyln shook her head in a disappointed manner. "I'm worried about what might happen to her if this keeps up. Not having our parents' approval and trying to set him up, I'm worried if she'll be able to last until our father eventually breaks."
"Why can't Curtis just tell him to stop? And what about your mother? Surely she doesn't support this?" Claire asked.
"Our father is someone difficult to oppose. Curtis tried having a civilized talk with father to get him to stop, but then he forced him into Lancer Academy to separate them. As for our mother, she doesn't support father, but he won't stop. Right now they don't even sleep in the same room anymore. Everything you see between them is her doing her duty and keeping up appearances. She doesn't want anyone to think there are any weaknesses in the council."
After the talk of the Glayder family, everyone tried to move the conversation to happier topics. Seeing as Kathyln was assigned to defend the wall and Lunaris to a unit in the beast glades clearing dungeons, Tess was curious as to how they managed to maintain their relationship.
The units operating in the beast glades of course had to resupply, so this was generally done between dungeons or every month. Either the whole unit would go to the wall, or just a team of about a dozen, depending on the location of the current or next dungeon. Lunaris took advantage of this, and always volunteered his team to resupply whenever that was necessary. This resulted in Lunaris returning to Kathyln close to every month for at most two days before he had to return back to his unit.
Tess didn't know what she expected, she had hoped she could somehow use their method to help her and Arthur, since she didn't know what kind of help she could expect from her grandfather. This however was pretty much useless information for her, as Arthur was assigned to the castle between missions and going there was not something she could do regularly without looking like a spoiled princess.
"Hello princesses," a female voice called out.
The whole group looked to see Varay and Bairon approaching in their white uniforms.
"Hello Generals," Tess and Kathyln replied in unison.
"You're here for the party too?" Claire asked.
"No, we've been asked to serve as bodyguards for the royal children," Varay replied.
"That said," Bairon looked to his left then right. "Where's Prince Curtis?"
"He didn't want to come," Lunaris answered.
"He didn't want to come?" Bairon questioned.
"That's right," Kathyln confirmed.
"He is a prince, he has responsibilities," Bairon replied, sounding frustrated at Curtis' decision.
"True, however he has his reasons for not wanting to be here, General," Tess replied in Curtis' defense.
Barion was clearly annoyed by Tess' reply, but held his tongue as he technically had no authority over the three royal children.
Feeling the obvious tension created by Tess and Bairon, Lunaris decided to try and change the topic of discussion.
"So General Varay, do you know what this party is about? We heard rumours that a retainer was defeated."
"It seems that very few people actually know what's going on, but we heard the same rumor," Varay replied, with a curious expression that led everyone else to believe she was speaking the truth.
"Well Arthur is somewhere in the castle, but we can't find him. If the rumours are true do you think he did it?" Theo asked.
Before Varay could reply, Barion scoffed. "Highly doubtful. He may have a white core, but there's no way he's actually capable of that."
"Why is that?" Kathyln asked, then looked to Varay. "Is Arthur not strong enough to do that?"
"I'm not sure. My encounters with Arthur since his return have been limited, and he is remarkably skilled at concealing his core. However from what little I've felt from his core, I'd guess that he is currently close to Bairon's level."
"So then General Bairon, are you also saying that you are incapable of defeating a retainer?" Tess shot at him.
Everyone understood why Tess didn't like Bairon, but what they couldn't understand was why she felt the need to take shots at him every chance she could.
Bairon glared at Tess. If not for her being a princess he would have long ago taught her a lesson for that mouth of hers. Bairon remembered Lucas' birth mother, and how his father had to remind her of her place after Lucas was born, as she tried to maintain her position as his mother. Then after Lucas was no longer nursing, she had outlived her usefulness and was dealt with accordingly. Bairon didn't care for the idea of killing someone just because of their behaviour, but living a life seeing his family's elf slaves beaten regularly, the mental image of beating Tess came to his mind.
"Oh, I think things are about to start," Claire commented as she saw several of the lights inside dim.
She wanted nothing more in this moment than for Bairon and Tess' stand off to come to an end. She knew of the Wykes family reputation, and how they used to own many elf slaves. She also suspected Bairon was restraining himself from treating Tess as one of those slaves. With Arthur now at the white core stage, he could no doubt handle Bairon if he were to lose control. The only problem was that Arthur wasn't always around.
The group was led back inside by Bairon with Varay taking up the rear. The sea of nobles and army officers parted as they proceeded towards a stage where the council members were standing.
Quickly the lights dimmed, until the only faint light was from the setting sun coming through the windows. The room became silent and the only faint noise was coming from a figure that was walking across the stage. A single light emitting artifact activated, shining down to reveal Commander Virion wearing dark red robe with a gold trim, and embellished with black jewels.
"I would first like to thank you all for coming on such short notice, and apologize for not giving a reason for this event," Virion said after a brief applause. A smile formed on his face as he continued. "This was done for neither security nor safety, but for the sake of surprising you all present here this evening." Virion paused to take a deep breath, then continued. "Despite being at war with Alacrya for roughly two years now, their main invasion forces only arrived a few days ago. Normally one would expect weeks if not months before any truly good news could be shared. But today, we have news so grand, that it must be shared right away. Today we are gathered to honor the one individual, who on only the first day of Alacrya's fleet landing," Virion paused briefly. "Single handedly fought and killed one of their central powers in this war. Today we celebrate the elimination of a retainer!"
The wooden stage split in half, as a hideous figure encased in ice rose for all to see. Even dead the aura the retainer gave off was enough to cause a few of the weaker nobles up front to collapse. Seeing as the retainer was encased in ice, many looked to Varay, only to see she was just as shocked as anyone. However Tess realized Varay wasn't looking at the retainer, but instead a figure hidden in the darkness of the room.
"Now I know you all are wondering, who was it that was able to defeat this fearsome enemy?" An unmistakable look of pride beamed from Virion's face. "Allow me to introduce to you the first of many heroes of this war, General Arthur Leywin!"