Serellia (Everlasting Legends, Book 2)

Ch. 17 - Learning from the Shadows

Journal Entry - Obtoxicullous

Praised be the day that I am no longer held to my contract with such beasts, as it has brought me more trouble and grief than if I had just set upon the task myself! Were my instructions not clear that even the infantile minds of these brutish wolf men could possibly conceive them? Perhaps this was my own doing. In my eagerness to seize the King's heritage, I resorted to the swiftest method instead of the most assured. The Utsi would have carried out the raid on the carriage so swiftly and quietly that it would have been as if it were not but plucked from existence, never to be seen again. But these werewolves! I've already heard rumors spread of their fumbled tactics, and now panic spreads across the north of Lorellian like wildfire. Their appearance has raised most suspicion and questions that will take many months to see laid to rest and forgotten, a mess that I will not soon forget!

And what could be worse? Well, but of course, they failed to get both twins or even their mother, so that even I must have some appreciation for the sheer expanse of their idiocy. And then do they return with heads hung low and eyes to the floor in a show of shame for their inadequacy? No! They brashly waltz into my tower, heads held high as if heroes deserving of my praise.

I may have taken some joy in lashing them with words if it would not have been a complete waste of time and breath! So that is it, then. I shall have to suffer their failure as my own, for the ability to comprehend it is beyond them. But did it stop there? No, for next, they presented me with their prize, one of the twins, and they'd not so much as scratched him. Once more, the blame must be mine as I had not taken the werewolves' paternal instincts into account, for if I had, I would have realized how unreasonable my request was for them to kill the infants. However, now the boy's fate lies with me, and... perhaps not all is lost? I am, after all, nothing if not adaptable.

***

Journal Entry - Obtoxicullous

I've sent the infant on with the wolves. They are witless, yes, but even I must admit that they own all the necessary skills to raise him at least for a few years. He'll learn the ways of survival and the forest, and when he comes of age I'll settle him with someone who can teach him how to survive in the political halls just as easily as the forest.

But this is the last time I'll call upon werewolves of Thornbrook...

***

Ardaik 16th - La'Trest, Lorellia

"So this is where the two of you slunk off to," Gautier said as he slipped into the guest room of the Baron of Causter, William Toussaint. He hadn't allowed Toussaint and Sebastien to converse for long before he'd joined them.

The prince had likely followed Sebastien there from the busy grand dining room, where the majority of the courtiers still sat, enjoying desserts and after-dinner wine with the king and queen, discussing what could and should be done about the attack on the capital, and who would be held responsible for it.

"Make sure that door is closed," Sebastien hissed, pressing circles into his temple. He was seated in the armchair nearest the room's fireplace, avoiding sending a glance at the mirror hung over the room's vanity days of being aboard those disgusting ships had sucked the life nearly out of him. Even now, freshly groomed and in clean clothing, he was aware that he looked drained of warmth and color and felt as spry as he presently looked.

Toussaint swirled his glass of wine, batting his lashes toward their intruder. "You shouldn't be in here at all, actually," the blond baron stated.

"I won't stay long," Gautier replied with a mild shrug.

After a short roll of his eyes, Toussaint continued, "If Artus was aboard a ship, why didn't you just bring him to me?"

Sebastien's jaw tensed further. "I made every effort to." Had they not been interrupted by the damned merchant ship nor the Merchant's Guild... "We were apprehended by a fleet outside of your influence. I was nearly able to arrange it since the Guild Emissary agreed on a heading to Causter, but the Admir-"