THE FORTUNIST

Lay

“The three independent territories are the Albenian Palace, the Albenian Bureau and Albenarum."

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Meanwhile, tension is burrowing its hook into the Albenian Palace as unconfirmed rumours flitter through the air. The truth will not be contained at this point. The queen's indisposition would have to be revealed to douse any fake news and mutters of dissent.

Rayton and Lay are still in their mother's living room. Her body had been relocated to the inner chambers by most trusted employees. Rayton paces endlessly round the room, with long strides, as if the space is not enough for him. Lay stares at the upturned writing table which had taken a heavy sabre blow. If staring could bare any more clue or hint from the table, Lay would recover it. The scarf and lace handkerchief had also been stowed safely away for further investigation.

"You confound my thinking, Brother," Lay comments. He is indeed trying to think but he does not know even where to begin on that.

"O great and mighty thinker. Have you finally come up with a tangible idea for world unification and mass polarisation?"

"Glad you haven't lost your sarcasm," Lay says wryly. He wanted to say: "Mother was writing." but that is an obvious fact he and Rayton had already covered. Lay is only a little thought away from becoming disoriented. He tries to arrange the immediate past events in his mind as accurately as he could.

He was keeping his brother's company. Rayton was telling him of how his former lover had somehow absconded with the Winter Solstice. Rayton was plotting to keep their mother in the dark at least until Lay could go as far away from the palace to retrieve a drawing of the ring in question. Rayton was hearing a tussle afterwards. Lay was smelling blood.

They had only caught a glimpse of the assassin —vivid purple hair and eyes— with an unmistakable hairpin in his grip. He had disappeared in a smoky haze. Their mother's lifeless body was on the floor along with a bloodied scarf, a silk handkerchief and a sabre. Right! There was a sabre.

"Where's the sabre?" Lay asks causing Rayton to shoot him an inpatient look.

"I do not need you confused Grand Prince. I need you thinking on your feet."

"I am thinking on my feet," Lay murmurs. Rayton stops his pacing.

"Sorry, what was that?"

Curse his super hearing. "Can we go over what you heard again?"

"Why? You think I'm lying?"

"You've never been a forthcoming person Ray. I just want to think on my feet without feeling crazy. The discussion, roll over it again."

"I don't exactly want to do that."

"For our mother's sake Ray."

Rayton sighs, rolls his shoulders uneasily. "She was calling for us and he was mimicking her, mocking her. She asked him who he was and he just hints that he is the one to end her. They struggle, struggle, struggle…well. At a point his disguise might have fallen through because she seems to recognise him. She says 'You' in that recognising way. He doesn't know we are already coming. She was smug about that until the very last moment."

"Her smugness didn't help. He got away."

"Lay."

"What?" Lay snaps irritably. He cannot help but feel his brother is omitting something. His brother who had gatekept information on the royal cryfixes for a good number of years. Who had only confessed to the repossession of one two weeks after it was stolen from him and the disappearance of the other many many weeks before that.