Chapter 3: Before the Fall
Kirin woke up feeling good, she always did after a fight. The day was new and she felt it had promise.
Kirin woke herself up the rest of the way and chose to walk into the great hall. She entered the court and sat down. The Queen chose not to engage her today, or anyone for that matter.
Certain tomato colored lords aside, most of the nobles were decent, respectful people. Most of them understood the Queen's mood. The Queen often went into these moods recently, she seemed...discontent.
All of a sudden, a few men bashed the great doors of the hall open, cheering and praising someone. Then she saw him, the prince. Earlier that day, the prince had taken a hunting party to the forest just outside the city.
According to the cheers, the prince had been rather successful on his hunting trip.
"Mother, I have returned!", the prince shouted, looking a little too proud of himself. Kirin caught his eye and vigorously shook her head...too late. The queen was seething....no, irate.
"YOU DARE THINK YOU CAN JUST BARGE INTO THIS HALL WITH NO REGARD TO THE COURT! A COURT YOU NEVER BOTHER TO SHOW UP TO!"
The prince at first looked taken aback, then looked sheepish." No, mother", he said as he walked and sat on one of the 13 empty seats. He wasn't alone among the royal family in his propensity to skip the court.
It wasn't that the Queen raised spoiled children, it was that the Queen didn't raise children. The royal children were raised by a priestess of the dawn, the formal term for a preacher of Mesonia's cult of a religion.
Due to the queen not raising her children personally, they had a sense of entitlement befitting emperors, rather than their rather small piece of land they called a kingdom.
Mesonia was very small all things considered, but the majority of the people lived in the mines, mines that went so deep they had to worry about crust wyrms that rested beneath the continents. These mines made Mesonia incredibly wealthy.
Orichalcum and Adamantine were the main exports of Mesonia, but that was far from all that was mined in the great depths. They also distributed more precious gems, hard metals, and magical materials than any other kingdom or empire combines. So much, that neighboring kingdoms placed armies along the borders to prevent Mesonia from gaining more land.
The children assumed that their wealth meant power. They knew nothing of the world in Kirin's eye, and she'd been in the same mountain range for a thousand years.
Sadly, Erik wasn't the worst of the children, not even close. Despite his lascivious nature, he never forced his will upon anyone, the same could not be said for the older princes and princesses. They only stayed away from Kirin due to her closeness to the queen.
Court settled down and things went back to normal. The prince, probably in apology to his mother, started listening to the complaints of the common folk. To Kirin's annoyance, he wasn't doing bad of a job.
One by one the pleas for this and that came and went. Then it was time for the Noble's discussion for the day. The first thing that came up was a discussion to extend the mine. This had come up a few times, the nobles wanted to add a western strip operation to the mine due to a mithril vein being discovered in the region. The Queen, ever the cautious women, didn't want to extend into the territory of Astoria, the neighboring kingdom, without their aristocrat's permission. The nobles argued that Astoria's boundaries would not be crossed.
This topic was dropped after a while and the court moved on.
Everything was going nicely until a lady decides to ask a question."My prince, may I ask why you haven't been fighting the recent challenges to you...yourself? It has been the tradition for the royal children to chose no honor champion.¹", at that, the prince froze. This started an uproar of realization.
All of the nobles suddenly realized that they couldn't remember the last time ANY of the children fought for themselves. Then the nail in the coffin hit, "Are ye scared of us me prince?".
Kirin, thinking she would be taking the head of a couple of nobles soon, froze when she heard the next words that came.
"I don't think any of you are worth our effort, so we use the lady Kirin in our stead.", Kirin's heart dropped into unmentionable places, that was the wrong answer. Just as she thought, a noble took advantage," Then fight her and prove your honor is strong!".
The prince, having his pride insulted, did the dumbest thing Kirin had ever seen him do."Very well, lady Kirin...what is your house? Nevermind, lady Kirin, honorgärd of the royal family, I challenge you."
The Queen paled. She knew how this would end, but she had no choice. The court could vote no confidence in the family's rule if their honor was deemed unfit.
Kirin looked like a rabbit that was in the jaws of a fox.
This would be the end of her time in Mesonia.
Slowly, Kirin walked onto the dueling floor, her face looking as if she'd seen a ghost.
Normally, this wouldn't be a huge deal, but a fight like this could only end in death. The prince could not yield, for his family would lose their sovereignty, and Nightingale would not let Kirin yield to anyone.
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Erik, now that he was able to see in hindsight, realized his fuckup. He was treating this like a normal duel at first, not thinking about who he was challenging.
Despite what she seemed to think of him, Erik liked Kirin, she didn't cater to his every whim, she would snap back at him.
He only then thought about the fact that Kirin didn't ever do anything to deserve the challenge, she would have to yield. He would apologize later.
He looked at her and saw no weapon, he wondered if she planned to yield immediately. That thought dies when he saw the 95 cm blade appear on her hip. The blade terrified him, it spoke of death. Then he thought more, Kirin wasn't a damsel, she was a seasoned duelist that had been fighting in this court for years without ever losing. He had only done training and, while prodigious in swordsmanship, had never truly dueled for honor.
He was still confident, but wary. His mother signaled the start of the duel and Kirin was...gone. He looked around and saw nothing, then he felt the metal at his neck. The blade felt like it...wanted. The blade wanted something from him, hungered for something, it chilled him to the bone.
"Yield", Kirin said in his ear, barely a whisper. He was scared, only now processing the fact that she moved 10 meters faster than he could blink. The stomach-dropping feeling of true dread, the dread that one feels when he knows death awaits in the dark, filled him. This...this was a mistake. He slammed the hilt of his blade into her side, giving him enough room to duck from under the sword and back away, but Kirin was already gone.
On instinct, he deflected a blow aimed at his leg, he didn't even see it. Then he felt pain, pain in his left hip to his right shoulder. She had gone through plate armor like it was paper, slashing through his defense. Everything went dark as he looked at the blood coming from the wound, his chest plate having been ripped off by the momentum of the slash.
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Kirin could barely control it. The blade wanted death, more than she ever thought possible. She slashed him deeper than she intended, it wasn't good.
"You....you killed him...you killed my son..", the Queen said shakily."No. my Queen no I..." before she could continue, the true monster awakened.
The Queen was a powerful mage in her own right, all of the women in the Deleparte family were. Kirin had never felt the brunt of that power until that moment.
The Queen screamed at Kirin. The last thing Kirin saw was a circle on the ground, circling her and the prince."YOU WILL NEVER SET FOOT IN MY KINGDOM AGAIN!"
Then, Kirin was cast out.
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1. honor champion/honorgärd- champion delegated to fight instead of the opposed/accused.
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