Blade of Erogrund

Chapter Fourteen- Lord & Ladies

Godric sat with a heavy thump on the seat of his chair. Mira more gracefully pulled the hem of her dress aside and sat beside Aeis, who had already resumed his meal.

Reaching for the leather sack, Godric eagerly joined him and they all sat in nearly complete silence, except for the quiet munching of food and the gurgling of the fountain.

This continued for quite some time until Mira threw her hands in the air with an exasperated sigh. "Good lord, will you two ever stop eating?!"

"You could join us, you know," Godric mentioned. Her plate still sat beside her, largely untouched.

"There is no time for food right now!"

"It's lunch, so if there ever was a time, it was now." Godric's reply was followed with a clever grin. Mira still did not seem to appreciate it.

"Never mind that," she said hurriedly. "Aeis, can you tell Godric what you told me?"

"Right," said the other boy, pushing away the last morsels of his meal. "There are a couple things you are going to need to know going into this Council meeting, Godric."

The other boy nodded and leaned forward in his chair intently. As much as he resented Aeis at the moment, he had no choice but to rely on him.

"First, treat everyone as your enemy." As if I wasn't already. "I never finished telling you about Caeros, but if you only know one thing it's that he has many friends. Ennor is king, but Caeros is ruler, if you get my meaning.

"At the Council today they will inevitably go over an important issue and word on the street is you will be involved. Since no one briefed the patrol last night, it's safe to assume Ennor will have to send out another. Intelligence on the Dragon's Nest is crucial at the moment and he won't rest until we know more about the Dragons' den.That means they will have to pick another troop."

"So?" Asked Godric. "I still don't see why they should include me. I don't even know how to properly handle a weapon yet."

"Precisely," countered Aeis. "You're vulnerable. See, as much as these meetings are made to look like they are collaborations, they are really just times for each lord to make a power play. The lords work together only so much as they are mandated to; the rest of the time they are at each others' throats and with you in the mix they will be tougher than ever. There is a strict protocol when it comes to picking members of a patrol. There are ten lords and each is allowed to nominated three members of the patrol. As unfair as it is, Ennor is not counted as one of the ten lords. Instead, he is allowed to veto three nominations in order to have some control of who gets into the patrol, but three is not very many."

Aeis's implication sank in slowly. "So," Godric gathered slowly, "you're saying that Caeros will try to send me on the patrol?"

"Perhaps," Aeis concluded. "It isn't quite that simple, though. In addition to three nominations, each lord can veto one of the other's nominations, provided that he forfeits one of his. So you can see how this might get difficult."

"Can't Ennor just command that one of the lords does or doesn't send someone? He is king after all."

"No," Aeis immediately answered. "The lords would never give up a chance to get rid of one another and Ennor knows it. These patrol usually take incredible casualties, especially on a mission as risky as this one. The opportunity to remove key supporting nobles or officers is too tempting."

"It's a game of politics," Mira explained. "One where if you don't win, you lose. Ennor is king because everyone tolerates it, not because they obey. Every lord got there because they had friends in high places, like a building held up by columns. Get enough columns conveniently killed while on patrol," she said grimly, "and the ceiling comes down."