Girl!Joren
I'm just making a nuisance of myself, here. I will go off and do proper things soon, but for the moment have some more girl!Joren fic. This is a follow on from last time, the next morning.
If anyone is wondering what girl!Joren looks like,
rain_sleet_snow drew a picture of her. I have inspired fanart. I can die happy.
The Privy Council meeting, a regrettably long affair involving detailed plans for the forthcoming Progress, had finally ended. Lady Knight Keladry of Mindelan, Knight Commander of the King's Own, and King's Champion, made her way to the buffet at the end of the meeting room, where servants had just left several teapots, many plates of small cakes and fruit, and an intriguing silver pot with a long spout emitting aromatic steam. She sighed, rolled her shoulders to try and relieve the knotted muscles, and began to help herself to some of the tea; she recognised one of the calming herbal ones her Healer friend Nealan recommended, and decided that wound suit her needs admirably. She was blowing gently on her hot drink, trying to decide between an apple or a pastry, when a voice purred in her ear;
“You look tired, Keladry, my dear.”
Kel jumped in surprise, and managed to slop some of her still rather hot tea on her breeches.
“Ow! Great Goddess...”
“Not her, but close.”
Kel turned, to look at a tall, slender woman, coldly beautiful and perfectly turned out in a pale blue gown, cut in the latest fashion. The woman smiled encouragingly.
“Joren, Prime Minister you may be, but if I didn't really want to drink this tea, I would throw it over you. Do you know how much trouble you've caused me?”
“Trouble?” Joren poured herself a small cup of the scarlet liquid the silver pot contained. She inhaled deeply, and took an appreciative sip. “The way you went dashing off after Eldorne yesterday made me think your troubles would soon be over. Did he disobey orders and hide from you? Because you can have them flogged for that,” she took another sip, “and punished as well, of course.”
“We had a very long discussion, by the end of which I just about convinced him I wasn't in cahoots with you to frame him for my personal amusement. He hasn't resigned, although he threatened to about seven times. He also said that treason ran in his family, and assassination would come very easily to him. Really, Joren, you couldn't have picked anyone who would take that sort of joke less well than Lerant.”
“I picked him because you seem to have some bizarre infatuation there, and I care that you are well catered for in all your needs. Prime Ministers have to care about all the needs of all their subjects, noble or common.”
“Ha, I didn't dare tell him it was your twisted idea of match making. Really, the truth is always the strangest of things.” Kel sighed and eyed the pastries. “Are you going to eat any of those nut-honey turnovers?”
“No. I've a new dress on order, and those things lethal for your waistline.” Joren looked with undisguised hunger at the pastries, and topped up her cup.
“Mmm,” Kel swallowed, “but they are so good. All that Copper Island Red tea is probably worse for you. And do you know how expensive it is?”
“This is from my own private stock, so you needn't start on inappropriate use of Government coffers. The King took a hard line on the official expense accounts, and I have had my fingers regally rapped.”
Kel spluttered some flakes of puff pastry down her tunic. “Roald gave you a row! Ha!” She took another pastry to celebrate.
“Those gowns were for the meetings with the Tusaine delegation. They were a political manoeuvre. You can't deny we did rather well out of those new trade treaties.”
“Wearing such low cut gowns that the foreign delegates cannot concentrate is not a valid strategy for economic negotiation!”
“Spoilsport. I'm sure there's nothing in the Code of Chivalry about it,” Joren pouted.
“And changing the subject doesn't distract me from the fact I am very annoyed with your busy bodying.” Kel sipped her tea. “Really, Joren.”
“You know you sound like my maiden Great Aunt Ofelia? I went to all the trouble of setting up an awkward, confrontational situation with you and the object of your affection, so passions could run high, you could fight, and voila! It could all spill over into unrestrained physicality. It is textbook, Keladry. At least you got a...” Joren eyed Kel, who was suddenly drinking tea with more interest than it really seemed to warrant.
“You didn't, did you? You really sat up all night just talking? Mithros, Kel, you are useless!”
“There are more important things than that,” Kel muttered. She took another pastry. “And I am the one who is angry with you! You are not allowed to be outraged, you interfering besom.”
“You wasted Prime Ministerial cunning, that's practically treason. Do I have to bang both your heads together? Is straightforward violence the only thing you recognise?”
“Just don't interfere. I know, before you start, that you're the Prime Minister, everyone's business is your concern, but, really, keep out.” Kel put down her empty mug and finished the last bite of her pastry. “You can be so unhelpful.”
“You'd miss me if I was gone,” Joren batted her eyelids.
“Like the plague. Look, I have to go, I have training to supervise.”
“Kel, that's what Sergeant Majors are for. You tell them what to do, and they make the troops do it. I had the same training as you, it's basic military procedure.”
“I enjoy it, and Goddess knows it gives me a break from paperwork. And no, before you ask, I don't need more clerks!” Kel walked off, surreptitiously brushing pastry flakes off her tunic.
“I am upset you find me so predictable. Off and roll in the mud with your men, then!” Joren called after her, because she was pathologically incapable of not having the last word.
Joren finished the last mouthful of her tea, cold and bitter though it was. It was not to be wasted, expensively imported as it was. She had to do something about the export tax on it as well, but Queen Dove was a difficult woman to influence. Joren made a little note in the pad she always carried at her belt. Flicking through, she saw a timetable tucked in the back cover. It told her the King's Own training camp had left for the Royal Forest two days before. So who on earth was Kel training? Joren felt simultaneously intrigued, and proud that Kel had managed to be devious, all by herself. The girl was finally learning! Joren clicked her fingers, and one of her ubiquitous clerks slipped over to her side. There was a muttered conversation and the black clad man hurried off. Joren swept off to her office, mind ticking over, a smile tickling the corners of her mouth.
The small, sealed parchment arrived on her desk an hour later. Joren cracked the heavy wax, and read. “Single combat,” she smiled to herself. “With a sergeant. Blond. They won an equal number of bouts with the sword.”
Joren leaned back for a moment. She won every bout, every conflict, with her mind.