Uninvited (Huckleberry FotW, Chocolate Chip Mint, Berry Punch + Malt)
‘Verse: ☼ The Sun, Radiant ☼
Flavors/Toppings/Extras: FotW: Huckleberry #7 (a guest should be blind in another man's house), Chocolate Chip Mint #25 (rumpled), Berry Punch #14 (high horse) + Malt (Summer '13 reward: we like disliking one another)
Rating: PG
Wordcount: 494
Title: Uninvited
Summary: Gavin has more enemies within his own country than outside of it.
Notes: Introducing Hector. I'm not quite sure where he'll turn up again, since he seems to have a mind of his own.
The instant Gavin was able to walk, he was out of the infirmary. Oh, he returned at night to be lectured at in a roundabout fashion by the perpetually-ruffled head healer, simply because the king knew enough about poison to not stretch his luck that far. He'd rather be clucked over like an invalid than drop dead if he pushed it. Mesvati helped as much as she could in her own way, simply by letting him escape the ward and taking the brunt of her master's ire when Gavin turned up missing each day. The poor girl may have been mousy, but she had a surprising amount of backbone.
Gavin hadn't become a king by lying about in bed. Besides, he needed to know what was going on outside the isolated ward. Surely time hadn't stopped passing for Arambh just because the foreign king was nearly killed - in fact, if his advisors were pushing for war, he needed to be there. The idiots were powerhungry, but they hadn't the faintest sense of self-preservation.
Especially Hector. He was the eldest of them, the grumpiest and the most stubborn. He had insisted on treating Gavin like a child since before the coronation, but he was firmly entrenched in his position and knew it. He'd strutted about the castle back in Fallstar, pointing out every flaw and inefficiency in how the place was run, terrifying the servants with his sharp tongue... Now, across the border in the very country Fallstar had warred with since oldest living memory, he was no different.
Briefly, Gavin had considered the possibility of a traitor within the delegation. If there was, he'd suspect Hector first. He would enjoy it being him. The problem was, Hector was extremely xenophobic and had made it known he would never work with Arambhis.
He was so public about it, in fact, that Gavin had wondered if Hector was making his own alibi.
I can't act on it, though, the king thought on more than one wandering. He had to be careful. Despite - or because of - his disrespect for the king, Hector was supported by the other advisors (at least, while it suited them, Gavin thought bitterly). As useless and insubordinate as they were, collectively they could make him and his position obsolete. Perhaps they'd have never dared it with his predecessors, all descendants of the first Fallstarian king and thus given some traditional legitimacy through their blood, but Gavin couldn't trace his ancestry anywhere.
He satisfied neither the supporters of the old regime or the radical idealists who wanted to abolish the monarchy altogether. And with the middle-road majority silent either way, he knew he would need all his charisma and wit to hold on to his crown.
So he snuck out of the ward, wandering the corridors of the elegant-if-labyrinthine palace, and plotted every route to his own demise, the better to avoid them.
Flavors/Toppings/Extras: FotW: Huckleberry #7 (a guest should be blind in another man's house), Chocolate Chip Mint #25 (rumpled), Berry Punch #14 (high horse) + Malt (Summer '13 reward: we like disliking one another)
Rating: PG
Wordcount: 494
Title: Uninvited
Summary: Gavin has more enemies within his own country than outside of it.
Notes: Introducing Hector. I'm not quite sure where he'll turn up again, since he seems to have a mind of his own.
The instant Gavin was able to walk, he was out of the infirmary. Oh, he returned at night to be lectured at in a roundabout fashion by the perpetually-ruffled head healer, simply because the king knew enough about poison to not stretch his luck that far. He'd rather be clucked over like an invalid than drop dead if he pushed it. Mesvati helped as much as she could in her own way, simply by letting him escape the ward and taking the brunt of her master's ire when Gavin turned up missing each day. The poor girl may have been mousy, but she had a surprising amount of backbone.
Gavin hadn't become a king by lying about in bed. Besides, he needed to know what was going on outside the isolated ward. Surely time hadn't stopped passing for Arambh just because the foreign king was nearly killed - in fact, if his advisors were pushing for war, he needed to be there. The idiots were powerhungry, but they hadn't the faintest sense of self-preservation.
Especially Hector. He was the eldest of them, the grumpiest and the most stubborn. He had insisted on treating Gavin like a child since before the coronation, but he was firmly entrenched in his position and knew it. He'd strutted about the castle back in Fallstar, pointing out every flaw and inefficiency in how the place was run, terrifying the servants with his sharp tongue... Now, across the border in the very country Fallstar had warred with since oldest living memory, he was no different.
Briefly, Gavin had considered the possibility of a traitor within the delegation. If there was, he'd suspect Hector first. He would enjoy it being him. The problem was, Hector was extremely xenophobic and had made it known he would never work with Arambhis.
He was so public about it, in fact, that Gavin had wondered if Hector was making his own alibi.
I can't act on it, though, the king thought on more than one wandering. He had to be careful. Despite - or because of - his disrespect for the king, Hector was supported by the other advisors (at least, while it suited them, Gavin thought bitterly). As useless and insubordinate as they were, collectively they could make him and his position obsolete. Perhaps they'd have never dared it with his predecessors, all descendants of the first Fallstarian king and thus given some traditional legitimacy through their blood, but Gavin couldn't trace his ancestry anywhere.
He satisfied neither the supporters of the old regime or the radical idealists who wanted to abolish the monarchy altogether. And with the middle-road majority silent either way, he knew he would need all his charisma and wit to hold on to his crown.
So he snuck out of the ward, wandering the corridors of the elegant-if-labyrinthine palace, and plotted every route to his own demise, the better to avoid them.