14.7
Jewel held her posture as the march began into the Capital of Cantor Reborn.
She had been informed there would be a Triumph for her when she arrived, the Halberdiers and sufficient men to bolster the image of what footmen and lords had made their journey with her to Burning Depths Ford at the last manor before her arrival proper into the capital.
The baron housing her had been kind, welcoming her like an adored sister or aunt. It wasn't until dinner where he was prattling on about how it was such an honor to welcome his late mother’s dearest and best friend from Viznove that she properly realized that this was the son of that one Baroness she had stayed with on her first visit.
A lord named Burchard she believed?
She asked Paul to gift his house with five of the Valasect messenger doves they were bringing to Mathias’ eyries for future correspondence. It only seemed fair if Jewel had truly left such an impression on the man’s family he might make for a future ally in the Realm’s court.
Marcel was also informed, although through less overt means, in case the local nobility could prove a useful ally and means of contact for his ‘work’ with the guild.
The capital had changed little since the last time she had visited prior to the war. Unlike Viznove it appeared there had not been a notable change in the fortunes of the dozens of overlapping rivers and underway passages leading out of the city at the heart of the Valley of Man.
Although Jewel had never seen it so vibrantly festive as she did now. The black and yellow banners of Cantor Reborn were at the gates as the vanguard of the Triumph entered to roaring waves of cheering voices. Young Kliatbatrn was there among them, his house’s banners held high.
Timotej and Ladislav rode their Gryphons in full parade armour afterwards, each stained in their nascent houses’ colors. Then were those of the officers and captains that had met up with them at the baron Burchard’s manor the evening prior.
It was nowhere near the thousands that had actually marched to war, not even the hundreds of footmen and cavalry that had served in the campaign. The Halberdiers were present as honor guard rather than full participants but Jewel suspected that the crowds didn't care for the difference.
The usual festival air was strong, billowing from streets on all sides as they made their way as directly as possible to the great estate that bridged the highest of the overlapping canals of Burning Depths Ford.
The foods that Jewel had caught scent of in her two other visits to the Valley of Man was billowing in clouds from the hundreds upon hundreds of cooking pots. The oil cooked dough and meat mingling gave way to open fire cooked morsels laden in spices as the triumph drew closer to the Palace estate itself.
Jewel as the Lady of the war took a privileged place near the end of the march, with Sergej the only figure of note ahead of her, just after the General on Land and his officers that Mathias had assigned her to manage the foreign levies.
Smithson as her freshly raised Captain of the Valasect guard rode a fine charger beside her on the left, Paul on her right with his own horse a matching black and the Bathory armor resplendent in the visnove black and red.
Coming up behind her Captain and Husband were the Twins and Gem in the finest of the dresses that could be made for them. Cut with all the capacity for grace and freedom of movement that Jewel had come to require for all of Gem’s clothing.
Allowing all of her daughter-selves to ride with legs astride the saddle of their steeds.
The crowd cheered all the louder as they saw her, the strange vulgar mannish words of ‘wyrm queen’ and ‘murad’s bane’ mingling with the more proper terms of the higher speech favored by Mathias’ court giving her the name ‘gold wyrm’.
The entire procession took hours, Jewel dutifully holding her posture, moving with all the grace she had honed over her life, her body’s every motion and face serene nobility. It was just past noon when they finally came upon the open square before the gates of the Palace’s crossing. The rest of the city having fallen away to either side but for the sparse buildings that could cling to the sides of the raised avenue.
There in view of his subjects for what must have been a rare sighting for most of the city was Mathias, High King of Cantor Reborn. To her eye he was frail.
The rising spires of the palace crossing and its grounds framing to his right and left just seemed to make what should have been a mighty man seem all the more diminished. His finery hung upon him in a way that perhaps was meant to hide the thin frame beneath it but just made Jewel think of how thin his sagging skin looked.
In the sunlight he arguably looked worse then when she had met him in his feasting hall just before the war.
The crown he wore upon his brow did not make the hair upon his head seem any less thin, as she came before him, the formation of the Triumph splitting to either side to join in the honor guard around the High King, his Queen and the closest advisors that could make the journey. Notably absent was the figure of her friend Thurzo, his illness still keeping him home in Arva for fear of his health.
Despite his aged skin and the scent of feint rot that came off the man as she lowered her head in what for their comparative sizes must have looked like a very deep supplication indeed for the crowd. In truth though Jewel’s head was only brought slightly lower then his own brow, requiring her to barely lower her eyes beneath his own gaze.
His smile was forced and he raised his hands, the people crowding at the edges of the streets took up a cheer for her. More voices echoed them on the streets, roofs and docks below to either side.
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The deep bellow of horns rose up over the throng of Burning Depths Ford and for a moment it sounded like the populace was trying to drown out the announcing call.
Then Jewel felt sorcery, not wizardry, but the carefully practiced ritual from two of the figures standing back from prominence to Mathias’ left and right. A working of mortal men drawing on a deeply etched pattern beneath the stone under the High King, where many other feet of esteemed men had stood before him.
The stone was venerable, ancient, Old Cantor Woven, but lively in a way its neighbors were not. Awakened often for the service it was about to perform again.
As Jewel ‘knelt’ while barely lowering her head lower then her liege the High King of Cantor Reborn spoke and his words carried, echoed in the deep brass of bells that rung not with chimes but his words.
“People of Burning Depths Ford, Today we honor our Lady of War, the Triumphant Shining Wyrm of Viznove, Conqueroress of Magarska! Bane of Murad!”
He spoke and the entire city rang with his voice, made metallic, harsh, thunderous where she could hear the actual power of his throat was quavering. The High King of Cantor Reborn stood tall to the eye of a distant peasant, but settled before him, her belly on the stones, her arms, legs and wings folded in tight to her sides Jewel could see he strained to even manage to stand.
“Cantor Reborn is Victorious! Magarska is Defeated and its terror splintered! For this service a feast in her honor, here in the palace, for the citizens of my fair city ten days of festivals and merriment! Praise Jewel of Rochford and Bathory, Countess of Viznove, Murad’s Bane! Gold Wyrm!”
The sorcery fell away from Mathias, the stones beneath his feet settled back into restfulness, Jewel rose back to her feet as he turned and marched as powerfully as he could manage, but she could smell the death upon him, the world within him sang about how it grated and pained with every motion. There were trembles in his hands and a strain in his eyes with every step.
As she fell into step behind him the High King spoke softly. Far too softly to be heard by anyone without a wyrm’s ears.
“Word of more than your victory and what you have sent in your letters has reached my ears Jewel of Rochford. There is a terrible stirring in the temples moving like fire on parched kindling all through the realm and beyond.”
Jewel, despite her difficulty with her composure lately, did not let her face or gait betray her. She leaned down close so her words could carry to his ear without being overheard.
“My High King, that is an uncertain and deeply personal matter, my court Priest still ‘conferring’ on the truth of the matter to his satisfaction.”
Mathias did not turn away as he walked, struggling to make his way up the steps without showing to those that could still witness his infirmity. Jewel did not acknowledge the way he briefly paused ever so slightly longer in his steps. When had she last seen the man move? Had it been this bad when last they met? surely the palace staff must suspect.
He raised a hand to gesture for her to lean closer, to make their conversation more obvious to witnesses.
“It is fortunate that you brought him within your entourage, the Pantheon is sending a delegation with three of the councilors of the Zodiac here to discuss the matter your court priest claims to have discovered with me personally.”
Jewel blinked slowly at that, then gently jostled her head, ears flicking like she had seen horses do to flick away flies. Adelyne had reported on a great many troubling things regarding the Pantheon and their continued interest and procurement of True Wyrm Eggs.
Of the divine power they had apparently been gathering through the splitting open of such, and the strange workings that the yolk within could be put to use for.
“What is their interest in the matter Priest Leo is investigating?”
That brought the High King to halt, she could feel in the world’s whispers how that pained him, almost more than the effort to ascend.
“You fool wyrm, if what your diviner suspects is true its a concern for every mortal in the world! The gods have claimed to shelter the souls of the dead since before the old empire of Cantor! If some of them have lied to us?!”
He shuddered, struggling to take a breath. One of his soldiers took a step towards him, but was waved off as Mathias forced himself under what the world told her was a great agony in his knees, hips and back to continue ascending the steps into the palace grounds proper.
“The Pantheon is sending members of their highest council to get to the bottom of the matter as soon as possible! They will be here in twelve days by the last message received."
They finally reached the gates of the palace itself, and as he made his way into the shelter of those walls his wife hurried up between Jewel and her husband to reach around a shockingly thin frame of his chest and heft his weight off of his legs.
Muttering what Jewel was pretty sure were curses in a language she had not yet learned!
Why was everyone’s wife so foreign?! It seemed absurd yet again to see a lady from another vault of the world marrying a man here.
It made Gwenn’s Betrothal seem nearly incestous by comparison with the proximity of Arva!
The thought felt like a single solid place to stand in the morass of the world life had become, something to cling to. Jewel had only just learned even part of what was going on in the Pantheon and now a delegation of their highest council was coming here, by intimation from Mathias to speak to her and Leo!
With a wave the High King dismissed her, and Jewel allowed the frail old man to be half carried by his wife and one of his footmen elsewhere in the Palace.
One of the familiar palace staff approached her then sank into a deep bow.
“Esteemed Countess, your party has been settled into the northernmost wing this time, if you would follow me.”
The woman spoke without lifting her head, voice practiced to a pitch to be easily heard despite the posture.
Jewel took a heavy breath and nodded.
“Lead the way then.”