Frustrations of a Self-Proclaimed Villain Lord

"Of course, Your Majesty. I am known for forgetting things at profitable times."

Adrien stepped from behind the screen. The physician would be furious. Good thing he wasn’t here.

The Crown Prince wore a dark robe, his face pale but no longer sickly. The old heaviness in his posture was gone, though weakness still clung to his body. He held himself with effort.

Not pride. Effort. There was a difference.

The Lady of the Crimson Quill stood immediately. This time, I did too. Everyone did. Adrien looked faintly annoyed by that.

Excellent. He was recovering enough to be irritated by ceremony.

"You will not write that I am here," he said.

"I will not."

"You will not imply it."

"I will not."

"You will not make charming remarks about hidden recovery, secret residence, royal debt, or the East swallowing the future of the empire."

Her eyes brightened. Abi whispered, "That last one is good."

"Abi," I said. He closed his mouth.

She looked at Adrien thoughtfully. "Then what would Your Highness allow?"

He hesitated. I watched him. This was important. Not because the paper mattered, though it did. Because he was learning the difference between being hidden and being protected. Between letting others speak for him and choosing what silence should mean.

He looked at me once. I gave him nothing. He would have to decide.

Adrien turned back to her. "Say the Crown Prince affirms the revised witness protocol," he said. "Say he trusts the investigation under imperial and Sonomian authority. Say any subject approached by unknown clergy, archive officials, or charitable agents requesting names, songs, witness responses, or private ritual participation should report to the palace guard."

Not bad. A little official. But not bad.

Her expression softened in approval. "May I improve the wording?"

Adrien looked wary. "That depends."

She smiled. "Always."

"Show me first."

"Of course."

She sat again and reached for one of Bernard’s blank sheets, her pen moving quickly, not like a court scribe, but like someone catching birds mid-flight and tying them into lines before they escaped.

While she wrote, the room settled into a working silence. William refilled tea. Bernard watched her technique with the face of a young man seeing forbidden machinery. Abi pretended not to lean over the page. My mother silently corrected the order of two paragraphs before she wrote them, by tapping the table once.

The Lady noticed. Adjusted.

Terrifying. Women with pens were more dangerous than half the knights I knew.

When she finished, she slid the page toward Adrien. He read it, then again. His expression shifted.

"What?" I asked.

He handed it to me. I read.

By emergency affirmation of the Crown Prince, no subject of Yarina shall be required to answer any unauthorized call, hymn, oath, or witness phrase given outside lawful ceremony. No borrowed voice shall be recognized. No child shall be surrendered to private charitable, clerical, or archival assessment without direct guardian verification and palace seal. Any such request is to be reported immediately.

The Grand Duke of Sonomi, acting under imperial authority, has placed several protected children and witnesses beyond unauthorized reach. Their names shall not be printed. Their dignity shall not be sold.

I looked up. She watched me. "Too much?" she asked.

"No."

Her expression changed. Just slightly. She’d expected me to object to the dignity line. I didn’t.

How annoying. Now she knew something true.

I looked at Bernard. "Copy it."

His pen moved at once. "Add," I said, "that anyone printing false names of protected children will be purchased, sued, or ruined according to my mood."

Mother looked at me. The Lady smiled. "May I phrase that better?"

"No."

"Yes," Mother said.

I looked at her. She ignored me.

She wrote another line. Any publication endangering protected minors or witnesses will be treated as interference with an imperial investigation.

Dry. Effective. Less satisfying.

Fine.

"Acceptable," I said.

Abi whispered, "Purchased, sued, or ruined had more personality."

"I know."

The Empress stepped forward and placed her own seal beside the prepared text. Adrien placed his. I placed mine.

She looked at the three seals. For the first time, she didn’t appear amused. She appeared aware. The Empress, the Crown Prince, and House Konstantin had given her a narrative with power behind it. That was not mere gossip. That was a cannon wrapped in print.

She folded the page carefully. "I will need to leave now."

"You will have an escort," I said.

"No."

I smiled. "Yes."

"I work better without one."

"I am not protecting you for your benefit."

"How flattering."

"If the Choir wants rumor roads, it may target the person paving over them."

Her smile faded. She considered, then nodded. "One shadow. Not visible."

"Two."

"One."

"Two, and you get exclusive access to the official Hall transcript after Bernard cleans it."

Bernard looked horrified. Her eyes gleamed. "Done."

Shameless woman. I approved. Slightly.

She stood and curtsied again. "Your Excellency. Your Majesty. Your Highness. Lady Konstantin. Former Grand Duke. Lord Abinatha."

Abi preened.

She turned toward Bernard. "And Master Bernard. Guard your line. People will steal it by morning."

Bernard went red again. I narrowed my eyes. "Leave before I change my mind."

She smiled and left with William guiding her to the side passage. Two shadows followed. Unseen. Mostly.

When the door closed, Adrien sat down with a slow breath. The Empress was immediately beside him. "You overexerted yourself."

"I sat and spoke."

"That has historically been enough to start wars."

"Mother."

I watched them argue quietly, then looked toward the window. Outside, the city waited, restless and hungry. By dawn, it would receive a story. Not the whole truth. Never that. Truth, unshaped, could be a weapon handed to fools. What mattered was giving people enough reality to stand on while denying the Choir the rhythm it wanted.

No borrowed voice shall be recognized.

Bernard’s line would move faster than the old phrasing. If we were fortunate, it would choke the rumor road before the Choir could use it. If we were not, then at least the city would become noisy in a more useful direction.

Mother approached my side. "You’re aware," she said quietly, "that this will make you look protective."

I stared out the window. A carriage rolled out through the side gate, carrying the most dangerous writer in the city and two shadows she’d probably pretend not to notice.

"Protective people are trusted," I said.

"Yes."

"Trusted people are easier to use."

Mother looked at me. "Is that what you’re doing?"

"Obviously."

I could feel her gaze. Warm. Terrible. Understanding too much.

"I see," she said.

She did not believe me. How rude.

By the third night bell, the presses began. By the fourth, the first sheets crossed the upper district. By dawn, servants were reading them in kitchens, guards were passing them between posts, carriage drivers were repeating the line outside gates, and noblewomen were pretending not to send footmen for extra copies.

By breakfast, the city had a new phrase.

No borrowed voice shall be recognized.

It moved through the Capital like a match carried carefully from lamp to lamp. Every time someone said it, the air felt a fraction cleaner. Not safe. Never safe. But clearer.

Unfortunately, by midmorning, a second phrase began traveling beside it.

The Grand Duke protects children.

I heard it first from a maid who thought I wasn’t close enough to hear. Then from a guard. Then from a kitchen boy. Then from a noble messenger who looked at me as if I had personally descended from a painting of benevolence.

How vile. I had attempted to control the rumor road and somehow become a public symbol of protective authority.

Again.

The direction of the story had shifted under my hand when I wasn’t looking. I noticed the redirection. I refused to examine it. Instead, I finished my tea and said, "William."

"Yes, Your Excellency."

"Buy the paper distribution network."

He blinked. "The entire network, sire?"

"As much as is available."

Abi, who had been reading the evening special with unholy delight, looked up. "Why?"

I smiled pleasantly. "If the Capital insists on giving me a reputation, I may as well own the road it travels on."

William bowed. "Very good, Your Excellency."

Adrien, sitting across the breakfast table with physician approved broth and deeply unapproved amusement, lowered his paper. "You realize this doesn’t make you look less protective."

"I am not discussing this with a prince currently eating soup in my house."

"It’s broth."

"That’s worse."

Spiro, seated beside me, read the repeated line slowly from the printed sheet. "No borrowed voice shall be recognized," he said.

The room quieted. He looked up, startled. "Did I say it wrong?"

"No," I said.

His small fingers rested over the words, then he nodded seriously. "It sounds strong."

I looked at the paper, then at the child.

"Yes," I said. "It does."

The phrase had worked. The city had taken it in. The Choir’s old rhythm had been interrupted by a better one.

How troublesome that protection, when properly written, could sound almost like a threat.

I decided not to think about that either. The morning was already too crowded.