Jackal Among Snakes

“I trust your journey here wasn’t difficult?” Princess Elenore asked from her desk, staring at the two in front of her. She had four golden-armored royal knights standing behind her.

The red-headed siblings Elaine and Rivien Vyrbell shook their heads fiercely. “Not at all,” Rivien began, a statement which Elaine agreed with a mumbled affirmation. “We were accosted by the undead. Fortunately, my sister recently ascended to A-rank.”

“I had been meaning to thank you for your help with my magical progress. I was able to get one of those Magister hoarders to give me the knowledge I needed to ascend,” Elaine thanked her with a hand held to her chest, her green eyes earnest.

Elenore nodded. “Alright. Argrave spoke highly of both your skills, and I’m short of time so I’ll summarize things for now. Rivien—you’re to become a member of parliament and the minister of Jast. You’re to help deliver the king’s will and the parliament’s will to all within the county of Jast. Elaine—you’re to represent the Order on the parliament. Unofficially, you’re a link that I have to keep track of things in the Order. You understand?”

“I do,” both confirmed.

“This is no joke,” Elenore stared at them with her steely gray eyes. “I don’t want underhanded dealings or corruption on any level. I keep track of things. You’ll be well paid, but well monitored. Let that be a deterrent from any skimming off the top you might be considering.”

“I under—”

“And that includes your men.” Elenore stared at Rivien fiercely. “If there are any rogue agents, your head rolls with them. I trust you know how to spell guillotine?”

Rivien stepped back, eyes narrowed. “Here I thought I was the gangster, Bat. Still hard to believe that it was you I was dealing with this whole time… but I digress. Yeah, we have an understanding.”

Elenore placed her elbows on the table and entwined her pale, skinny fingers. “Good. For the first while, you’ll be helping shepherd plague refugees, facilitate road reparation and construction, and find recruits for the military. You’ll get details—for now, I have something to attend to.” She looked behind her. “See them out.”

One of the royal knights moved to obey, moving the Vyrbell siblings out of the room to prepare for the next guest. Elenore briefly wrote on a piece of paper as she waited, then turned to another parchment that had a long list. After crossing off a point on the list, she stared at the next entry for a long time. She rubbed a golden ring on her finger—the B-rank warding ring that Durran had given her.

“Bring him in,” Elenore looked back once again.

The door opened, the royal knight leading the next guest into the room. She stared ahead, her gaze slowly lowering to keep eye contact as the guest entered further into the room.

“I’m very sure the briefing that was given amply conveyed that His Majesty was seeking S-rank spellcasters for potent, highly dangerous combat.” Elenore leaned back in her chair. “I’m wondering why you volunteered to join him, Artur.”

own two feet, the mantle he wore dragging along the ground behind him instead of suspending him in the air. His eyes gleamed as he answered, “Do

but revealed it again half a second later. “I think that His Majesty made it clear

good materials.” Artur spread his arms out. “I do have my reasons.

#####

trees that constituted the Bloodwoods, a tan-skinned elven woman with white hair sat on one of the branches. Onychinusa wore clothes that covered all but her head, and as her legs swayed back and forth

tendrils of black smoke danced out of her sockets, stretching past the branches. Far, far away, at the opposite end of this long trail of blackness, her two amber eyes looked down upon a stone fortress. They moved about, taking in sights. When Argrave emerged from his tent, walking about and delivering orders, they fixed

black mist, dispersing through the air and clinging to the trees and leaves. Just after, a flash of gold came to where she had been.

had left for a long while. After a time, her eyes melted away again, reforming elsewhere as they resumed

bottom of its body had sucking teethless mouths that inhaled the leaves of the redwood trees right off the branches and kept it fixed to

hand in the wake of a mana ripple, and with a burst of purple light the creature simply vanished. It reappeared miles away, the spirits tossing it into empty air. It flailed helplessly, falling

#####

House Quadreign opened a door, looking about the room quickly enough her blonde hair became a whip. Someone hailed her, and

coming to sit with the man. “I thought… I didn’t

the elf confirmed, red eyes watching her passively as she sat. “But… your king summoned me. I was called to this place.” The elf looked around. “I know this kingdom has grander cities—why does the king hold his parliament here? Beyond the grand fortresses blocking the entrances, there’s only this coastal village with one inn

king has plans for this place, apparently. It’s not my place to judge—merely to represent mom.” She tapped her hand against

head. “Frankly, I would have ignored it… but that letter had contents about my people. He gave claims for betterment I could not ignore and promises of

at him seriously. “So you’re only

of this waiting. I need to find the blue-eyed vampire—a harder task now with the eye destroyed. But considering the man that hailed me is the one who knew how to banish the scourge of vampirism

you’re staying?” Svetlana’s pleasure seeped into her voice, and she cleared her throat

enough for all others to gather, I’m told.” The elf crossed his arms. “Something big

#####

pairs of two. It had to be two—the content of the crates was pure metal, and more than that metal made to scale with the Veidimen. Elsewhere, he saw his three officers Grimalt, Bastal, and Rasten already handling their armor. It was dark gray steel, all, and though unpolished the magic on

known the royal smiths to

he looked at Orion, who wore exactly what he’d just described as stupid. “More than that, I had Elenore tap

rest of the train of new arrivals was not far behind the armor delivery. The bulk of them were common soldiers and spellcasters to better aid in garrisoning this fortress. Regardless of what they did