“This way, Zephyrin! Make haste, make haste!”

“Monsieur, it is improper to speak thus to a guest!” admonished the governess of the future Rudolf XIV, giving Zephyrin an apologetic look as she did so. Zephyrin slightly shook his head with a smile and simply replied, “I apologize for my sluggishness, Your Royal Highness.”

The Cygnon waved his hand dismissively, in such a way that Zephyrin was forcefully reminded of the boy’s mother. “Sir, I admire your concern for propriety; but as we are to be brothers, I insist on an informal mode of address. Call me Roland!”

The grandiloquence of this courtly mode of address coupled with his childish voice produced a comic effect, it was true, but also an inborn sense of authority, one that well justified the hopes of the aristocracy, that Rudolf XIII’s successor would be a decisive and effective ruler, in stark contrast to the irresolute man who occupied the throne today.

The prince waited with thinly disguised impatience for Zephyrin to cross the unseasonably verdant sward, tapping his foot and clutching a model giraffe in one hand, carved of the prodigious tooth or tusk of some unnamed beast, and a metallic, argent-hued hippogriff in the other hand, whose sleek plumage was meticulously graven out of iridescent nacre and which displayed a particularly fierce expression. A great favorite of the crown prince, it was his inseparable companion and playmate, and often seen preying upon the hapless ivory giraffe, whose soft tourmaline eyes could only stare in mute resignation as it was vigorously worried in the hippogriff’s beak, or seized by its talons.

At present, however, both hippogriff and giraffe were imitating the proverbial lion and lamb as their master, Rudolf-Louarn Roland Lieuwrude Adhémar Médarius dy Gaulyrie (as the crown prince had matter-of-factly introduced himself the day before) was now wholly engrossed in giving a tour of the Palace Gardens to Zephyrin, for whom he had developed an immediate liking.

While the little prince chattered excitedly about his personal flower plot and the specimens he intended to offer his mother next, provided the weather held out for a few days longer, Zephyrin allowed his eye to roam over the meticulously manicured grounds of the palace he had expected to enter by his father’s side as a triumphant general, crowned with honors and acclaimed by the nation.

Though the sky was only partially overcast, there was an unexpectedly oppressive undertone to the geometrically precise configuration of hedges and parterres, the cause of which Zephyrin needed some time to pinpoint. Before long he concluded that it was due to the jarring contrast created by the gray, looming edifice that served as the garden’s backdrop. The gardens, a much later addition to the imposing but austere fortification, were evidently calculated to lighten the locality’s severe aspect, but did not wholly succeed in doing so.

If the river island of Gaulyria’s kings could be likened a mythological sea-beast rising from the Seicwan’s depths, then the palace was assuredly the monster’s stone crown, its crenelated ramparts jagged and uneven like massive, well-worn molars. Algae-green where mosses crept up its walls’ feet and a faded gray where highest and most subjected to the onslaught of the elements, the somber palace, which despite its name was rather more reminiscent of a feudal castle, bore ample testimony to the martial heritage of its proprietors.

Zephyrin found himself unfavorably comparing the heavy construction with that of Elysia’s delicate, airy architecture, a thought he pushed from his mind annoyedly. He then briefly wondered at the palace’s state of neglect, before remembering that a relocation to the aged palace had been forced upon the king by the rioters of nearly ten years ago, who had insisted that he abandon his more pleasant domains ten or more leagues distant from Lutesse in favor of reigning from the seat of Gaulyria’s ancient monarchs. If the king made the capital his abode, it was hoped, the plight of the starving masses would not be so easily ignored.

“—and over there,” said Roland, breaking into Zephyrin’s thoughts, “—is the glasshouse! There’re all sorts of flowers there, and even a peridexery!”

“A peridexery?”

“It’s like an orangery, but with peridexion trees,” the young prince informed him. “The fruits are swirly and curious looking, but they taste marvelous.”

“Do you remember where those trees are most commonly found, Monsieur?” asked the crown prince’s governess, who earlier that day had—with some difficulty, admittedly—wedged in an introduction between Roland’s lively chatter and given her name, which was Madame Ehzvina.

The Cygnon scrunched his face, trying desperately to recall a recent lesson. “Um… in Primæva?”

“Yes. But which country, exactly?” prompted Madame Ehzvina. “It’s nearer to the equator than our southernmost colony, Navaö…” she hinted.

As the boy continued to struggle, Zephyrin decided to come to his assistance. “Undhu. Peridexions are endemic to that land, which is why the natives fared comparatively well even before the great dragon exterminations.

“That’s right. And Monsieur’s brother is from there,” Madame Ehzvina told the prince. Roland swiveled to face Zephyrin, his blue eyes parted wide in astonishment. “How! You, from Primæva?”

Amused by his misunderstanding, Zephyrin waited as the governess patiently clarified. “I was not referring to our guest, who is not yet a formal member of Her Majesty’s household, but to the adopted brother who is.”

“Oh. I hope Mama-Queen won’t take too long to adopt you!” said the crown prince, slipping his hand in Zephyrin’s before he could react. Remembering then the brother his mother had already adopted, Roland posed to his governess the question, “When will Tanji visit us next?”

“During the winter holidays. He is very busy studying at the Royal Academy. It is to be hoped you will profit from his and dy Valensis’s examples. Dy Valensis,” she added, “is at the head of his year. It took him all of one semester to rise to the top and earn the title of Emperor.”

“Emperor! How grand that sounds. Is an emperor greater than a king?” Being answered in the affirmative, the prince lapsed into thought, before deciding, “I think I should like to be the emperor of a very small realm more than the king of a great one.”

“And why is that, Monsieur?” inquired his governess, as several smiling courtiers were seen loitering in earshot, no doubt hoping to catch a bon mot from the princeling.

“Because,” explained the heir to the throne, “though a ruler may lose his kingdom, his title remains. No man can take it from him.”

“But would Monsieur still wish himself an emperor even if deprived of his regiment and suit of armor?”

“Ah! My governess knows where to prick so that it most smarts!” exclaimed the princeling, as his listeners smiled. Turning then to Zephyrin with a rueful smile, and beckoning him close, he lowered his voice and whispered through cupped hands, “I suspect her real name is Madame Meanie! But breathe not a word of that to her, my friend!” Then he started forward, pulling Zephyrin along with him. The prince showed him his flowers, somewhat the worse for wear after the recent cold snap but still resisting bravely with the much-needed assistance of a number of strategically placed firestones.

“I’m very sad because I won’t be able to keep offering bouquets at the hospital,” he stated, looking down glumly at the last flowers of the season. “And the blooms in the hothouse are too precious—that’s what Papa-King says.”

Zephyrin almost spoke up to the effect that he could practice weaving magical bouquets for the patients, but the words died in his throat. For the boy, there would soon be no more hospital visits, no supervised trips to the city to distribute alms. Zephyrin couldn’t bring himself to act as though he were ignorant of the fate that would befall the child and his family; never mind Roland, he would feel as though he were deceiving himself.

He raised his eyes to the sprawling mass of the palace, its bulk blocking out the thin shafts of light and casting them in shadow. For a moment a terrible restlessness seized him. He had an ominous sensation that if he didn’t succeed in leaving quickly, he would face the same end as the royal family…

Calm yourself, he thought. Two months and some weeks remained before the situation truly became dire. That gave him more than enough time to return to the lyceum.

Zephyrin briefly raised his eyes and looked at the governess. If she had noticed the strange intensity of his gaze, she gave no sign of it. And then, sparing him the need to think of a suitable rejoinder or change of topic, Zephyrin noticed that a small group of ladies accompanied by a handsome, smooth-faced young gentleman had ambled only a few dozen paces off from where they were standing. Surprisingly, the Cygnon scowled as he followed their slow progress with mistrustful eyes. “My uncle, here again! Oh, how I detest him!”

“You do not detest him, Monsieur,” Madame Ehzvina said sharply, wasting no time in issuing her admonition. “You detest his deed, which I will concede was most unworthy of his dignity.” Forestalling Zephyrin’s inquiry, she explained in a murmur, “His Royal Highness’s uncle knows how fond he is of his flowers, and derives a deplorable satisfaction from jumping in the flowerbeds and stomping on them.”

Zephyrin nodded, though quite unable to picture the nobleman in his splendid finery engaged in such a petty act, more appropriate for a child Roland’s age than a youth on the cusp of manhood, as he appeared to be. Plump-faced but slender from the neck down, with his long, powdered hair curled into ringlets at the sides but freely falling in the back past a pure white neckcloth, the rosy-lipped nobleman cut a trim figure.

In sharp disaccord with his fashionable appearance, however, was his deportment—for as Zephyrin watched, he advanced in a semi-crouch, his hands extended like a cat’s paws, while a gaggle of ladies formed a circle around him, their feather-tufted headdresses bobbing as they evasively hopped this way and that like feeding sparrows.

“…Who is he, and what is he doing?” Zephyrin asked, his eyes not leaving the bizarre spectacle.

“That is Duke Efflam, prince of the blood, and he is amusing himself as best he knows how,” responded Madame Ehzvina in a long-suffering tone, one indicating to Zephyrin that before caring for the rambunctious Roland, the governess had been assigned an even more unruly ward. “Of late his chief delight consists of tickling the court’s ladies and maids.”

Just as Zephyrin was wondering whether this was a euphemism intended for his childish ears, he saw the duke pivot on his heel and lunge in toward a shrieking lady, who for all her earsplitting remonstrances did not seem wholly displeased to find herself the prey of a man two decades her junior. Having tormented her to their mutual satisfaction, the duke then whirled around and turned his attention to her madly giggling companion, whose skirt-upheld flight was about as determined and long-lasting as that of a newborn lamb pursued by a wolf.

The Cygnon watched these antics with a scowl on his face. “Grown-ups are fond of very strange games,” he commented in a tone of arch disapproval. Then, facing Zephyrin once more: “Come, let us away, my friend! Reasonable gentlemen that we are, we know better how to amuse ourselves.” He tugged at Zephyrin’s hand, but Zephyrin remained still, staring at the royal who now stood with a grin in the midst of his fawning victims.

The man’s features were unknown to him, but his name was not. He was in Gaulyria’s Royal Palace, and so who could this ‘Duke Efflam’ be, if not the future King Efflam I, nominal ruler of the conquered Gaulyrian protectorate, installed on the throne by the victorious Alliance to do its bidding? The youngest and last son of Rudolf XII, sixth in line of succession in this era and with little hope of ever ascending the throne, the downfall of Gaulyria’s monarchy and subsequent collapse of her nascent empire would contrive to place the crown on his brow.

Zephyrin found it surreal to think that, had he undertaken the step of cooperating with an escape plot and managed to cross the border and rally the populace to his banner, this was the very man against whom he would have drawn his blade to contest Gaulyria’s future.

And then, Duke Efflam caught sight of them. Flushed with the thrill of the hunt, he quitted the circle of gigglesome, teary-eyed ladies to saunter toward the three of them, wearing a smile that his handsome features failed to render more pleasant than predatory.