The Williad

Great Willow commands the central isles of Brettania and is the most powerful kingdom in the commonwealth.

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Vilhelm Benkern
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The Williad

Post by Vilhelm Benkern »

The Williad
- Or, the Arrival of the Prince of Shalta on the Brettish Isles -

1


The sun smiled down on the serried lawns that lay behind Imperial House. It was an unequalled day: a momentous day, a day that would go down in history, and Atos knew this and was beaming down sweetly in accordance. Sweat would be broken into, records would be broken, sparkling fluids would be sprayed and good times would be had. Memories would be made that would endure until their holders’ dying day; memories further destined to last longer even than that, in the hearts of younger family forced to listen at every possible occasion, and in the community consciousness of the peoples affected. But William was taking things slowly. He was savouring the air, basking in the time. A great journey was laid out before him and he was doing his best to preserve in himself how he felt before its commencement.

William Eastward-Hart, 75th Prince of Shalta, 4th Earl of Fulham, ceased his reflection and put one arm up into the air. His valet approached with the appropriate air of deference. “Your Highness?” William stood up and said, “Hunt, I will take my wine in the Yellow Drawing Room, where I shall expect to receive the pilot.” Hunt nodded deeply, snapped around and hurried across the superbly neat grass. Shortly afterward, William stood up, straightened his double-breasted suit jacket and blazed the same trail across the sacred-looking lawn.

Image

William was soon to depart this house, the most recent seat of his proud and noble line, in favour of greater things. Imperial House was formerly a Hammish hôtel-de-ville, bought by the Harts one hundred and fifty years previously, following the utter devastation of the island on which it was situated by a hurricane. Savvy property purchases had kept the family in the bracket of stratospheric riches for millennia. The island in question was the smallest of what his family still referred to as the Virgin Islands, but the Commonwealth of Hamland had redesignated as Liberty Islands. When the state of Nova England dissolved and five hundred years ago, the Hamlanders occupied the islands at the mouth of the great Red River which they call Caledon. The aristocracy of Britannia and Nova England could do nothing but watch from their yachts as the ethnic cleansing and historical revision brutally took place. Virginity had been smashed cruelly in the name of Liberty. But in time the blue blooded nobles of Britannic descent had re-established themselves on these historic stones, using the only force available to them: the surest defence of culture, money.

The Yellow Drawing Room had held a special place in William’s heart since his youth, where it had been the site of his first kiss. Though, as did many of the rooms in the great manor, its walls spoke of many memories, without prejudice as to their content. It was the room where Auntie Priscilla had smashed the glass on Uncle Geoffrey’s head. It was the room where the young William had been caught spying on two indiscrete servants. It was, lately, the room where his mother had tried to introduce him to so many unappealing heiresses-in-exile. She was obsessed with the notion, William thought as he entered the blighted though beautiful room, that he wasn’t keen to marry fit with his station. He certainly was, though the girl must be at least passably comely as well as having passed through the correct birth canal. A servant had been instructed to leave the bottle of Chateau Petit-Dalia Difficile Cru 5000 ASC and two antique crystal glasses fashioned in Rielrar on the high oak table by one of the windows. The room, however, was dominated by a low, wide mahogany desk covered in maps. The Prince had just enough time to cork the vintage fig wine – for which he had developed a taste during his travels in the southern seas – before the pilot was announced. “Your Highness, I present Hildegunn Ahlstrøm, Løytnant, Judicial & Legal Services, Normarksgarde; Øversteløytnant, 109 Elwynnbrigaden, Union Aerospace Corps.”

While the announcing page was negotiating his finest (terrible) Norsk enunciations around the distinguished ø’s of the pilot’s career, the woman had entered the room and strode over to William. What first struck one about her was her fierce and twisted face, which was framed with a few thick jet-black curls and decorated with a scar running a long course from between her eyebrows, down across her right cheek and forming a curve, as if the blade that had caused it had been violently jerked away. She was dressed in the full dress uniform of her rank, her breast studded with medals and ribbons of varying metals and patterns respectively. She reached the Prince, bowed deeply and drew a ceremonial sword from a sheath at her side. She turned it around and offered the hilt without a word, still bowing. The Prince, touched by this show of respect for formal procedure, gripped the hilt and swung the sword. “This is a fine blade. Rise, soldier, I would speak with you before we embark on our journey.” He put the sword back into Ahlstrøm’s hand, who stood up straight again. “Come and have a drink with me.” William poured them each some wine and passed Ahlstrøm an ornate glass. “This wine has been in our family cellar for one hundred and one years.” Her face twitched slightly, imperceptibly to someone who had not been so well trained in reading people as the Prince. “Taste it before you judge it, or me.” She brought the glass to her lips and took a brief sip, which was swished around her mouth before the natural conclusion of ingestion. She raised the glass to the light pouring in the window to observe the colour, and placed the glass down on the table, retaining a forced poise and stiffness. “Your Highness, an unexpected treat, to be welcomed so extravagantly. I am used to a mess hall.” The Prince smiled and said, “I am not accustomed to spartan living. It may make one a good soldier, but it does not make one a good prince.” Ahlstrøm stiffened (surprisingly further stiffening was possible) and said, “In my homeland, we had no princes; only soldiers. I would remind your highness that I have accepted this position according to certain terms and intend to deliver a service of due quality befitting the situation. I am here to perform a role, which I understood to be of some importance, and was not expecting idle banter.” William nodded, recognising as all true philanderers do when a door was firmly shut, and beckoned for the pilot to join him beside the main table.

The Prince tucked the star-studded history of this table – the private forest of the Shirerithian Kaiser from which its materials had come, the Gotzer artisan’s workshop in Laus where cunning artifice had seen it crafted, the plots of conquest which had been hatched over it, the various family members who had been conceived on top of it – into a mental back pocket, reminding himself of the lack of luck he was going to have with this one, and gestured with a sweep of an arm to the cartographic panoply stretching across the prestigious surface. “I need to get to five locations within the next fifteen days. This will mean five journeys. I will have made arrangements for the fifth, but you will be flying me for the first four.” The Øversteløytnant was au fait with briefing-speek and immediately knew which questions to ask. “Mode of transport?”

“Flight, naturally. Up to the third location, plane, and between the third and fourth, helicopter.”
“Specifications?”
“I have a dossier for your study. They are both semi-experimental.”
“Safe to fly? Extensive flight tests?”
“Yes. I am satisfied with their airworthiness, to the extent that I am willing to ride as passenger.”
The Prince was not used to being interrogated, and the novelty had not yet worn off.
“The locations?”
“Marked on this map.”

Image

She glanced down at the largest of the maps, which was marked with six points connected by a route. There were several smaller maps placed near some of the points showing detailed regional projections. “This journey will be crossing quite a few international borders. Have the relevant jurisdictions been informed?”

“No, and it is a large part of your job to ensure that they aren’t. At least, until we are outside their legal remit once again.”
“If I am not to be landing legally, am I to land rough?”
“Only in one location.”
“This is not my usual kind of assignment.”
“It is not a usual assignment. It will be uniquely challenging and uniquely rewarding, as no doubt you have already been made aware.”
The slightest twitch on her face. “Your Highness, how much do you know about me?”

“Øversteløytnant Ahlstrøm, you were selected from a list of hundreds of possible pilots. The criteria involved were extensive and highly detailed to fit this assignment. A notably ruthless officer in the Normarker political wing, you received Order of Labor Second Class for your research into the effectiveness of sleep deprivation on nocturnal tribespeople; Order of The Oak Leaves Second Class for completing an airstrike successfully, after the pilot was killed, despite a lack of training, making you a national flying ace poster-girl. Your subsequent service in the Elwynnese air force was no less distinguished, successive mentions in dispatches and promotions saw you command a squadron of fighter jets. Furthermore, your most recent psychological assessment report, the third in succession to declare you unfit to serve, states that you are a heavy drinker, and this is something that appeals to me. In addition to your other qualities of being incredibly talented, exceptionally callous and above all discrete, you were the ideal candidate.”

“You may know more than most. Then you must know that financial reward will not suffice.”
“My family’s wealth would make a Babkhan Shah seem impoverished.”
“It will not suffice. I have a duty to my nation, to which I swore an oath of obedience.”
“An oath from which you have been relinquished.”
The soldier did not flinch, and replied, “Suddenly.”

William concealed a smile masterfully and said, “Arrangements have been made over a very long period. If it helps, a Raikothin consultant performed the final recruitment screening and concluded that by your previous actions and attitudes you had unknowingly consented to this.”

As he spoke, she walked slowly back to her Difficile Cru, picked up the glass, threw back her head and let her throat engulf the wine that had been produced on a singularly interesting year weather-wise, the like of which it was assured we would never seen again.
“This presents an unmitigated opportunity for you, Øversteløytnant.”
She walked back to him, fixing him with her gaze, until she was inches away. She showed the Prince her smile for the first time.
“Don’t call me that. You better hope this plane of yours is too beautifully designed for me to bring myself to drive it straight into the sea with you in it.”

Things were looking up, he thought.
Vilhelm Benkern DEOMI, Member of the Order of the Dragon, Silver Swan, Red Dragon
Dirigent of Musica, Count of Mar Sara
In Aryasht Prapta Vrteti, former Prince of Aryasht; Zaila Vrteti, Norfolknath
In Elwynn Benjamin Sebasokrator Timothy Quentin Kern, Duke of Raikoth
In Khalypsil Representative of the Wisdom

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Verion
Ayn Rand's toyboy
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Joined: Mon Oct 22, 2012 5:07 pm

Re: The Williad

Post by Verion »

This is most certainly very interesting, I wonder how this will end...

(Benkern, I admire your writing skills)
1.Titus Morvayne, Prefect of Shirekeep, Count of the Skyla Islands
2.Eki Aholibamah Verion, Queen in the North
3. Ludovic Verion, Lord of Blackstone and Governor-General of the Iron Company
4. Jeremy Harwinsson Archer, super sleuth

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Thomas Rivers
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Location: Willowshire

Re: The Williad

Post by Thomas Rivers »

Indeed, good story, and I'm loving that sepia map! :up1:
Thomas Rivers, His Lordship
of House Wellington, Lord of Willowshire
Known in other circles as Choygal Kamala

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Vilhelm Benkern
Posts: 3833
Joined: Sun Apr 01, 2012 11:08 am

Re: The Williad

Post by Vilhelm Benkern »

Thanks for your comments, hopefully it will get more interesting as it develops! The sepia map inadvertently matches the forum skin, which is cool.
Vilhelm Benkern DEOMI, Member of the Order of the Dragon, Silver Swan, Red Dragon
Dirigent of Musica, Count of Mar Sara
In Aryasht Prapta Vrteti, former Prince of Aryasht; Zaila Vrteti, Norfolknath
In Elwynn Benjamin Sebasokrator Timothy Quentin Kern, Duke of Raikoth
In Khalypsil Representative of the Wisdom

User avatar
Verion
Ayn Rand's toyboy
Posts: 6199
Joined: Mon Oct 22, 2012 5:07 pm

Re: The Williad

Post by Verion »

Indeed, and it gives the Isles a more central place on the map, where it belongs. :-D
1.Titus Morvayne, Prefect of Shirekeep, Count of the Skyla Islands
2.Eki Aholibamah Verion, Queen in the North
3. Ludovic Verion, Lord of Blackstone and Governor-General of the Iron Company
4. Jeremy Harwinsson Archer, super sleuth

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