The function of marriage in society was common sense to Florence, but clearly, Ayden had this knowledge gap. It was times like these that Florence wondered about Ayden’s first twelve years of life. As for Ayden’s last three years of life, Ayden was so busy working like an adult that people, including herself, forgot that he was still quite young and still had a lot to learn about life.
She suddenly felt a great sense of big-sisterly responsibility.
“The future is unpredictable. Regardless, can you imagine staying together with His Highness in the future? Can you imagine being together in the good times, but also working through future hardships together? Does imagining that make you feel good or bad? How would you feel if you weren’t together? How would you feel if His Highness married someone else?”
Ayden lowered his gaze.
“I can’t tell you what being in love feels like. But in practical terms, I see that lovers like to spend time together. They don’t feel bored constantly spending time together. They think about the other person, and feel happy to do little gestures and tasks that would otherwise be annoying if requested by someone else.”
Seeing more understanding on Ayden’s face, Florence asked “Does that help?”
Ayden exhaled. “Yes, it does.”
“Do you have any particular concerns right now?”
Ayden shook his head. “I want to think about it some more first.”
“You can always talk to me,” Florence said. “Or, even better, you could talk to His Highness. I’m sure Prince Rian would be happy to discuss any concerns you might have.” Florence gave a little grin. “He might be envious to hear that you spoke to me about marriage.”
Ayden’s lips quirked up in amusement. “You’re right. Thank you, Florence.”
“I’m happy to help. Now, we still have some time.”
“Oh yeah, I showed Rian the experimental garden field yesterday, and now I was thinking about whether this would be possible in the Capital.”
“If you have land in the Capital, no one can stop you,” Florence pointed out.
“But there has to be things I should look out for.”
“It’s true, you ideally wouldn’t use fertilisers with strong odours…”
After Florence chatted with Ayden, she returned to her suite. She prepared for the day, making sure that all her belongings were packed into her luggage. She had breakfast with the others, and then it was time for departure.
The Cordovans left first. Florence farewelled Ayden and Hadrian, before taking a seat in His Highness Prince Rian’s carriage—she had come to the Rosewood fief in the Rosewood carriage, so she didn’t have her own. Prince Rian would take her back to the Capital, and then she’d return to the Sage fief with her mother. Prince Alexius and his friends were also heading back to the Capital.
Once the Imperial carriages left the Rosewood family’s property, Prince Rian turned to Florence.
“I must thank you for your work on the agriculture initiative and your joint book so far,” Prince Rian said.
“It’s my pleasure,” Florence said.
“Ayden has reminded me again that the initiative is lacking a name. Do you have any suggestions? ‘Agricultural Initiative’ by itself is too limiting in the initiative’s goals.”
“How about the Royal Agricultural Development and Food Security Program?”
Prince Rian nodded thoughtfully. “Yes, that could work. Your help in the program so far has been valuable, and I hope you can continue to provide consultation support while Ayden and I are away. Don’t worry, you’ll be appropriately compensated.”
“Many thanks, Your Highness. Is there anything in particular that you’re anticipating?”
The first part of the program was focused on the northern fiefs, which suffered the most from lack of food. The program would provide free training and small interest-free loans to help farmers improve their crop yields in their short growing season. In addition, the program would build a few community greenhouses so that communities could grow fresh vegetables in the cold snowy months, and fix and maintain major roads from the south to north, to facilitate trade even during the winter. The northern fiefs tended to focus on animal husbandry due to the local environment, and it would be beneficial for them to be able to trade with the southern fiefs all year round.
Florence’s contribution to this first stage was to help write materials for mages—plant growing spells and what to look out for—as well as providing support to Ayden to produce cold-hardy crop varieties.
Prince Rian shook his head. “Nothing is anticipated. But you know well how unexpected problems crop up.”
Florence nodded.
“However, there’s another matter I would like to talk to you about, if you are willing. It’s not related to work, but rather, it’s a personal matter.” Prince Rian had a sheepish expression.
Florence suddenly had a strong feeling about exactly what Prince Rian wanted to talk about. “…Go on.”
“As you know, Ayden and I have been together, in one way or another, for years now.”
Florence nodded, keeping an externally calm expression. Internally though, she was suppressing her feeling of I knew it!
Prince Rian sighed. “But…do you think it’s too early to consider marriage? Engagements are commonplace at my age and marriage isn’t unheard of…”
“On what matter are you worried about in particular, Your Highness? The Rosewood fief’s minimum age of marriage is 18.”
Prince Rian lowered his eyes in thought. “What would your advice be regarding how I should propose to Ayden in order to make him say ‘yes’?”
“As you know, Ayden doesn’t like rushing into things if he can help it,” Florence said. “So, he may find a surprise proposal more cumbersome than romantic.”
Prince Rian’s expression fell. “But I’ve hinted…” he mumbled.
“You know Ayden well.”
Prince Rian brightened again. “Yes, I do.”
“Then I believe you know that he’d appreciate it if you talked to him openly. Your understanding of marriage is likely different from his. If you can’t talk about marriage together, how would you get married? It’d be good to come to a consensus. After he agrees, you can still do a romantic ring-presenting affair at a later date.”
Prince Rian’s lips quirked up. “You’re right. You’re very right.”
“I hope my words were helpful.”
“They were, thank you.”
Florence smiled, but on the inside, she felt that Prince Rian hadn’t needed her advice at all. Instead, it felt like Prince Rian needed some reassurance…and that he was showing off that he and Ayden were very close and that she shouldn’t harbour any thoughts of marrying Ayden herself.
It was as though Rian had forgotten that she liked women.
Florence silently berated Prince Rian in her heart: His Highness Prince Rian’s possessiveness really had no bounds.
“So, Hadrian.”
Ren Xiyang sat down on the sofa facing Hadrian Terra.
“Over the last few weeks, what has been most interesting for you to explore further?”
From an outsider’s perspective, it might be unusual to see a teenager speak with such a supportive tone towards a tall strong man who was at least a full head taller, but this was the case.
“—You should tell me as much as possible,” Ren Xiyang said as he served tea for Hadrian. “The more I know, the better I can place you.”
Hadrian picked up his notebook and opened to the bookmarked page. He had prepared for this meeting, but he still felt nervous. “First, thank you for allowing me to stay in the Rosewood fief and for freely showing me around.”
“It wasn’t a bother. You were quite helpful.”
Hadrian made a complex expression when his buried memories of working re-emerged. “Yes, well. I’ve made an ordered list.”
“Go ahead.”
“Firstly, I want to learn a more flexible style of direct magic manipulation.” As an adult mage, Hadrian knew some direct earth magic manipulation. But it wasn’t nearly as good as Earl Rosewood’s.
“That’s good.” Ren Xiyang jotted this down in his own notebook. On the page previous were his recalled notes about how to be a good PhD supervisor.
“Secondly, I want to study glass and its properties, and develop new glass products.”
Hadrian had given it thought. If he couldn’t be the Terra family’s head, then he should still contribute to the family business. He still wanted to be useful to his parents and family.
And one of the interesting things he had seen in the Rosewood fief was its glass workshop. The Rosewood fief bought so much glass from Terra, and yet, they still produced their own glass products. The workshop had two divisions, one that made products for sale, including stained glass, and another that was researching improvements to glass lenses for everyday and specialist use.
“I’ll have you join the Rosewood glass workshop then, while I’m gone,” Ren Xiyang said. “Does that sound amenable? You’d be paid the same wage as them while you’re still studying.”
Hadrian nodded.
“I appreciate your help a lot. I’ve had ideas but no one to work on them,” Ren Xiyang said. “One thing I’d like is industrial glass—smooth glass so strong it can be used as an entire wall without needing additional support magic. It’d also be convenient if we could have shaded glass that could extract some of the sun’s energy and store it in a magic crystal for later use, while still letting light through. Of course, you don’t need to study either of these in particular, but I hope that gives you more ideas.”
Hadrian nodded gratefully. “I’ll see what I can do.”
“Great. I’ll organise your position with the Rosewood workshop team. While you’re with them, I want you to learn how to make glass the non-magical way, and to write a report on all the different available types of glass that you can find. If you have time, then you can research magical glass-making methods.”
Hadrian quickly wrote this down.
“Before I leave, we’ll need to connect our communication mirrors. We’ll try for a meeting once a week, hopefully at a regular time.”
“Yes.”
“If you don’t have anything right now though, we can start on direct magic manipulation.”
Hadrian perked up. “Yes, right now is good.”
“Okay, show me what you can do first…”
Ren Xiyang was efficient. After he taught Hadrian the basics of generalised direct magic manipulation, he followed Hadrian back to his room to connect their communication mirrors. After lunch, he took Hadrian out to the Rosewood glass workshop, introduced everyone, and asked the staff to take care of Hadrian and teach him well while he was away.
At the end of the day, Hadrian returned to his room magically exhausted but with a new purpose in life.
That night, feeling good with his clear plan for study and product development, Hadrian decided to call his father.
Marquis Terra got off the call with his eldest son.
The current state of matters was very surreal.
Hadrian had just told him that he was going to stay at the Rosewood fief for an undefined amount of time to develop new glass products, such as a kind of glass that could be used to build an entire castle. Earl Rosewood had also taught him more about direct magic manipulation.
There was the strong sensation that his son was now studying under the supervision of Earl Rosewood—a person, it must be said, hadn’t even gone to school yet and had no formal tutor to speak of!
Hadrian had done his best to sound convincing though, spinning it as a way for the Terra fief to expand their product line and become wealthier.
With a sigh, Marquis Terra was about to get up from his desk, when his communication mirror lit up with another incoming call.
Marquis Terra’s expression became serious.
Princess Aurelia.
He accepted the connection. “Good evening, Your Highness. How can I help you today?”
“Marquis Terra, I request your aid,” Princess Aurelia said.
Marquis Terra had a bad feeling. “And how can I provide aid?”
“I need you to acquire a sizeable volume of food, which will be distributed jointly under your name and mine. The method of food acquisition is up to you. You may request charity from others, or you may purchase the food. Provided that you keep records of your expenditure, I will reimburse you in the future.”
Princess Aurelia’s gaze and tone were steady. Her tone wasn’t forceful and imposing. But at the same time, by requesting this, Princess Aurelia was stating that she wanted Marquis Terra to join her faction.
The Terra fief was far away enough from the capital that he could largely do his own thing. But he wasn’t immune from politics.
The time had come for him to make the decision.
With his eldest son in Sedaveria though, studying under Earl Rosewood himself, there was only one option: to agree.
“This can be done, but reimbursement would be necessary. We need to formally discuss the terms of engagement.”
Princess Aurelia inclined her head. “We have identified towns and fiefs that will need food in a month’s time, prior to the harvest. I’ll send through the details, including minimal required food volumes. As for the contract, please send me your preferred terms and we’ll discuss them as soon as possible.”
“Understood.”
Aurelia felt one less burden on her shoulders after Marquis Terra’s agreement.
The matter of food was sorted; she trusted Marquis Terra. She asked one of her new ladies-in-waiting to draft return letters to the fiefs that had requested aid and assigned her the task of following up with Marquis Terra.
Then, Lady Helios accompanied her to attend tonight’s court proceedings. After that, the two of them headed to the underground tower to meet with Viscountess Venenum.
The purpose of the tower was very clear now, and a dozen or so bodies had already been claimed. However, the hardest work was still underway—identifying the hundred other bodies, and finding other involved persons still at large.
Viscountess Venenum was making good progress given her limited resources.
Aurelia couldn’t give her many additional resources, for now. She could only assign tasks to her trusted ladies-in-waiting: she handed the task of preparing the court cases against the captured researchers to Lady Helios, who in turn gathered three additional trusted ladies-in-waiting.
The act of handing over tasks was something Aurelia was slowly starting to do more, after she saw how Viscountess Venenum delegated different tasks to members of her team. Lady Helios had taken the lead in other tasks before, but this time, Aurelia didn’t manage her as closely; and she didn’t need to, because Lady Helios did very good work.
These days, Aurelia also had more ladies-in-waiting to keep busy and to delegate work to: five more joined her from five different noble families who declared their allegiance to her. And she was anticipating more to join her soon.
This chapter is filled with speechless people >w
The function of marriage in society was common sense to Florence, but clearly, Ayden had this knowledge gap. It was times like these that Florence wondered about Ayden’s first twelve years of life. As for Ayden’s last three years of life, Ayden was so busy working like an adult that people, including herself, forgot that he was still quite young and still had a lot to learn about life.
She suddenly felt a great sense of big-sisterly responsibility.
“The future is unpredictable. Regardless, can you imagine staying together with His Highness in the future? Can you imagine being together in the good times, but also working through future hardships together? Does imagining that make you feel good or bad? How would you feel if you weren’t together? How would you feel if His Highness married someone else?”
Ayden lowered his gaze.
“I can’t tell you what being in love feels like. But in practical terms, I see that lovers like to spend time together. They don’t feel bored constantly spending time together. They think about the other person, and feel happy to do little gestures and tasks that would otherwise be annoying if requested by someone else.”
Seeing more understanding on Ayden’s face, Florence asked “Does that help?”
Ayden exhaled. “Yes, it does.”
“Do you have any particular concerns right now?”
Ayden shook his head. “I want to think about it some more first.”
“You can always talk to me,” Florence said. “Or, even better, you could talk to His Highness. I’m sure Prince Rian would be happy to discuss any concerns you might have.” Florence gave a little grin. “He might be envious to hear that you spoke to me about marriage.”
Ayden’s lips quirked up in amusement. “You’re right. Thank you, Florence.”
“I’m happy to help. Now, we still have some time.”
“Oh yeah, I showed Rian the experimental garden field yesterday, and now I was thinking about whether this would be possible in the Capital.”
“If you have land in the Capital, no one can stop you,” Florence pointed out.
“But there has to be things I should look out for.”
“It’s true, you ideally wouldn’t use fertilisers with strong odours…”
After Florence chatted with Ayden, she returned to her suite. She prepared for the day, making sure that all her belongings were packed into her luggage. She had breakfast with the others, and then it was time for departure.
The Cordovans left first. Florence farewelled Ayden and Hadrian, before taking a seat in His Highness Prince Rian’s carriage—she had come to the Rosewood fief in the Rosewood carriage, so she didn’t have her own. Prince Rian would take her back to the Capital, and then she’d return to the Sage fief with her mother. Prince Alexius and his friends were also heading back to the Capital.
Once the Imperial carriages left the Rosewood family’s property, Prince Rian turned to Florence.
“I must thank you for your work on the agriculture initiative and your joint book so far,” Prince Rian said.
“It’s my pleasure,” Florence said.
“Ayden has reminded me again that the initiative is lacking a name. Do you have any suggestions? ‘Agricultural Initiative’ by itself is too limiting in the initiative’s goals.”
“How about the Royal Agricultural Development and Food Security Program?”
Prince Rian nodded thoughtfully. “Yes, that could work. Your help in the program so far has been valuable, and I hope you can continue to provide consultation support while Ayden and I are away. Don’t worry, you’ll be appropriately compensated.”
“Many thanks, Your Highness. Is there anything in particular that you’re anticipating?”
The first part of the program was focused on the northern fiefs, which suffered the most from lack of food. The program would provide free training and small interest-free loans to help farmers improve their crop yields in their short growing season. In addition, the program would build a few community greenhouses so that communities could grow fresh vegetables in the cold snowy months, and fix and maintain major roads from the south to north, to facilitate trade even during the winter. The northern fiefs tended to focus on animal husbandry due to the local environment, and it would be beneficial for them to be able to trade with the southern fiefs all year round.
Florence’s contribution to this first stage was to help write materials for mages—plant growing spells and what to look out for—as well as providing support to Ayden to produce cold-hardy crop varieties.
Prince Rian shook his head. “Nothing is anticipated. But you know well how unexpected problems crop up.”
Florence nodded.
“However, there’s another matter I would like to talk to you about, if you are willing. It’s not related to work, but rather, it’s a personal matter.” Prince Rian had a sheepish expression.
Florence suddenly had a strong feeling about exactly what Prince Rian wanted to talk about. “…Go on.”
“As you know, Ayden and I have been together, in one way or another, for years now.”
Florence nodded, keeping an externally calm expression. Internally though, she was suppressing her feeling of I knew it!
Prince Rian sighed. “But…do you think it’s too early to consider marriage? Engagements are commonplace at my age and marriage isn’t unheard of…”
“On what matter are you worried about in particular, Your Highness? The Rosewood fief’s minimum age of marriage is 18.”
Prince Rian lowered his eyes in thought. “What would your advice be regarding how I should propose to Ayden in order to make him say ‘yes’?”
“As you know, Ayden doesn’t like rushing into things if he can help it,” Florence said. “So, he may find a surprise proposal more cumbersome than romantic.”
Prince Rian’s expression fell. “But I’ve hinted…” he mumbled.
“You know Ayden well.”
Prince Rian brightened again. “Yes, I do.”
“Then I believe you know that he’d appreciate it if you talked to him openly. Your understanding of marriage is likely different from his. If you can’t talk about marriage together, how would you get married? It’d be good to come to a consensus. After he agrees, you can still do a romantic ring-presenting affair at a later date.”
Prince Rian’s lips quirked up. “You’re right. You’re very right.”
“I hope my words were helpful.”
“They were, thank you.”
Florence smiled, but on the inside, she felt that Prince Rian hadn’t needed her advice at all. Instead, it felt like Prince Rian needed some reassurance…and that he was showing off that he and Ayden were very close and that she shouldn’t harbour any thoughts of marrying Ayden herself.
It was as though Rian had forgotten that she liked women.
Florence silently berated Prince Rian in her heart: His Highness Prince Rian’s possessiveness really had no bounds.
“So, Hadrian.”
Ren Xiyang sat down on the sofa facing Hadrian Terra.
“Over the last few weeks, what has been most interesting for you to explore further?”
From an outsider’s perspective, it might be unusual to see a teenager speak with such a supportive tone towards a tall strong man who was at least a full head taller, but this was the case.
“—You should tell me as much as possible,” Ren Xiyang said as he served tea for Hadrian. “The more I know, the better I can place you.”
Hadrian picked up his notebook and opened to the bookmarked page. He had prepared for this meeting, but he still felt nervous. “First, thank you for allowing me to stay in the Rosewood fief and for freely showing me around.”
“It wasn’t a bother. You were quite helpful.”
Hadrian made a complex expression when his buried memories of working re-emerged. “Yes, well. I’ve made an ordered list.”
“Go ahead.”
“Firstly, I want to learn a more flexible style of direct magic manipulation.” As an adult mage, Hadrian knew some direct earth magic manipulation. But it wasn’t nearly as good as Earl Rosewood’s.
“That’s good.” Ren Xiyang jotted this down in his own notebook. On the page previous were his recalled notes about how to be a good PhD supervisor.
“Secondly, I want to study glass and its properties, and develop new glass products.”
Hadrian had given it thought. If he couldn’t be the Terra family’s head, then he should still contribute to the family business. He still wanted to be useful to his parents and family.
And one of the interesting things he had seen in the Rosewood fief was its glass workshop. The Rosewood fief bought so much glass from Terra, and yet, they still produced their own glass products. The workshop had two divisions, one that made products for sale, including stained glass, and another that was researching improvements to glass lenses for everyday and specialist use.
“I’ll have you join the Rosewood glass workshop then, while I’m gone,” Ren Xiyang said. “Does that sound amenable? You’d be paid the same wage as them while you’re still studying.”
Hadrian nodded.
“I appreciate your help a lot. I’ve had ideas but no one to work on them,” Ren Xiyang said. “One thing I’d like is industrial glass—smooth glass so strong it can be used as an entire wall without needing additional support magic. It’d also be convenient if we could have shaded glass that could extract some of the sun’s energy and store it in a magic crystal for later use, while still letting light through. Of course, you don’t need to study either of these in particular, but I hope that gives you more ideas.”
Hadrian nodded gratefully. “I’ll see what I can do.”
“Great. I’ll organise your position with the Rosewood workshop team. While you’re with them, I want you to learn how to make glass the non-magical way, and to write a report on all the different available types of glass that you can find. If you have time, then you can research magical glass-making methods.”
Hadrian quickly wrote this down.
“Before I leave, we’ll need to connect our communication mirrors. We’ll try for a meeting once a week, hopefully at a regular time.”
“Yes.”
“If you don’t have anything right now though, we can start on direct magic manipulation.”
Hadrian perked up. “Yes, right now is good.”
“Okay, show me what you can do first…”
Ren Xiyang was efficient. After he taught Hadrian the basics of generalised direct magic manipulation, he followed Hadrian back to his room to connect their communication mirrors. After lunch, he took Hadrian out to the Rosewood glass workshop, introduced everyone, and asked the staff to take care of Hadrian and teach him well while he was away.
At the end of the day, Hadrian returned to his room magically exhausted but with a new purpose in life.
That night, feeling good with his clear plan for study and product development, Hadrian decided to call his father.
Marquis Terra got off the call with his eldest son.
The current state of matters was very surreal.
Hadrian had just told him that he was going to stay at the Rosewood fief for an undefined amount of time to develop new glass products, such as a kind of glass that could be used to build an entire castle. Earl Rosewood had also taught him more about direct magic manipulation.
There was the strong sensation that his son was now studying under the supervision of Earl Rosewood—a person, it must be said, hadn’t even gone to school yet and had no formal tutor to speak of!
Hadrian had done his best to sound convincing though, spinning it as a way for the Terra fief to expand their product line and become wealthier.
With a sigh, Marquis Terra was about to get up from his desk, when his communication mirror lit up with another incoming call.
Marquis Terra’s expression became serious.
Princess Aurelia.
He accepted the connection. “Good evening, Your Highness. How can I help you today?”
“Marquis Terra, I request your aid,” Princess Aurelia said.
Marquis Terra had a bad feeling. “And how can I provide aid?”
“I need you to acquire a sizeable volume of food, which will be distributed jointly under your name and mine. The method of food acquisition is up to you. You may request charity from others, or you may purchase the food. Provided that you keep records of your expenditure, I will reimburse you in the future.”
Princess Aurelia’s gaze and tone were steady. Her tone wasn’t forceful and imposing. But at the same time, by requesting this, Princess Aurelia was stating that she wanted Marquis Terra to join her faction.
The Terra fief was far away enough from the capital that he could largely do his own thing. But he wasn’t immune from politics.
The time had come for him to make the decision.
With his eldest son in Sedaveria though, studying under Earl Rosewood himself, there was only one option: to agree.
“This can be done, but reimbursement would be necessary. We need to formally discuss the terms of engagement.”
Princess Aurelia inclined her head. “We have identified towns and fiefs that will need food in a month’s time, prior to the harvest. I’ll send through the details, including minimal required food volumes. As for the contract, please send me your preferred terms and we’ll discuss them as soon as possible.”
“Understood.”
Aurelia felt one less burden on her shoulders after Marquis Terra’s agreement.
The matter of food was sorted; she trusted Marquis Terra. She asked one of her new ladies-in-waiting to draft return letters to the fiefs that had requested aid and assigned her the task of following up with Marquis Terra.
Then, Lady Helios accompanied her to attend tonight’s court proceedings. After that, the two of them headed to the underground tower to meet with Viscountess Venenum.
The purpose of the tower was very clear now, and a dozen or so bodies had already been claimed. However, the hardest work was still underway—identifying the hundred other bodies, and finding other involved persons still at large.
Viscountess Venenum was making good progress given her limited resources.
Aurelia couldn’t give her many additional resources, for now. She could only assign tasks to her trusted ladies-in-waiting: she handed the task of preparing the court cases against the captured researchers to Lady Helios, who in turn gathered three additional trusted ladies-in-waiting.
The act of handing over tasks was something Aurelia was slowly starting to do more, after she saw how Viscountess Venenum delegated different tasks to members of her team. Lady Helios had taken the lead in other tasks before, but this time, Aurelia didn’t manage her as closely; and she didn’t need to, because Lady Helios did very good work.
These days, Aurelia also had more ladies-in-waiting to keep busy and to delegate work to: five more joined her from five different noble families who declared their allegiance to her. And she was anticipating more to join her soon.
This chapter is filled with speechless people >w
