Alanaer son of Enfar has a strong arm and needs money.

He doesn't ask questions, but he's--quietly--very observant.

A lot of the people that work here have absolutely no idea why Lord Rithan is coming here, and it doesn't look like he's going to stay for very long. This is an awful lot of wasted resources for what looks like a stay of a month or two, at the most.

... There is a particular care towards getting his bedroom set up. Some people gossip that maybe he's quietly gotten married, or this estate is going to belong to a mistress or something.

Either sounds plausible, but he's not going to make assumptions yet. He does his job diligently and keeps his eyes peeled, his ears open and his mouth shut.

He's well liked for his taciturn nature and his capable manner.

As such, when the lord himself shows up at the estate, Alanaer gets quietly taken aside and asked if he'd like to be paid extra to work late that night. To help make sure everything goes smoothly.

That sounds intensely suspicious, so of course he says yes. You can't find out what's going on if you're not around, after all.

Lord Rithan seems oddly smug, and seems to enjoy showing off his magic's teleportation abilities.

And in the middle of the very suspicious night, there is a feminine shriek from one of the rooms.

Well.

He was certainly not warned that any such thing was to happen. Not that he wouldn't have investigated without that convenient excuse.

The shrieking has evolved into shouting. He can only really hear one side of the conversation.

"- You idiot, do you have any idea how stupid this is - you can't just steal a princess and have people not care -"

What. The. Fuck.

He knocks on the door.

"M'lord, is there some trouble?"

"No trouble, thank you, please go -"

"Like hell there's no - excuse me! I will pay an outrageous sum of money to whomever gets this madman away from m-"

There is a feminine-sounding squeak and then:

"It's fine, really."

Like hell it is.

Alanaer likes to think he'd have done the exact same thing even if he hadn't had two sisters, but as it is all he can think of is Larassa's voice replacing this stranger's.

He is very good with a sword, and attendant skills. The door is open and he's inside and then his employer has a large piece of metal somewhere very inconvenient for making trouble for anyone ever again.

His employer was not expecting this! He does not teleport out of the way, and summarily chokes on his own blood and dies.

"... Thank you very much for your prompt response," says the princess sincerely, after an awkward pause. "Hello. Would you like a new employer?"

"That would be very kind of you, seeing as I seem to have just mislaid my old one."

She hiccups half a giggle, then her princessly dignity reasserts itself and she curtsies politely.

"Excellent. I'm Crown Princess Aliveth Vaslinue, pleasure to make your acquaintance. Would you like to have, ah -" she does a quick tally of all of the jewelry on her person, its net worth, and what she will likely need to pay her way out of trouble in the future, "- my necklace and my bracelet in exchange for your help and directions back to Kivenne, with more compensation when I make it home, or would you like to help escort me back to Kivenne in exchange for, uh. Asylum from whatever trouble doing that would get you, a lot of money, and possibly a nice house somewhere?"

"If I pick the latter option can I bring my family? They'd be useful for camoflage on the way there, too, my mother and sister are redheads, you'll fit right in."

"Certainly! That sounds like an excellent idea."

"Then the latter option sounds excellent." He looks at the corpse on the floor and sighs and shakes his head. "We'd best be off quickly, then, before the other guards discover what's happened."

"Agreed. We can go out the window, if that would help avoid any trouble. I can fly."

"Ooh, it might!"

"Excellent. Though I do glow in the dark while I'm doing it, so, ah. If anyone would notice, please let me know."

"Well, he didn't tell us he was planning to kidnap someone--come to think of it, with all the speculation that he was prettying the place up for a wife or mistress, we could probably walk right out by pretending you were one of those and had asked me to bodyguard you while you took a walk. As long as no one walks in on this, at least," he adds, gesturing to the body with his sword.

"He didn't even tell his guards that he was -" she shakes her head, annoyed. "Someone might check on this place on account of the shrieking, then. Window?"

"He did not. I was surprised and alarmed when I heard you--I have two sisters, and..." he shakes his head. "Window it is."

"The prick," she sniffs. She opens the window, then a golden light flares at her back and she casually hops out. The princess floats in mid-air and offers him her hands.

"You are not actually relying on my upper body strength here," she asserts, "there's a safety glide built in for passengers, if I drop you, you'll gently float to the ground safely."

"Good to know!" he says, and takes her hands.

She gently pulls him out into the air. Part of his weight seems to be held aloft by magic, but clearly she's carrying some of it, because she grits her teeth and makes a very polite face that probably implies that he's a bit too heavy for her to easily lift. Luckily she doesn't have to do it for very long, because she gently lowers him (and then herself) safely to the ground.

"Gliding's actually pretty fun, just. Now's not really the time."

"Later when we're less likely to be effectively pursued for murder," he agrees. "The village is this way," he adds, gesturing.

"Yep." She goes the gestured direction! "Are either of your sisters approximately my size, so I could change into something less, uh. Princessly?"

"Ah--Larassa's a bit shorter than you, but not too much, I don't think."

"Ah, okay. That should be fine, then. And then we can sell my dress along the way, along with all of my jewelry. Or just dump it, I suppose, but that seems like a bit of a waste."

"Yes--we won't have much time to pack our things but prioritizing things with sentimental value that can't be replaced and things that can be sold on the road seems sensible."

She nods.

"And you're sure that the rest of your family will be all right with packing up and leaving immediately? I will definitely see to a place to put you all once we're in Kivenne, but."

"--I really don't trust the guards he brought with him not to go after my family when they realize I'm the one who killed him."

"Ah. Yes, fair enough. I will try very hard to make it up to them, and you."

Nice pleasant house somewhere, where none of them have to worry too much about money again; she's a princess, she can make that happen.

"--Also my little sister has musical ambitions that would be much easier to achieve in a city."

"I can arrange her a tutor if she'd like one," she says. "And a house in a city. I could do a bigger one in the country somewhere, but somewhere nice in a city's definitely possible."

"A tutor would be amazing. She's very good for the amount of training she's had but it's not much."

"What instrument does she play? Or is it singing?"

"Flute."

She smiles and nods. "Yeah, I could find her a tutor for that."

"She'll be so happy."

"I want to make it a good idea to help me when I've been kidnapped by a creep! And also it sounds like it'd be a waste if I didn't arrange lessons for her."

"Well, I think so, but I don't know what a princess's standards are. You'll have plenty of time to find out for yourself on the trip."

"Even just liking it enough to want to do it for her whole life would probably be enough to make it worth it, really? I'm not a musician myself, but a lot of it's dedication, not just raw talent. If she has that I think she'll do fine, and if it's the first thing you bring up when a princess owes you a favor, I think she does."

"She very much does. She practices as much as she can." His voice is full of fond fraternal pride.

"Yep. Waste if I didn't. Lessons she shall have."

"Excellent."

She smiles.

They're reaching the town properly, now. Most people are inside at this hour, but they could still run into someone if they're not careful. Presumably Alanaer can sneak her to his home.

Yes. There are very few people about and it's not hard to avoid them if you know the town.

He gets her to his house and knocks on the door, quietly but urgently.

The door opens. "Alle, what--" the woman begins, then stops short when she sees the princess standing beside him.

"Hello, I'm Crown Princess Aliveth Vaslinue of Kivenne, I apologize for the trouble. Your lord kidnapped me and your brother stabbed him for it, may I come inside?"

"--Yes of course."

"I don't know how long it's going to take before the other guards realize what happened."

Sigh. "I'll rouse Mom and Dad and Sissy."

Aliveth smiles an apologetic smile, then starts systematically removing her jewelry and placing it into a neat pile on a table. This will be useful for them later, and it's best if she doesn't have it immediately on her person right now. Since she's presumably going to change into something less ostentatious soon.

"You'll want to borrow something of mine, I'm guessing?"

"Yes, please. I appreciate the help."

"Eh, not your fault some noble guy decided to be a jerk. Do you want to go pick something out while I wake the others?"

"No, but I'd understand if you found a kidnapped princess on your doorstep pretty upsetting. Yes, please."

"My room's over there, don't take the blue dress or the green one but anything else is fine," she says, gesturing to indicate direction, and then retreats into a different room to wake her parents.

"Thank you," she says, and then she hurries off to change. She does not take the blue dress or the green dress, and picks what she assesses to be the most mundane dress available. ... She leaves her leggings on. At some point in the future she might have to fly.

Soon the whole family is bustling about, packing up as much as they can.

The youngest daughter does pause to stare a little the first time she sees Aliveth, though.

She doesn't actually look as aggressively like a princess anymore in an ordinary dress, with her makeup and jewelry removed and her hair down. Still pretty, though, and sort of ladylike in mannerisms if not in dress. (She'll have to work on that.)

"Hello," she says, smiling back. "Can I help pack?"

"Sure," she says. "...I was expecting you to look less like a regular person."

"A lot of the princess look is having a lot of clever tricks to look pretty, all stacked on top of each other to make a cake, then covered in princessly mannerism icing. With optional haughtiness sprinkled on top. Remove all that, and I'm basically a regular person."

She helps pack! She doesn't know where anything in this house is, but she can grab things when pointed to them and can carefully organize the things they've gathered into things that can be easily carried. She's pretty good at it, actually.

"We have a wagon, by the way, you don't need to optimize everything to be carried by hand."

"Oh, that's useful, all right."

She stops doing that in favor of helping more directly with frantic packing, then! Hooray, frantic packing.

Once some stuff has been packed she can also help load it onto the wagon. Larassa feeds the horse an apple in apology for waking her at this hour.

Aliveth is pretty happy to help with whatever they point her at! Soon enough the wagon is packed and they can go.

She eyes the estate once everything's packed. It doesn't look like half a dozen guards are filing out of it to come slaughter them all to avenge their employer. Maybe he gave a stupid order like 'do not disturb me' or something, and no one's found the body yet. Or perhaps they think the perpetrator's still inside. Either way, they do not have half a dozen guards coming after them with sharp objects. Yet.

Yet.

Cissere gets into the back of the wagon for first shift sleeping, and then Larassa climbs up into the driver's seat and urges the horse to go, and they're off, with a minimum of difficult-to-replace items left behind.

The princess doesn't mind walking. Alanaer's parents seem slightly intimidated by her, and Larassa's a bit busy, so she will make Alanaer himself the target of her questions.

"Where actually are we, anyway?"

"The town's called Willowvale--we're on the Milardes river, in Callae."

"Ah. Okay." She clearly has absolutely no idea where Willowvale is. Milardes is a long river, being on it doesn't really clear up how far away her country is. "Are we closest to - um, Graypoint, Aramoor, or Yellowpool?"

"Greypoint. That's where we're headed, to sell the horse and wagon and get on a boat."

"Good plan," she says, approvingly. "All right. I've actually been there before. ... I shouldn't be recognized by anyone, I didn't really get out much while there."

"Stand between Mom and Larassa just in case," he suggests, "for extra camoflage."

She nods, seriously.

"Do I have any really egregious 'I'm a princess' tells I can work on before we get there, too?"

"Not egregious, no.

You're--more sensible than I would have expected a princess to be," he adds approvingly

"Thank you! I try my best. It'd be very annoying if I spent my time... hmm, what might a less sensible princess do. Ah, yes, insist to ride in the wagon! Nevermind that your poor horse is going to be put through enough on my account, and that I have a perfectly functioning pair of legs. I'd be insufferable, and as such I wouldn't be able to tolerate myself."

He laughs.

"You do, mm, move a little more formally. But it's not too terribly noticeable. And I'm certainly no judge, the only nobility I'd met before you was him," he makes a little shooing gesture, "and I'll go ahead and assume he wasn't typical."

She snorts.

"No, he was just a prick. I mean, there are definitely a number of very entitled people that are rather useless, but mostly they get caught up in, hm. A bubble world? Where they're worried about a different set of things than everyone else because those are the only problems they've encountered. All of the others have been kept far away from them. But underneath the pomp and silk they're still just people."

"Yes. I can't help but wonder what he could have been thinking."

"... Having met the man, I think he thought his problem was that he'd never gotten the chance to speak to me alone and show me how great he was. Except that was not his problem, his problem was that I didn't like him and didn't like being around him. So he thought he was solving a problem, and wasn't."

"That seems...like an unusually bad failure to think things through."

"Yes. I get the impression that he was also terribly lonely. That doesn't excuse anything, but. I do think he needed some kind of help. But of course, when you're a lord and surrounded by people that are loyal to your coin, who do you look to for warning that you're not thinking things through?"

"When they came around hiring extra guards they wanted strong arms and no questions," he sighs. "It's for the best that he advertised for things I'm good at, but still."

"Yes. I'm not saying he didn't deserve to be run through, just." Shrug. "I try to stay empathetic. It's, ah, sort of my job."

"Yes. I do feel a little sorry for him," he sighs.

"Yes. Now that he's far away and can't touch me again, anyway."

"Of course." A little wryly: "Maybe that's why they say not to speak ill of the dead. Because they can't hurt anyone anymore, so there's no point."

"Ha. Yes, I suppose so."

"Except when they can," he sighs, "but there's still no point trying to disincentivize them."

Snort. "Not as if they have anything left to lose, is it?"

"Rather. And no ability left to reduce the harm they've done."

"No." Sigh. "That's left up to the rest of us."

"Yeah."

"Anyway. On to matters of the living. ... Though now of course that I've said that, I have no idea what to say."

"What's it like in Kivenne?"

"Compared to here? Hm. Well, more mountainous, for one. We have flatland, but Callae's just sort of - weirdly flat to me. Magic's a bit more plentiful - we have magic lamps and healing stations in most places. We're a bit less concerned with tradition? My sister's gotten weird looks for wearing pants and a sword before, it's not very princessly of her but it's not actually weird there."

"--Huh. I don't think I've ever seen a woman in pants before."

"Huh. Really? I didn't think it went that far, I would think that traders or something would be in pants for the practicality, but all right. ... Do leggings count as pants? Because I'm in those. Dresses are not very cooperative with flying."

"Leggings don't count," he affirms.

"Alas. Well, I suppose you'll meet my sister eventually, she hasn't worn a dress in years."

"Oh, I'm sure if she's good with the sword I'll be more interested in sparring than what she's wearing."

Giggle. "Fair enough. The sword's not for show, I bet she'd enjoy it too."

"Oh, good."

"Though I do warn you, she can fly. Not that she will without saying from the start that she's going to fly, just. She's much scarier when she's allowed to fly."

"As long as it's a friendly spar, I welcome scariness. The point is to learn, not to win."

"That'd be about how she'd feel about it, yep. I can't see her caring more about winning than learning. If losing meant something that mattered, sure, but." She shrugs. "Friendly sparring match."

"Quite. I wasn't aiming to learn anything when I killed him."

Snort. "No. Focus on learning when losing doesn't matter, so you can win when it does. Or something, anyway. I'm not really the martially inclined princess."

"That's about right. And if it never really matters, well, all to the best, and the learning is fun."

"Yeah. Well, for some people anyway. I don't think I'd find it all that appealing."

"To each their own," he nods. "I'd never have Sissy's patience with a musical instrument."

Smile. "Navai's good at languages. She thinks they're fun. I think she'd like to adventure around the world, talking to people and solving their problems."

"That does sound like fun."

"Yeah. I think I'd rapidly lose enthusiasm with the annoying, boring parts of travel, but I don't think the same's true for her."

"Depends on what kind of travel, I think, for me."

"I can see that. Moving with large groups can be a bit of a, a production. Or did you mean the travel method?"

"I did, but you're not wrong about the other, either."

"You should see a proper royal traveling procession. There's the royalty themselves, then their advisers, then the representatives of different houses at court, then all of the people that work for them, along with all of the guards working for lots of different people, and servants and the various people hired to make sure everything runs smoothly... It, ah, it gets complicated. Somewhat ironically for a person that can fly, moving places can be tricky sometimes."

"Oh dear."

Shrug. "I can dodge the bloated royal procession most of the time, that's only really for foreign affairs or very important things. For most things I can get away with a guard or two if I'm somewhere public, or not at all if I'm in the palace or one of our estates or something. But it does get a bit old."

"I can imagine. Is your sister better at avoiding it?"

"Yes, for two reasons. First, she can absolutely defend herself and doesn't really need guards. Second... well, I'm the heir. I both need to be at important social functions to look pretty more often, and people are more inclined to freak out if something happens to me."

"How much do you suppose they're freaking out now?"

"Some, but it's not to 'declare a war over it,' levels. They know my situation, and that I'm not in any immediate danger, and that I have help getting home."

"Your magic lets you communicate with them from here?"

"Mhm. Though, communicate implies that I can just - talk through it, which isn't quite what's going on. How much do you know about magic?"

"Very little."

"All right. So think of magic as an... heirloom, I suppose. Something that is held by a person and then passed down to their children when they die or are ready to part with it. Except instead of an object, it's alive. Sort of like a - a magical family pet that you pass down from family member to family member. It grows bigger and smarter the longer you take care of it, and over time it learns different tricks, or new ways to use old ones."

"...Huh." It's a charming description. "That explains why it's all nobles and so on who have it."

"Right. A person acquires magic, they set up in a nice little place somewhere with superior magical power, and they declare themselves nobility and pass the magic and the title down to their children. Or in my family's case, we conquer a bunch of different warring territories that had their own magic warlords, declare all of them vassals, and name ourselves royalty. But that was a while ago, it's been some time since we were conquerors."

Nod. "What happens if a line dies out?"

"Depends. Moving between heirs is easier the more closely related they are, but it's not trivial. There's a loss of size and power every time it happens. Start jumping to more distant relations and you start taking major power hits. If a line dies out, and there's nowhere the magic can jump to with the power it's got left... then that's it. It's gone. Dies with its last user."

"Damn. I hope that idiot had cousins somewhere."

"Yeah. Me too. But I'm a little surprised that his magic participated in kidnapping. They gain personalities over time, become more and more like people. At the point my family's magic is at, it's sort of accurate to say that it helps rule the country with administrative helper humans that happen to wear crowns. It can absolutely refuse to do things if it disagrees with me."

"Uncharitable thought: maybe it agreed to kidnap you because it knew I would kill him and thought he was too crazy to go on having it."

"That's possible, but unlikely. They can jump without their current holder dying, it's just avoided because doing so loses power. And it can choose who to jump to - my mother wasn't a direct descendant of her predecessor, she was a cousin, but our magic picked her because it thought she'd be the best at it."

"Well, maybe he comes from a long line of unpleasant people."

"Maybe. It's happened before, there have been some nasty magical lines throughout history."

"Maybe it's not so bad after all if he didn't have cousins."

Shrug. "Maybe not. I'd have to know more to say for sure, I didn't get so involved in foreign affairs that I could rattle off the history of a random Callae noble house from memory. I'll give it the benefit of the doubt for now. If anything, suddenly being shunted to a cousin might have taught it a lesson."

Nod. "Not much use in speculating at this point," he says wryly. "It is what it is, and his cousins are or are not, and none of it changes what we have to do next."

"Nope! And the hole in my defenses should be patched now, so the opening he took advantage of isn't available for a cousin. Aside from that, it's a problem for either my mother to deal with, or for after I'm back in my country."

"Or, if we're very lucky, for the Callae royalty."

"Ha. Yeah. But Callae's royal line got its crown in more of a... sneaky politicky way than Kivenne did. We, uh, basically beat anyone that tried to depose us so well that people stopped trying. Callae's line is less secure. It makes them a bit more unpredictable. I'd rather not just hope for the best."

"Rather, yes."

After a little longer Larassa says, "It's time to change sleeping shifts. Your Highness, do you want to go next?

"I should be all right for now, thank you. Um, thank you for the courtesy, but it's all right if you call me Aliveth."

"I forgot your name, and I couldn't think of anything else besides 'Your Highness' to call you," she admits cheerfully.

"Oh, well, fair enough," she agrees, with a bit of a giggle. "Actually - is my name particularly noteworthy here?"

"Not really."