Return of the Scarlet Empress III - The Lookshy War

[Ifni]

Ireva

Her escort shakes his head, refuses to leave.

"Can't be too careful, ma'am. Commander wanted privacy, own way when she was alone with her husband, with the Good Sir. We agreed. The Immaculate bastards killed him. Not going to happen again. Not on our watch."

He grins.

"Don't want to know what happened to the bodies. Commander blessed them, too. No ghosts or nothing to worry about."

"Was a farmer. Fair Folk came. Burned crops. Took my daughter. My wife. Nearly killed me. Then she came with a hundred men. Saved me. Saved others. Offered us a chance to fight back. Trained us. She goes, we follow. She orders, we obey. She fights...we win."

"For her...everything."

Here and there, pockets of darkness dot the encampment, with a plurality clustered in an area sectioned off from everyone else. Even still, there are those the Sun's Face has turned from walking, talking, smiling amidst the camp. One of them nods to Five Hounds; and the man grins back, grasping his arm and thumping him affectionately on the back.

Ireva listens silently to Five Hounds' story, offering the occasional nod or murmur of heartfelt sympathy. Wife, daughter... she can imagine what it must have been like, and wishes she couldn't.

She smiles politely at Five Hounds' interlocutor, warmly enough for a casual meeting - but behind the easy courtesy studies him carefully, looking for any tell-tale hints of inhuman heritage. As Black Ice Shadow proves, the condemnation of the Sun doesn't necessary imply evil intent or deeds, but the number in the camp is... worrying. She can think of one benign explanation. She can think of many more alarming ones.

Spoiler

Show

She would actually fire Mastery of Small Manners here, trying to pick up the CoD's emotional state and motivations. Depending on how CET works now and how much it costs, she might fire that too, trying to check for suspicious values of Resources/Backing, or an answer on the "how many allies does he consider himself to have in the vicinity" question (this is probably pretty different for a spy and a member of Fire Orchid's army).

Later, as Ireva tries to discreetly escape, Five Hounds and a group of ten or so is gathered around a nearby fire. They spot her in the gloom, call out to her, to share their fire. If she refuses, two of them come with her; otherwise, they provide her a log to sit on. Either way, she is Ireva, and even if she isn't obviously a Solar, she obviously isn't one of them.

Her jokes about the Immaculates are met with mixed receptions. A few turn sullen, others laugh, one or two get angry for making light of the killers. Others pitch in their own jokes; those about the Immaculates are far more mean-spirited. And more bawdy. Five Hounds for his part, stirs when asked, and his words are met with applause.

"Don't know much about them. My town, we keep to ourselves, and the preacher tells us words and we pray. But they tried to kill the Commander, and they killed the Good Sir, and that makes them the enemy. Man tries to gut you or take your purse, don't matter if its because his kids need food or he ain't had food for a week."

Throughout Ireva's evening, the stories tend to repeat. The Commander saved me, perhaps seven in ten say. We owe her our lives. They trust her, they die for her, they kill for her. And they are proud to do so. They believe in her. Most don't know where, exactly they're going. To Nexus, the consensus seems to be. No, to Lookshy. No, to Thorns. There's a division and some talk over whether or not they would come to aid either city or to lay siege to it. Some of them lie even as they tell the truth, and others tell the truth even as they think themselves liars. But they all trust in their Commander.

Ireva accepts the offer gracefully, walks over to share the fire's warmth with apparent pleasure. She listens far more than she talks, and she is a good listener - making appreciative noises at appropriate points in the soldiers' tales, grinning delightedly at their recounted triumphs, wincing or cursing under her breath at stories of betrayal or disaster. When they speak of the Commander she smiles, and largely holds her peace, only nodding slowly in respect or murmuring quiet words of understated but seeming-earnest praise. She laughs at some of the bawdy jokes; rolls her eyes at the worst of the mean-spirited ones, as if to say is that the best you can do?

(Firada would understand. Her sister had sent her into the Mask's court, after all, to laugh at far worse things.)

But she does speak up after Five Hounds, once the applause has died down. She's slipped down to the ground over the course of the evening and is leaning back against the log, comfortable, relaxed, a mug in her hand. Her voice is musing, pensive, the slow lazy tones of post-prandial thinking-out-loud. Not angry, or challenging the soldier's words - at least not directly. Her accent has shifted over the evening, growing less polished, closer to a street-dialect (and Five Hounds' own rural accent).

"Doesn't matter right then and there, no. You do what you gotta do, to keep yourself alive. But there are different kinds of enemies, don't y'think?"

She waves one hand in a direction that might be that of Thorns. "A gang boss sends a nine-year-old to stab you in the kidneys, tells them they'll get half a loaf of bread if they succeed, is the kid really the one you should be calling your enemy? I mean, you can cut 'em down, but is it gonna solve the problem?" She shakes her head. "Yeah, if you're dead, you won't care if your killer was doing it for bread, for medicine, to save a kid, to defend their city; out of ignorance, or passion; for wealth, or power, or revenge; for the fun of hurting you; to drink your blood and make your corpse into a puppet..."

She seems to lose her train of thought for a moment, staring into the dark. Then she shakes her head.

"Like you say, maybe it makes no mind, when it's down to knives in the dark, them or you." (She doesn't rub her arms, and one who knows Ireva very well might realize from that the iron control that lies beneath her casual demeanor, even as the scent of blood and roses floods back in memory, almost hallucinatory in its vividness.) "You do what's needed, to defend yourself and those who rely on you, and be proud of it - damn straight you do." She nods, almost angrily. "But before then - and after, if you win - there's a difference. You can help a starving kid, give them choices other than death or murder. You can talk a greedy Guildsman into a new line of business. You can challenge a fool's ignorance, or even a zealot's anger. But there are those in the world who just want to hurt you to feed on your screams, who'll kill you for the crime of living."

She shrugs, and stretches her arms as if to work a crick out of her shoulders, and as she settles back against the log murmurs softly, "It seems like a difference that matters, to me."

But she lets the subject drop easily enough, when the conversation turns to other less contentious stories, of a heroic commander and the troops who follow her with pride, of desperate rescues and glorious victory. It's a bright shining legend, worthy of a hundred songs, and Ireva seems to all appearances to relish it, offering up admiration and encouragement and approval both spoken and wordless.

I wanted - want? - to believe in her, too.

-----------------

She eventually takes her leave of the group and slips back into the tent, going to wrap herself into the curve of Zhou's arm, letting the hidden tension and the carefully-gauged cheeriness fall away together. Once again, she offers a wordless prayer of gratitude to the Dragons: it is so easy, with Zhou, to cast aside the masks and their burdens with them, easier than she could have imagined in those ten years of loneliness.

Unfortunately, she is given little time to cuddle with her husband and apologize for abandoning him for the evening, as Skandi the Cat promptly transforms back into human form and delivers his whispered story. The Solar's green eyes do widen slightly at the vision of Skandi attired in a 'constricting outfit' to dance for a god's delight, but she puts her hand to her mouth to stifle small squeaking noises, and suppresses any comment until after the Lunar is done. As he speaks, she moves slowly and quietly about the tent in the darkness, watching for moonlit shadows on the canvas walls, listening for the sound of half-stilled breathing, checking for inconsistencies in the floor; much as Fire Orchid had done, a few hours earlier.

By the end her eyes are serious again.

"First," she whispers, "Skandi, should you ever desire to dance this dance, you must let me know so I can advertise and sell tickets. I feel this would instantly resolve any financial shortfalls you might be facing." From her smile, she is joking - but perhaps only half-joking.

"Second - you cut straight to the chase, don't you?" She looks away, and shakes her head, but keeps speaking, quiet as a breath of wind. "This isn't about pride. You would be a good officer, in this army. Zhou would be a good officer. I... am not a soldier, and not qualified to command troops, and you heard Fire Orchid say very clearly that she had no use for any other skills of mine."

"The question is not can we help. The question is can we help better here than anywhere else. If you or she are trying to persuade me to spend the time leading up to the invasion dancing in costume, that's the question I will need answered."

And then, because Skandi is her friend, not merely a means to convey her intentions to Fire Orchid - she reaches into her jacket, and slides the hilt of Resolve clear, curling her body around to hide the distinctive silhouette from any watchers. She taps the blue gem set into the pommel and murmurs, "By the way. Did you catch the Kazei's mind-magic, at the end there?"

Spoiler

Show

Ireva is actually more positive about staying than this makes it look, but she wants to hear Skandi's arguments, and she wants to know if and how the mind-control affected him before she reveals too much, since it was Obvious to her but she doesn't know exactly what it did. She also thinks that Zhou is still reluctant to stay, and doesn't want to undermine him.

(Also this lets me try to get more information on Five Hounds' CoD buddy before reporting )

EDIT: I'd meant to do a search for watchers, but forgot to write it in at first, so I'll roll it in the OOC. Also putting Unblinking Sentinel Gaze up again just in case it helps with spotting spying CoDs.