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The Castle gardens were swiftly becoming more involved than anything seen before on Cephiro, masterpieces of manipulated nature turning each area into an artwork. Even the orchards and the herb gardens boasted the largest and brightest plants in all Cephiro. It might be the side-effect of gathering most of the land’s strongest plant-affined mages into one place, but it did prove useful. The kitchens never ran out of supplies, no matter how many people they needed to feed, and on days when he was entertaining envoys from other Lands Clef took everyone out to sit in the shade of the trees and relax more than was possible in the formality of the meeting rooms.
If only he could say as much for the rest of the plants on Cephiro… Without the constant focused power of the lone Pillar they were struggling to maintain a healthy environment, plants dying too soon, or growing so fast they missed important stages, like flowering…
But, no. Shaking his head, Clef dragged his attention back to the group loosely assembled in the rock-garden, the only place left where the vast crystals which once surrounded the base of the Castle could still be seen in their natural forms, though far reduced in size, and host to a hundred varieties of clinging, climbing plant. The rest had been used to build the bailey wall, and the far smaller dividers between the gardens. The knights were here, and the delegations from Chizeta and Fahren –
Though, huh. He couldn’t actually see Princess Aska anywhere.
He could see ChangAn, speaking animatedly with Fuu (last time he’d wandered past, they were discussing the healing properties of tea while tending to the tea service), and SangYung… who was hovering behind the tea tables, away from ChangAn, looking nervous.
Well, that answered the first of his questions; wherever she was, Princess Aska was up to something she shouldn’t be.
Clef drifted further away from everyone else and sighed, reaching for a twist of power. /Lantis?/ He called, soundlessly. His former apprentice was on duty this morning or he would have been present.
/Guru Clef?/
/Would you please locate Princess Aska for me? Again?/
/…As you wish./ There was silence for a moment while Lantis interrogated the makeshift mix of Autozamnian technology and Cephiran shielding magic which let the Guards watch over the Castle. (The technology had been a gift from an Autozam grateful for Cephiro not going to war with them, and for looking after Eagle – and also, Clef suspected, as a down-payment towards more support with healing Autozam’s atmosphere than they had yet dared ask for.) When he replied, Lantis sounded as close to amused as he ever let on. /She appears to be entering your study. Should I intercept her?/
Clef grimaced, staring at the tangle of vines over the back wall of the garden. /No, I’ll see to it somehow. We can hardly arrest her…/
He hadn’t noticed anyone approaching him, so when Umi spoke he jumped, and nearly tried to hit her with his staff. “Is something wrong?” He blinked at her, the connection with Lantis broken. “You look…”
“Like you nearly startled me half out of my skin?” He said, wryly. “It’s nothing, Umi.” Umi shrugged. She turned back to watch the party, and after a moment Clef glanced up at her. She was a lot quieter today, now that the Chizetan Princesses had departed. Maybe… “or… you might actually be just the person to help.”
“So there is something up?” Umi brightened, spinning back. “I’ll help! Just tell me what to do – I can’t drink another sip of tea without going mad.”
“If you could, uh, go and get Aska out of my study without letting her liberate anything of mine, and without her realising you have been sent to do so?”
Umi blinked at him for one long moment, before she had to clasp her hands to her mouth to smother a laugh. “What, she got in again?”
“Locks are apparently only there to stop the people who don’t know how to pick them.” He said, wryly. “And shields only for those who can’t charm them into opening, and both below the notice of a Princess… stop laughing, Umi! She keeps trying to get to reports on Cephiro’s recovery, ones which are confidential – she might not mean anything bad by it, she just wants to find a way to help, but if she unthinkingly tells anyone else just how weak Cephiro still is…”
“I’m not certain Aska knows the meaning of ‘strategy’.” Umi mused, still grinning, but more under control.
“She probably defines it as ‘being so awesome that everyone else is overwhelmed’.”
“…That sounds reasonable, really.” Umi giggled again, coughed, and straightened up. “Don’t worry, I’ll go extricate her. It’s the least I can do, when you’re putting up with us hanging about.”
“…Thank you, Umi.”
No one had been watching them, down at the end of the garden, so no one noticed now when Umi slipped away, back into the bulk of the Castle as it towered above them, glinting in the high sunshine.
oOo
When Princess Aska and Umi reappeared, Clef took note of Umi’s smirk, and was worried. When Umi trailed him back towards his study after dinner that evening, her was certain she’d done something.
But when he unlocked the door (the wards long since taken down by Aska) and looked about, there was nothing obviously out of place, nothing missing. All his papers seemed to be in the same untidy stacks on his desk, although… he didn’t remember the short stack sat on the corner, that was where his tea set should…
“You stole my tea set? And left me work in its place?” He glared at Umi. “Are you trying to punish me for something?”
“No! The paper was waiting outside your door. You really need a postbox if you’re going to lock your office up, Clef.”
“…Postbox?”
“A secure place for people to leave stuff. I have no idea what that scrawl means, but hopefully it’s not important - Aska was reading it when I got here.”
“…You still stole my tea.”
She was trying not to smile, mouth twitching at the sides. “Just for tonight! I had to do something, that was my excuse for being here! It won’t do you any harm to go without caffeine for a few hours. Might even do you some good.”
“With all this to get through?” He flung an arm at the stacks, piled taller than he was – not that that was the hardest task, but the principle stood.
“You do not need to get through all that paper tonight.” It was Umi’s turn to frown, and he realised , uneasily, that her disapproval was far more convincing than his own. “Just this once, can’t you take the opportunity and look after yourself a little? You’re looking… you were yawning all morning, Clef. …If you’re going to make yourself stay up all night, you should at least take enough of a break to fetch your tea from the kitchens. I’m not letting you have your kettle back!”
She folded her arms and glared at him, but she was biting her lip at the same time. And Clef… he had been working quite a lot lately. There wasn’t much choice in the matter, when Cephiro was still less stable than she should be, when the fledgling Council had no idea how to govern, and even the barely noticeable change in seasons the Pillar had maintained was apparently beyond their ability to co-ordinate between the Priests and the people’s prayers.
Umi wasn’t the only person who was starting to notice when he yawned. What was one night, if it would make people stop nagging him about it? At least he could tell them to leave him alone, he did rest on occasion.
“…Just this once.”
Umi blinked. “…What, really? You’ll take the night off?”
Shock was as good a way as any to get the other expression off her face, in the end. “Yes, really. Unless you didn’t mean it…”
“No! No taking it back!” Umi grabbed hold of his sleeve and dragged him back to the door. Clef yelped as he stumbled after her, robes yanking at his neck.
“Wait! Umi, hold on a moment. I have to lock the door-“
“Why? It didn’t do you much good last time.” She was laughing again, but obediently let go once he was over the threshold.
Clef pulled the door shut, and held his hand out to it until the latch and his ring both gleamed briefly and the lock clicked. “That just means I get to do it my way this evening, and the Guards don’t get to argue.” He reached out further, resting both palms against the smooth paint of the door. He’d wanted to just throw a shield over the whole room and be done with it from the beginning, but LaFarga had a policy against places the Guards couldn’t enter in an emergency.
If there was an emergency with his paperwork, it could cursed well wait one night.
Light sparked about his fingers, then spilled out in a sheet which coated door and wall together, seeping into them. Closing his eyes and focusing, he dragged power across ceiling and floor as well as the walls, keeping the power fluid until the edges had met and merged seamlessly together. Then he let it build until intent and magic saturated the walls, enough that it would take a sincerely unsubtle bit of magic to break past it.
Stepping back, he watched critically as the last of the glow faded to invisibility. Umi cut through his scrutiny – “are you done now?” she asked, and he flinched. He’d mostly forgotten she was there, but at his nod she grabbed his sleeve again and towed him off towards his chambers, higher in the tower.
“I can walk through my own castle without an escort, Umi!” He snapped, when he had his feet back under himself.
“Your castle? What would the Council think about that?” was all Umi said, plowing straight on.
“My home, then!”
He’d been thinking about letting his form age somewhat – a new form to better suit this new Cephiro, if it really did need more pronounced seasons than just the eternal summer they were used to – the rate the forests and crops were withering certainly demanded something… it seemed inappropriate to remain forever youthful if Cephiro could not. Other peoples would find him less disconcerting, as well.
And if he was larger, Umi would no longer be able to drag him about so easily.
(…Probably. Maybe. It was still the most persuasive argument he’d come up with.)
Most people were still at dinner, so they only passed a few bemused Guards on patrol in the corridors. The shield about his rooms was far more robust than the one on his study, and Umi had let go again so he could open it up across the door.
Even when he stepped inside, Umi showed no sign of leaving him. She hovered on the threshold instead, looking about curiously at the half-bare shelves and the settee near the low table – on which sat his second kettle, at which she pulled a truly indescribable expression.
“I’m here, I’m not working. Your task is complete, Umi; go find your friends again, enjoy the rest of the evening.”
“Will you really…” Umi paused, then seemingly decided she’d said too much anyway and might as well continue. “You’ll really relax?” The sunlight was streaming through the wide window across the back of the room, gilding everything and making her face strangely hard to read, now she wasn’t grimacing.
He should have been irritated at the lack of trust, but the quiet of his rooms at the end of a noisy day was already beginning to settle into him.
“I promise.” He raised his hand. “In Cephiro’s name, I promise I will keep this evening free from all work. …Will that let you leave me alone now?”
Umi’s smile was bright through the gold of the sunset, there and then gone, as she turned on her heel and ran down the corridor. “Sleep well, Clef!” She called back to him.
“…Inexplicable girl.” He muttered, shutting the door and drawing his shields back across it. He yawned, then glanced briefly at the crystal flask tucked into the far corner of one of the shelves, where the sunlight couldn’t reach it. But in the end he turned to the bed without reaching for the potions. It was early still, he might just as well lay down and see if he ended up asleep without a draught.
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(Within an hour, he was lost to the world in a sleep deep enough he didn’t wake even when his dreams turned unsettled; slowly, even they relented and let him rest.)
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end
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