1865-10-10: On Healing Wounds
On Healing Wounds
Summary: While unable to sleep, Alina muses over the political ramifications of both her potential matches.
Date: 1865-10-10
Related: In Which Duke James is Revealed to be a Troll; the Tristan/Alina arc, etc
NPCs: {$npc}
Players:
Alina  

With references and thoughts regarding:

James  Tristan  Gabriel  

<FS3> Alina rolls Intrigue: Good Success.

Alina stares at the ceiling. She did not know what was worse, that her shoulder throbbed where it had been stitched together, that she couldn't be given another dose of fleshknit for at least a month (so this wound, alas, would have heal entirely on its own), or the memory of how her father responded when she had reported to him and at the end, asked him to consider wedding her to Lord Tristan.

She had thought she had made a rather convincing case, after all. He could have told her he was talking to others. Well, he was always talking, there was always SOMEONE who wanted their son or cousin to be the next Duke al'Sylenthar, and thought they'd be the ones running the house in truth because her public persona was so incredibly stupid.

But still, there was a difference between reading over and dismissing such offers, or even sending her out to weigh and measure the merits of such a match… and saying he would actually give further consideration.

He didn't even say that with Tristan when she had pointed out all the reasons. Continued peace with Galenthia. Tristan's skill in the same arts of stealth and espionage her family cleaves to. His flexible morality; that he would be able to handle the need for both sides of the family business. That he was one of the only remaining royal cousins, so the al'Sylenthar would manage quite the political bragging rights, so to speak. Long had they intermarried with the al'Ramars; wasn't it time to acquire further royal blood within their line? It wasn't like the Viscarins of Kentaire had a son of suitable age, save if you count the Prince's bastard. He was highly intelligent, loyal, cunning. He understood that the Gods let men make their own way now, and wouldn't be mewling in wait for divine assistance that would never come. That his black reputation and that their own spies had never discovered the truth of the lie of it only proved his value.

She rolls over on her side, wanting to cry. She should have known better than to let her heart get involved with these sorts of things. But why was Father even considering the al'Callenta at all? Why was Duke Cesare even making such an offer? Father wouldn't lie about that, not to the Duke's own son. The al'Callenta hate her house, she knew. And though they played a similar farce in public, she knew her father did go to great lengths in his own business to assure that no such clandestine attacks were made upon that insufferable house of prigs and religious fanatics. They were valuable to the realm, after all, even if they could not see or know the work the al'Sylenthar do in the name of their country.

Some people slay barbarians and field mighty armies. Others poison and spy. Each had their own place, but it was the nature of the spy to be untrustworthy. And men of honor spit on people like her and her family, even as they are protected by them.

She sighs, closing her eyes. She tries to imagine all the things she had been dreaming of with Tristan, only putting Gabriel in his stead. She shivers from a sudden chill. Gone were the whispered discussions of intrigue, the understanding of things without them needing to be enumerated in such very small words. The utter trust, the compatibility, the warmth and comfort; the gentleness. Desire and passion. Intellectual conversation. Debates on the merits of different courses of action.

Replaced by duty. Honor. A cold, stiff form in plate in her bed and by her side. A man inflexible and unable to grasp the subtleties of her work. A man with no patience for intrigue or slow-to-motion plotting; who would rather face the enemy with sword is hand, screaming a battle-cry (she tried that earlier, she thinks ruefully, forcing herself not the rub the already-itching shoulder, and it was NOT helpful… why they do that she would never understand) than to smile to their face and offer a dagger, proverbial or literal, to their back. There was no warmth or comfort in him, from what she saw, only the ice cold of the north and of steel.

She draws the blankets over her head. This isn't what she wants. What could possess them to consider putting aside a feud that had lasted generations for this? Cesare would have two sons, twinborn, with all the innate (according to the superstitous) powers that come with twins (identical ones moreso), ruling two duchies in Aequor. Father couldn't possibly be helping that happen; that was too much power being consolidated in one house. Why would he even—

She sits upright in her bed, suddenly. For their houses to work together, it would be powerful. It would strengthen Aequor from within at the very time a enemy threatens from without. She lets out a half-laugh, half-sob. The intrigues she and Tristan had found, she realizes, may very likely be the reason why this match could even be on the table.

"Ever am I the architect of my own troubles," Alina murmurs aloud, a hand at her lips. Though she did not agree that pushing her and Tristan apart was the wisest course, it was not her choice.

She just had to figure out a way to convince her father that what Tristan offers would be far better than strengthening ties with the al'Callenta.

She lays back down, her mind racing with too many plots and too much intrigue to allow her to sleep.

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