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[NRDL]

4

[notquitethere]

4 is good.

[Vgray]

Breden nodded, never taking her eyes off yours. "Their new House's trader tried to collect them at the end of the Angelday ceremony. Big Olen's pleas were so wretched, they upset kuria Pelematou's daughter. Poor little child wouldn't stop sobbing…started pleading with her lady mother and making a great scene. She eventually worked herself up into some kind of fit and fell frothing on the floor." The young helot's lips disappeared into a thin, dark line. "So Olen was hauled out back and beaten with threshing flails, until those who loved him most couldn't tell him from butchers' wares. We're burying him today, up the road. Save for a few of us on watch, most of the hundred-odd helots from the district are there now."

"And that's the danger."

She gave a grim shrug. As when you first met her, the deference was gone from her voice, and this time it no longer sounded friendly. "It's a damned poor time for a visit from two young aristarchs who might question the gathering. Who might well mock. Who might start something that won't end how they think it will."

You stared at her, now completely incredulous at her audacity. "How did you know of me, Breden?"

"I knew all your names within a month of being sold here, kurios," she replied gravely. "All of us do. You have to know which ones to avoid. I never heard you were one of those, though."

Your shock was turning into something unfamiliar, unsettling. "What have you heard of me that…that makes you think you can speak this way to me?"

Breden stepped closer, all intensity and freedom. "Not a thing, kurios Hugh. Not a damned thing. Only what I've seen in your face in the last few minutes."

1) That was when I kissed her.

2) That was when I knew I had to see her again and keep talking.

3) I could no longer countenance such barefaced impudence!

Spoiler: Current Stats (click to show/hide)

You are Hugh de Huguenot, aristocrat of the Shayard Rim.

Traits
Charisma: Not yet defined.
Combat: Not yet defined.
Intellect: Not yet defined.

  Ruthless: 49% Compassionate: 51%   
  Skeptical: 50% Devout: 50%   
  Homelander: 54% Cosmopolitan: 46%   

Anarchy: 0

[NRDL]

2

[Digital Hellhound]

2, 1 is just skeevy, 3 doesn’t really fit.

[notquitethere]

Agreed 2.

[Vgray]

"You've got altogether too much confidence in your face-reading skills, gi…Breden," you mumbled in disbelief. "But…Xthonos. You were right, and I had no idea how much I needed to hear what you've just said."

Breden tilted her head to one side. "What? The idea that anyone might one day give the Keriatou what they deserve?"

You looked up sharply with new shock and an undeniable twinge of guilt. "Why? They're my father's cousins. They've always been—their door has always been open to us."

"I saw the family love in how they talked to you, kurios."

"Cousin Calea's just…" You shook your head with sudden, angry vehemence. "No. You're right. But it's so much more than that. You've got no reason on earth to trust me—but you did. And I don't remember the last time I heard someone speak so freely! We all walk around all day stifling our fires, never talking about the things we hate…."

"Freely?" Breden gave a raw laugh. "Angels, kurios Hugh. If what I've said is speaking free by your standards, you nobles really are pickling your tongues. I can speak a lot more free than that."

"Go ahead, then," you said hungrily.

She blinked, then shook her head. "No, milord. Your turn to take a risk. Tell me just what you hate so much."

For a moment, you found yourself choking on the volume of possibilities. Ever since you watched hieros Zebed have his gentler predecessor beaten and banished, you've been learning to despise the Karagond Hegemony.

Then it crystallized in your mind, and you blurted out to Breden what you loathe most about the Thaumatarchy:

1) Its brutal disregard for the rights of the nobility and other free folk.

2) All the ways that helots are treated as less than human—above all the harvest of their blood in the Harrowing.

3) The Thaumatarch's lack of ruthlessness when it comes to punishing his own corrupt and decadent officials.

4) The superstitious nonsense the Ecclesiasts teach to justify the evils of Hegemony.

5) The corruption of the true faith of Xthonos by the Karagond priesthood.

6) The subjugation of Shayard, my homeland, and its forced assimilation into a foreign empire.

7) The way the Hegemony reinforces the ethnic divides between its subject peoples—and keeps us cut off from the wisdom and wealth of outside nations.

Spoiler: Current Stats (click to show/hide)

You are Hugh de Huguenot, aristocrat of the Shayard Rim.

Traits
Charisma: Not yet defined.
Combat: Not yet defined.
Intellect: Not yet defined.

  Ruthless: 49% Compassionate: 51%   
  Skeptical: 50% Devout: 50%   
  Homelander: 54% Cosmopolitan: 46%   

Anarchy: 0

((For this vote, please pick two options, if you pick number 1, please pick a third.))

[A Thing]

1, 2, 6.

[NRDL]

1,2,5, I feel like there needs to be a religious motive for our guy considering his attachment to the Sister earlier.

[A Thing]

1,2,5, I feel like there needs to be a religious motive for our guy considering his attachment to the Sister earlier.

Yeah, there definitely should be, but I'm not entirely sure how many other opportunities we'll get to up our homelander percentage.

[notquitethere]

2,6

[Vgray]

You rapidly poured out the litany of injustices that the other local nobles your age usually skirt around in hints and whispers. "The Karagonds have always treated the ancient rights of the nobility like so much dirt! Our lands are whittled away; our houses, stables, and barns claimed for garrison; our goods stolen through ravenous taxation. They send Kryptasts to live among us in secret and kill us without explanation or appeal. We live under constant threat of unjust and arbitrary death…"

"A bit like the Harrowing," Breden cut in blandly.

"Yes! Well…" You faltered, vividly recalling the day in your boyhood when Joana became Old Joana—when her limp frame was borne back up from the agora by bleak-faced nephews, her hair newly white, her own nail-tracks scarring her face. You grew up with the fear of a Kryptast stealing you away, but perhaps it doesn't quite compare to watching family members slaughtered like cattle every few months.

Breden looked on the verge of a dismissive wave of her arm. "Kurios, forgive me…but doesn't it go without saying that a noble will hate the way that the Hegemony treats its nobles? I'd have thought you more original than that."

You shook your head, feeling warm blood rise in your cheeks and neck. "Have it your way, you outrageous disrespecter of persons. Setting aside the obvious, then…what I hate about the Hegemony is…"


All the ways that helots are treated as less than human—above all the harvest of their blood in the Harrowing.

"That so?" Breden said skeptically. "I mean, it's good to hear you say so, milord. But that's truly what a young aristo hates most about the world we live in?"


1) Of course not, but I'm going to convince her that it is.

2) Yes: I sincerely care about the helotry.

((I had forgotten this choice branched. At least, it branches for aristos.))

[NRDL]

2

[birdy51]

2

[A Thing]

2
I thought by free folk, it meant people in general, not just nobility.