Episode 23: Memory and Dedication Greyspill Plains, 203 From his vantage point on the Greyspill, Alessandro watched the Bellatrix armies disappear over the distant line of the hills. When the last of their banners slipped beneath the southern hilltops, he rose from his camp seat and headed towards the narrow path down the cliff slope. Ten paces down, he heard Martin call out to him. He turned, and waved up at his bodyguard. "I'm just going down to take a look." Martin, huffing for breath in his chain hauberk, jogged to the edge of the path and stopped, looking ruefully down at the jumbled rocks below him. "Your Highness, you shouldn't go down there. There could still be Bellatrix about-" Alessandro shrugged his objection off, imagining the metal-shod bodyguard tumbling down the sage-dotted hillside in pursuit. "I need to go down there, Martin. I have to see this for myself." Martin peered down the slope again, and put a foot down on the nearest stone. The shale gave under his foot, sending a tiny avalanche of pebbles towards Alessandro. Like an ungainly shorebird, Martin hopped backwards, away from the edge. "Ah, Your Highness, please wait. I can get out of this armor in just a moment...." Martin realized he was addressing the prince's back; Alessandro, still waving, was well on his way to the foot of the cliff. It took the prince ten more minutes to make his way to the base of the cliff. As he walked, the reek of gunpowder grew stronger, a harsh, acrid odor that combined the scents of burnt cinnamon and onions. At the foot of the cliff, he entered the reddish haze left by the discharge of dozens of cannons, and the intensity of the odor brought tears to his eyes. In ten more minutes, he reached the edge of the battlefield, marked by the first of hundreds of casualties. As he picked his way through the lines of the fallen, he felt a familiar numbness. Here, he passed a fallen horse impaled on a broken pike. There, he passed near a man in his own livery, felled by arrows and finished off with a sword thrust to the gut. These were familiar sights, almost comforting compared to what he found at the heart of the battlefield. The steel balls the Crux artillerists had used to destroy Wall had been put aside in favor of other ammunition. On Greyspill Plains, Alessandro's cannons had fired lead pellets, nails, and even chain. Many of the bodies of the cannons' victims were no longer recognizable as human; only in the worst aftermath of cavalry charges, where men and animals' bodies twisted together into chimerical monstrosities, had Alessandro seen anything to match the nightmarish horror of Greyspill Plains. Sickened by the carnage and the ever-present miasma, he stumbled back towards the cliffs and the waiting encampments. At the edge of the plains of the dead, Alessandro found two women tending to a small throng of wounded. The older of the two, grey-haired and pinch-faced, was washing and cleaning wounds; as he watched, he saw the younger woman give her instructions on bandaging a deep slash in one half-conscious soldier's bicep. The man's arm was drenched in blood; it was a wound that any physician could have closed in a minute, but here on the fringe of the battlefield, it could well cost the man his arm. The elder woman gripped the bandages tentatively, and Alessandro could tell that she had made the same assessment of the man's fate. Then, the younger woman shoved her aside, placing her hands on the raw wound. "Those three men need you, Annette," she directed the older woman away, and then returned her attention to her patient. The woman's face contorted in pain, and Alessandro saw tears form at the corners of her eyes. Distracted by her agony, he nearly missed the faint bluish glow that played over her hands. The woman looked around nervously, and when her eyes touched him, he made a point of showing that his attention was elsewhere. Satisfied, the woman removed her hand from her patient's arm, and carefully wrapped layers of blood-spotted bandages over his healthy, blue-streaked arm. As she worked, Alessandro went back to watching her. Dark-haired and slim, she wore a peasant's brown cotton dress over an off-white blouse, its sleeves hacked unevenly away. The hem and bodice of the dress were stained with red-brown blood, and by both the cut of the latter, and the woman's air of world-weary acceptance, Alessandro judged that this was not the first battle she had spent with his army. He approached her to see her face more clearly. By the softness of her features, she could be no older than nineteen. She chose just that moment to look up, meeting his gaze with unflinching brown eyes. With a glance, she dismissed him as not requiring her attention, "If you're hurt, sir, Annette can help you," she pointed out her companion. Annette lifted her head from where she sat by a soldier with a half-splinted ankle, saw Alessandro, and gasped before prostrating herself in the mud. Sounding half-strangled, she blurted, "Your Highness." The younger woman's eyes widened, and she hesitated for a heartbeat before sinking into the dirt beside her patient. Her curtsey confirmed his earlier assessment. Even spattered with blood, the curve of her neck and the swell of her sunburned bosom awoke in him the familiar stirring of desire. A quickening heartbeat later, something else welled up within him, far more satisfying than lust. An idea. "You may rise," he gestured to the women. "You, what's your name?" The younger girl lifted her head three inches, but refused to rise from the curtsey. "Delphine Courtenay, Your Highness." No matter how he handled this, he knew he was going to frighten her. He chose to be direct. "Where did you learn the arts of the physician?" Delphine blanched at the question, fearfully dipping her head back down. He could see her shaking; spotted with gore as she was, he wondered if she hoped he would mistake her for a corpse and forget his question. Gently, he added, "I'm not asking to endanger you. Just tell me." Wilting, she whispered, "My mother taught me." He knew the simple statement for the damning confession it was: her reticence showed that her mother had not belonged to either the Church or the Physician's Guild. Delphine Courtenay was a renegade physician. If either Guild or Church learned of her, she would be branded a heretic and killed. "Well, Delphine," he said, coaxing her with the art Clarissa Sone had taught him so long ago, "the Church has excommunicated me, so I won't be telling any of them. It looks like it hurts you to use your talents. Why?" "I'm only half-trained," she admitted. "My mother didn't finish training me before she went away. I've been on my own since." Her voice was small and tight, and Alessandro saw the shadows of fading bruises on her shoulders. Knowing what to look for, he saw the same marks on her arms, and the fading trace of a blackened left eye. A cold anger filled him, and he fought against it, knowing it would serve no purpose here. Alessandro bent down next to the terrified girl, and put a gentle hand on her shoulder. Cynically, he reflected that Clarissa's lessons were finally being put to good use; in his kindest voice, he said, "Delphine, you have a rare gift, and every man here that you have saved will attest to its value. But your gift shouldn't hurt you. I have a friend named Lucien d'Aramis. Perhaps you've heard of him? He has connections with the Physician's Guild. After you finish here, come to the command tent and ask for me. I'll introduce you to Lucien, and we'll send you to complete your training." While he spoke, he watched her exhausted, alluring face: fear, shame, hope, and disbelief flickered across it like flame swept by wind. In the back of his mind, he heard Clarissa tell him of this moment, when he could take her in his arms, kiss her boldly, and steal her heart away forever. With a shake of his head, he smiled at her instead. "Once you're trained, you can come back to me. I'll need people like you when this kingdom is mine." Then he rose, and nodded a farewell to the soldiers and the other woman. He heard Delphine murmur disbelieving thanks, and reassured her as well as he could with another grin as he walked away. He stopped once to glance over his shoulder and see Annette touching Delphine's shoulder. He could imagine the older woman's words, knowing full well what Annette would tell the girl he really wanted. Bemused by the thought, he looked out over the battlefield, to where the ravens already fed amidst the newly dead. As he walked, he wondered how many Delphines saved would balance the weight of the fields of the slain. He pushed the thought aside as he saw Romana waiting for him at the top of the cliff. As long as Delphine came to his camp, he would do well by her, and it would be a beginning.

The Royal Palace, 230 Adriana Komaru entered her brother's sickroom, three anxious steps behind her mother. In her right hand she held two Cosmos cards, light and faintly warm to the touch as she gripped them in fingers moist with nervous perspiration. "We might have another way to help you," Kimiko spoke, her voice strained with concern, the words tumbling out before she could contain them. In a chair beside the dying prince's bed, Delphine Courtenay rose unsteadily from her doze. Her blood-spotted physician's robe had fallen open in her sleep, revealing the tight-laced leather vest and suede pants she wore as part of her other duty, bodyguard to her second generation of Komaru sovereigns. Between her rumpled, dirty attire and the severe braid that bound back her graying hair from her age-lined face, she looked more like a bandit queen than the guardian of Komaru's youngest prince. Not for the first time, Adriana felt a surge of affection for her. "Don't wake him," Delphine sighed reflexively, only half awake herself. Beside her, Hideo coughed once. In the broken hiss that had once been his voice, he murmured, "I was already awake." Kimiko, anguished by his weakness, said, "We might have found the key. Before she..." she swallowed, and began again, "Nadeshiko Komaru found a reference to a key in the shape of a Cosmos card. We think one of these two cards might be it. We're going to take you to a new castle that Seraphine Komaru is raising near Ishiki. We think if we try to attune you to one of them, it might help." Adriana could find no words as she approached Hideo's bedside. She could barely bring herself to look upon him, for fear she would start crying and never be able to stop. Silently, she placed the two cards in his hands. Kimiko said, "Keep them safe until we get you to the new castle. When we get you there, we will try to-" Hideo held one of the cards before his face. He asked, "What is the name of this one?" His rasping whisper halted his mother's words. "We don't know," Kimiko confessed. "We never knew it existed before-" "No," said Hideo, struggling to sit up, "nevermind. I think I know." A cough tore through him, and as he spat blood upon his dark-stained sheets, Delphine reached out to steady him, to beg him to stop hurting himself, to rest, to save his energy- "It is," he breathed between spasms. Komaru

Mourn, 230, Sixty Seconds Only Delphine Courtenay sees the first change. His eyes were honey-gold, his mother's, his father's. Now they are as bright as forged gold, wrenched from the earth to find a haven within his eyes.

"Ah," says Hideo, as the card drops from his fingertips towards the red-flecked sheets of the bed. As though they were one, the three women move towards him, their fear binding them together. He closes his eyes and clenches his fist. Something inside him laughs with delight. If only they knew, he thinks, they would not fear so. He decides to show them.

Everyone sees the second change. Color is many things to humanity. Artists speak of warmth and coolness, colors that soothe and colors that inflame. Physicians speak of color as shorthand for heritage. Geomancers speak of color as the key to mysteries of the earth and of the sky, concealing a secret language of meaning. Few are the souls who cannot look to the brightness of the blue vault of day and not feel warmed, to the vastness of the black vault of night and not feel awed, to the uncounted palette of splendor that comes between without understanding, at least the slightest bit, the miracle that is existence. To the three women who stand around him, it is a bubble of color, swirling and swelling about him, every hue of the rainbow, every sight of a sunset, every memory of a flower in a time of happiness or loss. To the inhabitants of the city, it is a flash, and a shimmering, a bewildering play of brightness that washes away the cares of the moment and leaves every man, woman, and child stumbling forth to squint up at the sky. To the inhabitants of the country, it is a brightening, a lightening of worry that comes in an instant and is chased, minutes or hours or even days later, by a realization of how the world has once again changed. To the inhabitants of the world, it is a fire of a thousand thousand colors that sweeps in a dozen heartbeats across the sky, illuminating it, day or night, so that the stars shine more brightly, the white moon more purely, the black moon more starkly, and the blazing sun as boldly as any day of Mournish spring. And with a gesture and a wish, the haze that fouls Mourn's sky is gone.

The Royal Palace, 230 "Are you okay?" Delphine stammered. "What just happened?" Kimiko demanded. "What did you do?" Adriana cried. Nameless colors forming his cloak and sword, Hideo slipped out of the bed. "I'm fine." He laughed. "I'm better than I have ever been. I understand now. I understand everything," he laughed again, a mad skeletal boy grinning with delight, his smile looking as though it might split his face in two. "Thank you," he said, embracing Delphine and kissing her forehead. She flushed with embarrassment, but her words failed as the warmth of his trailing aura swept across her like a butterfly's wings. "Thank you," he said, embracing Kimiko and kissing her cheek. She opened her mouth and closed it again, delighted, confused, annoyed, and searching for an explanation in the heart of a rainbow. "Thank you," he said, embracing Adriana and kissing her lips. She turned red as a beet, her knees wobbling with the desire she felt in his lips, with the strength she felt as they met her own, with the dizzy spray of colors that swirled suddenly in her mind and in her stomach. "Now, I have to hurry, before he gets away," he said, his spectral wings carrying him across and out of the room in two impossible steps, leaving the three women gaping in his absence, in the euphoric confusion of chromatic brilliance he left in his wake. Adriana felt stunned. Beside her, Delphine's mouth hung open. Her mother's voice cut sharply through her bewilderment: "What are you waiting for? We need to follow him." Instinct compelled her to obey. The trio caught up to Hideo in the stairs to the dungeon, led by the trail of color he left hanging in the air behind him. "Are you sure you're better?" Kimiko demanded as he stood before a locked door, its stout oaken width slowly dissolving into a pool of radiance. Hideo chortled, "I really am! I love you, mother!" He stuck his hand into the door, plunging it three inches into the wood before pulling it out again. "This is taking too long," he said, anxiously drumming his foot as he continued to stare intently at the door. "Are we ever going to get an explanation, then?" Adriana snapped, guiltily pleased that her sharp tone hid her earlier shock. She watched Hideo stick his hand into the door again and pull it out with dismay. With a disgusted sigh, she grabbed the dungeon keys off her belt, and reached to push him aside. His emotions hit her with nearly physical force. She could feel him reveling in his newfound power, his sudden health. She knew in an instant that he was hunting, that he was overwhelmed with a passionate need to strike back for his years of pain. She knew, exactly and without doubt, just how intensely his feelings for her burned within him. Somehow, she unlocked the door before her knees crumpled beneath her and she fell to the ground, gasping. With a joyous yell, Hideo swept Adriana to her feet, kissed her three times, and passed her limp body to Delphine. "I love you, Adry!" he cried, before bounding through the dungeon door with the enthusiasm of a puppy. "Are you okay, Your Highness?" Delphine asked, holding Adriana up. She nodded, barely able to feel her body move, her face burning brightly enough to light a room. "We have to catch him. He's going to kill the Jitani."

Hideo pushes through the last door just as Dmitri jams the keys into his cell's lock, his arm twisted at an unnatural angle to reach through the thin open space in the door. One of his guards lies near the door, his neck broken and his eyes bulging in his lifeless face; Hideo sees he is missing his sword. The second has fallen some distance away, and Hideo can smell the trickle of blood that dribbles from the tongue he bit half off while being strangled. Smoothly, the arm twists the key in the lock and retracts as the door swings open. The stench of corrosion is thick about Dmitri as the twisted bones of his arm knit themselves back together. The Jitani has the composure to smile as Hideo glides into the room. "So, the Shepherd has awoken at last, has he?" Dmitri says casually, his hand resting on the hilt of his sword. "Congratulations. We wondered if-" The stink is too much for him. It is like every terrible thing he can imagine. It is the sickness that bound him for years and nearly slew him. It is the pain of his sister being taken from him. It is an injury to the universe. He raises his hand and turns his sword into a spear of color, driving it through Dmitri's heart. Transfixed by an arc of color, Dmitri spreads his hands as the three women enter the room. For an instant, Hideo feels the filth gather around him, responding to his call. Hideo sees his eyes flicker to the women, sees his smile widen, feels the noxious rush as he gathers his power. Hideo can feel him start to act, to hurt them, to hurt her- Dmitri turns to flame. His skin sears, his eyes pop, his muscle burns, and his bones turn to ash. A single black plaque falls with a clatter to the stone floor. It is all that remains of Jitani Dmitri. "Well," Hideo says as he turns to the three horrified women. "I feel much better." Then he falls, completely exhausted and unconscious, to the floor. The three women hurry to his side. Beside them, the black plaque sits, upon it a character and a name: Unbinder.

Komaru, 230 - 235 An organic castle is born on 4 Waning of Month 4 of the 230th year of Paraceln's Age. It is raised amidst the southern edge of the Sentinel Mountains, and on a clear day, one can see from its heights to the clouds of the Plains of Crystal, far to the south. When first it rises, it seems it will be a towering spire, pale lavender in hue and ringed with ornamental pinnate crenellations. But as its growth draws to a conclusion, it reveals one last surprise: around it, the earth bubbles and swells, forming a high-rimmed base that rises in a concentric circle around the central tower. When the fall rains come, water pools around the tower. When the winter turns it to ice, it gleams as brightly as any mirror. It is named Memory, and it opens once a year on 2 Waxing of Month 9.

An organic castle is born on 1 Waning of Month 5 of the 230th year of Paraceln's Age. It is raised in the low foothills west of Ishiki, overlooking the River Aoi as it winds its way down to the Royal Capital. It bursts from the ground and branches instantly, a bounding triskelion of growth spreading away from its center. It does not rise, but rather spreads, a low-slung silver cloud forming small chambers interconnected by arching walkways exposed to the outside air. When at last it reaches the edge of its growth, it does at last thrust three broad walls into the air, spearhead triangular projections soaring above it like the points of a great crown. It is named Dedication, and it opens once a year on 7 Waning of Month 2.

On the west coast of Komaru, atop a bluff overlooking a lonely stretch of rocky shoreline, the ruins of Castle Touraine lie, broken and crumbling. It was raised nearly half a millennium ago, on a site of significance long forgotten, and though once its graceful spiral rose into the sky, and though once its minarets held firm, it stands strong no more. Its name was the Castle of the Sea, and in the winter of 231, the Mer rise in a great wave to carry its ashes back to the place of its founders' birth.

In the years that follow the clearing of the sky, Komaru is not at peace. In the north, the Yuasa wage a lengthy conflict with the elusive Naga invaders. Battles are fought not with armies and massed troops, but with arrows and ambushes, scouts and subterfuge. In the northwest, the Naga slowly grind down the Touraine levies sent to bolster Yuasa forces, and within three years the Yuasa have been driven from their outlying mines and watch posts. In the east the uneasy alliance of Laurent and Morika Yuasa converts several deep caverns into fortresses, its entrenched forces holding their position despite heavy casualties, including the disappearance of Jaime Yuasa, pioneer of the cave-based defensive plan, into a cavern soon deemed too dangerous to be occupied. After the first year of conflict, the Yuasa receive unexpected reinforcements from the Church of Inner Light, making them the first family to benefit from Kedakai's declaration that the Church's modern purpose is to wage war against Komaru's external enemies. While the Minamet and the Sone are quick to deride this focus, the Yuasa welcome the assistance, and the Church's theurgists soon show their value in supporting the defenders. Meanwhile, in the southeastern edge of Yuasa territory, Victor Yuasa, Duke of Way, fortifies his own border against the Minamet, entrenching himself upon lands seized from them since the Interregnum. The Yuasa - Church alliance remains stable until the matter of Kedakai's previous existence as the Code-sworn Julien Bellatrix is once more brought before the Royal Council, this time by Christoph Bellatrix, a member of Julien's own family. This time, allegations that Julien Bellatrix has broken his oath are backed enthusiastically by Morika Yuasa, and the question of whether or not the man now known as Kedakai must be punished for oath-breaking is not easily set aside. In his campaign against Kedakai, Morika finds allies in the Sone family and, ironically, the Minamet, both eager to weaken the Church. By the time the sordid drama concludes, Morika Yuasa, not the first Yuasa to decide upon an alternate interpretation of Church structure, has declared that he believes Thierry Smith is the leader of the true Church. In response, Kedakai wastes no time in declaring that Morika is a heretic. In a heartbeat, the Church armies in the northeast begin hunting Morika as well as Naga, and Laurent and Victor Yuasa clash again as each works to turn the diplomatic disaster to his own benefit. In the east, the last of the colonists in the Black Valley are finally withdrawn, marking the end of the Church's dream of expansion and the collapse of the Eastern Church. The Minamet greet the departure with a great festival dedicated to the remembrance of those who have died in their unending war with the easterners, defiantly snubbing the Church with their open demonstration of their heretical religion. The Church's one consolation is that, in the wake of the departure of Purity Touraine's settlers, she makes no effort to shield the Eastern Church's leaders. By the time the last of the displaced settlers is returned to Komaran soil, the Eastern Church's leaders are all in Church custody awaiting punishment for their actions. In the wake of the fall of the Eastern Church, only two last remnants of Komaru extend across the desert: the Royal Garrison in Sirocco, and the Dawning Star in Spear. To the Dawning Star, the Minamet deliver an unequivocal message: find a new home. In the south, the great army raised by Seraphine Komaru and her allies pushes back the Jitani invaders practically before they reach the battlefield. In the wake of her victory, Seraphine becomes a force to be reckoned with in the Royal Capital: for a year, she seems to be everywhere at once, doing everything. She has raised a castle, led armies in the north and the south, borne twins, entranced her husband, and still found time to attend every party, play, and invitation sent to her. Lingering rumors about her sanity vanish in the face of the force of her personality: by 232, many Komaru joke that she must have found the twin she was separated from at birth, and that together they are fulfilling her myriad obligations. When, at last, pregnant with a second set of twins, she retires to her country estate for a year to rest and recover, no one in the capital begrudges her a much-deserved holiday. The heroes' welcome that Athel and Theo Bellatrix receive in the wake of their victory against the Jitani incursion is no less spectacular, although neither embraces their accolades with as much energy as Seraphine Komaru. Maria Komaru, no longer able to hide her own pregnancy, shrieks with joy as she embraces her husband Athel, turning him a shade of red deep enough to match his family's colors. And if Theo Bellatrix, at 24 already the veteran of more broken engagements than he cares to count, seems surprised by the attention he receives, and at first dismayed to hear of his engagement to Princess Mirabelle Komaru's second daughter Sakiko, his abundant joy is unmistakable when the two are married on Her Excellency Sakiko Komaru's twenty-first birthday, three short months after her sister Himiko's marriage to Kuro Minamet. After the Bellatrix and the Sone drive back their foes, many eyes turn to the Jitani who now occupy the Touraine family's lands. Plans are drawn up to assault them, but before they can be enacted, Patience Touraine makes a sharp declaration to the Royal Council: "Stop your foolish meddling. They are there because we want them there." Chastened, the would-be generals slink back to their families, brooding over the lost chance for glory. Meanwhile, the Jitani themselves work diligently to make the grant of lands their own; within a year, a dozen castles fly the banners of the new Jitani counts, and those that dare to bring battle to them find themselves ravaged by winds that kill. In the heart of Komaru, Hideo Sone's miraculous recovery is the talk of the court for a season. He convalesces unwillingly for two months, his devastated body rebuilding itself slowly while he impatiently insists that he feels fine, that he's strong enough to move around without help, and that it's always been possible to count his ribs when he has his shirt off. For her part, the Crown Princess is jubilant, the pain of the last few years of pain wiped away in a day. Her former Royal Tutor Jet Touraine, her mother Kimiko Sone, and her cousin Kiseki Komaru are exalted before the court: it is said that Komaru Kiseki's retirement to her country estate in the fall of 230 is the result of her need to escape the continuous stream of prominent engagements the Crown Princess seeks to arrange for her. For Jet Touraine's part, more than one wag is heard to remark that the grieving widower may soon be putting aside his black in favor of a princely crown. The rumor leads to many chuckles, and more than one duel. Not all benefit from the Crown Princess's new vitality. In the Royal Council, Adriana's previous exhaustion is replaced by a fierce surety. She wields every weapon at her disposal as she staves off the reforms she feels Komaru cannot handle. She shows no qualms against using force: Ruby Touraine fights three duels for her in the Royal Council Hall in the space of a month. Even her own advisors are not safe from her newfound energy. A dozen ministers appointed by her mother are sent back to their estates with polite thanks for the services they have rendered, and half a dozen others are pressured to prove the value of the services they offer the Crown. Princess Mirabelle Komaru mirrors the Crown Princess's energy throughout: like an executioner, she stalks the halls of the Royal Capital seeking out corruption and inefficiency, until at last even the Veiled Guard are said to flee from her. Of all of the targets of the princesses' efforts, the Prince Consort Presumptive comes under the most pressure. Courtiers whisper of his involvement in Hideo Sone's sickness, of his illegitimate child, of his affairs. Some even say that the Crown Princess is preparing to send her champion to have him killed. For three days, Dante is not seen at all, and many suspect the Crown Princess of falling back on her grandfather's methods to eliminate her foe. Then, to the shock of all the court, the Crown Princess and the Prince Consort Presumptive appear together before the Royal Council, smiling and healthy. "Many years ago, my uncle Faust Yuasa, whose title I now bear, arranged for me to become Prince Consort Presumptive," Dante states in a firm voice, commanding the attention of the Royal Council in a voice so like his uncle's. "It was never a choice I made, and as the years have passed, I have realized in my heart that though the Crown Princess is a woman I respect and admire, she is not the woman I am destined to marry. Thus, I relinquish my position as Prince Consort Presumptive." The Crown Princess raises her voice, "The Crown wishes to announce the engagement of Her Grace Alessa Komaru, Marquess of Valekaze, to the most deserving Duke Dante Yuasa of Alban. Though We are saddened to be set aside in favor of a younger woman, We are certain that both of Their Graces will find great happiness in their marriage, and We commend His Grace Dante for his efforts on the Crown's behalf during his years of service as Prince Consort Presumptive. For the newly engaged, let there be a great cheer!" And at her command, in joy and bewilderment, the Royal Council Hall fills with noise that drowns out anything else she has to say. Many of the court wonder at the politics behind the decision, but the consequences begin with Dante Yuasa's sudden engagement to Lucien Skye Komaru's fourth daughter, and though the wedding comes five years later, it is never imperiled by politics. For her part, Adriana Komaru makes it publicly clear that she holds no ill will towards His Grace, and in fact arranges for Ruby Touraine to be present to defend him against a duel issued by a furious young Touraine lord with a private grudge. Furthermore, shortly after the announcement, the Crown Princess names Morika Yuasa the Warden of the North, and dispatches Royal Guard to his assistance in the north. That the troops end up relieving forces he then uses to keep Church armies out of his duchy amuses many observers. These same observers express no surprise when His Grace Morika announces his engagement to Her Excellency Charlotte Bellatrix, who, along with her fiance, is quickly excommunicated by the Church. In the wake of the engagement's end, the court watches the Crown Princess with a keen eye. For all of her grief at his illness, Adriana's response to her brother's health is troubling to many: far from embracing him joyously, she greets him cautiously and with obvious reserve. For his part, Hideo does not seem to notice, and the capital's gossips whisper ceaselessly as they search for explanations for the strange dance the two enact before the court, even as they wonder if the Crown Princess will soon find herself with a fiance to replace the one she escaped. Five years pass.

Though Seraphine Komaru raises Castle Dedication, she soon grants it to Adriana Komaru. Adriana rewards Seraphine with favor and thanks, but rather than sharing her gift, she declares it off limits to the Royal Court until such time as she feels it is appropriately defended. She commands Tohru Komaru and Shiro Minamet to design and build a defensive wall around the castle to protect it from those who would seek to threaten it. For four years, the finest Minamet engineers work with the Royal Guard to raise a great wall about the castle, until at last Dedication lies within a star of slanting red stone, as impregnable as Komaran science allows. Then, and only then, Adriana Komaru grants it to her mother to continue the work that had been done at the Castle of the Sea. "And," she says, crossing her arms before her, the Royal Sword across her thighs, "We will be the first to use it. It is time for the Crown Princess to seek an attunement."

It is the 235th year since Paraceln's Dream. Five years have passed, five long years of war, of births, of deaths. They mark the end of the old era, when magic hid and the world beyond Komaru was forgotten. Now, the time of innocence is but a memory, and the dedication of every soul that knows what the future holds will be tempered upon the fire of history reborn. In Komaru, the Consort has awoken.