Logs:Rone's Story
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| RL Date: 11 December, 2013 |
| Who: Rone |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Vignette |
| What: Nothing is ever quite as black-and-white as it seems. |
| Where: Nabol |
| When: Turn 17 - Turn 33 |
| Mentions: Aughan/Mentions, Bevuel/Mentions, Devaki/Mentions, Edeline/Mentions, Frieja/Mentions, Giarnon/Mentions, Huelet/Mentions, Ienavi/Mentions, Kisare/Mentions, Lunmein/Mentions, Marisse/Mentions, Potipher/Mentions, Rh'mis/Mentions, Tevrane/Mentions, Ustelan/Mentions, Wildar/Mentions |
| OOC Notes: With many thanks to Leova for her edits and additions. |
| Turn 17 It certainly wasn't Rone who negotiated the marriage. Twenty-six turns old, he was rather more concerned with his mistress, and his work as Ustelan's Steward, than marriage. He'd always been ambitious. His father was Ustelan's eldest son, and while Huelet had never been named heir, there was never any doubt in Rone's mind that, one day, that would be confirmed. Nabol would pass to Huelet, and from him, to Rone. Knowing his father, knowing his father's vices, he'd never doubted that Nabol would be his sooner rather than later. That's why he'd requested to work under Nabol's Steward, when he was seventeen. Let his brothers and cousins, his uncles and aunts, fritter away their adult lives; he was going to be useful. He liked the work; he rather thought he was good at it, really. Certainly, he'd been named Steward when he was twenty-five, which had to say something about his ability. Marriage had always been something that was necessary, but not an immediate concern. He'd rather imagined there would be girls lining up to be his wife, and knowing how long-lived his grandfather was, he had time. It was his mother, Kisare, who pursued the possibility of Ienavi. She was of a second-rate hold, certainly, but Greenfields wasn't impoverished, and according to rumour she was well-educated, attractive, intelligent. Ideal, really. He'd had no objections. (He'd had even fewer when she arrived at Nabol; he liked her instantly.) They hadn't spent much time together, of course. She was his mother's lady-in-waiting, and Rone was too busy to spend much time with his mother. Still, self-possessed Ienavi was difficult to miss, and he let himself imagine now and again - anticipate, really - what it might be like once he had her for his helpmeet. Turn 18 Frieja's death was... unexpected. One day, Lady Nabol was hale and healthy, ordering around the children of her predecessor, but still... present. Well-liked - or, at least, tolerated, by Ustelan's earlier-born descendants. The next day she was dead. She'd been more than twenty turns younger than her husband, and they'd all assumed that would be that. But... it hadn't been. He'd caught sight of Ienavi at the funeral, his Ienavi, and... It was shocking, really. Shockingly fast. How Tevrane and Wildar felt, Rone didn't know. All he knew was that the woman who was supposed to be his was now smiling prettily at his grandfather and... He hated her, after that. For throwing him over. For preferring a man of over seventy to a man still in his twenties. For lording it over everyone, when she became Lady Nabol. He married elsewhere, in the end. It didn't matter. His wife was... sufficient. His children, too. He took comfort in the fact that, one day, he would be Lord Nabol, and Ienavi would be nothing. Turn 25 They'd all expected Ustelan to be dead by now. He was eighty, after all, and it's not as though his father had lived to be an old man. Rone tried to ignore the excesses of his brothers and sisters, his half-siblings. It bothered him, though, how little they did with themselves. It was all drinking and hunting and whoring and... did none of them care about actually doing something with their lives? True, they weren't going to inherit (that his father hadn't been named heir, that he hadn't, he tried to ignore these things; he tried, too, to ignore those who thought Marisse's children should be ignored, because she had never been Lady Nabol). Rone rather thought that was more reason, rather than less, to try and be useful. He resented their idleness. He resented... It would've been easier if his wife were someone he could talk to, but she wasn't. And Huelet, who should have been prepared for his own eventual ascent to Nabol... no, his father was no use, either. His father was a waste. And Rone... he had plans. He was going to do something for Nabol. Turn 32 It was hard to tell how much other people noticed, but Rone? He had. Ustelan was failing. He was eighty-seven, of course, so it wasn't a surprise, but... Ienavi was picking up the slack, more and more often. She was meeting people alongside her husband, and she was acting in his place. He still hadn't named an heir, and it was finally beginning to bother Rone. It was owed to him... if Ustelan were in his right mind, and making a decision, no doubt he'd see that. But he was old, scarcely paying attention, and if he died without naming anyone... It bothered Rone. It bothered him a lot. He still noticed Ienavi. He still watched her. There was something up with her - something different. If there'd been even a hint of scandal about her, in all these turns, Rone would have noticed. There hadn't been: he didn't like her, but he was sure of that much. However unlikely it seemed, she was true to her husband. But now... there was something different about her. He didn't like it. Not at all. He suspected she knew he was watching her, more than usual, in the months before her disappearance. She behaved like... like she had something to hide. Like something was going on. It was suspicious. And there was something wrong with that Harper she kept. He kept... staring away. Hiding something. Lunmein's disappearance didn't seem like much of a surprise, really. The Harper had seemed on edge; he seemed afraid. His disappearance seemed more like a well-planned escape, really. Like he was trying to get away. It wasn't Rone he was trying to get away from. And Ienavi... she seemed more bothered than afraid. Angry. And then... strangely satisfied. And then she had disappeared. And then the rumours had started. So she was pregnant, was she? He didn't want to believe that it was Ustelan's, but he knew... even in the past few months, there'd been no suggestion of an affair. No, the child was almost certainly Ustelan's. But there was no way, surely there was no way, Ustelan intended to name that child heir. Not before it was born. Not... not ever. He knew his grandfather was in a coma. He knew it wouldn't be long now. He was ready. Ustelan died. Rone pushed his father into presenting himself as Lord Holder, even without any proof of intention from Ustelan (he was ignoring Ienavi's lies, of course). Huelet wrote letters to the Weyr, and to the other Holds in the area. It worked less well than Rone could have hoped, but... it was something. A start. A declaration of intention. Ienavi was still missing, but she was a threat. Rone didn't trust her: he didn't trust that she wasn't lying about Ustelan's intentions, and he certainly wasn't confident that she hadn't been involved in his final end. Rone needed to act - to save Nabol from a maybe-murderess, an outsider. A baby. No Hold could truly prosper under the leadership of a newborn. (If said newborn even existed.) He abandoned his post. He felt terrible about it, but... this was important. He needed to save Nabol from the murderess, and no one else was stepping up to do it. He had assistants, and he'd appoint one of them in his place just as soon as he had the authority to do so. In the meantime, he began to gather men to help him. Like-minded men to speak up for order, to reassure people that there was still someone - yes, him - who would make things right again, to make certain she, a still-young and still-pretty woman, didn't get ahead for having abandoned the Hold in her flight from justice. Men to redistribute resources from hoarders, to protect vulnerable cotholds from those who would take advantage of chaos, to investigate those same holds for pockets of rebellion and stamp them out. Men who were proud to serve their Hold. Eventually there were so many, they were calling it an army. It... didn't feel like that, not entirely. He was... protecting the Hold. Holds were teetering, uncertain places, without a confirmed Lord. Someone needed to look after Nabol while all of this was being sorted out; someone needed to protect it. From Ienavi, yes. From Lord - no, from 'Aughan,' from Devaki despite even higher mountains in the way; from Giarnon, too. From anyone who might decide that now was time to encroach upon them. At least Potipher, Blood of Nabol and companion of his youth, still had some family pride. It helped, too, that once upon a time it had been Edeline who had had to protect her Hold from outsiders and fight for what was rightfully hers. Nabolese men ought to be proud to serve their Hold. Most of them were, and those who weren't, had to learn. Ienavi showed up at Healer Hall. So - yes, she really had been pregnant. Yes, she really did have a son. To Rone's eyes, it didn't matter. Huelet was Ustelan's heir. If not Huelet, or Huelet's sons, then Bevuel. There was simply no way the succession stretched all the way to Ustelan's fourth wife and her infant son. He gathered more men. It was necessary. They had to be fed, but that was necessary too. And Huelet... he was proving to be a liability despite his letters. Senile, old before his time, his body ravaged by alcohol and illness. He would have been ready, Turns ago if only his father had had the decency to die then, but not now. The Conclave wouldn't take him now, not without more incentives than Nabol could afford. Yes, he had to go. He knew it, though. "Let me die," Huelet said. "Please. I'm in your way. I'm dying, anyway. Do it now, and do it quick." Rone felt guilty - his own father, for all that Huelet had asked him, for all that he wouldn't want to die slowly either - but... it was for Nabol. For the sake of Nabol. For... for their people. Huelet couldn't be Lord, not anymore. He'd caught a flash of dark hair and blue eyes, just barely, out of the corner of his eye: a face in the window. For a mere fraction of a second, their gazes had met, and then the boy was gone. It was long enough: he memorised that face, he'd know it anywhere, however unremarkable. It was a dreadful lapse in security, if a mere boy could slip past the guards and climb the walls of Nabol. That lapse had to be corrected. Rone couldn't let anyone get in his way. Not after all he'd already done, and all of it for his Hold. So the Weyr was supporting Ienavi, was it? He supposed it wasn't surprising. A woman's touch - she'd pretend anything, no doubt. Pretend that she'd been in danger, pretend she had proof, pretend. She was a liar, but she wasn't going to take Nabol. She hadn't the right. Turn 33 Spring would come, soon. He'd found - and immediately lost - the boy who thought he was a murderer, but he'd have to live with that. Come spring, his forces would move. Come spring, he'd have a case to present: he'd been protecting his people. It might not all have worked out the way he'd planned, but 'when chopping wood, chips fly,' as the smallhold saying went; some casualties were to be expected in dealing with those so hardened against the rightful order of things. He was the one who had made the sacrifices, who had been out there struggling instead of drinking tea in the safety of a Hall. And he'd pay for everything; just let him look after his people, his people. As Lord. Please don't let the Greenfields bitch take his Hold. Please. He still hadn't expected it. He'd barely lived to be surprised. But at least he'd left insurance. He didn't have proof, but a well-constructed story went a long way. |
Comments
Edyis (Edyis (talk)) left a comment on Thu, 12 Dec 2013 11:47:51 GMT.
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- fistshakes* I should not feel any sympathy for Rone. And yet, he makes so much more sense now. And I do feel just the slightest bit bad for him.
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