Her escort returhen led her into the main hall and towards the thrones, where he bowed to the king and queen as he introduced her. “Your Majesties, this is Lady Moriko, of the Sakiya Temple.” The hall was not terribly busy, but it was also the ter point of business for the court, so there were plenty of people to see her being introduced and hear her name. She’d also spotted Princess Kagami, though she didn’t really have the opportunity to look around for the rest.
“It is a pleasure and honor to meet you, Your Majesties,” Moriko said to them as she curtsied. She’d practiced enough to not be awkward, but she’d alreferred bowing. Court rules were more formal than the rest of life however, and she had been given a ret education to make sure she got the basics right.
“Lady Moriko, it is good to put a face to one of the names I’ve been hearing so much about retly,” King Yoshihiro replied, giving a slight nod to aowledge her introdu, and signaling her escort to leave.
Queen Phaedra shot her husband an amused gnce before leaning forward to give Moriko a warm smile. “I’ve heard much about you from my daughters, they seem quite taken with you. I am quite looking forward to talking with you over dionight.” The queen’s fair appearance gave quite a bit of proof to Princess Kagami’s he eldest daughter ractically a mirror of her mother.
“There is some court busio attend to yet, but we will be joining you in our private dining hall shortly.” The king was about to tinue when another male voice spoke up.
“Lady Moriko, perhaps I escort you there and keep you eained awhile?” The speaker was a young blonde man in his teens, though tall and unusually solidly built for his age, with a moderately tan plexion that trasted with his fairer hair.
King Yoshihiro smiled slightly as he gestured toward the boy. “Lady Moriko, I should like to introduce you to Priny you.”
Moriko gave the young prince a shallower curtsy than she’d given the king and queen as she sidered how best to respond. “Ah, it is a pleasure to meet you, Yhness.” Prince Gou’s smile was a touch too warm and eager to please, and Moriko wao make sure she defused any vague hopes quickly. She doubted that he had any specific ideas in his mind beyond wanting to show off and be admired, but the young could bee over-focused quickly.
Then she spied Princess Kagami looking at her you brother with an expression Moriko was certain she’d worn herself, and the perspective ge gave her inspiration. “And I would be happy to be escorted by such a dashing young man.” She pitched her voiake sure that ‘dashing’ sounded more like ‘cute’ than ‘handsome’, and had to suppress a desire to ugh as she took the offered arm with a smile. “You remind me of my younger brother, he’s always so ear. I do hope you are a better swordsman than him however, it wasn’t too long ago that he lost a spar to a rabbit actor. Admittedly, the rabbit was a dungeoure, but he’d only been a three-foot-tall humanoid for a few weeks.”
The twit Gou’s expression told Moriko that her verbal bo had hit his ego, but the prinly briefly stiffened before he ined his head. “Well, maybe I visit your dungeon someday a myself against the same actor, and we could see.” His smile still seemed genuine enough, just a bit less intense, and Kagami’s smirk looked satisfied, so Moriko was fairly certain that she’d struck the right bance. He got to treat her like another older sister, no more.
As he showed her the way to the dining hall, Moriko replied, “Well, if you have a good showing, perhaps my husband or I could have a spar with you as well. Don’t fet that I am a disciple of the monastery.” Well, that got his i focused, and the resulting versation was more about martial teiques than anything else. He really did remind her of Gan, though more posed and broadly educated. They’d either be best friends or sider each other rivals. Though the difference could be hard to tell sometimes.
The dining hall was maybe not quite as big as her family’s home ba Riverbridge, but they also had a rger home than average for their town. It not only held the rge dining table, but had enough space around it for servants to pass by each other while pushing carts, with furniture decorating the walls as well. If this was the private dining hall, the ba hall had to be bigger than her monastery’s dining hall.
The rest of the royal family filtered in shortly after their arrival and Moriko finally got to meet the heir, Prince Ailwin, as well as the royal spouses; Prince Zarod, Princess Amhis, and Princess Catherine. Priiriana’s fiance, Lord Ilimater, was currently in his homend. He would acquire the title of Prince as well, ohey were married.
There were a lot of names and faces to remember, even with havihe royal princesses two days ago and having studied the notes her master had given her. Prince Zarod was a little taller than Moriko was while she was wearing these boots, with curly, light brown hair that was kept barely tamed. He seemed affable enough and clearly doted on his wife, but to Moriko’s eye any apparent softness was an illusion, he had a solid sort of fidehat suggested he was reasonably capable at the least.
Princess Amhis was the least physically imposing member of the royal family. She was dark-haired with dusky skin, and barely taller than Kazue but not as slender, which led to a slight excess of curves. However, she was eic to the point of effervesce, always ready to join any versation while managing to keep track of everything going on in the room, and broke smoothly away when she was needed by one of the servants. She was quite the trast against her much taller husband, but they also fitted against each other charmingly when she had a moment to rest in his arms.
Princess Catherine oher hand was like a narrower, sharper version of her wife, Princess Kitiara. Both tall and blond, Catherine was more of a ‘rapier’ pared to Kitiara’s ‘broadsword’. paring them to ons seemed apt, as her took any care to hide their military bearing.
Moriko found herself swept into different versations, not quite guided along a set flow so much as the ter of a certed effort to ehat she was eained and occupied until the King and Queen arrived. Following a bit of advice from Mordecai, she took the time during these versations to make sure she plimented each piece of jewelry she’d been loaned for the occasion, borrowing some of her terminology from Kazue and Mordecai but keeping her pliments sincere. Her favorite was the neckce, a string of spectacur blue opal beads woven into a rope of gold threads, the beads fshing with occasional hints of fiery reds and yellows.
She hadn’t beeaihey were going to seat her, but she was only a little surprised to find herself seated between Queen Phaedra and Princess Kagami. Her atus as a Lady certainly didn’t put her there, but as an ‘ambassador’ and a specifically invited guest for a private meal, it made more sense.
The dihat was served was closer to a feast, and it came with the difficulty of restraint. Moriko was certainly not a messy or noisy eater, but eating in careful, small bites at a retively slow rate was not the same as normal polite eating. It made talking during the meal easier, but it also made eating take at least twice as long, and Moriko teo eat quite a lot. The versation was kept social during the meal as well, ‘business’ talk waited until after dessert had been finished and the table cleared, then a sele of lightweight snacks and drinks ced. The serving staff filtered out, leaving more items covered on the sideboards, but one new persoered. A young man in scribe’s robes, carrying a small portable desk and a couple of folders full of paper as well as a wax tablet and steel scribe for taking notes.
“Well, I suppose it's time to get down to business, then,” Phaedra said softly. The scribe set up his desk and materials a discrete distance behind them. “We would like an official retionship with your family and dungeon. The very first thing we’ll need is an official name for the territory.”
Moriko took a moment to sult with Mordecai and Kazue, who had been spending a fair amount of time on the idea already. “Well, there have been a few thoughts. ‘the twin core dungeon’ roposed, but dismissed due to possibly creating to an association with The Twins, and the same for being called the Kuic dungeon. There weren’t any other descriptive title sort of hat arongly wanted, so going back to geography, we’ve decided on being The Azeria Mountain Dungeon.” She smiled slightly. “Riverbridge is about the same distance as Azeria Forest, but I have to admit it doesn't have quite as strong a name."
King Yoshihiro chuckled. “Should I take offehat you wish to keep some distance from the Kingdom? No, no, I uand. Remaining distinct like that is for the best, it avoids fusion. Hmm.” He gave a thoughtful frown for a moment. “The mountain raself is the Raincatcher Mountains, but as far as I know nothing is keeping the mountain and its foothills from being named Azeria Mountain. Assuming it doesn’t trip aing treaties, we have no problems aowledging that name officially.”
“Speaking of,” Moriko replied, “could you go into some more detail on that? It’s ly something Kazue or I paid a lot of attention to, and Mordecai was rather out of the loop.”
Prince Ailwin took the lead here. “The basics are not plicated, though the treaty itself goes into a lot of specifics, exceptions, and ditionals. Throughout the mountain range are many tribes and small nations, plus a dwarven kingdom deep below. Most are sidered Indepe and are simply in a trade agreement mixed with a mutual defereaty, as well as deliing their rights to travel freely as individuals inside of Kui. Most of the burden of defense is left to the kingdoms, but the tribes ot let hostile forces traverse their territories without some level of challenge unless clearly outmatched. In addition to those, other tribes are more closely tied to us, and have the status of Vassal State. They rule themselves indepely but follow all of our applicable ws. Individuals of those tribes do not owe taxes to Kuic, but the tribe as a whole owes some sort of duty to the kingdom.” He smiled slightly at that. “As most tribes who chose to be that indepe and prefer the mountains also tend to have uraits or talents, they also tend to be suitable for training the Marked, and that avaibility is usually accepted in lieu of tribute.” The prince paused a moment before he tinued. “There are some other arras involved with that, but that is where things start to get plicated, and they don’t affect your dungeon, so I think it best if we skip it for now.”
Moriko pursed her lips thoughtfully as she spoke with her spouses, then turned her attention back to the royals in front of her. “Alright, so what form of retionship are you seeking with us?” The princesses had talked about it with her the ht, but this occasion was stating it more formally.
“Something iween,” the King answered, “namely, an Associated State. You would have more duty to us than the indeperibes, but the ws of our nd do not automatically apply in your territory, uhe vassal states. You would have a more plete snty, just a formalized duty to be allies. In exge for this, you gain our prote, and while our ws would not apply to you or yours ihe dungeon’s territory, they do apply to any of our citizens who are in your territory, and should you have grievance against a citizen of Kuic who has left the dungeon, we either judge the citizen by our ws or extradite them to your territory, depending upon your preferences.”
From there it became a matter of iating the fine points and then reviewing the finalized treaty after the scribe used his o edit the papers with an ented quill. Once everyone agreed on the finalized version, the scribe brought out a scroll case and a small stamp. He stamped each of the pages in order, then tapped the scroll case. The papers merged and flowed into a single sheet of paper as the scrolls case opened up, creating a single tinuous dot that then ed itself into the scroll case. All that was left was to sign and swear oaths to the i and purpose of the treaty. When pleted, the entments on the scroll case finished activating and the tents were fixed into pce. There was no more editing that treaty, if anything o be ged it would have to be a whole reaty written, witnessed, and signed.
It went a lot easier than it would have if Moriko didn’t have Mordecai and Kazue sitting in her head. Moriko didn’t have to process what she was reading, so she could just quickly s over the lines ahe cores do the memorization and double cheg everything was written correctly. Mordecai was the focus of analyzing it, given his experience, but Kazue’s passion for reading made it easier to take all the information quickly as she was used to reading fast.
It was te into the evening whehing was done, and much of the dessert and snack foods were gohe King, Queen, Princess Kagami, Prince Ailwin, and his wife Princess Amhis were the only ones involved for most of the process, the rest had rexed into a more lightweight socialization mode, ing and going as they pleased, though occasionally thoughts and opinions.
“Well, one more thing o be doonight,” Queen Phaedra said with a smile. “Give us a moment, we need everyone back here, but they shouldn’t have gone far.”
Zagaroth