color. Not finery really, more visiting clothes, but they'd serve. Burks picked Lairdgren green, a military style dress uniform and Denno pouted as he was left in his soiled blue prisoner outfit. Tor almost took pity on him and passed over his second clothing amulet, but that had weapons on it too, as well as a shield. Besides, maybe the King and Queen would take pity on Brown if he didn't look perfectly sharp?
Tor stood on the far right, Burks took the left and they slowly walked towards the palace, waiting for someone to greet them. It turned out to be a cute, and obviously pregnant Princess who floated above the ground a few inches. She stopped and stared for a second, then nodded and floated to Tor, giving him a warm hug. That she'd figured out which identical looking guys was him didn't throw Tor at all. Burks may look the same, but he was five inches taller and obviously dressed up like Lairdgren always did.
“Guests?” She didn't ask any more.
“Yes. You know Count Lairdgren, even if he does look a bit funny right now. This other man is… Denno Brown, the Ancient that the Austrans were holding? We helped him leave.” Tor hoped he didn't say it in a way that would trigger the Royal Guard. They could be hugely over-reactive at times. No one tackled them, evil Austran in their midst or not, so Varley took them to the audience chamber. Floating in the air the whole time. She looked darling.
This was a place Tor had never been before, a giant hall used only for the most important guests. That was his guess at least. It was certainly grand enough, in polished dark wood, all one color for the whole room except the two chairs up front, that were gold wood and bright red seat cushions. In this space it screamed “look at me!” without being so obvious as having a man calling them all to attention and respect. That would be tacky. This was much better, since you could count it as happenstance instead of years of careful planning.
The King and Queen walked out of a door behind the thrones that was nearly invisible, recessed into the wall as it was. They wore robes that looked splendid and colorful, along with the royal crowns, but Tor picked up his own work from fifty feet away. It was all just a clothing amulet. They probably memorized the patterns for emergencies and quick changes. It was a good idea really, all Tor had was this suit of clothes and his student browns, at least for fast work. A bigger repertoire wouldn't hurt at all. Tor decided to actually come up with a couple of things. It would give him a reason to spend time with Petra if nothing else. She was good with styles and colors.
Tor bowed first here, being the least important person in the room. It was an odd thing, since he normally didn't bow to Rich and Connie at all, because they were his friend’s parents, and he'd met them as such, not royalty, but they needed to put on a good show for the stranger, so he went low, his head dropping below the level of his waist.
After they all bowed, Richard smiled.
“Welcome Dennorian Brown, Ancient of Austra. I hope you are… I suppose doing well is too much to ask yet, but let us hope that soon you will be.”
Connie stared at the men in front of her, not losing composure, but nearly so. To her it probably looked like two of him and the most gorgeous man she'd ever seen standing their chatting with her, Tor thought. Or had she seen Burks like this before, back when she was a school girl and thought of him as being another version of Count Lairdgren? It might explain why she kept acting like Tor was special. Was it the older one she really wanted?
It made sense at least, but in this case just being a good point didn't make it true.
After a few seconds Connie spoke, but it was to Tor directly.
“So, Torrance, in your capacity as Queen’s advisor, what's your take on this Ancient that comes from the land of those who would make war on us?” The tone was official and formal and didn't come with a smile for once. It took a second to understand she wasn't joking at all. She really wanted his opinion. Right.
Tor had to fight the shrug he felt and took a deep breath.
“On the surface he seems friendly and charming. His captivity felt real enough. However… I do have some questions that need to be answered before I fully accept him as a friend to us, the people of Noram.” She'd asked for his real opinion, so supposed brother or not, she was going to get it.
Richards’s eyes went wide, perhaps he expected a joke, but if so he was going to be disappointed.
Tor kept going, hoping no one would hit him.
“When we were escaping from captivity, the whole thing went smoothly, even though it was just being made up as I went along. I'd like to think I'm just that clever and intelligent, but everything worked for us. We started in a room with twenty armed guards and seemed to have been gone at least an hour or more before pursuit came. Maybe we got lucky, but there are some other things…
“For instance, I thought I was being clever in acting slightly afraid of Denno, forcing Glost and Daria to push me towards him, but insane or not, would you thrust me into a meeting with your highest level prisoner? Or anyone for that matter? At best they should have kept us apart just because he was a captive, don't you think? I would have.”
Both the monarchs sat forward and Denno had gone wide eyed as if to show his innocence.
“Then, later, Denno and I came across an army of young Larvals. At least six hundred, possibly many more. We didn't engage with them, just ran away from the fence line without issue, but they were at least fifteen years old if not older.”
Burks nodded. So that hadn't gone unnoticed by him either? The Ancient version of him spoke softly. “It takes a normal life span to grow a Larval assassin to maturity and high level training. But much of what makes them so effective is a semi-intelligent nano hive that infects them all. It literally makes them into one being, that had to be done early and it isn't a simple process.”
Tor tried to store that information away, even though some of the terms weren't familiar to him. He knew what a nano was, kind of. A little machine. Like death dust. A hive… Like hornets or bees? Put together it seemed to mean something specific, which could be anything. Tor shrugged and tilted his head to the right before continuing.
“But if we stretch things to the outside and say that Denno was a prisoner for ten years, not just seven, that leaves five years of work being done that needs someone really skilled. I don't know if Austra has a lot of people that could make them, Larval's, but I'm willing to bet that in the list of their best few doctors that do that kind of thing, you'd find the name Denno Brown right near the top. Having the skill to do something doesn't imply guilt, but…”
All of that didn't mean it was a trick, maybe he really was just that good or unexpected, or maybe the guards knew what was going on and purposefully looked the other way? Yeah, they could be killed for it, but it could be pretty easy to love someone as charming as Denno if your other option involved a crazy man in a clown suit. Plus there was one other thing that bothered Tor a little.
“It was when Denno was arguing with Burks about what to do in regards to the Larval. I mean, there are only so many things that can be done there, and the only certain one is killing them all. Denno seems to regard them as his kids, so fair enough that he doesn't want them killed outright, but he drew Burks into calling for a summit of Ancients. Why? Right now, if Denno said he wanted to set aside a compound in Austra for them, everyone would agree, as long as Glost lost power and we knew they weren't going to invade Noram or one of the other lands and take over. If he said kill them, well we could to that too. I don't want to myself, so I get how he feels on the matter, at least a bit, but-”
Burks gave Tor a small bow.
“Thought you might have missed that bit. But as Tor was getting at, I believe, Denno has more power in this situation without the others being involved, so why goad me into getting them together?”
The King asked if they should question Brown using a truth device. It was a plan but it might not work, Tor told them.
“I don't know if it can be beaten, but if anyone can figure it out, a three thousand year old is the being for the job, don't you think? If we're going to question him using it, I think Burks should spend some time trying to defeat it for a while. He could at least tell us if it works on someone like him.” Then Tor shut up. The rest would take care of itself or not. Really that he was speaking at all here was half insane itself. What did he really know?
Not enough to pretend to advise anyone, that was for sure.
The conversation went forward from there as if he hadn't spoken at all, except that everyone looked at him funny when they thought he wasn't paying attention.
Yes, he'd been a little rough, but Denno was, at least supposedly, in charge of all the Larval and Austra to a good degree. Maybe what he'd mentioned was too obvious? That could be it. He started to feel embarrassed when Connie suggested that they set Brown up in a guest room and get him some clean clothing and a nice hot bath.
