Episode 8: The Orphan Pt. 1 (Niels)

Sometimes when he sat near Talise, his whole body buzzed like its own little dancing strand of copper.

Today was the worst. Whether it was the fact that today was her birthday, or the games, he wasn’t sure. The charge of being near her was intoxicating and horrible because they had kids and life and he had a challenge to see through.

He glowered darkly at her over the top of his glass. He suspected it came off as flirting and not glowering. He scowled.

She laughed and offered another bite of her crepe to Val.

He ate it and dribbled vineapal juice down his face, which he wiped with the back of his hand before Talise could get ahold of a napkin.

Niels looked around the room. It was busier than usual, because of the heirs’ birthday, so tables were packed shoulder-to-shoulder and little kids sat on parents’ laps.

A villager came over to the table, pushing a little boy with curly brown hair and pale skin with matching pale blue eyes. She stopped in front of Talise. “Happy birthday, princess,” she said.

Everyone here insisted the villager rags was just normal clothes, but Niels had a serious interest in getting a few clothing stores, maybe getting a fashion designer involved. As long as the citizens of the Dells dressed and talked differently from the people in movies, they’d look at those people as other and be against technological advances.

This villager looked like she’d never heard words like technology or chic. Or bath, for that matter.

Talise was much better about villagers than Niels was. He knew it was a shortcoming for a future king, and he was trying to get there. Two years of training did not undo twenty years of fashion snobbery. And there was no helping Niels’ opinion that people should bathe a few times a century, at minimum. Even Meldrick couldn’t stamp that out of him, especially given that Meldrick was almost as fastidious about hygiene as Ach.

While Niels judged the outfit, Talise’s body grew warm out of embarrassment. She’d gotten better control over her blush, but he could still see a slight change in her cheeks. He wanted to kiss them.

“Thank you,” Talise said. “And thank you for traveling here to celebrate Maelvish and my birthday with me.” She took a sip of some passion fruit tea – Niels recognized it by the reddish tint. “How is your harvest going?”

“It goes well,” the woman assured her. She patted the little boy on his shoulder. Niels could see that her attention was on the boy, not on small talk about her harvest. Good. Niels hated small talk. “My son is the one who wanted to meet you,” the woman said. She pushed the boy toward Talise.

Like most village children, he was barefoot and dirty. Unlike most village children, he didn’t have an easy smile. His lip quivered and he tucked his shoulders in towards his sternum. “Hi,” he mumbled.

Talise leaned over enough that she and the little boy were eye-to-eye. “Hi. How are you this morning?”

Johanne, about the same size as the little boy, popped up from under the table. “Hi!”

“Good,” the boy said to Talise. His posture opened more as he looked at Johanne. “Hi. I’m Or…liver.”

The villager’s nostrils flared and she grabbed the boy’s arm. Her grip turned the skin around it white.

“Well,” she said with a smile, but no eye contact. “We should be going. Enjoy your day.”

Something was wrong. Niels casually sat up straighter. He reached for a bite of food to make it look more natural, and he checked mentally for the placement of the knife along his leg.

Humans needed a third of a second to react to anything, Konrad had taught him. He figured he could have the knife in his grip within another second or so, if the woman tried anything, either with Talise or with the boy.

“You said I could play!” the boy protested. He tugged back against the woman.

“It is very nice to meet you, Orliver,” Talise said, with a genuine smile.

The villager’s smile tightened into a thin white line when Talise said ‘Orliver’ and she pressed the boy’s body up against hers. “He gets in these moods sometimes, I’m sorry,” she explained. She jerked on the boy’s arm.

“Don’t be sorry,” Talise insisted. “I love kids and their games. You are more than welcome to stay. Or we can stop by your village.”

Niels loved her, for her awareness of situations. The way she could seem nice while making a threat-promise to check in on that kid.

“We shouldn’t,” the villager said.

Niels studied everything about her; her relative height, the way her upper lip was bigger than her lower lip, the small barely-visible scar just to the left of her left eye.

“Yes!” The boy clapped his hands. “Please?” He tugged back on the woman’s arm, more adamant. “I don’t want to go home.”

Talise’s eyes widened. Niels decided this had gone far enough. He looked around the room for Konrad, but the guard faced away from him. He scanned the crowd and caught king Meldrick’s eye. Through the dragons, he sent the growing feeling of alarm, the memory of the woman’s tight grip on the boy.

Meldrick kissed Aadya and picked something up off his table before he walked toward them.

“Let me at least get you a stuffed animal and a toy train, since you can’t play,” Talise offered. “We make them here.”

The boy looked up at the villager, eyes full of excitement.

The villager looked down at him with a threat. The way her body arced over him, her eyes narrowed, her grip tightened until the excitement left the boy’s eyes…

It was a promise, a silent you will be punished for this later.

Niels dared a glance at Talise. She didn’t look back at him, but she did bite her lip.

“Oh, all right,” the villager snapped. She flung the boy’s arm away from her body. “It’ll just get burned.”

The boy turned a shade of white that even Ach at his most pale couldn’t have pulled off.

Talise stood. She kissed Niels’ forehead lightly. He could feel the hot fire of tension just under her skin.

So much for an uncomplicated, happy birthday, he thought.

“Can he pick his own?” Talise asked the village woman. She reached for the boy’s hand as she spoke.

The woman shook her head and put a hand on her hip. “I’m going with. I don’t know anyone here, it isn’t like at home.”

Time for action. Meldrick was almost here, but not almost enough. Niels leaned forward and rested his hand on the woman’s arm. “Have you ever met the king before?” he asked her. He encouraged her to turn a little, so that she could see Meldrick’s approach. While she looked away, Talise led the little boy out of the room.

Meldrick didn’t acknowledge the villager right away, which Niels thought was smart. Instead he went over to Val with a container of colorful sprinkles and said, “Val, you look like you need some of these on that crepe.”

“Sprinkles?” Val jumped up and watched Meldrick pour a few onto the whipped cream that already topped the crepe.

“Don’t tell your dad,” Meldrick teased. Val’s eyes turned big and round as he looked at Niels, confused about what to do. Niels laughed and gave him a thumbs-up sign.

Meldrick turned around. “Good morning,” he said to the villager.

She bowed her head. Not like she thought Meldrick, as king, was deserving of awe, but like she thought he was going to hit her.

Except.

Something about it looked really fake and theatric. She looked around like she wanted other people nearby to notice her.

Niels did his best not to let his face show what he thought. He’d been training in deadpan for so long that he should have been good at it, but seriously. The woman was begging for a few choice facial expressions.

“Good morning,” she said. Her voice quavered and she gathered her skirts into a fist in her hand, which made her hunch over a little.

Everything about her body language screamed victim.

“I wasn’t expecting to meet you today,” she told Meldrick, head down.

Meldrick was mister calm, cool, and collected. If he was worried, it didn’t show.

Niels was so bad at deadpan. He listened to Meldrick’s steady voice and solid reliability.

Someday. Niels would get there.

“I’m here every Maelvish,” Meldrick said, loud enough for the people around them to hear but not so loud that anyone could accuse him of yelling. “Is there anything I can do to help you?”

She dropped her head even lower. “I don’t want to cause trouble. My son only wanted to greet the princess on her birthday. We’ll go when he returns.”

Without looking at Niels, Meldrick managed to direct a question at him: “Where did your son head off to?”

“Talise took him to the toys stock room to pick something out,” Niels invented. There was no such place, but he didn’t want this woman looking for her son in his apartment. He looked at the villager. “He should be back soon.”

“Have you heard about my daughter and son-in-law’s project?” Meldrick asked her. “They’ve been delivering toys, many made by them and all made by the royal family.”

Niels watched to see if she had a way to spin that in her favor, but she straightened a little. “That sounds nice for the children.” She smiled. It was probably an ordinary smile but Niels was annoyed with her so he decided it was a dark, cunning smile.

“Such a generous and giving family,” the woman continued, looking around.

Niels wondered who she was looking for, what others in the crowd were with her.

Talise had gone off alone.

He needed to find an excuse to get out of there without alarming Meldrick.

Maybe Meldrick should be alarmed.

Fuck deadpan. He called Konrad by dragon, just in case Meldrick hadn’t signaled him somehow.

“What village are you from?” Meldrick asked her. He took a sip of his tea, nonchalant. “It would be a shame if they missed yours.”

“Cherrix. I live in a little white house with a little white fence and little white flowers in the front.”

No she didn’t. Niels knew that family. They had a son in the school, Gaspard. There was no way this woman shared a home with them.

“That village is a good community,” Meldrick commented. Niels hoped that meant he knew the woman was lying. “We have plans to be by in the next two weeks, coincidentally. Is there anything you can bring your family?”

“I’m sure all the children will look forward to it,” she said, like the stuffed animals were probably laced with arsenic. “My family has everything it needs.” She looked over at Niels, extra hostile just for fun, and said, “My son wanted to stop by, but really sometimes there’s talk among the villages of instability. It’s nice to come for myself and see in person.”

Did she think she saw instability here?

It had been the most gorgeously unified church service in modern history. An army of Catholic nuns couldn’t have pulled off better unity.

“Talk of instability?” Meldrick asked. His voice was mild, but Niels saw that his posture had changed so that he was more prepared for a threat. Niels copied the stance.

Where was Konrad?

“Folks wondering when the princess will step up. If her…” she shot a dark look at Niels, “husband is reliable.”

“Unfortunately,” Meldrick gave Niels a small smile, “he’s beyond reliable. Giving a daughter away is never easy, but I couldn’t argue with his competence.”

When he’d first met the crown princess of the Dells and expressed interest in her, Niels had expected wariness.

What he’d gotten was an insistence that he marry her and take on the responsibilities of becoming the crown prince. Meldrick had told him that everyone – which seemed to consist of Meldrick, Aadya, Konrad, and possibly Nell – hoped Talise would end up with him.

It had been the most disarming conversation of his life. He’d gone in prepared for a fight, or at least to defend his character and worthiness to date her, and instead he’d gotten a nice apartment and a crown.

It was like if he’d robbed a convenience store for a few hundred in cash, and then gone and turned himself in, and instead of arresting him the police had given him a winning lottery ticket.

So he knew that Meldrick meant it, about believing Niels was competent. Two years ago when they’d had the dating-a-princess conversation, Meldrick had listed Niels’ soup kitchen charity, his knitting charity, his management of the band and his bandmates’ assets, and his parenting skills as a single dad.

Niels was glad that Meldrick thought so much of him, because watching Meldrick in action right now while they figured this woman out…Niels had a lot to learn.

Not to mention self control issues.

He looked at the woman’s demanding expression. She’d opened up since her little cower act in front of Meldrick and now stood, chest out, challenging. “They’ll be stepping up soon, then?”

“I hope not,” Meldrick assured her. “I enjoy the job. Aadya and I are doing well. No reason to pass it on.”

Niels had a bad feeling that this one question was the real reason for the woman’s visit today. In a lot of realms, including Niels’ realm, eighteen was an important age.

It was sixteen here, but still. Eighteen was notably adult.

He hoped he was wrong, but he had a gut feeling that there would be trouble when he and Talise did eventually take over.

At least they had something to look forward to.

Konrad finally showed. Niels wondered where the hell he’d been all this time, but he wasn’t about to ask that. He tried not to even think it too loudly, because Konrad had this way of seeming to read minds.

“All set?” Konrad asked. He had a tray, with a few dirty dishes, and he added whatever was on the table behind them all. Val gripped his plate like a coveted toy and gave Konrad a suspicious, narrow-eyed look when Konrad got too close to his plate.

The villager tightened her eyes just like Val had as she passed her plate to Konrad. Unlike with Val, it wasn’t adorable and drastic and absurd. It was a dangerous look. Niels suspected she recognized Konrad; recognized, and didn’t like.

“Did you travel far to come today?” Konrad asked her. “We have a cart going into the Lower Dell if your feet are sore.”

She backed away.

Her cowering with Meldrick had been all for show. Niels recognized that while it was going on, but it was nice to have it confirmed now, because she was genuinely scared of Konrad. Her eyes darted to the exits twice while he asked his question.

She ignored Konrad and said to Meldrick, “Where did the princess take my Oliver? He should be back by now, even in a house as large as yours.”

Her eyes flickered to the exit again. Niels wondered if she was considering leaving without her son.

“He must be struggling to decide on a toy,” Meldrick suggested. Still calm, still acting like he had nothing to worry about.

Niels had so much to learn.

“I’ll go check,” he offered. He wanted to make sure Talise was okay, and he knew Meldrick and Konrad wouldn’t let that woman disappear.

He also knew there was no way he was letting that little boy go home with her. He’d adopt the kid himself if he had to.

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