Episode 216: Bowmancing (Konrad)

It didn’t sit right. He reviewed the tapes again, searching for something – anything – that might be significant. Meldrick and Giana arrived in the conference room at 7:28 pm. They reached her room at 7:30 and went inside. Meldrick wore a tuxedo with a tie, the black vest slung over one arm and the top button undone as he walked.

His body language towards Giana was perhaps a little cool, but Konrad wouldn’t say it was agitated. Giana herself seemed fine. She wore a fitted gown, flats. Nothing special or alarming about either of them. The halls were empty; they encountered no one. They went into her room at 7:30 pm.

At 7:51 pm, Meldrick left the room alone, agitated, in new clothes – a plain tunic and slacks – and wet hair.

No amount of replaying the tapes changed any of the facts.

Nothing in Meldrick’s character aligned with the events portrayed on camera.

Perhaps Giana had used a special travel pack to visit her estate in Babylon. But then why would Meldrick be agitated? And why would he need to shower?

Something was missing.

Perhaps Niels had information Konrad didn’t possess. This would need to be managed with care, given that Talise was in labor.

Konrad knocked on the door with two short raps. “Niels? Do you have a moment?”

Even that brief act would alarm Talise. Konrad might not have done it, save that he had a cover story and Niels would be with her soon.

Niels ducked out of the room sideways, his eyes only on Talise, and stepped into the hall with his usual casual-yet-coiled demeanor.

Konrad waited for the door to click shut. “We were able to form a treaty with some rebels from within Calseasa,” Konrad told him. “I thought you and Talise ought to know. There are a number of new faces in the palace, all children.”

“Thanks for letting me know,” Niels said. His distraction, worry over Talise, showed in the frown line of his upper brow.

“ I have yet to tell your mother and Meldrick, as they were at the campaign dinner in Spence’s stead,” Konrad explained.

Thoughts of Giana – surprise, that she had gone campaigning in Sylem, relief that she would be at the palace for the births – flashed across Niels’s mind and settled. There was no worry, no concern, no thoughts of unexpected vacations or anything else of the sort.

Alright.

“That was nice of them,” Niels said. His mind began to wend its way back towards Talise, the delivery of their first children together.

“How is Talise?” Konrad asked him. He only half listened to Niels’s response about Talise’s anxiety; he could feel it rolling off her in waves; fear that she would lose the babies and in some way that would mean she had let Niels down. Fear that this was the wrong choice. Worry about what Konrad needed him for.

He let Niels return to her.

Alone in the hall again, he surveyed the corners of the ceilings, the camera angles. He imagined the time it might take a man as fastidious as Meldrick to shower – in a scenario in which he was only refreshing himself, and a second scenario in which he scrubbed Giana’s blood from his person.

He had so little information. A palace full of cameras, and he had nothing.

“We will solve this,” he murmured to Cecily, “and find Giana. Nourish you.”

She made herself manifest on his shoulder, dressed in some sort of denim contraption Konrad thought might be called a romper. “Hi,” she said.

“Hello.”

“Busy night,” she commented.

It had been a busy week. All his time since Nell cured him, consumed by work. Save, of course, for the time spent in the arms of Nell and Enny. His Nell and his Enny. He let his mind graze over them as he mused.

“What do you think happened?” Cecily asked.

“I think.” He looked up and down the hallway, scanning for anyone who might overhear, but for the moment they were alone. “It is very possible he told Indigo the truth.”

He wanted to believe it, but he knew better than to cleave to his own emotions in a time like this. Subjectiveness was key to success. Yet Konrad’s work always relied on his understanding of those around him, and it rarely failed him.

“It is,” Cecily agreed. “I’m well fed today, by the way.”

He wondered how she could be. He’d held back in the fight with Ionia, allowed Spence to have his moment to prove his capabilities. He’d failed to apprehend Ionia after that initial fight. He’d done little more today aside of get married and have a series of talks with people.

Still… “I don’t suppose you could reserve it?” he asked.

“It will last a few months, I think,” she assured him. That could only be true if she rationed herself, but he wanted her strong and capable. If not for him, then for herself.

“It won’t be like that anymore,” he assured her. “We’ll keep a steady diet.” Nell liked his adventures, Weston would know of places that could use a hand. Perhaps he could do some good in the Chatkas, since Weston had stepped away from them.

“Okay,” Cecily said, and it might as well have been a thank-you. “I don’t think he is lying,” she added. “I just don’t know if he desired the outcome into existence or if another did.”

He’d heard wiccans under duress were capable of acts of unexpected magic. Could Meldrick have banished Giana somehow, perhaps during an argument? If so, why was she untraceable?

“It’s the shower that I cannot explain, and the untraceability.” They had arrived, during the course of their talk, at the threshold of Aadya’s labor room door, which lay slightly ajar.

“This will boost my energy too,” she said, nodding toward the door. “Because of your marriage. It’s powerful.”

He wondered what about Aadya delivering Nell’s children would nourish Cecily. He had so little understanding of how the sidhe magic worked. So little interest in finding out, though he knew he ought to learn.

“And maybe he just likes showers,” Cecily suggested. “Or felt dazed. You should track her.”

He laughed, low. “You think I could manage what Indigo could not?”

“I was reading about genetics.” She flitted across in front of his face, hovering in the air. “Did you know a child’s DNA is in a mother’s body for about thirty years after birth? She has three, right? Three arrows against a board…”

Rather than pretend he knew what DNA was, Konrad drew the information from her mind, and from the context. It wasn’t a bad thought. The idea that parts of the child lingered in the mother turned his stomach. “I ought to construct a list of reasons I’m happy to be male,” he mused. Nell was at the top of that list, closely followed by Enny, and then a lack of all things pregnancy. And bleeding every month.

“Alright,” he said, gathering his thoughts. “I’ll attempt that after the arrest.”

“It’s actually fascinating,” Cecily said. She did herself no favors in her attempts to connect with him, discussing this subject. “The DNA helps protect her from health issues. Cancer risks, brain damage, heart issues…not that she’s at risk here.”

He cut her off before she discovered a concealed knowledge of other bits of womens’ anatomy.

“Aadya?” he called into the labor room. He knocked twice.

Her mind called out to him with amusement, an intent to conceal her presence in the room. “Very funny,” he called. Cecily vanished, camouflaged against the worn leather of his shirt.

From the room, Aadya laughed. “I’m just trying to survive tonight,” she called. Konrad took it as an invitation to enter, so he pushed the door open and walked into the room. She lay in a bed – a state he wasn’t sure he’d seen her in ever since the last war. Their encounters were always in the woods, or his office. Her labors were always under water.

Aadya lying down, for him, symbolized Aadya powerless.

The sooner she delivered these children, the better for her.

“What have you found out?” Aadya asked him.

“Indigo and Zero haven’t done the reenactment spell yet,” he apologized. He wished he had more information for her. “The cameras show that they go into her room, and only he comes out, empty-handed.”

“Same clothes?” she asked.

He had hoped to avoid that detail. He stepped back on his left heel. “No. His hair was also damp.”

She exchanged concern with Greg, who sat beside the bed. Where Meldrick spent Aadya’s labors actively involved in whatever she needed; touch, words, gifts, attention, Greg seemed to be more of a chattering pillar, supportive but unaware of what he had to live up to.

Greg had a good deal to learn yet, sitting in a chair. Why in the world had he not insisted that Zero bring in a bath? Why had Zero not brought one in? Or Nell. He would speak to Nell, they could transport one directly into the room.

“What do you think we should do?” she asked.

Get her a tub. Once he had spoken to Meldrick and tracked Giana, he would find Nell and they would bring a tub from somewhere, so that she could deliver her children

Konrad ran his fingers through the curls of his beard and let his attention transition from the concerns for Aadya’s wellbeing, to the situation at hand.

“I had been contemplating an apparent retirement,” he confessed, “so that I might focus more attention on him. Did you notice, when you met with Tarragon and Annatto, they knew him?”

“He did?” she asked. Her face contorted briefly in a pain he did his best to ignore through his pixie connection to all animals.

Not that Aadya was an animal, except inasmuch as all humanoids were.

“I believe so,” Konrad confirmed. “I’ve called Tarragon to this room, if that’s alright. I’d like you to hear whatever it is he answers.”

“Okay. Sure.” She squared her shoulders and sat more upright. Simultaneously, Greg’s hand made its way to the small of her back, where he suspected Greg was spreading warmth or cold, whichever Aadya needed in each moment.

She twisted her body slightly until she could see Greg’s face. “Would you mind lying under the bed or something?” she asked.

Perhaps luck magic had warned her that Tarragon would be more forthcoming without Greg present.

He laughed. “I’ll be next door looking at baby machines,” he said, and he leaned down and pressed first his lips, then his forehead, to hers.

“But listening,” Aadya requested.

He laughed again, warm and content. “Of course, listening. This is too interesting to ignore.” He sauntered out of the room as though he owned it, as though he hadn’t just arrived earlier this week.

It reminded Konrad, annoyingly, of the way Niels had behaved upon his arrival in the Dells.

“A fake retirement?” Aadya challenged, amused.

Oh, no, it would be real enough in the ways that mattered to him: He would get his Nell and his Enny as his first priorities, and leave the dealings of the kingdom to others.

“I thought he might let his guard down if I was no longer an imminent threat. Also, I…” warmth, unexpected, coursed through the blood vessels of his face, staining his cheeks. “There were several weddings today,” he managed.

“Congratulations,” she said, with her tightly pleased smile which she reserved for family and close friends. “On both marriages.”

“Thank you,” he said. He sent a message to Tarragon, through the dragons, that it was alright to come into the labor room. “Big day for Nell.”

“It is.” She gazed down at her full belly, only hours, perhaps moments, away from giving life to Nell’s newest children. “I wish he’d show up for this part.”

He was a pixie. Perhaps if Aadya understood what it was like to be so close to something so monumental as birth, so attached and so filled with empathy, as Nell was…

“It intimidates him to be exposed to so much emotion,” Konrad said. It failed to explain the extent of Nell’s anxiety, but it covered the portion Aadya was most likely to understand.

Tarragon entered then, as he’d hoped, cutting off any opportunity for Aadya to further lament Nell’s absence.

Konrad smiled at him, a welcome sight both because of his timing and because after nearly twenty years of worry, Tarragon was safe. “How are you settling in?” he asked.

“Well. The palace is incredible. I’d heard stories, but it’s more than I expected.”

It might have come off as flattery, from another, but from Tarragon it was likely genuine. “Have you recognized any of your hosts?” Konrad asked him.

His mind flickered to images of Meldrick, dressed in outfits Konrad hadn’t known Meldrick even owned, visiting throughout the past years. It wasn’t Meldrick’s typical fashion, which was simple and open and light; these clothes were darker and more layered, more traditional.

“You mean Meldrick?” Tarragon asked.

“Meldrick, yes,” Konrad confirmed. There must be some place – with access to travel packs, it could be anywhere, really – where Meldrick visited to change his clothing and adopt this other, colder persona.

“I’ve seen him multiple times a season my whole life.”

It was an almost unbearable betrayal. Konrad was such a natural at assessing the strengths and capabilities of others, and it was unheard of for him to be this badly mistaken about someone he believed he knew this well. Not only him – Aadya, Drey, countless children, staff around the palace…

Meldrick must be the most skilled liar Konrad had ever met.

“Are you and he close?” he asked.

Tarragon shook his head slightly. “No, but we’ve spoken.”

Perhaps it wasn’t him; perhaps someone used a glamour to impersonate him, as a means of ensuring that none who worked with Ionia could ever trust the Dragon King.

“You’re delivering?” Tarragon asked Aadya.

“I am.”

“I look forward to meeting my newest siblings.” His eyes strayed to Konrad, his tone as stiff and formal as Drey’s in the height of his anxieties. “Is that all for this evening?”

It was a shame Drey and Tarragon had never met; Konrad suspected they might have enjoyed the occasional game of chess or discussion of some great work in history, be it literature or battle.

“I believe so,” Aadya told him. “Thank you, Tarragon.”

Konrad nodded his head, dismissing him, and waited until he and Aadya were alone before he spoke again. “Spence is in the most complex cell, but we have others which are fireproof and warded.”

“You can let Spence go,” she decided. “The dinner is over. When you retire, who will replace you?”

“Corban.” He ran his fingers through the tangles of his beard again. “Did it avoid the war, or is Giana at the center of a maelstrom?”

“It avoided things,” she assured him. “Gi is unrelated.” She winced as another wave of pain unfurled itself from her back and down to her lower abdomen.

“Alright,” he agreed, when her face slackened. “I’ll let you know our success. And…Nell will be along when he is ready.”

Not a moment before, he suspected.

“Perhaps he could ready himself this century.”

Konrad laughed. Aadya, he knew, would forgive Nell’s absence. Already, she’d half-forgiven him.

“Perhaps the world might spin the other direction,” he suggested to her.

“You know, these were entirely his idea.” Her mind found the memories of the twins’ conception in the barn, Nell’s urgency and relief that Aadya had not disliked the idea.

The imagery and sensations were quite lucid.

“I’ve shared his dreams,” Konrad assured her tersely.

“Has it offended Rylena?”

He was unable to discern whether she asked out of concern, or out of competition. Einin and Eiron were the fruits of duty and deep love, more than need and hunger and lust. Konrad was sure, that for Aadya to know she was the first woman to draw Nell’s eye away from men, would have been a buttress to her sense of self worth.

“A bit,” he conceded. “She would rather they were hers.”

It was little matter; the next ones…all the next ones…would be.

“You are welcome here too, you know,” Aadya offered. “They’re yours too.”

And expose Nell to the experience vicariously? No, he would not do that to him.

“I love Enny,” he said carefully, searching for truth in all his protective feelings which surrounded Nell and Enny. “But I’m happy they’re yours. It ties all our children together.”

She nodded her head and settled back against the pillow as acceptance overcame her; Nell would not be coming. Fatherhood was a skill Nell possessed and for which he underrated himself; achieving that end was not.

“Good luck, then?” Aadya pushed the words out against the tide of her own emotions. He could sense that she knew about Cecil down in the dungeons, that he’d interrupted a shared moment of shock and loss between her and Greg.

It wasn’t impossible to see what the man would choose.

She had no Meldrick, no Nell, no Konrad, and if Greg was the man Konrad believed him to be, she would soon have no Greg.

Someone. He would find someone calm and steady and reliable to send her way. He need only discern the best option.

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