With the meeting broken, the small sounds of murmuring and movement returned to the room. It wasn’t until the sound of fabric moving was gone did he realize how weird it was to live without.

  “That went well.”

  Cecil turned to Eriss, “yeah, I’ve seen a flock of dragons share food as nicely.”

  She rolled her eyes, “oh don't be so dense. They stated their opinion, and since it's only noon they have plenty of time to lobby each other in one way or another.”

  “I guess?”

  “That's the spirit. Speaking of lobbying, I have some ears to bend. See you later.”

  Erris slipped out of the room between the lords and ladies who were, if Erris was right, about to try and strong arm each other into a coalition. Which begged the question, what sort of political power did she have?

  “Cecil! Glad to see you could make it to one of the first meetings.”

  He turned in the creaky chair to answer Talmage, “of course, I want to get it done as soon as possible so that I'll have time for other things.”

  “Freeform study is good, but I would encourage you to come to one of the last meetings. You cannot fully understand a story if you do not have at least the beginning, middle, and end.”

  Cecil shrugged, “Maybe. I guess it doesn’t matter when the free time is. Speaking of which, did you talk to your friend about lessons?”

  “No, but I haven’t forgotten. I sent him a quick letter this morning, and he’s a bit of a drunk. So, I expect to hear back in the next two days.”

  The man Talmage was offering as a tutor was a drunk? There were plenty of engravers in the palace, let alone in the royal academy. Why not one of them?

  Cecil gripped his hands together, “Well, if he’s busy I wouldn’t mind waiting for you to find another teacher…”

  He chuckled “Don’t worry, he loves to teach. And besides, the engravers in the palace don’t want students. If they did, they would be at the academy. And those at the academy don’t have the time nor care to teach someone talentless, even if that talentless person is in line for the throne.” He smiled and slapped Cecil’s shoulder, “don’t fret about it. You have plenty to worry about with your presentation of this meeting. I decided that it’s due tonight, no memory aids. They are still fixing the windows in primary, so, see you in the secondary classroom at five!” He chuckled then left the room.

  Cecil hurried after him in a sudden scramble to dump the stray thoughts that had been clouding his mind, and focusing in on the important parts of the meeting. Except, Talmage would probably say they’re all important.

  Cecil stopped his half jog and groaned as he turned around. He had forgotten his book bag with the guards at the door. He only had three hours… scratch that. After he had run back to his room, then to the classroom, he would be down around thirty minutes. Which left him with two hours and thirty minutes. Minus five for forgetting the book bag. And twenty if he detoured to the kitchen for a snack. And if he went now, he would save up to five minutes walking time…

  He shook his head vigorously. This was not the time for indecision. There was no time for a snack, and going a little hungry once wouldn’t kill him. But a bad grade might. Which meant he needed to remember what had happened in the meeting.

  …

  The next day was much the same. Cecil woke up, got dressed in the black and silver outfit, then ran to the first meeting of the day. He nodded at the guards at the door as he handed over his bookbag and entered the room. Even though he was a comfortable fifteen minutes early, Cecil found the room almost full. It seemed that many people had talked yesterday, and wanted to cement their coalitions as fast as possible.

  He took the same seat next to Eriss and turned to her as he sat down.

  “How did your mingling go?”

  “Oh, very well. I agree with Xeon. The amount of recent attacks have been unsettling. You haven’t even felt them all since some have been while me and Arron were on an experiential learning trip.”

  “Really? When?”

  “A couple months ago. Remember when we had to join the city guard for a while? And it was cut short?”

  “Yeah. you said it was because Arron fell into the water and got sick?”

  “He got thrown in and was poisoned. Mecine had to spend almost twenty four hours straight trying to figure out how to heal him. Even Branyn was at a loss.”

  Cecil's eyes widened “I didn’t even realize…”

  She shrugged, “They didn’t want it widely known how close the attempt had come to succeeding. But with this embargo, we can stop the attempts.”

  “But what if it’s internal?”

  A predatory smile crossed her lips, “Then we can fix them.”

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  Cecil didn’t want to die, and had doubts that anyone who wanted to murder him could be fixed. But Eriss probably had a solution. She always did.

  Then he felt the shift in the air, and his tapping foot was silenced.

  At the end of the table his mother smiled, “I heard that many of you shared tea last night. And I am eager to hear your conclusions. But first let's start with the investigation. Pro Xeon?”

  Everyone turned to the neatly attired researcher, his robe pressed and his angular glasses with silver rims glinted. He cleared his throat, “To recap, the explosion rune was inscribed onto one of the glow lights especially made for the royal household. It was activated by a young researcher of mine,” he gripped the arm rests “And was killed instantly along with a section of the royal’s private collection.” “The fault lies with predictable buying patterns. The palace replenished each library on schedule, not on a need by need basis. Especially since they buy higher quality for royal use. So, anyone who had known the order, would be able to also find the information on where it was going. And since eighty percent of the people who use the library regularly are royals, there was a good chance that their assassination would reach the right target. And what if it had succeeded? Since there was little more to dig into on this case, I looked into the other assassination attempts to see if there were any overlaps. Foreign goods were the underlying common denominator.”

  The skin around Lady Reems’ eyes tightened slightly as she heard the revelation, but remained silent.

  Pro Xeon cast a sweeping glance across the chamber, “We have all seen the devastation caused by unregulated engraved imports. Why invite further disaster? We don’t want to end up like Inatol, with a dead king, and the royalists and the rebels fighting over the kingdom”. He leaned forward, “Our sovereignty is at stake! Without control, we leave ourselves open to more attacks!”

  Lady Reems crossed her arms and spoke firmly. “I understand the concern, but cutting ourselves off from engraved goods entirely is dangerous. Our trade depends on them. The economy will suffer if we act rashly. And what's next, mundane goods? People?”

  Lady Janick Ganyon scoffed. “The economy will suffer more if the kingdom falls due to another attack. Once again, look at Inatol. They are an economic disaster, and will be for many years even if they agree to one ruler soon. If we rely on foreign engravings, we remain at their mercy.”

  Lady Reems leaned forward, “the kingdom will fall if we are at the mercy of other markets.”

  “Like how we are at the mercy of others for our engraved goods?”

  Everyone fell silent and stared at Lord Chambers.

  He shrugged, “What? I’m just continuing the logic you proposed dear. And all it took was one step to realize that we are aligned! When the assassination attempts start coming through mundane goods, then we can reassess the situation. Regardless, an embargo on all engraved goods would be beneficial. We would have a better reason to fund Wint Academy, and stop the assassinations. As it is, the old academy has been a drain on royal funds. So, we control goods from the start, ban all outside engravings, and both sides are happy. It’s a win win.” he smiled expansively.

  Lady Reems looked like she was in the process of eating a lemon and pinched the bridge of her nose, “I can concur. No foreign engraved goods inside Effrain. But I would like to make an exception for a few long term contracts with the Nimoans. They are our allies and I have family among them. They would have nothing to gain with our downfall.”

  Lord Xeon spoke slowly, “We can accept this. But your head will roll if these assassination attempts continue as is.”

  “We can get a certification and/or key for each item. They do not make cheap trinkets, but specific goods. Often one of a kind pieces. If the assassinations continue, it will not be my fault, but the fault of palace security.” Reems shot back, “Just because you eliminate one vector of attack does not mean you are safe from non linier threats that our current analysis has been able to touch on.”

  Xeon opened his mouth to continue, but the queen clapped her hands once and it clicked shut. “Scribe, write down a document summarizing the concessions that were just made.” The man next to Cecil nodded, took out a new sheet of paper, and started writing on it. “We will make mock ups, read and make adjustments as soon as our scribe can have them ready. During that meeting we shall discuss our martial response, and then sign the final document at the end.”

  With her main point of interest being settled, the king started talking about options related to defence and offence in regards to Inatol. Cecil only paid half attention after the first few people spoke. They hadn’t changed their opinions, and didn’t seem likely to.

  The scribe was interesting though. His steady hand made gentle strokes across the cream paper before returning to the left side. Back and forth in neat little letters that flowed one to the other. It was perfect and fast.

  His handwriting never looked like that. Madam Wyntrop despaired when she had seen his thank you letters in their lesson on communication. But he just hadn’t cared enough to fix writing no matter how she wailed about it.

  Talmage had said “as long as it’s legible, it serves its function.” So, Cecil had focused on learning other things. But if handwriting this nice could be done this quick… there was no reason to not learn. And in fact, a good reason to learn. It might help him learn engraving faster, if he already knew how to write neatly. That and learn how to carve. But wood carving was different from stone engraving. People did use wood sometimes. It just didn’t last long.

  His thought process was interrupted as the scribe stood up, took his papers, then brought them to the queen and sat back down. She read it and nodded, then read it aloud. It was almost a word for word summation of the earlier discussion put into legalese. But despite the accuracy of their prior statements, the council argued over every single word of it. Picking it to pieces with the precision of a flock of hens on a carcass.

  Cecil tried to listen, but when their attention turned to legal laws and consequences, his mind wandered.

  He could probably beg a knife off the armorer to practice with. Or Eriss would give him one if he asked. If not, he could steal one from Tavv. Except Tavv had a tendency to steal things. And Cecil didn’t want to be blamed if the knife he was given belonged to someone else. Aaron might give him one if he asked… but he would ask for something in return. It wouldn’t come to that though.

  Once he had the knife, then he would need some wood. There was wood in the forest, but that was technically off limits. And a small knife wouldn’t do well at chopping off limbs. Who handled the wood in the castle anyways? Not the stablemaster, nor the head of housekeeping. They had long ago switched from fires in rooms to a system of heating that used engravings.

  But there was someone who didn’t want to switch. The chef! The argument had been so loud and long that it was still spoken of today. But years ago when they were making the switch, the old chef had refused, saying that it would mess with the flavor of the food.

  Cecil used to sneak down to the kitchens to steal cookies all the time. Big Thom would probably give him a piece if he asked nicely. If he didn’t he could just-

  A clap rung through the air. “Excellent. This is the final version of the new law. It will be implemented as soon as we leave this room. Thank you all for staying late to complete this, and I will see you tomorrow.”