drinking

Samantha

“You said you care about me. Why?”

“Don’t ask me to explain,” said Anisa. “Stop thinking. Spend an hour being happy you’re alive.”

“Yeah,” said Samantha. “Yeah.”

Blusters. She hadn’t paid mind to the terrain on the way up. Piles of snow. Some pine trees. A few trails snaked off from the main paths, probably sled dogs.

She had to thank their horses, who probably weren’t happy pulling them in this weather. Concord, for driving. Quincy and John. Whoever had approved Quincy getting the chest. Whoever had made the trail they were now on. Whatever force prevented monsters and bandits from showing up on this trail. Air. Whoever had made the bread she’d eaten. Time and space. Whatever Anisa had contributed.

A few of those bricks probably could’ve been removed, and she’d still be alive, but not many.

What the hell were they doing. Standing on so many bricks, and lamenting that they weren’t at the top.

Why weren’t they? Reimond was 66.

“Anisa, what’s the Brunian life expectancy?”

“Bourrienne would— Concord, where’s Bourrienne?”

“John said he was meeting us in Gelmton, that’s why I—”

“Yes, we’re stopping in Gelmton, then.”

“Acknowledged. Time is… I seem to have misplaced my watch.”

Someone had been maintaining the roads enough that, despite the snow that had been piling for weeks, there was still a clear path. Maybe the same people who had directed the conspiracy to not interact with her and Roe. Would Agarma be employing them? Possibly… a clear road was predictable, and useful.

“Anisa, what the hell are we doing?”

“Samantha, don’t make me regret this.”

“Why don’t we use golems?”

“Lack of resources, mostly. They’re very expensive.”

“That’s a stupid answer, when they can pay for themselves.”

“Maybe when this succession war is over, and we know what things look like years in the future, we can start considering it.”

“Huh. Yeah. Ah. That makes sense.”

It wasn’t over?

Of course it wasn’t. What, would she just—

“I should marry him.”

“No! No! Do you want to?”

Anisa was silent.

“Exactly!” said Samantha. “He wants me dead, you want me alive, that should be enough! That’s why a vacation is a great idea! Spend some time figuring out what you want!”

Yeah, it wasn’t over, of course. Ugh. They were probably being actively pursued. No wonder nothing got done, everyone worrying about the psychological game.

“We will need to write,” said Anisa. “Write to Agarma, and Calhoun. Formalize our position. Hendrik, too, he’s a loose end.”

“The position of ‘Samantha is better alive’?” pleaded Samantha.

“In part.”

“Write to the Felkner Vanguard as well, Agarma said they wanted him to wait for them to show up before executing me. Make sure they haven’t stabbed me in the back, assholes. Also, if you’re writing to Agarma, tell him to not kill Vincent Whiteclaw, or we do something.”

Logistics, logistics. Boring.

That’s probably all that being a king or queen is about, though. Slaying dragons is at most, what, 1% of that?

Ugh! She didn’t want to have to understand everyone!

Was this all some convoluted plan to make her gain perspective? Shove a semester of curriculum into 3 weeks! No, dad would be too stupid to do that, and it’d require everyone acting exactly as he’d anticipated, when everyone hated him and would react in ways he’d be unable to predict. And it’d require knowing Quincy was alive, and knowing whatever kind of magic he used to rescue her, and either having Agarma follow a script, or knowing that he wouldn’t plan for that kind of magic, and…

For the sake of stability, Reimond needed to be ousted immediately. Agarma can’t be allowed to be king, though…

Samantha laughed, so Anisa glanced over, worried. “We have Quincy,” said Samantha. “That asshole. That asshole! That asshole who saved me! Are we making him king?”

“‘Making him king’, Samantha?”

“It’s dad’s fault Samantha got sent to Northpoint, and dad didn’t interfere when Agarma wanted to kill her,” said Samantha. “So we need to oust him immediately, so no more Samanthas get sent to Northpoints. And we have the first crown prince, unless he just ran away again.” She looked to the box with no lid. She got up, leaned over it and shouted, “hey, are you in there?” She only saw a short ladder down to blackness. Fog leaked through.

“Yeah!” shouted John, “Yeah, we’re down here! Do, do you want a drink? He brought beer, we, we’ve got beer down here!”

“Kata, we’re kata here,” said Quincy.

“Quincy, are you going to be king?” shouted Samantha.

“No,” shouted Quincy.

“You’re a pathetic bastard,” shouted Samantha.

“We’re all bastards,” said Anisa.

“For one, we’re all bastards,” shouted Quincy, not hearing Anisa. “For another, I’m a pathetic bastard who saved you.”

“Granted, you’re a pathetic bastard who saved me, but think, if you’re not king, Agarma is, and then he kills me, so just, I don’t know, kill dad, say you’re king, and put Anisa in charge.”

There was a long silence.

“Does that work,” said Quincy.

“Yeah,” said John.

“We’re not killing father,” said Anisa.

“Shut up Anisa, we’re killing dad,” said Samantha. “If you want to plug your ears and play innocent, fine. Or we find some crime to accuse him of, if that makes you feel better. And then Quincy is king and he makes you empress, or something, and you put me in charge of, I don’t know, all the Vanguardists in the country, and then we work with the engineers to make golems and we automate farming and mining. There. Now we have a plan, and now I never have to worry about logistics again.”

“What if I make you — Samantha — queen, and then step down,” said Quincy.

Her eyes unfocused, unblinking. Putting aside that she wasn’t sure she wanted to deal with the logistics; “Why didn’t you do that in the first place?”

There was a pause, then, meekly, he said, “Well, now we have Anisa onboard.”

“We do not,” said Anisa.

“Yes we do,” said Samantha. “If we don’t, she should start suggesting some better alternatives.”

“She needs a break,” said Anisa.

“…Right. Fair. Sorry.” Samantha climbed in the chest. “I’m flipping kata and getting drunk,” said Samantha.

“We’re arriving in,” Anisa looked to her watch, “10 minutes.”

“I’m flipping kata and getting drunk and you should too,” said Samantha, and she climbed down the ladder and flipped kata.

The ladder led through a thin film of water and snow down to another chest, with another wagon, except this one was smaller, and held a table and a few crates. Samantha was briefly disoriented by the gravity flip; but, managed to rotate herself around and climb up.

“What the hell is this?” she said. Quincy and John sat on crates, playing cards at the table, drinking from mugs. The wagon was tiny, and was completely exposed. It was a flat wooden square, with a piece of wood along each side so objects wouldn’t roll out.

“Oh, oh,” said John. “Something about physics, and a house being too heavy to drag around.”

“Antigravity?” said Samantha.

“The crystals have weight limits,” said Quincy. “If I’d attached anything more, the chest would’ve prevented the Midworld wagon from moving.”

“What’s this about antigravity?” said Anisa, peeking in.

“We’re all so drunk it feels like we’re weightless,” said Samantha.

“What she said,” said John.

“I couldn’t bring attach a house to the wagon because it was too heavy,” said Quincy.

“Is it safe down there?” said Anisa.

“Yes,” said Quincy.

“Concord, ensure the chest does not fall out,” said Anisa. As if the driver would do anything different.