"Ren," I said, "good to see you. You know you can call me Theo within the inner palace, no one will be a witness."
"The moment I let my guard down, it's the moment I'll make a mistake," he said.
"You say that based on your own experience or Akcar's?" Ren just looked at me, the perfect poker face.
"Here are the reports you asked to see." He sat next to me, handing me the reports of everything in this Kingdom.
I smiled, even when he didn't trust me he would help me. He started staying close whenever I wanted to stretch my legs in the gardens. He ignored me the first days when I tried talking to him, later we actually had a conversation. He answered some of my questions, making sure not to give too much information. So we talked about the Creation Power. I could feel it, the energy in its electrical form. It was there, latent. Although I wasn't sure how to wield it.
When Ren didn't want to talk, I would spend that time learning the layout of the palace. It was built as interconnected rooms, each one always facing a garden, sometimes even two. At the north end, there was this waterfall at the end of the main garden, where the river that passes underneath the palace and surfaces in the city originates. In the middle of the waterfall, there was a small cave, the mourning grounds.
"What are you looking for?" Ren asked after a while, bringing me back to the present.
"Nothing in particular," I answered.
According to this system, the Electors voted for which of the blood heirs would be the new Emperor. That's why every brother, child, or even nephew of any given Emperor had a chance to become the next one to sit on the throne. Currently, there were no other candidates than Yurubi, the only surviving member of the royal family.
As with her siblings' case, Yurubi had been raised to be an Empress, but it was her older sister who quickly gained the Electors support due to her sharp mind and sense of leadership. Their father soon changed tactics and trained Yurubi and Nezo to be her right and left hand. If the previous Electors were here, they would have supported Yurubi since she shared her sister's ruling vision, but the problem was those Electors were no longer here, and the new ones wanted to rule in her stead.
From what I could guess of these papers, Ekcar made sure every new elector knew he was in charge of the troops, but a rumor started gaining strength. Ikcar, an outsider, had already caused so much grief to the Kingdom of Water. Akcar and Ekcar perhaps were traitors too, though Akcar was probably dead or dying somewhere in the inner palace. And poor Yurubi was too young and inexperienced to lead at only 20 years of age.
Tomorrow was going to be the final discussion where the Electors would vote. If it was favorable then Yurubi was to spend three days at the mourning grounds as the custom ordered, before her ascension to the throne. It was the way of being grateful for the past, in order to face the upcoming future. An heir entered and a ruler would emerge.
Something caught my eye.
"This report says there is some strange movement near the border with the Kingdom of Earth," I said. "To which elector is this part under his or her control?"
Ren glanced at the report. "That was Elector Birham's land, he used to befriend late Princess Dazania, he wanted his son to marry the future Empress. His son succeeded him."
That annoyed me for some reason.
"This seems weird, there used to be regular crossings between both Kingdoms, but now there are fewer enough to be remarked by the guards," I said searching through the papers, "yet Birham junior didn't write anything regarding the change in the border," I added after I scanned his report.
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YOU ARE READING
Water & Lightning
FantasyA wish for life, unfinished things. A boy changes place with his other self of another dimension, where things that can only come from a dream are real. He'll have to find his inner strength in order to face what's ahead of him and save the people...