§129 The Breakup (Patreon)

Prudence — Vawdrey House

Prudence was uneasy at breakfast. Part of the reason was that her entire family had returned to the estate. Breakfast at Vawdrey House was served buffet-style, and the family sat themselves at three tables, like soldiers in a mixed-service barracks. Nearly everyone was in uniform, and most of them were IEF. She had a cousin who was a city warden and took a good deal of ribbing for it, but the uniform shielded him from outright scorn. The only people who weren't in uniform were two adults who had married into the family, Prudence, and a few cousins too young to join much of anything.

She took her breakfast and made to sit with the cousins, until her mother waved her down and made her sit nearby. Her stomach sank, and the food was suddenly unwelcome on her tray. She tried not to let it show and turned on her heel to take the indicated place. There was no chance now of getting away from the table without having the talk. And her parents would do it in front of everyone.

It was that time of year again. Celosia Academy's term was about to start, which meant it was time to choose courses and take assessments. The first two weeks of classes were tests on the subject matter for the upcoming year. Most students didn't take the tests too seriously, not like they did the finals at the end of term. Assessments were a preview of the upcoming material and a way for teachers to gauge if specific topics required extra attention. Ambitious students sought to pass the tests entirely and progress to the next-higher course.

Her mother let her eat all of five bites before she asked the inevitable question. "What courses are you taking, Prudence?"

"Contracts, Logistics, Arcaic, and Appraisal. I'm supposed to take some kind of art course, but I haven't decided."

"Drop Arcaic," said her brother. He was farther down the table, leaning past their parents. "They all speak Orlut anyway. Then you could fit in QM a year early."

There it was. Quartermaster. Her assumed life's goal in two letters. Like every other Vawdrey, Prudence was fortunate to have a class. But, instead of a useful combat class, she had Merchant. And the only armed service role for a Merchant was Quartermaster. Her class had already offered it as a specialist path. The invitation sat there, staring at her, every time she opened her class panel.

For some in her family, like her father, ranking up their classes was an act of faith in the Giving Goddess, Knexenk. The Vawdreys were unusually blessed, and those blessings were to be used for the Empire. It was unthinkable that she wouldn't choose a service, wouldn't use her class for the glory of the empire. Uncle Hugh had taken a different path, and the family barely talked to him. If they mentioned him at all, it was in the hushed tones one used when speaking of the dead.

Her mother agreed, of course. "That's good advice, dear. Do that."

"I don't want to. Arcaic is useful. And I'm not in a hurry to take Quartermaster. I can take it in the last year, if I want to."

Father's utensils hit his plate with force. That was never a good sign.

"Are you waiting for an engraved invitation? A sign from the goddess herself? Take the QM course."

Fear gripped Prudence's heart, but so did a reckless surge of rebellion. "I don't want to. There's more to the world than the services."

"Without the services, the rest of the world isn't fit to live in. The only good use for a Merchant class is the Quartermaster path. What are you going to do, girl? Live a selfish, decadent life of dissipation? Suck the blood out of every trade?" He had added 'dissipation' to his rant. At least there was some variety.

"It's not like that at D&P. A good merchant…"

"Take the course, Prudence." He wasn't even listening.

"I don't want to."

"This isn't about 'want to'. This is about your duty to your family and your emperor."

"Darling." Too late, her mother tried to calm him before the confrontation spun out of control. His face was red, and his uniform strained as his body swelled with combat-ready skills. That was never a good sign. He had never used his skills on his family, but he was never reasonable when he was in this state.

"I'm paying for your school, and you're living in my house."

"Stop," warned Mother. "Remember your brother."

Father yelled at his wife, "Curse my brother! And curse this one, too, if she's going to throw all our sacrifices in our faces!"

"Sacrifices?" Prudence yelled back. She should have been mortified to speak to him so, but she was in the grip of a reckless, unfamiliar emotion. "You've sacrificed plenty for your precious emperor. But what did you ever give up for me, for any of us, that was important to you? Not promotions. Or deployments. Or special schooling, or anything. You always did whatever you wanted in pursuit of your career. I never cost you anything. And don't tell me about the money, because our family's real fortune was made generations ago. You can save your paycheck because a great-great-someone-or-other passed down their fortune to us. You can piss and moan all day about bloodsucking merchants, but all of this," she waved at their house, the compound, their entire homelife, "is maintained on what we Merchants call passive income."

"Prudence," her mother urged, "apologize to your father, and take the QM course."

"I'm not taking it. I have better things to do."

Father slammed his fist on the table so hard that all the plates clattered. The entire clan was watching. Her brother's face had turned white in the realization of what his comment had started.

"Get out of my house." Father's voice was low and tense. "If you're not going to be a good daughter, then get out now."

She knew her father. He would change his mind if she backed down now, if she agreed to take QM and said that she was wrong to hector him about the estate. That's not what she wanted, though. A door had been thrown wide open. If he changed his mind, it would close again.

"Fine." She opened her class panel and let everyone see what Knexenk had offered her, and let them watch her make a permanent choice.

Path Offered: [Quartermaster]
[Quartermaster] has been declined.

It was the most hurtful thing she could think of, and also the most honest.

"I'm going to pack."

Prudence left with a single trunk on wheels, pulled with a hand that still shook from their confrontation. Her anger had turned sour in her belly, but the recklessness was still on her. If Father had his way, she would leave with the clothes on her back and nothing else, but the rest of the family intervened. She heard them arguing downstairs while she packed.

She had been shocked when the first of them came to her door. They didn't congratulate her, exactly, but they were supportive. "You're too smart to be a Quartermaster anyway," said an aunt, "and nobody likes them. Do you need money?"

"No, thank you. I'm set for now." Thanks to her work at Donbrook and Pearl, she had enough saved up to attend school and live in the dorm. She only needed a place to stay until school began.

Her aunt wasn't the only one, either. Her brother came by to apologize for setting off the argument, and her warden cousin outright praised her for "having the balls to break with tradition, instead of half-assing it as I did."

Her parents were nowhere to be seen as she paraded to the front door with her trunk gliding behind her. Father was probably in his office, "working", while her mother tried to reason with him. Prudence kept her head high as she wheeled past servants and members of the Vawdrey clan, whose faces she didn't look at but whose disapproval she imagined as hot glares against her back. If she didn't live there anymore, then they didn't matter. Prudence burst through the front doors, hauled her trunk down the few steps, and stalled. A line of carriages waited in the drive, ready to take the various factions to their posts in and around the city, but none of them were for her. The relative she usually rode with was on the disapproving side of the family.

She was free, but she lacked any semblance of a plan.

"A merchant uses her connections," she said out loud, and set a course for the public carriage stop a quarter mile away. She would start at D&P. They might have a place for rent, or know someone else who did. By the time the public carriage came, and she had wrestled her trunk aboard with the assistance of a helpful older man, a share of her queasiness had passed.

The short trip seemed to take far longer than usual. The uncertainty of her situation and its endless possibilities filled her with mild restlessness. Even when Restoration fell, and she found herself in a stream of refugees fleeing the territory as fast as it could, she had borrowed certainty from her family, their position, and the ancestral estate waiting for them in Celosia. Even when surrounded by desperate people, she knew what her future was supposed to look like.

Now, anything could happen.

About the time she stashed her trunk into the cloakroom at D&P, Prudence realized she had forgotten something important. She had moved out, but Cecilia still lived at Vawdrey House. She hadn't seen her friend since the previous morning. When Cecilia returned, Prudence would be gone. With Prudence thrown out on the street, would she even be welcome as a guest?

That was going to be awkward.

Messrs. Donbrook and Pearl were unflappably kind, even when their newest employee turned up at the office, on a day she wasn't scheduled to work, with a large trunk and a declaration of homelessness.

"I have human-sized accommodations at home, if you need them. Try not to worry. I'm sure this will resolve itself to everyone's satisfaction," said the diminutive Donbrook. He was small, even for an arc. It was hard to imagine that he kept a room in his house for human-sized guests. "It's just as well you came to work today. One of our clients purchased an estate in town, and we're paying him a brief social call. Come along."

"The house is not officially open yet," warned Mister Pearl, the human side of the partnership, "and he purchased the property outright. So be prepared for sparse furnishings and slight hospitality. No doubt he'll hold an event when the house is ready."

"Aren't we imposing?"

"It's all been arranged! We'll deliver a small housewarming gift, chat for a few minutes, and be on our way before our host tires of us."

Donbrook nodded. "A few brief visitors make a newcomer feel welcome. We are not such grand people as to discomfort him."

"So true," agreed Pearl.

"You two are up to something," she said suspiciously.

"Naturally," said Donbrook.

"Aren't we always?" added Pearl.

As Donbrook's home was close to their destination, the partners decided to load her trunk into the carriage. Their client's new home was across the river, in a wealthy arcaic section of town opposite from Vawdrey House and a mile upriver. The houses in the area were large and surrounded by ample land for drives, lawns, gardens, greenhouses, carriage houses, guest houses, or any other addition the owners desired. Some houses sat centered in formal gardens. Others sat closer to the street, backed by a small village's worth of outbuildings. At least one home took the Vawdrey approach and filled the grounds with a single large building with many wings.

Then, they came to their client's new estate. The grounds were bordered by a low stone wall, which grew taller near the gate. The length of the wall most visible from the street was lettered in freshly-polished brass: Poplar Grove. The twin gates were open, inviting them to the stately home presiding over grounds that hadn't gone wild, but could use some attention.

Large emblems graced either side of the iron gates, again in polished bronze: a circle, with three poplar leaves inside. Prudence knew that sign. It was stamped on every crate that shipped out from D&P's warehouse on behalf of Taylor.

"Unbelievable," she moaned.

"Isn't it just," agreed Pearl.

"The gods must favor you," added Donbrook.

To think she picked today, of all days, to be homeless. At least she had a clue where Cecilia had gone. She might have stayed overnight at her brother's new house. Why hadn't she said anything?

They were greeted at the door by a uniformed maid of middle years and a statue of a goddess Prudence didn't recognize. It was one of Taylor's divine figures, given how close it felt to being alive.

Pearl waved at the porters behind them carrying five cases. "Miss Chambers, we've taken the liberty of bringing a selection of wines favored by certain prestigious individuals: the governor, and so on."

"All labeled, of course," said Donbrook.

"Thank you for the thoughtful gift. Our master will put it to excellent use. Jolien will show them where to put it." Another uniformed maid came forward, an arc this time, and led the porters deeper into the house.

"The Young Master is in the back. Please come through."

They followed the maid to find her master in the back garden, sitting at a folding table under a cloth awning. Papers stirred in the slight wind, weighted down by dishes. Folding chairs scattered around him. A ravaged tea cart stood nearby. Beyond him stood a small hut made of bricks, with people clustered around it. Past the hut, the land fell down to the river. Across the river, above the far bank, she could make out an equally grand house that she knew well. The owners were Vawdrey family friends.

Prudence and her two bosses all stopped in their tracks. Taylor wore his Battlesage robes and prayer beads, but he wasn't wearing his mask.

"Don't be alarmed," Chambers assured them in a low voice. "The Young Master has learned to contain his curse, yet the mask is difficult to let go of. Try not to stare."

The big new house bought with cash, the servants calling him "Young Master," his supposed curse, the pompous way he did the most normal of things, like sitting on his own lawn while not wearing a mask; it was all too much for Prudence just then. She marched to his tea cart, helped herself to the only unbroken cookie she could find, and huffed at him.

"So the rumors are true. You have a face. I'm shocked."

Behind her, the partners D&P laughed.