Chapter 59: 62.

As it turned out, Edmon Dantes IS interested in the admiralty position. He is obviously cautious about it, and given what I managed to gather about his interactions with local nobles, he has more than enough reasons to be, but I have had already bought myself a lot of goodwill by dealing with him up front and financing his fleet expansion. Not to mention he is absolutely smitten with all the new ship schematics I've given him. He introduces me to the dockmaster, one Jose Faria. Apparently, monsieur Faria had been interested in the blueprints and seeks my permission to license them for producing ships.

We reach preliminary agreement reasonably quickly - Faria would have to travel to Gillespie estates to finalize this, however. The gist of the agreement is that his docks are licensed to build sloops and brigantines, and he pays a tithe to Gillespie county in return from each ship sale. He also gets the right to maintain up to one brigandine and two sloops for the needs of docks, tithe being deferred until he actually sells them. I promise him several more schematics for small and medium ships once he finishes the construction of ones Dantes is to take command of. And this is where we get interrupted.

The ruckus from the outside suddenly increases in volume a lot, and I hear shouting. So naturally, we all step outside to see what is going on. And... I'm NOT pleased by what I see. Because what I see is about a dozen armed men on horseback menacing my guests with pikes, while a rather gaudily dressed fellow prances around giving commands that I'm fairly sure he is not fucking authorized to give. So, naturally, I step in, grabbing two of the more audacious armsmen by the hafts just after the spearheads and yanking them off the horses. As they land on the ground with a clatter, the rest of armsmen visibly back off and turn their pikes in my direction, while the gaudy fellow grows red.

"Good day. I am Alyssa Gillespie, firstborn of count Gillespie." - I tell them with a tight smirk, flinging the pikes away from me on the ground - "Now, mind telling me who you are so I'd know who's house I'm about to start a blood feud with?"

Gaudy fellow reddens more, then pales, swallowing, as the idea hits his brain at last. "I wouldn't be so hasty, lady Gillespie." - he finally offers - "As I am baron Lancaster, and I am the sheriff of Haver. It is well within my purview to investigate the oddities."

I smile at him. "Is it also within your purview to menace several different royals at once?" - I quip, pointing out - "Prince Edward Cullen, princess Lily-Anne Nortrop-Cullen, crownprince Hiram Hohenzollern, sheikha Rafiqa bint Salaadin. That's four times the beheading as is, sheriff Lancaster. Unless, of course, this is all a horrible mistake and you are about to offer your utmost apologies."

He pales, goes green, red, pale again and... topples off the horse, clutching at his chest. Armsmen around him back off nervously, their pikes now raised towards the sky as they look at each other, probably trying to figure out which of them is to speak now. God damn it. Jackass just HAD to go down with infarction.

"Selene, Moon Unit!" - I bark, as I stride over to the lump of arrogant flesh - "Healing magic now, jackass just had a heart attack."

It takes a bit of an effort, and ends with Moon Unit and Selene being escorted back to the airship by Bridgit and Edmon respectively. Ed makes a move, but peters out as he comes to the obvious conclusion father has a bit of precedence over him in this scenario. I, meanwhile, browbeat armsmen into complete obedience, sending off half of them to fetch the carriage and manservants, while the rest under my command bring in a bale of hay, cover it with their capes and move insensate sheriff onto the makeshift bed. It takes better part of an hour before he regains consciousness.

During this, I finish talks with Faria and Dantes, apologize to my guests for the unseemly display sheriff had ended up causing and feed everyone a five-o'clock tea/coffee with significant sweets. Dantes comments on my coffee favorably, while Faria seems to have had fallen in love with raisin bread. I... make a horrible mistake of joking with Faria that he might want to invest in a bakery if he likes it so much... and he takes me at face value. So now I'm also apparently planning to open a bakery shop in this town. Well, at least I already have the know-how on how to make it quickly and easily. We end up with an agreement that Faria would scout the locale for good shop place and potential employees and notify me via Dantes, at which point I come in, buy the building and take the potential employees to Parsee for a crash course in confectioneries in my shop. Then return them to Haver once I'm confident they got it downpat.

And that's when one of the cowed armsmen comes in, bowing and saying sheriff had regained consciousness. I come out to find him still sprawled on the hay bale, his breathing obviously labored. He croaks something that might have been a question but is too incoherent to figure out. A couple of manservants are around, and that woman looks like his wife.

"Right. Listen closely." - I tell both sheriff and his wife - "I have discussed the incident with my guests, and since baron Lancaster is obviously ill, we will tentatively consider the matter being simply a case of unsound mind caused by heart about to fail. It's in your best interests to support this version, because all alternatives I can see include baron getting beheaded for multiple Lèse-majesté." His wife bites her thumb, obviously distressed. Baron's breathing quickens, he begins to choke. Fuck. I hit him with a healing spell, a generalized normalization stuff, useful in therapy. He... slows down, thankfully.

"You need to change your life, if you want to survive this." - I tell them - "Baron is overweight. Not fat just yet, but well into the plump territory. This is a problem when the heart is weak. In the following two to four weeks, baron should be fed easy neutral foods. Vegetable soup, oatmeal, cooked chicken and fish. Avoid fried meats, spices, ease up on salt. Bed rest for the next three days, taking it very easy for the next two weeks. Slow walks in the garden, reading books, playing with children. Absolutely no worries. If you survive the first month without recurring chest pains, you can consider roasted meat again. Remember - any situation that worries, annoys or angers you might be the last thing you see in your life. Until your heart had time to heal, you can end yourself with something so petty as getting angry about stumbling over a cat."

His wife nods quickly, looking worried. Huh. I guess even jackasses have someone who loves them. "Right. Once you are strong enough to walk around freely, consider going to the temple and offering a donation in thanks. This issue with your heart had been long in the making, and you probably wouldn't survive it if it didn't happen in close proximity to three experienced healers who already dealt with that sort of problem before. Anyone else? Kaput." - I tell them - "Don't bother poking around monsieurs Dantes or Faria. They are currently busy doing work for me and will remain busy for the foreseeable future. Rather, once you are well enough to stroll around, come and check out new bakery monsieur Faria had persuaded me to open here."

"Bakery, milady?" - his wife bleats.

"You might have heard about Sweet Dream confectionery? I'm going to open a branch here as a test. If it pans out well enough, I will open branch bakeries in other towns and cities." - I explain, and I could have sworn the woman just had stars in her eyes. A quick poke to Bridgit, and she brings out a box with a raspberry shortcake in it, which I hand over to lady Lancaster. "Here." - I tell her - "You had a bad scare today, treat yourself." She peers into the box and squeals, muffling herself with her hand once she realizes it.

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"My deepest gratitude, Lady Gillespie." - she offers with a deep bow - "Is this... from Sweet Dream?"

"Yeah, raspberry shortcake. Your husband won't appreciate it right now, but give him a day or two to recover, and he should be fine enough to share the sweets with you. This goes well with tea." - I tell her. Well, the baron is a jackass, but apparently his wife is a fan.

___

It is getting late, and everyone has had enough of excitement by now. Well, almost. We all pile into the airship, along with Dantes and Faria. They're too curious to let us go, so we agree on a quick jaunt along the coastline, to show them the capabilities of the airship. To that end, they stand next to me in the nose, while my guests partially park themselves in the lounge to partake in still laid out sweets and beverages, and partially spread into the cabins to nap on the way back. Both men are visibly biting back swearing as the ship lofts up easily, and accelerates along the coastline. There are some cliffs on the coast a few minutes in, and I raise the airship further. And this is when Dantes (who had been peering around through one of the spyglasses) curses horribly and points downwards into one of the smaller fjords.

"I'll be keelhauled! Those bastards are hiding THIS close? Just wait till I get back to town, you sons of bitches, there's going to be a reckoning tonight or my name isn't Edmon!" - he grouses.

"What's the matter, monsieur Dantes?" - I inquire, as I peer through another spyglass towards whatever he had spotted. A ship there, looks like one of his cogs, but built obviously bigger. Much to my surprise, it has a black flag. Good grief, are those pirates?

"Pirates! This is the gods-damned crew of captain Peg-Leg Cauzak, I'll recognize his ship anywhere." - he replies - "To think their hideout is so close. No one ever thought of trying to hide in the cliffs, the waters are treacherous there. Crafty bastard."

Hm. Why not show off? I tilt the rudder, sending the airship in a big circle around the fjord in question, as I quickly run through mathemagic formulae, shaping the spell matrix. Faria sees this and pokes Dantes in the ribs, pointing at me. Edmon has just enough time to widen his eyes as my spell fires off. Aaaand HIT! It's pretty high level magic, I admit, to call down a bolt of lightning from the sky. Thankfully, there were clouds that could provide at least a part of charge for it. The results? Oh, the results are spectacular, as the bolt impacts the mast of the ship and travels down its length into the hull, setting the mast and a good chunk of the hull on fire, several figures too close to the lightning strike falling over on the deck spasming.

Faria and Dantes swear synchronously, and raise their spyglasses to look at the fjord. "Gods and stars, lady Gillespie." - Faria offers finally - "That was..."

Dantes picks up where he left off, yelping - "...bloody terrifying, that's what it was." He lowers the spyglass and peers at me - "That was a war spell, lady Gillespie, wasn't it? To just.. smite the ship like that, snap and... Gah." He pauses, then continues - "Where should we send the reward for defeating Peg-Leg, milady?"

I chuckle at them, as I manipulate controls to set the airship back to Haver. "What are you talking about, gentlemen? It was a clear case of a natural disaster. A random bolt of lightning finding a pirate ship, solely by accident." - I offer to them - "Naturally, you'd want to investigate the lightning strike so close to the city, and with sheriff ill... Who knows who might have been on board tonight." We share a look of understanding, and both of them begin to grin. Pirates managing to set shop so close means that someone's aiding them. Someone from the nobles. Having a legit reason to "stumble upon" this would go a long way towards undercutting the noble influence in Haver.

As the town grows beneath us, Dantes lets out a sigh. "Today was insane." - he mutters - "I don't think I ever had so many events happening in one day."

I snicker - "Well, it could be worse. You could've also learned Selene is engaged, on top of everything."

There is a pregnant pause. "...What do you mean, Selene is engaged?" - he then demands quietly, but very intently.

"..I mean Selene is engaged to prince Edward?" - I repeat. I mean, it's not like it's news to him, is it?.... IS IT?!

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