Chapter Text
The palace is huge. Charles had been expecting a grand building, full of history and busy, well-dressed people and servants. But this, this is… more than huge. The Palace (and its gardens, and stables, and orchards, and, and, and…) is closer to being a small town, just by itself.
Charles looks about him, absently noting the entrances and exits and hiding spots, just in case. Then he shakes his head. I don’t have to do that anymore. They’re not here. He stands up straight, bracing himself—and has to jump to one side as a flurry of noble children, all older than him, run through the hall and into rooms beyond.
Charles cranes his neck after them, wondering which of them was the King he’s here to, well, serve, he supposes. The tall boy in black, or the shorter one in grey? Definitely not the one with scarlet skin; he knows that much about King Erik, at least.
There’s an astounding and lengthy crash from the room they ran into, followed by yelling and laughter.
Charles straightens up again.
“Ah, Charles, my boy.” Charles tips his head back to look the man in the eye.
“M’lord regent?” He keeps his gaze wide and a little bit awed. Lord Sebastian Shaw seems to appreciate it when he does that. Lord Shaw smiles at him, almost genially.
“Come along. Leave your bag here. I’ll introduce you to her Majesty… and His Majesty, too.”
Charles gulps. The King. His new… master. So to speak.
“Don’t worry,” the Regent says, wheeling round. “We’ll let you get settled in before we start beating you.” He laughs. His teeth are white and sharp in his handsome face. Charles smiles politely. Lord Shaw is a funny person—his moods don’t always match his words, and Charles finds him confusing.
Still, the Regent is better—or easier to deal with—than Kurt, Charles’s stepfather, and Cain, his stepbrother. Anyone is. Maybe even the wild young King Erik. And his friends, and tutors.
The journey here took a week. A whole week of not having to fear Cain’s taunts or Kurt’s attention. Even the worst of Charles’s bruises have mostly healed. Despite the chilly nights, the mud, the jolting carriage and other miseries of travelling cross-Kingdom in autumn, it was the best week Charles has had for years.
He stretches his legs and scampers to keep up with the Regent’s swift paces. As they pass through corridors and rooms, people bow, curtsy, step aside and murmur respectfully or resentfully to Lord Shaw. Charles is ignored, mostly, which he prefers. Being noticed only leads to painful things, in his short experience.
“Can I—” He’s nearly breathless, Lord Shaw is moving so fast. “Can I wash my—my hands, and change first, sir?” Charles squints down at his shabby shoes, and bites his lip. He’s still wearing his travelling clothes, serviceable enough, but worn and mud-splashed.
Sebastian Shaw chuckles indulgently, and shakes his head.
“You’re hardly filthy, my boy.” He does not walk any slower. “The Queen and her son are used to the exigencies of road travel.”
“Yes, sir.” Charles swallows down a bubble of frustration and fear. It doesn’t matter. He’s going to be the King’s whipping boy; not his friend or, or anything.
Lord Shaw has already warned him that the young King had tried to avoid having a whipping boy, and was currently sulking over the matter, “As only a thirteen year old boy caught between the pleasures of childhood and the pains of being a ruling monarch can,” Lord Shaw had chuckled. “He’ll come round to you, I’m sure. You look like a clever boy.”
“Erik!”
“What?” The King of Genosha raised his head cautiously above the table. Azazel and Janos and he had all got away clean from the shattered vase by scattering—he hoped—but he didn’t want to reveal himself to anyone, even Emma, if displeased and irritating adults might spot him. Not that they could really do anything to him, but nagging was tiresome.
“Isn’t today one of the days you give an Audience?”
Erik gave his future wife an unloving look.
Lady Emma rolled her eyes. She was used to Erik’s unloving looks, and, indeed, vastly preferred them to when he attempted to give her loving looks. Anyway, she could glare better than him. She put her hands on her hips.
“Lord Sebastian’s back; my maid says he brought a boy with him.”
“Don’t care.” Erik said sullenly, and dropped back under the table. Emma kicked him. “Ow!”
“I’m not bending down to talk to you in this dress, Erik. Come out of there and talk like a person.”
“I’m the King. I don’t get to be a person.” Erik heaved a huge sigh. He was just a puppet, a doll for his people to watch dance, while the real power and all the decisions lay with his Regent, Lord Sebastian Shaw.
“Kings give audiences.” Emma said, unmoved by Erik’s attempts at self-pity. “And boy-kings get out of being punished for boyish misdeeds by having whipping boys. Which I think is just unfair. Especially after that thing with the eggs.”
“The thing with the eggs was Janos’ idea.” Erik sulked. “Az did most of it.”
“Yes, but you were the one who said it was your fault, so he couldn’t be punished for it; and you did that knowing perfectly well that no one can whip the King, even if he is a thirteen year old boy who’s just done that thing with the eggs in front of three Ambassadors.”
Emma paused and drew a deep breath. Erik wriggled further under the table.
“I don’t want a whipping boy!” he snapped. “Everyone knows I hate giving audiences. They shouldn’t be surprised if I’m not there. They all want to talk to the Lord Regent, anyway. He can actually give orders that people obey. Like you, but without the telepathy.”
“Erik.”
“I can’t do anything like that yet, not really. And Sebastian is just doing this so I know he’s the boss!” Erik kicked out, and hit the table leg. The table juddered faintly, but the noise wasn’t very satisfactory. “I know he is already!”
“Erik.” Emma shifted from foot to foot.
“WHAT?”
“Is sulking—”
“I AM NOT SULKING!”
“―or whatever hiding under a table in the Little Yellow Parlour is defined as in your mind… is that going to stop you from having to endure a whipping boy for at least the immediate future?”
“I told you, no.” Erik picked at the floorboards. “I tried. You know that what dear Sebastian says goes. I’m just going to have to make him want to leave.”
Emma decided not to touch that not-so-new plan of her lord-to-be. He seemed to like ignoring the fact that for a bit of coin and the chance at a good education, some people would offer up their children for far worse roles than that of whipping boy to the King. If Erik thought the first one would be the only whipping boy to be thrust upon him…
“Is anything, other than you growing up and living ’til you’re twenty-five going to stop the Lord Regent Regenting?”
“Probably not.” Erik admitted, reluctantly. “I just—”
Emma leaned down and hissed.
“Then get out from under the table and go do your audience and you might live ‘til you’re twenty-five. Because if you’re going to be like this for the next twelve minutes, let alone twelve years, I will strangle you.”
“That’s… really not encouraging me to come out, Emma.” Erik said. “Death threats from my loving wife-to-be.” It was very strange to think that he’d have to marry Emma at some point. Not that he objected to marrying her, precisely, but. It was weird. Erik paused to give silent thanks that his eighteenth birthday was five years away. And also that Emma refused to Read his mind very often.
“If I strangle you, I won’t have to marry you,” Emma said brightly. “Come on. I know they’re boring but— You might get to meet the whipping boy’s family, as well, if he’s being presented.”
“I don’t care about his family. They’re letting him come to live here.” Erik edged out from under the table. “I don’t care about him at all. What kind of a person agrees to be beaten for money?”
“And an education.” Emma briskly hauled her fiancé upright. “Whipping boys, masochists and whores, mostly.”
Erik sputtered.
“What? You asked. And if you spot his family or see what he’s like in his first time at Court, you can learn about him. Who he is, what kind of a person―” her voice deepened to imitate his― “agrees to be beaten for money.”
“I don’t want to learn about him.” Erik brushed her hands away. “Stop that, I’m not that dusty.”
“Shouldn’t have worn black velvet again.” Emma stepped back, stared at the gangly boy she would one day have to marry, and sighed. “And you don’t have to want to learn about him, it’s just that knowing things about people is helpful if you later decide to interact with them.”
“I don’t—”
“Have a choice about interacting with him? No, you don’t.” Erik gave her another sullen glare. She gave it right back, with a little extra for good measure. “Come on. We won’t be late if you run.”