Chapter 977: Ashlynn’s Lessons (Part Two)
"No, I’m not telling you that you need to be dishonest," Ashlynn corrected Sybyll when she noticed that she’d touched on a wound within the other woman’s heart that was unexpectedly tender. She had to remind herself, once again, that despite the fact that Sybyll was a knight and the daughter of a Baron, she hadn’t benefited from a nobleman’s upbringing.
Ashlynn had tried to approach Sybyll like she was a fellow nobleman’s daughter, and a little bit, she realized, like she would have broached these topics with Jocelynn. It was easy to fall into familiar habits, discussing political strategy the way she would have with her younger sister, as if this was just another ’forbidden’ picnic on the cliffs overlooking the Blackwell harbor.
But in truth, the Crimson Knight had much more in common with Ollie than she did with Jocelynn, and she needed to offer an approach that would appeal to Sybyll’s more straightforward way of looking at the world and its leaders.
"Go to your people with complete honesty," Ashlynn suggested. "Share with them the hurts you suffered, and they’ll understand why you would go so far, bringing an army to their doorstep and fighting your way to the heart of Hanrahan Keep to seize your cousin and hold him accountable for his crimes."
"Once you’ve done that," Ashlynn said, holding up one finger and then raising a second to indicate the next point in the strategy she was helping Sybyll develop to take control of the barony as smoothly as possible. "You need to transform your individual pain into a shared pain. Before you claim your cousin’s life, before you even threaten it, you need to lay out his crimes against the rest of his people."
"You know he’s guilty, Sybyll," Thane added. "You’ve visited your homeland every winter for close to twenty years. You’ve seen the way his people suffer, and now, you have his own son to stand as a witness against him. Help your people see your cousin Ian the way you do. Reveal his secrets one by one until they’re as sick of him and disgusted by him as you are."
"If you can do that," Thane said with a wistful, sad smile. "If you can do that, then you’ll avoid the mistake my sister made when she killed the baron who forced himself on her. His people thought he was a hero who protected them from demons during the War of Undying Demons. He was their guardian who they revered as much as they revered the Holy Lord of Light, and she took him from them."
Even though she’d been wronged. Even though he was the sort of man who would force himself on his vassal’s daughter and coerce her by threatening to send her father to the front lines in the next war, the people hadn’t known any of it. So when she claimed the life of the man who wronged her, the people cried out for justice, and they wouldn’t rest until the young Marquis executed her for the crime of magnicide.
"Ian Hanrahan will die, one way or another," Ashlynn promised. "But the difference will be whether the people are afraid that they’ll be next, or they cheer to see his head mounted in the central plaza."
"That’s why it’s so important that you put him on trial for his crimes, and let the people turn against him before you lay claim to his life," Ashlynn counseled her. "Move too strongly against him too soon, and they’ll doubt the evidence against him, and you risk everything falling apart. But if you can hold yourself back long enough to show them that you were wronged, and they were wronged as well... then your people will not only bow down to your strength, they’ll welcome your rule."
In the end, Sybyll had come to accept Lady Ashlynn’s advice. It wasn’t easy. She had to overcome her distaste for the methods that noblemen used to rule in human lands, and some of Ashlynn’s methods felt... uncomfortable. Underhanded. But both Ashlynn and Thane had reminded her that ruling over humans who only knew the ways and traditions of the Kingdom of Gaal and the Church would be different than ruling over the Eldritch.
On Airgead Mountain, Sybyll had grown to appreciate the simple unity she found among the Soft Paws Clan. They might scrap and tussle, but they never came for each other’s lives. Perhaps the people in Hanrahan would find the folk from Airgead Mountain to be quick-tempered and prone to violence, but when she lived among Jalal’s people, disagreements were solved as quickly as they formed.
There might be some hissing, some swatting, and a few cuts and bruises if it were a serious dispute, but then it was over. There were no grudges, and afterwards, the victor helped the loser tend to their wounds as they came back together as one people again.
Hanrahan wasn’t like that, or at least, it wasn’t like that yet. Sybyll had to accept her people the way they were right now until she could teach them a better way, and that meant learning to act like a human lady instead of an Eldritch lord, at least for now.
Once she’d come to accept that, Ashlynn had schooled her in the etiquette of holding court and the ways of ruling that Sybyll would have learned from her own father if she’d had the chance to grow up beside him. She made certain that Sybyll could play the part of Baron Brighton Hanrahan’s returning daughter and not just the role of a conquering, bloodthirsty vampire.
There had been so much preparation for the night when she would sit upon the throne and take her rightful place before her people, and yet, in a single moment, with a few hasty words and a slip of the tongue, Sybyll had put all of it at risk by doing exactly what Ashlynn had warned her not to... She claimed Ian’s life before she’d convinced her people of his guilt.
Worse than that, she’d revealed that her attack on Hanrahan Town was part of a much larger scheme, one aimed at the Lothians and the entire march. The instant she did that, she could hear the mutters rippling through the crowd, wondering if it had all been a lie, a convenient story to turn them into ’puppets on strings,’ using the very same words she’d used to describe the Lothians.
Sitting beside her, Heila watched as a sudden stillness overtook the powerful vampire. The tightening of her eyes, the slightest shift of her fingers on the armrests of her thone... People who hadn’t lived among vampires might not notice the subtle signs, but Heila had spent her entire life in Lady Nyrielle’s fortress or traveling with Lady Ashlynn and Lady Nyrielle.
She could tell that Sybyll had made a mistake, and she was trying to find a way to fix it, but this wasn’t her battlefield. Ashlynn might have been able to shift the conversation, to plaster over the hasty words or redirect the people’s attention to something else, but Sybyll was a knight, not a noble lady, and she had yet to master the tools that Ashlynn had given her in a few brief days of mutual lessons. And so Heila did what a lady-in-waiting should do... she looked for a way to help without drawing attention to herself.
"Remember, Inquisitor," Heila said softly as she turned her attention from Sybyll to the man sitting on her other side. "Dame Sybyll didn’t invite you here to be a prop or an ornament. You’re here to seek the truth and see justice done," she said, shaking the man loose from his inwardly spiralling thoughts as he’d clearly become lost in the implications of Sybyll and Hugo’s revelations.
"Before Dame Sybyll can sentence her cousin to die, you can speak up for the accused," Heila prompted. "And if you don’t, it’s likely that no one else will. Can you accept that, Inquisitor?" Heila asked.
"No, no I can’t," Diarmuid said as he regathered his thoughts and looked around the hall. Already, he could see that some parts of the crowd were turning ugly. The people were frightened...
Even he had been frightened. But the Lord of Light never promised that it would be easy to do what was right, and tonight, Diarmuid had resolved to save as many people as he could, even if it meant doing the hardest thing imaginable and serving on a court with demons. But since he’d placed himself here in order to protect the people, he had to do his part, even if it meant provoking a vampire who could easily end his life and the lives of everyone else in the great hall.
"Dame Sybyll," Diarmuid said loudly, calling attention to himself as he leaned forward to address the imposing woman. "I wonder if you would allow me to ask a few questions..."