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Help[Games] Re: Saphirdufeu’s Royal Congrats - Round 9
in reply to a message by saphirdufeu
House of Fairfax
DH: King Richard Christopher Samuel [d.]
DW: Dowager Queen Beatrice Edith Sybillia [d.]
DD: Matilda Anne Christine, Countess of Richmond [51]
-DH: George Nicolas, Earl of Arundel [d.]
--DD: Helen Susanna Euphemia [33]
---DH: Conrad Teodoric Restault, Count of Blois [33]
----DS: Lucas Alasdair [12]
----DD: Eleanore Jane [9]
----DS: Adam Florian [2]
----DS: Roger Edmond [nb]
--DS: Henry Fabian Richard, Earl of Arundel [31]
---DW: Isabel Bernardine, Baroness of Mulgrave [32]
-DH: Antony Peregrin Mercier, Earl of Richmond [d.]
--DS: Benedict Philip, Earl of Richmond [27]
---DW: Adriana Rosario Adela Sandoval, Viscountess of Cabrera [25]
----DD: Julia Maura Inez [6]
DS: King Henry Valerian Ambrose [50]
-DW: Queen Louise Charlotte, Duchess of Aquitaine [d.]
--DS: Prince Jehan Leopold Walter [d.]
DS: Prince Rufus Joscelin Ives [47]
-DW: Princess Dorothea Cateline Rennes, Countess of Anjou [d.]
--DD: Cecily Honora [23]
---DH: Isidore Magnus, Earl of Pembroke [27]
---DD: Cecily Hosianna [3]
---DD: Arabella Isolde [1]
--DD: Marion Sabeline [22]
---DFiancé: Leonard Raphael, Earl of Hereford [d.]
---DH: Thomas Gilbert Tulles, Duke of Narbonne [20]
--DS: Adrian Valentine [20]
---DW: Alice Elizabeth Osmond, Countess of Salisbury [18]
--DS: Amaury Noel [19]
--DD: Mary Eulalia [d.]
There are many things you could do to secure a kingdom. You could fortify its borders, assigning well-trained armies to pace back and forth on big walls and generally look intimidating. You could protect your economy, establishing trading hubs that ensured you could provide anything anyone wanted for a price. You could marry your children into other royal families and hope their loyalty to you will remain unshakeable (although this one isn't an option for Hal).
What you couldn't do, no matter how much you tried, was protect the kingdom from disease. You could drain swamps to prevent the miasmatic air from billowing into towns, you could dig wells so deep you struck gold, you could order plague doctors to patrol the city and throw poultices at everyone who sports even a single boil, but whatever you do, you will not be able to completely eradicate disease. It's like trying to demolish an anthill using a catapault: you'd miss most of the time, and even if you do hit the anthill, it'll turn out the ants have a different burrow elsewhere and will start to bite your legs again in a few months. You have to try to fix it, try to prevent it from ever happening again, because it's your responsibility to do so, but don't come in with lofty hopes of wiping it forever off the slate. It'll bring nothing but heartbreak.
That's what Uncle Hal explained to Adrian, sitting atop the castle battements overlooking the pox-swept city. And it made sense, it really did. It was rational, just like Uncle Hal was rational. But Adrian could still see his mother's pock-marked face, hear her feverish ramblings echo between his ears... and against his mother's last moments, rationality slunk away like a defeated dog.
His mother'd died of the pox. So had Leonard, his sister's betrothed. So had an innumerable amount of servants, serfs, soldiers, people from all sorts of places and backgrounds. And, in the final stretches of the outbreak, so had the queen.
He asked, hesitant, if it was true, if Aunt Louise had forbidden her husband from visiting her bedchamber in her final hours. He hoped and hoped it was just a rumour. It seemed so cruel, to bar your own spouse from your deathbed, even if it was a marriage of convenience and politics, like him and Alice.
Hal looked him straight in the eye and nodded. Louise had forbid him from visiting her, he explained slowly, because she would not risk him becoming infected from the miasma in her room. A nation must not be decapitated. That was why he was crowned the very same day Richard died. That was why his sick wife screamed at the nurses to prevent him from entering her quarters. And that was why--he pulled out a scroll, stamped with the official royal seal--he'd named Adrian as his official successor and heir.
And Adrian had gawked, glanced from the scroll to his uncle and to the city down below. He knew he was going to be king someday. Nobody made a secret of it. It was decided for him years ago. But it had always seemed like a mainly administrative job, kinging, even if occasional rebels decided they wanted to swing their sword at you or your family members at strange moments. He'd never before thought there would be so much grief in running a country, not as much as he saw in Hal's eyes when he stared out at his kingdom, the kingdom he had worked so hard to build and protect, bending its knees to inexorable disease.
Death, Hal murmured, is implacable. It doesn't discriminate. It isn't evil, merely terribly good at its job. And it's truly inevitable, not the sort of inevitability that's still under your control.
After a pause, Adrian asked if there was an inevitability they could control. It seemed paradoxical for his uncle to insinuate there was.
And Hal'd given him a blank, puzzled look and said of course there was. It's called taxes.
Mutatis mutandis. Si non confectus, non reficiat.
DH: King Richard Christopher Samuel [d.]
DW: Dowager Queen Beatrice Edith Sybillia [d.]
DD: Matilda Anne Christine, Countess of Richmond [51]
-DH: George Nicolas, Earl of Arundel [d.]
--DD: Helen Susanna Euphemia [33]
---DH: Conrad Teodoric Restault, Count of Blois [33]
----DS: Lucas Alasdair [12]
----DD: Eleanore Jane [9]
----DS: Adam Florian [2]
----DS: Roger Edmond [nb]
--DS: Henry Fabian Richard, Earl of Arundel [31]
---DW: Isabel Bernardine, Baroness of Mulgrave [32]
-DH: Antony Peregrin Mercier, Earl of Richmond [d.]
--DS: Benedict Philip, Earl of Richmond [27]
---DW: Adriana Rosario Adela Sandoval, Viscountess of Cabrera [25]
----DD: Julia Maura Inez [6]
DS: King Henry Valerian Ambrose [50]
-DW: Queen Louise Charlotte, Duchess of Aquitaine [d.]
--DS: Prince Jehan Leopold Walter [d.]
DS: Prince Rufus Joscelin Ives [47]
-DW: Princess Dorothea Cateline Rennes, Countess of Anjou [d.]
--DD: Cecily Honora [23]
---DH: Isidore Magnus, Earl of Pembroke [27]
---DD: Cecily Hosianna [3]
---DD: Arabella Isolde [1]
--DD: Marion Sabeline [22]
---DFiancé: Leonard Raphael, Earl of Hereford [d.]
---DH: Thomas Gilbert Tulles, Duke of Narbonne [20]
--DS: Adrian Valentine [20]
---DW: Alice Elizabeth Osmond, Countess of Salisbury [18]
--DS: Amaury Noel [19]
--DD: Mary Eulalia [d.]
There are many things you could do to secure a kingdom. You could fortify its borders, assigning well-trained armies to pace back and forth on big walls and generally look intimidating. You could protect your economy, establishing trading hubs that ensured you could provide anything anyone wanted for a price. You could marry your children into other royal families and hope their loyalty to you will remain unshakeable (although this one isn't an option for Hal).
What you couldn't do, no matter how much you tried, was protect the kingdom from disease. You could drain swamps to prevent the miasmatic air from billowing into towns, you could dig wells so deep you struck gold, you could order plague doctors to patrol the city and throw poultices at everyone who sports even a single boil, but whatever you do, you will not be able to completely eradicate disease. It's like trying to demolish an anthill using a catapault: you'd miss most of the time, and even if you do hit the anthill, it'll turn out the ants have a different burrow elsewhere and will start to bite your legs again in a few months. You have to try to fix it, try to prevent it from ever happening again, because it's your responsibility to do so, but don't come in with lofty hopes of wiping it forever off the slate. It'll bring nothing but heartbreak.
That's what Uncle Hal explained to Adrian, sitting atop the castle battements overlooking the pox-swept city. And it made sense, it really did. It was rational, just like Uncle Hal was rational. But Adrian could still see his mother's pock-marked face, hear her feverish ramblings echo between his ears... and against his mother's last moments, rationality slunk away like a defeated dog.
His mother'd died of the pox. So had Leonard, his sister's betrothed. So had an innumerable amount of servants, serfs, soldiers, people from all sorts of places and backgrounds. And, in the final stretches of the outbreak, so had the queen.
He asked, hesitant, if it was true, if Aunt Louise had forbidden her husband from visiting her bedchamber in her final hours. He hoped and hoped it was just a rumour. It seemed so cruel, to bar your own spouse from your deathbed, even if it was a marriage of convenience and politics, like him and Alice.
Hal looked him straight in the eye and nodded. Louise had forbid him from visiting her, he explained slowly, because she would not risk him becoming infected from the miasma in her room. A nation must not be decapitated. That was why he was crowned the very same day Richard died. That was why his sick wife screamed at the nurses to prevent him from entering her quarters. And that was why--he pulled out a scroll, stamped with the official royal seal--he'd named Adrian as his official successor and heir.
And Adrian had gawked, glanced from the scroll to his uncle and to the city down below. He knew he was going to be king someday. Nobody made a secret of it. It was decided for him years ago. But it had always seemed like a mainly administrative job, kinging, even if occasional rebels decided they wanted to swing their sword at you or your family members at strange moments. He'd never before thought there would be so much grief in running a country, not as much as he saw in Hal's eyes when he stared out at his kingdom, the kingdom he had worked so hard to build and protect, bending its knees to inexorable disease.
Death, Hal murmured, is implacable. It doesn't discriminate. It isn't evil, merely terribly good at its job. And it's truly inevitable, not the sort of inevitability that's still under your control.
After a pause, Adrian asked if there was an inevitability they could control. It seemed paradoxical for his uncle to insinuate there was.
And Hal'd given him a blank, puzzled look and said of course there was. It's called taxes.
Mutatis mutandis. Si non confectus, non reficiat.
This message was edited 8/2/2018, 1:11 AM
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