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Keeping Up Honors
...Allerdale, it's no good habit to eavesdrop. Listen to your father, now.
Only lowly scoundrels would hide away in the dark to plot the demise of another.
Maybe they do it for their own benefit, but such stolen victories never last for long.
- Allerdale
(Urgh... lowly scoundrels, both of them...)
- Allerdale
(Dad...)
She doesn't want to be caught barefaced, especially not by these awful people. It'd disappoint her father, and bring shame on the Cumberland name.
If she can just climb out of the window...
- Indistinct Officer
We need to seize the moment.
- Indistinct Officer
The soldiers are counting heads right now. We'll mingle with the crowd in the confusion. That way, nobody will realize we were ever gone.
- Obscured Merchant
...Did you hear something?
- Indistinct Officer
It must be some little house pest. Don't overthink it. How's a room so cramped going to hide anyone?
- Allerdale
Phew...
She carefully, gingerly cowers inside the shadow. Her most loyal ally—the tremendous suit of steam armor—becomes her shield.
Her fingers feel to the edge of the window, and if she can just climb over and out, she can avoid this duo's line of sight, and climb down the gutter pipe.
Her skirt's filthy by now. Ailshie won't be happy about this.
But as long as she's not caught...
- Allerdale
Agh!
She doesn't understand what happened.
The sky and ground seem to spin before her eyes, the inside of Allerdale's head whirling with. Her hands and legs lose all purchase, her grasp and footing touch nothing but thin air. She plummets straight from the second story.
The garden scenery screams like mad towards her head, but before she hits the stiff soil, a soft yet ample cushion catches her.
A cushion from where?
No, it's not even a cushion.
Allerdale feels herself gently placed upon the ground.
She turns to looks behind—
And creatures confined to legend stand before her.
They must have leapt out of a fairy tale just a moment ago, stood there imposingly in the garden. They really do exist.
Their golden fur gleams scintillant as the sun. The one at the head has pupils of deep brown, and they are now calmly staring at Allerdale.
Allerdale, brought by her father, has had several audiences with His Majesty, and seen generations of portraits of the Aslan kings hung on the palace walls.
But this is the first time she cannot help the urge to bow her head before such a gaze—for the ones before her seem more awe-inspiring than any monarch.
Yet a Cumberland does not bow so lightly. Allerdale makes a conscious effort to keep her head held high, as high as it can go, and only then does she notice that the one in the center carries a human astride him.
A girl who must be even younger than her, dressed in sumptuous ceremony, languidly sat atop his back akin to plated gold.
In his mouth is held a sword... a sword that outsizes the girl by far.
A deep, resonant voice arises in Allerdale's head.
'Allerdale Cumberland.
You will meet Vina again, someday.'
This is the first time Allerdale meets them, and the last as well.
In the over twenty years to follow, this sight will recur in her dreams, dreams of that august, golden presence, of the girl who was there with them—
Until, like the Aristocrat of Beasts prophesized, she once again meets the one named Vina.
- Victorian Officer
Look, that... that's...
- Victorian Officer
Her Royal Highness Alexandrina!
- Victorian Officer
Inform His Majesty immediately, we've found Her Highness, she's in the garden right this moment—
- Victorian Officer
Wait, I'm not seeing things, am I? Isn't that... the missing...
- Victorian Officer
Her Highness—she's found the Sighs of Kings!
- Victorian Officer
God save Victoria!
- Victorian Officer
God save the King!
Cheers instantly erupt throughout the garden.
Servicemen, nobles, servants... everyone swarms for the place, eyes on Her Highness bearing the symbol of royal power.
What a miracle it is!
Hot tears fill the people's eyes, and one after another they reach their hands out in joy.
- Maid Ailshie
Miss Allerdale... what are you doing here?
- Allerdale
...Ailshie.
- Allerdale
You can't see them?
- Maid Ailshie
Them? Who do you mean? Her Highness Alexandrina?
- Maid Ailshie
She's the only one there, you know.
- Allerdale
No, them, they're golden...
- Allerdale
He just said something to me too.
- Maid Ailshie
Did something happen to you? Your skirt's dirty to high heaven... are you alright?
- Allerdale
I... I'm not sure.
- Allerdale
Stars... stars fell into the room upstairs.
- Allerdale
The steam knight... armor... it gave those scoundrels a beating!
- Maid Ailshie
I don't understand what you're telling me.
- Allerdale
Ailshie, I feel really dizzy.
- Maid Ailshie
You need some proper rest. Who hasn't lost their head, seeing all of this? Far too much has happened today.
- Noble Lady
Did you see? Her Royal Highness Alexandrina came back with the missing Sighs of Kings!
- Noble Gentleman
The cheers from the gardens were practically shaking all the windows and walls. Hardly anyone believed their own eyes. Her Highness Alexandrina in the flesh—and her age, how young is she still?
- Noble Lady
'A miracle,' everyone's calling it.
- Noble Gentleman
Yes, a miracle, of course it is.
- Noble Gentleman
The greatest difference between miracles and coincidence is that miracles never descend for no reason in the time and place they do.
- Noble Gentleman
It'll be His Majesty's birthday soon... How could I not consider this magical affair a splendid portent of things to come?
- Noble Lady
Do give that a rest. They put on this whole auteur-styled drama for the merriment of anyone watching.
- Noble Lady
What I'm suddenly minding is the opinion some dukes have of His Majesty and our Duke of Cumberland...
- Noble Gentleman
Leave it there. All worries on the backburner, now. The dinner party's about to begin.
- Noble Lady
You're quite right. Let's enjoy everything here to the fullest—
- Noble Gentleman & Noble Lady
God save Victoria!
- Impassioned Voice
...It seems the people's attentions are on Alexandrina's adventure.
- Sullen Voice
Your Majesty... you knew beforehand Her Highness would enter the cavern underground?
- Impassioned Voice
It was a fine opportunity. With me out of the Palace, the diligent guards could more easily chatter, or perhaps sleep on the job, and thus let this little intruder of ours slip by.
- Sullen Voice
So you planned all this.
- Impassioned Voice
Half was his fine improvisation. He does like a harmless little practical joke on us humans now and then.
- Sullen Voice
If he went along with this, does that imply he, too, considered this a necessary deed?
- Impassioned Voice
...Londinium will be soon for summer. Awfully stuffy days, and torrents of rain from time to time. You're planning to send Allerdale and the wife out of the city yourself, aren't you?
- Sullen Voice
Your Majesty! My intention has always been but one, I simply...
- Impassioned Voice
Robert, you adore your daughter, as do I.
- Impassioned Voice
We are to wager everything for Victoria's present, but they are Victoria's future. On the off-chance we do fail...
- Sullen Voice
We will not, Your Majesty. I will ensure the worst case does not happen, if it takes my very life.
- Impassioned Voice
I'm filled with great courage and confidence at our prospects. Still, it doesn't hinder me from planning just the most minute escape option for Alexandrina.
- Impassioned Voice
She'll be ruling Victoria sooner or later. Is it so wrong to have her get to grips with this city in advance?
- Impassioned Voice
And a similar farce still more or less served to right the balance, on this stifling-seeming afternoon.
- Impassioned Voice
Under all this pressure, the people's spirits need a little boost. That is what we're met here for.
- Impassioned Voice
......
- Impassioned Voice
Of course... we all have some premonition. Hence why we made these calculations, correct?
- Sullen Voice
......
- Impassioned Voice
Come, Robert. Once you're done with your tea, we'll be due downstairs.
- Allerdale
I hear music. That's the band Dad and His Majesty invited?
- Maid Ailshie
Yes, Miss Allerdale. The dinner party's about to begin.
- Allerdale
Everyone's so happy.
- Maid Ailshie
Aren't you, too?
- Allerdale
Ailshie... will the days go on like this forever?
- Allerdale
Me and you, and Dad, and Mum... we'll always be together?
- Maid Ailshie
I don't know, Miss Allerdale. But I believe nothing ever stays completely the same, just as the flowers in the garden.
- Allerdale
......
- Allerdale
No. There are some things that will never change, Ailshie!
- Allerdale
I'll grow up to be a Steam Knight, just like Sir Lynch! No, even greater than Sir Lynch!
- Allerdale
I'll protect you all, and I'll drive every scoundrel away.
- Allerdale
I'll uphold the glory of Cumberland, just like my great-great-great-great grandmother!
- Allerdale
I promise this, Ailshie! You'll see!
- Maid Ailshie
Miss...
- Allerdale
...I'm not leaving Londinium. You're not allowed to leave either, Ailshie.
- Allerdale
I'm going to tell Dad—
- Allerdale
This is my home. Just like every Cumberland's done before me, I'll keep it, I'll protect it, until my life is over.
- Allerdale
I swear.
