Nero Walker, Book 3 Ch.1 (116) (Patreon)

Nero’s morning started before it was even bright and early. Apparently there was some kind intercom system in his room, so he was treated to Vera’s voice startling him awake.

“Nero, you have 30 minutes until breakfast is finished. Make sure you don’t leave anything in the guest room.”

His head shot up from the pillow like a gopher coming out of his hole. Blearily, he looked around the room, trying to find out where the hell that voice had come from. Huffing in annoyance, he realized that there wasn’t a snooze alarm to abuse.

Stumbling to his feet, he grumbled, “They have links here, so who in their right mind would bother installing an intercom? Crazy woman probably has security cameras too. Magic scrying and telepathy wouldn’t be enough for the illustrious Vera Salvatore… No, the that’s Vera freaking VERENA-Salvatore. Damn woman probably charged my account for using her guest room.”

Nero looked like a zombie as he made his way to the bathroom, all the while ranting under his breath.

Unbeknownst to him, Vera and her husband, Nick, were at the kitchen table having their morning coffee and tea, while a small hologram hovered over the table showing a struggling Nero plod toward the bathroom.

Nick, sipping his coffee, nearly did a spit-take when he heard Nero’s accusation. The hologram disappeared quickly, and he turned to see Vera gritting her teeth in annoyance.

With a smile, he asked, “So, were you really going to charge him for using the guest room?”

Rolling her shoulders uncomfortably, she replied tersely, “Of course not. Not that it wouldn’t be unreasonable to expect compensation for the head of the house I’m serving to pay for his lodging.”

She met Nick’s grin with a glare, and decided to change the subject.

“Have you been in contact with the rest of your team?” she asked.

Being the kind and wonderful husband that he is, he accepted the change in topic without complaint, and replied, “Yes. It seems last night General Branson debriefed Ms. Vikander and Sergeant Wesker. Both are fine with staying on the team. According to the general, there are no hard feelings, but I doubt they will forget Nero’s games. We will be meeting them at one of the Gate 15 side gates before heading back into the wilds. Wesker has the coordinates for the base camp the elites set up. We’re to meet them in 2 hours.”

Nodding along, Vera asked, “And Cathleen?”

Nick shrugged, and replied, “No issues. I talked to her this morning. You won’t be surprised to hear that she couldn’t care less about what happened. She asked where we were planning on meeting, then closed the connection before I could find out anything else.”

With a grin, Vera said, “Sounds like Cathleen. We should just be grateful that she agreed to keep an eye on Nero, I know how much she hates politics. After having to stand by while we dealt with the leadership council, I thought she might want to distance herself.”

Nick tapped his finger on the table in thought, then replied, “I wasn’t going to say anything, but now that I had access to my lab again, I looked up something she said during training.”

Interested, Vera set down her tea and gave Nick her full attention.

Coughing lightly to clear his throat, Nick sat up in his chair and took up his lecture with enthusiasm.

“As you know, Cathleen hails from one of the more famous Northern Clans, the Averetts. They have a rich martial tradition and consistently send out their children to all corners of Oglivarch. If there is a conflict, there will be an Averett fighting in it. Because of that, a great deal of information is available concerning some of the North’s more unique traditions.”

Vera didn’t want Nick stray to far away from his point, and asked, “And this has to do with Nero, how?”

Smiling as though he expected the question, he replied, “Because Cathleen mentioned that she was training Nero in the manner of their ‘Warblades’. In principle, the idea is that the trainee is constantly faced with life and death battles, struggling to survive a moment longer, maintain composure under the most dire circumstances, to live their life as though they were a bared blade ready for anything. From what I read, there is a lot of symbolism involved in the tradition, but it comes down to putting their recruits through incredibly harsh training and seeing if they’ll break. I think that’s why she doesn’t care about the politics.”

Confused, Vera didn’t understand what one thing had to do with the other. “I think I’m going to need you to walk me through how those two things are connected,” she said.

Nick nodded easily. “One of the papers I read discussed how northerners see their warblades. They consider them heroes, or clan treasures. The failure rate is spectacular, as most recruits fold under the pressure. Not many people are capable of dealing with the constant threat of death. Instead of improving, they start accepting their failures, and embracing their weaknesses. So when someone is found who can stand up to the punishment, they are revered. And I personally watched as Nero fought with broken bones, missing limbs, and all manner of injuries, while never backing down. I’m not surprised that Cathleen finds him interesting. In fact, I’d say that would be an understatement,” he finished with a chuckle.

Vera leaned back in her chair, working through what she had just heard. She had known that training at the elite camp would be intense, but she hadn’t realized how brutal it turned out to be. Vera wasn’t exactly sure how she should feel about that. After all, Nero was still a young man, it didn’t seem right to put him through such abuse. He was the head of a house, and not just any house.

House Walker was a financial powerhouse, with zero real infrastructure. As proxy, she was able to tie all of the financial incentives, contracts, and tax breaks to aid in growing her own house. Without Nero, her road to domination would be much more difficult. As much as she liked the young man, she was too pragmatic to ignore how much she still needed him. ‘He’s not just a tool, he’s a friend,’ she reminded herself with some anger at her thoughts.

If she was going to be unhappy with the training Nero was going through, she wanted to be unhappy with it for the right reasons.

Nick, however, found the entire situation interesting from an intellectual and sociological standpoint. How often would he, as a southerner, have a chance to see a Northern Clansman train one of their elites? It was an opportunity to study a field he hadn’t really focused on. Normally, he studied physical and ethereal phenomena, not cultural relativism. Nero, to him, was a wonderful subject at the center of several different cultural influences. Just being around him was a very intellectually enriching experience.

While Nick and Vera were thinking about Nero, the young man in question walked into the room with an annoyed look on his face. Before they could greet him, their faces fell as he started talking.

“Why the hell are we up so early? It’s not even dawn. Didn’t you two spend most of last night reminding each why it’s worth putting up with each other? How in the hell are you both so awake?” he asked without caring about decorum.

With a cold look on her face, Vera replied, “Our sex life is fine, Nero. We’re more than capable of compartmentalizing our bedroom escapades and still dealing with the rest of our lives.”

Remembering that people in this world didn’t realize how embarrassing sex was supposed to be, he dropped it. There was no fun poking people who didn’t realize you were screwing with them.

“Whatever,” he said, then took a seat at the table.

After pouring himself some coffee, he grabbed something that resembled a breakfast Danish and started eating.

With his mouth full of delicious bread, he mumbled, “So, what’s the plan?”

Nick chose to be the one to answer the young man, as he could tell Vera was already ignoring Nero and was instead doing something on her link. “We’re meeting the rest of the team, then heading back into the wilds. By tomorrow afternoon we should reach the base camp that the rest of the elites set up. From there we will be deployed throughout the regions dealing with issues including monster clusters, spawn-points, proto-dungeons, and whatever else needs doing,” he said.

Curious, Nero asked, “No problems with the military? We not being reassigned or anything?”

Shaking his head, Nick replied, “Nope. Same team. Everything is forgotten. It was all handled by the arbitration paperwork Vera handled.”

Shooting the woman in question a side-eye, Nero said, “Must have been one hell of an arbitration agreement to cover everything that sucked about the past week. How are the powers-that-be handling the people that knew about the dirty nobles, and incompetent military?”

Chuckling, Nick replied, “No idea. Not my department. I’m staying out of it.”

Without bothering to look away from her invisible holograms, Vera said, “From what I’ve gathered, they’re putting it all on the former Lord Blackwood. He was turned in by his disgraced son, the young man gave up his future as a scion to take up a military position and serve the interests of the people. Sergeant Blackwood is now a hero, and House Blackwood is rallying around their new identity. Victoria Blackwood has already dueled two of her sisters for control of the family, and has been appointed the new Lord Blackwood.

“As for House Cosgrave, it seems Deidre Cosgrave was executed for her relationship with her mother’s consort, the former Lord Blackwood. The official account was that there was some worry Deidre was trying to take over the house in order to side with her trouble-making brother. I expect word to reach us soon of Derek’s untimely death at the hands of bandits, beasts, or something similar. It should all be cleared up by dinner time.”

Stunned, Nero was frozen with his pastry halfway to his mouth.

“Um… I guess everyone had a busy night. Didn’t this all just happen yesterday? How long was I asleep?” he asked.

With a smirk, Vera replied, “It’s easy to deal with issues if you are decisive enough. Being a noble means that you have to make decisions quickly, and seize the initiative. The game is a lot like life, and if you forget that, you’re not likely to win at either.”

Nero took a second to think through what she just said, then replied, “I think you all take this whole ‘game’ thing too seriously. Just because you have an interface, doesn’t mean you’re game characters. Life is complicated, and trying to plan everything out is just asking for trouble. What happens if someone leaks the real story? What if the arbitration agreement gets out? Someone could blow this whole thing wide open, and then they’re all screwed.”

Nick and Vera shared confused looks. Vera leaned forward in her seat and asked, “You do know that the real story is published alongside the official statement, right?”

Confused, Nero eloquently replied, “Huh?”

Nick chuckled and said, “The arbitration agreement is referenced in any news story concerning what happened. Everyone will know what really happened. They will also know that for the common good, an agreement was reached to ignore parts of what happened so that everyone can get on with their lives. There is no conspiracy, or lie, which anyone needs to fear coming out. That’s the entire point of an arbitration agreement. All parties involved agreed on how to handle it, and no one, including the government, has the right to an opinion. The Tower of Law oversaw the agreement, so no one was coerced, and the agreement was ratified. The people have no say in it, and I doubt they’d care if they even bothered to look through the finer details.”

Stunned, Nero lamely asked, “So, no one is going to be protesting, or calling for an investigation into collusion or whatever?”

Vera replied easily, “Nero, some nobles trying to kill each other isn’t exactly shocking. As long as the law is followed, no one will bat an eye. They have bigger things to worry about then some new noble and his problems. Granted, your story is interesting, but more as a tale worthy for the bar or the diner, not for one of the over-site committees.”

There was so much to unpack there, Nero was forced to lean back in his chair and work through the concept of people having better things to do than complain about the government. Not to mention the fact that the government was completely up front about their cover-up, so it wasn’t even a cover-up at all. It was all legal, and they just killed the troublemakers, then moved on with business as usual, while choosing to forget about the details.

There was only one word for what Nero was feeling… it was ‘flabbergasted’.

With a rueful chuckle, Nero muttered, “A government that executes their troublemakers, then tells the people about it. Freaking savages.”