“Send in the next appellant,” Grand Magistrate Vicomtesse Perrine Labelle commanded to the empty room. Nonetheless, she knew her command had been heard, and that her bailiff was hurrying to obey. He had better. She had gone through two bailiffs this month already.

After a short wait, the great doors at the far end of the opulent office wherein the Grand Magistrate conducted her business opened. Her bailiff, a tall man whose name the Vicomtesse had never bothered to learn, parted the hanging curtains in front of the doors and took two steps – short steps – into the room and spoke.

“There are no more appellants today, Grand Magistrate.” The Vicomtesse felt her stomach drop slightly. Disappointment was not a dish she savored. But before she could express her displeasure, the bailiff continued. “However, My Lady, there is a representative from the Scholars who has requested an audience with you.”

The Grand Magistrate arched an eyebrow. The Scholars had been obnoxiously silent throughout the course of the ongoing unpleasantness with the peasantry, and the Aristocrats had largely written them off as pacifists or cowards. The fact that they had sent an envoy to her directly perhaps indicated their readiness to pledge their support, which they should have done months ago.

“Very well,” she said to the bailiff. “I will speak with her. Send her in.”

The bailiff seemed to hesitate for just a moment, though not quite long enough for the Vicomtesse to consider going through the process of hiring a replacement. The bailiff disappeared back through the curtain, and the Grand Magistrate considered how she should deal with this Scholar. The Scholars’ support was hardly necessary in this insurrection, though their help would likely speed the search for the rebels, and one in particular. And while the Scholars posed little threat by themselves, they would make irritating allies for the peasants, which might delay her search even more.

When the curtains parted again, the Vicomtesse was surprised by what she saw. Rather than the image of a bookish old woman she associated with the Scholars, a young man stepped through into the office. Unlike most people who entered there, this man’s eyes seemed not to register the grandeur of the room, but they instead focused directly on the Grand Magistrate herself. She felt her cheeks burn slightly at the gall of the Scholars. Had they really sent a man to parley with her? What was he, a secretary to some third-rate professor? Perhaps they had anticipated punishment for their delay in pledging their support, and sent their most dispensable representative. A small smile crossed her face. Today may not be disappointing after all.

To the man’s credit, he did not make a move to enter the room further than that first step, nor did he risk insulting her by speaking first. The Vicomtesse decided to make him wait. She spent the time studying this man. He was young, though certainly no child, for if he was a scholar himself, he was likely past his studies. His hair was a sort of honey blond and neatly combed, and his face smooth and pleasing. He wore a confident, nearly arrogant, smile, and the longer Perrine Labelle made him wait, the more that smile seemed to grow.

Eventually, the Grand Magistrate grew tired of the game. “Approach,” she said simply, and the man nodded once and obliged. In his right hand, he carried a Scholar’s scroll, which he offered to the Vicomtesse without a word. She looked at him suspiciously, then accepted the offered scroll and unrolled it. It was a brief letter from the Council of Scholars at the University of Port Manteau. In fine, sweeping calligraphy, the letter read:

The Grand Magistrate looked up from the letter to see the man still smiling that same confident smile. “You, I take it, are Thomas Cerveau?”

“Yes, Madame,” he said, bowing deeply. “Professor Thomas Cerveau, University of Port Manteau, at your service.”

“I see,” she said, leaning back in her cushioned chair. “Then perhaps you can tell me, Monsieur Cerveau, how this letter is supposed to satisfy me after months of silence from the Scholars? As I am certain you know well, the Barony of Fleche is in the throes of insurrection, and while the Tradeswomen rushed to our side, the Scholars have remained eternally, and suspiciously, quiet. And this letter gives no explanation, no excuse, for this unacceptable behavior.”

“No Madame, it does not,” Thomas agreed. “Nor do I suspect it was meant to, if I am being honest. As you say, Fleche is currently imperiled, in what you have termed an insurrection, and what others may have named a Revolution.”

The Vicomtesse set her jaw and stared at the man. “Only the rebels would call it that.”

Thomas nodded. “Indeed, Madame Vicomtesse. And the rebels, as we know, are of the peasantry, or perhaps the mages. And the peasants, if I may remind Your Honor, are everywhere.”

“Vermin are like that,” Perrine Labelle said.

Cerveau raised his eyebrows in brief assent. “Vermin also know the roads well, do they not? They scurry all over, strike when the opportunity arrives, and then vanish back into their holes and their burrows. Vermin, Madame Magistrate, are dangerous, especially in hordes.”

“Vermin can also be exterminated,” she replied, pointedly.

“By those with the means to exterminate them, certainly.”

“What is your point, Monsieur Cerveau?”

“The point, Madame Vicomtesse, is that the Scholars are ill-equipped to deal with an infestation, particularly one organized and directed specifically at them. As it says in that letter, I was sent here to explain. If a letter were sent to you, perhaps by a courier on the road, how easily could said courier be overtaken by the vermin who oppose you? And should that happen, the Scholars would find themselves the enemy of the peasants and the mages, with no allies whatsoever.”

The Vicomtesse scoffed. “So the Scholars are cowards, then?”

“Yes,” Thomas said without a hint of hesitation or shame. “The Scholars are very much cowards. It is a cowardice born of knowledge. We know our own weakness as well as we understand our possible strength. We have read the histories, Madame Magistrate, and we understand the precariousness of our position.”

“This begs an interesting question,” she said. “If the Scholars are so weak, so enfeebled, that they fear to even send a simple letter, why should the Aristocracy bother accepting their pledge of loyalty in the first place?”

“If the rumors about you and your intelligence are even remotely true, Madame Vicomtesse, then you have already answered that question for yourself. However, on the unlikely chance that you missed something, I will tell you my opinion on the matter. Nobody would ever claim that the Scholars are strong, in and of themselves. The Scholars could never muster an army, nor pay for one. But the Aristocrats would do well to have the Scholars on their side, merely because making them an enemy would prove devastating.”

“Devastating?” Perrine Labelle asked. “Hardly. I think you overestimate your own abilities, or that of the peasants.”

“It is not about either, Madame, but rather about both. Tell me, what is it that the peasants primarily lack? They outnumber you greatly, so it is not numbers or womanpower. In fact, even if the Scholars and the Craftswomen both side with the Aristocracy, the peasants would still outnumber you by a considerable amount.”

“That does not make them a threat,” the Grand Magistrate said. “For all their numbers, they lack the intelligence, the training, and the organization needed for victory in a war.”

“Intelligence, training, and organization, Madame Vicomtesse?” Thomas said with a smirk. “It seems to me that each of those are elements that the Scholars could provide. In fact, I would suggest that an alliance between the Scholars and the peasants would represent the best of both worlds, so to speak. The Scholars would lead, and the peasants would provide the bodies.”

“And there would be bodies, Monsieur,” Perrine Labelle warned.

Thomas nodded. “Enough to choke the rivers of Foraine, Madame. Enough to bury and suffocate an entire queendom.”

The Vicomtesse shook her head. “Is this what you have come to tell me, Scholar? You were sent to deliver some thinly-veiled threat in the hope of earning my favor?”

“Not in the least, Madame,” Thomas said. “To be perfectly honest with you, I am going well off-script. The things that I have pointed out were discussed - at great length, I might add – in Council, but none of it was ever meant for your ears.”

Perrine Labelle stared at her strange visitor. “So you would betray the secrets of your own people, is that it?”

“The Scholars are not my people,” Thomas said. “Perhaps you have noticed that as I speak of the Scholars, I refer to them as ‘they,’ not as ‘we.’ Oh, they count me amongst their numbers, true, but I do not. As you said yourself, the Scholars are cowards, and remarkably shortsighted for so intelligent a class. They are content, for instance, to sit in their Universities, to hold their positions, from now ‘til Queendom come!”

“If you feel this way,” Perrine Labelle said with a mocking sneer, “I question why they would send you of all people to me.”

“That, Madame Labelle, was my doing. Their fear of their correspondence being intercepted en route was very real, and I argued that as a man, I would be safer. The peasants would not assume that any important business would be conducted by a man, after all.”

The Grand Magistrate nodded to concede the point. “So, if your coming here was your own doing, what was so important that you needed to see me? Surely, you know of my reputation.”

“Madame du Collet?” Thomas asked. “Naturally. Coming here is a calculated risk. I did so knowing that I might never leave this room alive. Enough other people have not, after all. But I am a man who is not afraid to risk everything for a little more. I was not born into the Scholar class, Madame. I was born to a peasant mother and father, and I was almost strangled by that mass of vermin you have mentioned. But I was better. I was the cat amongst the rats, and I climbed to a better station. I worked and I studied harder and better than anyone born to the Scholars, and I made myself better.”

“You must be very proud,” the Vicomtesse said disinterestedly.

“You think climbing above your station is not a noble pursuit?” He asked her.

“The Scholars, I admit, are a step above the vermin,” Perrine Labelle said with a predatory smirk. “But only a step. Is it a noble pursuit? My dear boy, the Scholars are very far from noble.”

The Vicomtesse expected his expression to turn sour, but instead, a genuine smile appeared on his lips. “That, Madame, is precisely why I have come to you, why it was so important that I come to you. Because you are exactly correct. The Scholars are not noble, and they never will be. When I was a child, in my mother’s hovel in D’arnaud, the Scholars seemed such a lofty goal. They seemed my salvation. But now that I am here, I see through their illusions. I can stay there, living and working among the cowards, lecturing and grading in an eternal cycle until the day I die. Or, Madame Vicomtesse, I can better my station again.”

“And how do you propose to do that?”

“Again, Madame, you hit on the precise word. I have begun my climb, and I cannot be satisfied until there is no higher left to go. I wish to be noble, Grand Magistrate. And the best way to do so is through a proposal. From you.”

The absurdity of the statement made Perrine Labelle laugh, and only a lifetime of aristocratic discipline stopped her from doing so uproariously. As she laughed, Thomas never lost his smile. “You, Thomas Cerveau, are by a wide margin the most presumptuous man I have ever met! What makes you think that I would ever, in even my wildest delusions, ever concede to marry you?”

“Because of what I can offer in return,” he said flatly. “For one thing, I can secure you the allegiance of the Scholars, thus ensuring that their abilities will not be put to use against you in this…insurrection.”

“Do not misinterpret this question as me in any way considering your offer, but what makes you believe you could convince them in the first place?”

“Simple. I was sent here with one primary purpose, and that is to determine whether or not the Scholars can trust you.”

“I beg your pardon?”

Thomas indicated down to the letter now lying on Perrine Labelle’s desk. “That letter is written in code. Read every fifth word.”

The Grand Magistrate stared a hole through Thomas for a long moment before smoothing out the letter and reading it again. When she looked back up at him, her gray eyes were burning. “What is the meaning of this?”

“The Code of Five is a long-standing Scholarly tradition, and a great secret. If the Scholars knew I had revealed it to you, I would be excommunicated from their ranks. At best. I might well be killed.”

“Trusting sort, are you?” The Grand Magistrate mocked.

“Not at all,” Thomas said. “Just a risk-taker. I know that you could have me killed on a whim, so really, this just gives you one more way to do it. More than that, this is my pledge of loyalty, something that the Scholars only give tepidly. I hope to prove to you that I am not a Scholar, when all is said and done.”

“That remains to be seen,” she said. “But I still want to know what this message means.”

“As you say, the Scholars are cowards, and this war between the Aristocracy and the Peasantry has them frightened. Of the two, they would prefer to side with you, but doing so would make them some powerful enemies, particularly the mages. The Scholars are also exceedingly cautious. They want to know whether you can be trusted to protect them from the new enemies the pledge would make them. I was sent, essentially, to make that determination.”

“Indeed?” Perrine Labelle laughed. “And what have you determined thus far?”

“My dearest Perrine, it could not matter less what I determine.” The Grand Magistrate’s smile fell with Thomas’s use of her given name, but the man continued before she could comment on it. “What truly matters is what I tell the Council. If you agree to my terms, I assure you, I shall give you a glowing recommendation.”

“And if I refuse, you will tell them I am not to be trusted?” She laughed again. “This hardly seems like the genius plan I would expect from a scheming Scholar. Besides, as you have pointed out, I could easily have you arrested, tried, and executed. This entire conversation is tantamount to treason, you know.”

“I have said nothing treasonous,” Thomas countered, “but I grant you that you could easily have me detained, in a cell or in a grave, before I could get any message at all to the Council. Of course, my death or incarceration would be a message in and of itself, would it not?”

“You are clever, Monsieur Cerveau, though I suspect that you are not nearly so clever as you believe yourself to be. For instance, I have only to reveal the contents of our conversation to your Council to explain my actions. Further, when I inform them that you revealed both your code, and the Scholar’s considerations of joining the peasants in their little tantrum, I think they would become quite receptive to whatever terms I chose to offer at that point.”

Thomas nodded. “No doubt they would. But as I said, the Scholar’s pledge is just one of the things I could offer you, should you propose marriage to me. I am a very pleasant conversationalist.” Perrine Labelle stared blankly at him. “I have a marvelous singing voice,” he said. She frowned. “My memory is exceptional, and I can recite all manner of poetry, from…”

“Enough of this,” Perrine said, putting an edge into her voice. “You have wasted more of my time than I care to spare, and you offer me nothing of value.”

“Oh, very well,” Thomas said, sighing. “I have one last offer, which I was saving for the end because it is the one I know you will be most interested in.”

“Your time, Thomas Cerveau, has run out. There is nothing you can offer me to…”

She started to rise from her seat as she was talking, and so Thomas quickly interrupted her. “I can get you Vocal Henri.”

Perrine Labelle froze mid-way between a seated and a standing position. The gaze from her gray eyes could have melted ice, but she slowly eased herself back into her chair. “Now you truly do speak treason,” she said. “If you know where the murderous Vocal Henri is, and are withholding that knowledge, you betray your Baroness, your Queen, and all of Foraine.”

“Not to mention you, my love,” Thomas said with a smirk.

The Grand Magistrate slammed both fists down on her mahogany desk. “Do not toy with me. I will have Vocal Henri with or without you, but Goddess help me, if you try to keep knowledge of him from me, I will wring it out of your neck!”

“Oh, you will have him with me, I assure you. But just as I was not foolish enough to come here without thought of what the Council will do with my death, so was I not foolish enough to come with something you could simply take. I did not say that I knew where Vocal Henri was. I am in a position, however, to find him.”

Perrine Labelle’s eyes had narrowed to slits now. She spoke but a single word, but it seemed to thunder through her large hall. “How?”

“There is no doubt in my mind that you employ spies, and undoubtedly, they are the best that money can buy. Therefore, I have no doubt that you have discovered by now the name of Vocal Henri’s most trusted advisor.”

“You will not so easily trick information out of me, Scholar,” the Vicomtesse warned.

Thomas gave an exaggerated sigh. “Am I to be the only one in this relationship to volunteer information freely? Very well, my dear. Vocal Henri’s most trusted advisor is Aurélie Cerveau, is it not?”

Perrine Labelle merely nodded.

Thomas grinned. “Well, it is no accident that she and I share a surname. Aurélie Cerveau is my sister. And while our relationship is perhaps not as close as most siblings’, I can get close to her. And, given time, I can get her, and likely Henri, to a particular place at a particular time.”

“What place, and what time?”

Thomas’s grin widened. “That, my love, is entirely up to you. You set the trap, and I will provide the bait.”

The Grand Magistrate glared at him. “For all that you present yourself as a Scholar, you truly are a fool. Why would I ever, possibly, believe that you would betray your own sister? Do you think me so foolish that I would be so easily manipulated? You will die, Thomas Cerveau, or whatever your true name is, and I shall relish the experience of your death.”

“You are correct,” Thomas said, still surprisingly calm. “I did incorrectly estimate your intelligence, but I did not underestimate it. Quite to the contrary, it seems that I have greatly overestimated your abilities. For the price of a wedding, you could make yourself the heroine of your age. You could cement an accord with the Scholars, end a rebellion, and stretch the necks of those who have caused you the most trouble, all in one swift stroke. And yet you would give all of that up without even checking on my story.”

This made the Vicomtesse pause. She leaned back in her chair and brought one hand up to her chin as Thomas continued.

“Even peasants have birth records. My mother was Thérèse Cerveau of D’arnaud, and my father was named Marc. They bore three children, Aurélie, me, and a girl named Danielle, who died in infancy. You have access to all of these records, and can easily verify them. My position at the University is equally easy to verify. I would think that before refusing me outright, you would at least check on these facts.”

Carefully, Perrine Labelle considered the man. “Even if you are who you say you are, you are asking me to believe a great deal that is, frankly, unlikely. If the traitor Aurélie is indeed your sister, why would you betray her, knowing what I would do to her if given the opportunity?”

“I have no love for my sister. I have no hatred for her, true, but ultimately, she is just another peasant. She did more than anyone to try to hold me back, to halt my progress up that ladder and into the ranks of the Scholars. And now she plunges Foraine into war, and for what? Because she could not accomplish what I did and better her own station? My sister signed her own death papers when she joined up with Vocal Henri. From that moment, her death became a certainty. I have no desire to draw it out any further.”

“I do not believe you.”

Thomas shrugged. “Does your belief matter? I am asking you to propose to me, to marry me, so that I can become an Aristocrat. At no point do you and I ever need to be in a position where I can harm you. Your guards will always be around, I can be easily searched, and we do not even need to consummate the union if you do not wish to. This is a business proposal. Nothing more.”

“I am shocked,” Perrine Labelle said, with a mocking tone, “that you would so defame the sacred sacrament of marriage.”

“Did you not marry a man from a better family?” Thomas said with a smirk. “From my understanding, it was his family that ingratiated you with the civil offices.”

“Perhaps,” she admitted, “but I was a noble. You are a peasant masquerading as a Scholar, with his sights set even higher.”

“I am a man,” Thomas said, still not losing his infuriating smile, “who has worked himself into a very enviable position, one that I am ready to trade on to people who can benefit from it, if they further benefit me. You do not have to trust me, Perrine Labelle. Trust does not enter into it at all. What I want is very simple. I want to marry you. And then, I want to get my wife and my sister in the same room at the same time, a family reunion of sorts, and see what happens.”

The Grand Magistrate smiled at this thought. Nearly everyone would be surprised at what would happen, she thought, lightly caressing the rope affixed to her sleeve. She did want to get her hands on Aurélie Cerveau, and more importantly Vocal Henri, and Thomas’s offer was almost – almost – worth the risk. And even if he proved treacherous, she had advantages even he could not know of. But still, there was one problem.

“You are a very intelligent man, Thomas Cerveau,” she said, and could almost feel the smugness settle in over him. “But your plan has one major flaw.”

For the first time since Thomas had entered her office, his smile faded. The Grand Magistrate could not contain her own grin at that small satisfaction. “The fact is that I could never lower myself to marrying a commoner, no matter how rich the prize.”

She could see the man’s eyes dart back and forth. She could almost hear his mind working through this new complication. She even fancied that she saw a bead of sweat form at his temple. “Surely, that is a trivial concern when compared…”

”I assure you,” the Vicomtesse interrupted sternly, “that there in nothing trivial about matters of nobility. You test my patience by suggesting otherwise.”

”Madame, the whole of Foraine could be at our fingertips, if only you would…”

”There is no ‘our.’ You presume far beyond your station, Thomas Cerveau. At first it was amusing, if only for the surprise, but you begin to tire me. And that, I fear, would truly be a crime.”

The look in Thomas’s blue eyes was something between bewilderment and panic. Perrine Labelle drank it up.

“But…” Thomas stammered, disbelieving. “You would throw away all of this, the alliance with the Scholars, the rebels served up to you on a silver platter, all for the vanity of your position?”

“My dear boy,” the Vicomtesse cooed, almost like chiding a child. “It is hardly just that, now is it? After all, what would the Baroness say? What would any of the Aristocracy say? Would any of them believe that I, Vicomtesse Perrine Labelle, Grand Magistrate of Fleche, would willingly concede to marrying a common man? It would raise suspicions, surely.”

From the look on his face, it was clear that Thomas had not considered this. The disbelief he wore was priceless. After a few moments of watching the otherwise loquacious man move his mouth in stunned speechlessness, the Vicomtesse pushed herself away from her desk and stood up. Slowly, she moved around the desk and close to Thomas, and with the motions of a patient mother, she put one arm around his shoulder and held his arm gently with the other.

“Now, do not look so devastated, my dear boy. Perhaps we can come up with a solution to this little problem. Now, let me see,” she pretended to consider. “Oh, I have a wonderful idea. Tell me, Thomas, have you ever heard of a woman named Jacquilyn du Broy?” Thomas shook his head. “Well, she is a local noble. Titleless, of course, and frankly, a very foolish romantic. She has confided in me that she hopes to marry for love, if you can believe it. She is a gentle woman, quiet, fond of music and books.”

Thomas’s eyes widened slightly, realizing the Vicomtesse’s meaning. She smiled at him. “Now, let us say that you were sent to me to negotiate the Scholar’s pledge. And perhaps, that negotiation is a longer process than either you or I thought. And so, as a show of my good faith, perhaps I have invited you to stay at my chateau. Nothing about that could be seen as improper, now could it? Especially with so many chaperones around. But perhaps, despite you not being a noble yourself, the hard-hearted and still-grieving Vicomtesse takes a liking to you, in a way that everyone can see.”

Thomas’s eyes shone. “But of course, we could never marry, because I am not noble.”

“No, but perhaps I would want to see a man I liked happy. And so perhaps I introduce him to a friend of mine who may be interested in just that sort of man.”

Thomas smiled. “So all I need to do is be interesting to a woman already predisposed to finding me interesting.”

“And in no time, wedding bells will ring,” Perrine Labelle said.

“And I will be nobility,” Thomas finished.

“Yes,” she agreed, then slipped something into his hand, “and fit to marry a Vicomtesse.” Thomas looked down at his hand. She had slipped a length of rope into it. Perrine Labelle continued. “After the bride has an unfortunate run-in with a peasant assassin on her wedding night, that is.”

Thomas’s eyes widened. “But, I thought…”

“It does not matter what you thought, Thomas,” the Vicomtesse said. “You came here to negotiate for my proposal. This is how you will get it. After all, if you are going to give up your own sister to me, I need some assurance that you can be trusted.” She lifted up his arm, showing him the rope he was holding. It was tied into a noose. “Strangling your wife on your wedding night should just about convince me. Do you not think so?”

“I am shocked,” Perrine Labelle said, with a mocking tone, “that you would so defame the sacred sacrament of marriage.”

“Did you not marry a man from a better family?” Thomas said with a smirk. “From my understanding, it was his family that ingratiated you with the civil offices.”

“Perhaps,” she admitted, “but I was a noble. You are a peasant masquerading as a Scholar, with his sights set even higher.”

“I am a man,” Thomas said, still not losing his infuriating smile, “who has worked himself into a very enviable position, one that I am ready to trade on to people who can benefit from it, if they further benefit me. You do not have to trust me, Perrine Labelle. Trust does not enter into it at all. What I want is very simple. I want to marry you. And then, I want to get my wife and my sister in the same room at the same time, a family reunion of sorts, and see what happens.”

The Grand Magistrate smiled at this thought. Nearly everyone would be surprised at what would happen, she thought, lightly caressing the rope affixed to her sleeve. She did want to get her hands on Aurélie Cerveau, and more importantly Vocal Henri, and Thomas’s offer was almost – almost – worth the risk. And even if he proved treacherous, she had advantages even he could not know of. But still, there was one problem.

“You are a very intelligent man, Thomas Cerveau,” she said, and could almost feel the smugness settle in over him. “But your plan has one major flaw.”

For the first time since Thomas had entered her office, his smile faded. The Grand Magistrate could not contain her own grin at that small satisfaction. “The fact is that I could never lower myself to marrying a commoner, no matter how rich the prize.”

She could see the man’s eyes dart back and forth. She could almost hear his mind working through this new complication. She even fancied that she saw a bead of sweat form at his temple. “Surely, that is a trivial concern when compared…”

”I assure you,” the Vicomtesse interrupted sternly, “that there in nothing trivial about matters of nobility. You test my patience by suggesting otherwise.”

”Madame, the whole of Foraine could be at our fingertips, if only you would…”

”There is no ‘our.’ You presume far beyond your station, Thomas Cerveau. At first it was amusing, if only for the surprise, but you begin to tire me. And that, I fear, would truly be a crime.”

The look in Thomas’s blue eyes was something between bewilderment and panic. Perrine Labelle drank it up.

“But…” Thomas stammered, disbelieving. “You would throw away all of this, the alliance with the Scholars, the rebels served up to you on a silver platter, all for the vanity of your position?”

“My dear boy,” the Vicomtesse cooed, almost like chiding a child. “It is hardly just that, now is it? After all, what would the Baroness say? What would any of the Aristocracy say? Would any of them believe that I, Vicomtesse Perrine Labelle, Grand Magistrate of Fleche, would willingly concede to marrying a common man? It would raise suspicions, surely.”