Tales of Osterpunk

In the Service of the Great Black Eagle

“Your Majesty?”

The chamber was silent and dark.  A strong breeze flowed in the window though the skyship had stopped moving.

“Your Majesty?” Luisa said again and louder in the direction of the massive four poster bed at the end of the chamber.

“Wha?!” A female figure sat bolt upright on the bed.  “What? What is it?” She muttered, half-asleep.

“We’ve arrived above Rome, your Majesty.  You asked me to wake you when we arrived at Rome.”

“Yeah, okay… just five more minutes, mom.”

Luisa walked calmly over to the bed, took one last disapproving look at the Imperial hot mess that had rolled over on it and then clapped her hands as loud as she could.  “Damn it, Maria.  I try to be all noble and stand on ceremony and then you make it so difficult that I have to be your big sister again and treat you like a little kid!  We’re at Rome!  Get UP!” The Great Black Eagle’s most senior adviser and simultaneous big sister shouted as the Imperator Maria X jolted awake and scrambled out of bed.

“Ooooh, Gawd, Luisa.  I told you I didn’t sleep well last night,” the Imperator whined.

“Maria, we’ve been over this.  You may have reluctantly assumed the command of the empire at a young age when you’re unwilling, and dare I say, unable to fulfill that responsibility.  You may be a hapless, melancholy teenager…”

“I’ll be twenty next month…” Maria protested.

“TEEN ager,” Luisa stressed the syllable, “...who had to grow up too soon but Pontiff Clara is not.  The Swan does not take her job lightly and hasn’t for several hundred years.” “So, let the crusty old pontiff hold off the Turk herself.” “She can’t and you know it.  The Swan cannot protect Osta alone.”

“Ohhh,” Maria groaned.

“It’s the Swan and the Great Black Eagle to…”

“Together… yeah, yeah, yeah… blah, blah, blah…” The last ‘blah’ was interrupted by a yawn.  Luisa gently smacked the royal shoulder as only her big sister would be allowed to do.  The sound of light and cautious tapping was heard from the chamber door.  Luisa smoothed the front of her uniform and made her way towards the door with an imperious stride.  When she opened it slightly to look out, she had her most aristocratic expression glued to her face.

“What is it, Lieutenant?”

“We’re readying the skiff, my lady.”

“Excellent.” “The Apostolic Palace has acknowledged our arrival and they’ve said they are eagerly waiting the presence of the Great Black Eagle.”

“Wonderful, Lieutenant.  Just wonderful.”

Luisa made as if to shut the door in the lieutenant’s face.  He hurried to ask:

“And how is everything else progressing, your ladyship?”

Luisa’s expression darkened without losing much of its aristocracy.  “Wonderful, Lieutenant.  Just wonderful.” She shut the door.

“God!  That lieutenant doesn’t know when to shut up!” Maria said as she stood sleepily in front of her sister.  “He must’ve tried to wake me up a hundred times before you came.” “Well, luckily you can’t withstand me.”

Maria yawned and stretched.  “Alright…”

“Alright what?”

“Let’s go meet the crusty old pontiff lady… er… swan…”

“Umm, no.”

“No?”

“Not looking like that,” Luisa contradicted her imperial majesty.  “Gerrard?”

A servant with long stylish coat tails and the traditional wig of the contemporary 18th century style entered.  He wore a perpetual haughty sneer.  A dozen other ladies in waiting crowded behind him.  “You called, Lady Luisa?”

“Make me proud and make it look like the fastest Turk skygalleon is standing still.” “With pleasure, Your Ladyship.” Gerrard clapped his hands and the servants set upon the empress faster than a Turkish skygalleon.  The servant with the perpetual sneer said to Luisa as she left the room: “We’ll make the empire proud of this empress.”

“Thank you, Gerrard.  I’m going on ahead to make excuses for her majesty being fashionably late.”  Luisa looked back at her sister who was now being dressed by her attendants and made up into regal majesty.   Gerrard had since opened the curtains in the bedchamber on the skyship so that the light of the Roman sun was streaming in.  “I’ll see you down there, your Majesty.”

“You mean: Maria…”

“No, I mean your Majesty.”

“Fine.”

Luisa started walking again but turned as an afterthought.  “I’m proud of you.  You’re going to do fine.”

“Alright, your Majesty,” Maria said with a sarcasm which spoke much more of hurt and fear than of pride or bitterness.

The Eagle and the Swan

Hans had been up all night.  Not because he had any reason to worry.  No, he had laid everything out for tomorrow’s meeting.  Every detail was perfect, from the agenda and other documents which he had proofread what felt like a hundred thousand times, right down to the place settings on the luncheon table, which he had personally inspected.  Everything was perfection; just the way Special Nuncio Hans von Grauber liked it.  But that was the problem.  He felt better when he could find a mistake and correct it.  All this seeming perfection was most disconcerting.  With the Pontiff and the Imperator meeting so frequently in these troubled times he needed to find a mistake to correct and therefore to be reassured that he was dotting all the I’s and crossing all the T’s.  Maybe Hans was so worried that he was literally worried over nothing.  Whether or not it was over nothing, the night passed, restless, and the day of the meeting was soon upon him.

As the Special Nuncio headed down the early morning streets of Rome on the way to the Apostolic Palace, he ran his fingers over the gold and glass of his best holy water vial.  This was the vial he saved for special occasions, the vial he had received upon his ordination as a present from his now-deceased grandmother.  He touched the small jewels inlaid in the gold one by one and said a prayer upon each, then returning and muttering each prayer over again.  Though even the poorest pauper in Osta possessed a holy water vial, this one was special, not just sentimental, to him.  Powerful blessings had been placed on this water by his beloved grandmother, who had always believed he had something special to offer in the Church, some beautiful story to unfold.  She believed it even when he had lost faith.  Now Hans wondered how proud his grandmother would be if she could see him now: Special Nuncio von Grauber… facilitating every meeting of Her Holiness, Pontiff Clara III as she consults with the Imperator amidst this new looming threat of war in Osterpunk.  But his quiet, prayerful stride was interrupted just around the next street corner.

As he passed into the next square, he noticed a young woman standing in the early morning glow.

“Good morning,” he greeted her.

“Good morning, Father,” she respectfully replied but her gaze was distant, fixed on a third floor balcony on an adjacent building.  Her face was contorted in a frown.

“Is there something the matter, young lady?” Father Hans tried to follow her gaze.  Apart from a large orange cat sitting on the balcony he couldn’t see anything that could provoke such a worried look.

“Well, yes… I don’t mean to bother you though…” Her voice trailed off as the frown disappeared just long enough to give a brief and grateful smile to the priest before she returned to looking up at the balcony.

“There’s no bother.  I assure you.  It’s just you look somewhat vexed and I wonder if I might be able to assist.”

“Oh, how embarrassing!” The dark haired girl said and shook her fist up at the cat.  “Now, look here, Figaro!  You’re interrupting innocent passerbys and one is a priest.”

Hans chuckled and started to put together a plausible explanation.  “Is he stuck?  Is that big orange muffin stuck up there?  Is that all?”

“Yes, Father.  He’s climbed up the trellis in pursuit of pigeons and now he can’t get down.  Once it gets later in the day I can just go up to the owner of that balcony and we’ll let him in through the door.  It’s just that the tenant there is elderly and I don’t want to wake him this early.”

“Don’t you have your holy water?” Hans asked.

“I’ve misplaced it and I’m saving to buy more.”

“Ah, I see,” said the priest and chuckled a little more.  “He doesn’t look very distressed.  Does he?”

“No, the baddun. He thinks this is just a game,” she admitted.  “Well, you’re just going to have to wait there until Mr. Giacomo wakes up and lets you in!” She said in the fluffy ginger red miscreant’s direction.

“Nonsense,” said the priest in a comforting and gentle tone.  “I have my holy water right here.  Just give me a second here.  I promise I’ll be very careful not to drop him.”

“It would serve the baddun right if you did,” she said as if unfeeling but then held her breath as Father Hans gripped his grandmother’s vial and focused his attention on Mr. Figaro.

They say that gentle souls manifest this quality through their holy water’s extension as if their kind and sympathetic feelings can be felt even through the force they generate when using the waters.  Fortunately for Mr. Figaro’s protective owner, Father Hans was a very gentle soul and he had soon used the power of his waters to place the fluffy baddun in the arms of his waiting Mama.

“There you are.  He is heavy for a cat though.  Isn’t he?”

“Thank you so much, Father…?”

“Father Hans von Grauber at your service.  And may I ask your name?”

“Cecilia.” “Cecilia and the infamous baddun who they call Mr. Figaro, eh.  Mr. Figaro would learn better than to chase pigeons if he ever tangoed with bigger birds.”

“That he would.  There aren’t any bigger birds in the city.  If you knew of any, Father Hans, I’d be happy to show them to him, if only to scare him a bit and teach him a lesson.”

“Well, I work for the two biggest birds there are, after a fashion,” he smiled with pride.

“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean,” said Cecilia.

“I work for the Swan herself and today I’m going to be facilitating a meeting between her and the Great Black Eagle.”

Figaro was squirming so much in his rescuer’s grasp that she missed the significance of his words.  Cecilia dropped the mischievous cat and watched him run away without comprehending Hans’ attempt at name-dropping.

“I wonder if he wouldn’t even learn from meeting them,” she said.

Hans realized the metaphor had been lost on Cecilia and felt more than a little silly for his attempt at hubris.

“Well,” he said.  “I’m very glad Mr. Figaro is safe.  I bid you auf wiedersehen.”

“Auf Wiedersehen, Father.  It was nice meeting you.  Ciao!”

Hans waved goodbye to the cat and the girl and continued on his way to the Apostolic Palace.

He saluted the Swiss Guard at the gate and kept muttering his prayers on his waters.  He even muttered slightly faster and louder, to say them for the thousandth time before he made it all the way up to the council chambers.  In the last few steps of his morning commute, before reaching the chambers where his workday would begin, he paused and looked out the gold-encrusted window frame.  He thought of the incident with the cat stuck up in the balcony and looked at the waters in his hand.

“Well, Grandma, your darling grandson has done at least some good today.  With Osta on the brink of war with the Turk again, let’s hope he can do some more good.  At least, let’s hope I can do my part in assisting the two biggest birds there are in protecting what is good in our world.” Here the priest bowed his head in silence.  “Amen.”

I am new to Tumblr but as I am learning how to use it I quickly decided to open a separate blog for my new fantasy fiction project: Tales of Osterpunk.

This project has reawakened some of the fun things I used to do as a kid including drawing maps of fantasy realms and then writing fiction to accompany them.  I will include these maps of Osterpunk and its continents as well.

It is so liberating to write and create without the pressure of wondering what their reception will be.  When I was younger I used to feel pressured to make my writing a career.  Now that I am in my early thirties and have a day job, my writing can be completely free to go wherever it may.