"No, you come back here. You don't just say that to me!" Fury and indignation in the one calling to me, for once the vessel calling me was easy to drop in. One of those 'I'm done here and it's your job now' agreements.

 "I'm.... sorry? What is it you heard me say?" Rounding on them with what I am certain was a different expression than they-- than he expected. I was faced with a rather entirely naked man when I turned, tensed through his battleworthy frame for but a moment before he leapt backwards with teeth bare and claws latching him to the wooden wall in the way of a clean exit.

 "What the fuck Iridanya?" Glaring at me while I did not register the threat he seemed to think he was posing with a fear posture.

"Iridanya.... must be my name. Okay... so you're..." I rattled the brain, pacing to get my bearings of the feet and the hips and the weight I had to work with. "You're her... boyfriend? Side piece? This is a nobility body and this is..." Studying the architecture with as much a care for him as a spider had for a flea. "A resort room isn't it? Some kind of vacation space. Not what I meant by that comment this morning..."

 "What the fuck is this Iri?" Snarling under his voice now. It appeared I would be on my own figuring out where I was.

"Alright so your name is Fuck? Puck? Cuck?" Arms crossed over notably petite chest. For nobility I was impressed the woman was built for agility and strength as she was. Also a belated realization of being QUITE naked myself.

"You... aren't Iridanya. She'd never say something so crass." This did not seem to calm him at all. But I nodded the affirmation to his assumptions, digging around in the vessel for her magic stores. "Alright, who are you?"

 "What planet is this?"

"Planet?"

 "Planet."

"Thia is Cordi-aeon 5..."

"Cordi.... Alright that's.... So this is... Hmm. I'm not due here yet. What'd you do to piss the Apoc off?" Standing quite still as the body ran Apocalae diagnostics to plug in for Radiance and Ai.

 "The... Apoc? Iridanya is the vessel of... oh." A thud when he dropped rom his position on the wall. Recognition and he was padding off to the other end of the suite, came back with clothes for both myself and him to don. "Whatever, we have to get you back to the castle and the husband."

 "Not going to finish the lover's quarrel with me, then?" Wriggling into the shift dress and her over cloak readily enough before winding strands of silver hair back into a comb twist. "I'm almost disappointed. You seemed very passionate."

"I'm her problem, not yours." Curt and still posturing in power.

"I don't think you'll be seeing her again. I can't leave an Apoc until it finishes the job it's alive to do. Iridanya is gone." Blunt, final and with no particular emotion in voice or face. I experienced no passion for him and had a great many questions what he could have done to incite such an exit from Iridanya.

"What?" Hissed out between his teeth as he took both my shoulders roughly under his hands, forcing eye contact and receiving a deep dive into all the inner functions the vessel was undergoing when he triggered the trance from it's eyes. Many things were different than he knew of the woman as he spiraled unprepared into the telepathic feedback, clinging too tight to my shoulders before he cast me out of his grip to break the state and vomitted on the spot.

"That's about right... So there's a castle you mentioned, and a husband. Iridanya is a Lady? A Queen?" My hands moved through the question, emotive and unphased by his discomfort.

He kept his eyes down when he wiped the bile from his lips. "She's a... Grace. Above the regency, the High Religious Lady of the planet. She communes... communed with things like you. To varying degrees of anyone believing what she could see and know she leads the Church."  He shuddered and stepped around me, going to the door and pulling some sort of communicator down to request us transportation.

 "Oh. That's an awkward position for an Apoc." Consideration.

____________________________________________________________

"Warden Lucas, how strange to see you with my wife in these hallowed floors. I thought you were ordained in a different Caste for your last tasteless incursion upon our marriage." The rolling growl of the rather plain looking man insinuated some dangerous understanding of his place and power over woman, position and person delivering her. It was a moment before he turned his attention to me, and then his eyes darted back to Lucas uncertainly. "This is not Iridanya, what did you do?"

".... That is of little import. I think you need to understand that this is the Apoc you stand in the company of. Iridanya will not.... or can not return until the duty of this is done." Lucas' arms folded and his gaze averted from the much more confident husband, no clear apology under the vagrant frustration over how Iridanya dealt with whatever he had said to get me here.

"The whomst?" Eyes back to me and his posture from lurking serpent to proper Lordship, one arm over his banner and the other hung limp until the fist at his hip. He registered the stance of me, feet bare under the regal dress and hands loose at my hips, chin confidently high and back loose over firmly set hips.

"Oh, my turn to talk now? You're fine to think of letting the High Grace talk last but I'll have to teach you boys better manners than whatever this petty lover's triangle was. Who are you, Castle Keeper?" My tongue sharper and my eyes studying him with similar formality. "I'll need to know your name before I can assign you to preparing quarters for Warden Lucas and more appropriate dress from the tailor for me."

Flabberghasted expressions on both of them that turned to indignation and offense. They stammered and growled over one another in enough commotion it drew out the butler, who I immediately stepped around them to greet.

"Hello, you might be more helpful than.... those two. Grace Iridanya has invoked her rite as Apoc and I am not due to be here yet. I need to be informed of my social obligations in her stead and shown to my stations and quarters." My voice gentle and my eye contact quite less dangerous now, the butler seemed less surprised than the men about meeting me at least.

"I see, she made her decision then." His right hand outstretched to take my right hand and offer a polite kiss of fealty to the knuckle as part of his bow. "Lord High, Ilkyr. It is a pleasure to meet you, and I will show you to all you have asked to attend after I explain the situation to your gentleman companions."

"I think I'll watch you do that. Be so gracious to introduce us all, please?" A grin to my lips and a bounce about how I turned to look at the dumbfounded Lord and Warden. He bowed his head in assent and stepped between the three of us, poised and proficient in socially leveling a space.

"Lord Vaisen Der Thordel, the Second Seat to the Grace of the Church and Lord of this the Castle Reiynheit. He is formally husband to your vessel, Grace Iridanya Feliche of the Celestial Ordinance and Apoc of Cordi-aeon 5. You were brought home by Warden Lucas Deigh, one of the guardians of the Celestial Ordinance Castles, previously assigned as Formal Guardian of Grace." Prattled off and let me know plenty, before he turned a stern paternal stare on the men and introduced me. "Gentlemen, within the Grace Apoc there now resides the Lord High and a Tyrant of the Stars. Here we name him Ilkyr, the War. You will behave, you will take your reassignments gracefully, and you will not give me cause to report misconduct to the Council."

____________________________________________________________

"How many attend in Reiynheit?" Curious tone as I'd climbed up one of the feature pillars in the castle to claw sigils in for a ward base. Not the most unhinged place I’d scurried up to while the butler, Vanderbaun, gave me a grand tour of my base.

"There's a team of forty various skilled maintenance folks that upkeep the kitchens, manage the grounds, maintain the walls, clean the quarters, manage the affairs and guests, handle the stables and Miss Iridanya's various familiars and pets. All hand picked while she was channeling your link to ensure you would have a trusted crew." The butler prattled this off from where he leaned on the wall watching me etch. The man was delightfully unshakable.

"Any offensive folk or do we only employ workhands?" My tone still even and my gaze cast to him in the question while I continued to pressure stone with claw.

"Everyone hired for your eventual arrival was fielded for unique battle capability before our hobby work, even myself. It was a strange day that I applied to attend the place and was asked first if I'd ever killed or fought before." I caught him grinning, the war in his spirit enchanted with the nature of me.

________________________________________________________________

"Hello, how the fuck did she get you in without nuking that stupid hotel?" A woman dressed in loose pants and a braided leather bands over her otherwise naked chest. She had a wildness about her, and on her arms were insulated bite guards... so one of the beast handlers. Someone with the status to be cursing casually with the Grace.

"Not sure if I should say 'intentionally' or 'spitefully' because the Warden was being an ass when I got here and refused to elaborate." Honest answer as I strode up to her, eyes locked together and wild grins pairing with a song of trills and chirps between a dance of interlocked hands and bare feet. There was no physical hesitation between our bodies, a childish tango of flexing muscle and extended limbs making a greeting like we'd known one another from the womb to the marble we now stood.

"You're unlike her, so intuitive and intimate, so much a beast!" Delighted in her tone as she released from our dance, teeth bare in smile and eyes flared with excitement.

"You're unlike any other I've met since I came here yourself!" Equally joyous as knuckles drew lightly down her jaw, readily trusting and deeply connected with her after the impromptu waltzing. The butler was hardly concealing his amusement and approval. "Introduce me to them?"

"Aye, we should take to the pasture next. You're too much for just her, and you need to call in your folk." Half a conversation, she knew I sought to meet the beasts that were gathered for me.

_____________________________________________________________

"The dragon didn't respond to me, or to her. I don't know that you'll have better luck, he just sleeps over there." Tebes, the tamer, was standing with a much more manageable silver pegasus who's blue eyes had assumed a ring of gold on the iris when connecting to me rather than Iridanya. He was stamping his feet and fluttering his wings about the intensity, eager to go on a flight for me and held in place by his muzzle. "We had just brought Amatium here in and the dragon came days later to roost."

"Shh, shh Ama~" Softly as I set my hand to his shoulder, black dapple and stripe markings blooming in his fur and tinting his feathers and mane at the contact. There was a vibrant screaming whinny and Tebes let go of him as I moved in front to grasp his cheeks by the bone, forehead to forehead while he kicked hindlegs and buffeted the pasture with vagrantly darker and stronger wings. Bulk built on him quickly under my influence, a graceful pleasure mount made into a war formal beast before he stopped kicking out his excitement and settled down to heavy breathing. "There we go, there you are. Hello Amatium, my beloved. This vessel suits you I hope?"

The golden eyes of the now apparently feral beast blinked and the head dipped in respect and greeting before he trotted away to adjust to the musculature and weight of meat.

Tebes was much more surprised than I was that the dragon had slithered closer when she took her eyes off the horse.

"Now you don't belong to me, do you darling?" Questioned as I lowered to crouch and the narrow caiman length snout followed, grey and black scales decorated the thing in a rough hide of unsettling symmetries and perfect diamonds.

The four dominant limbs were on the ground as the thing followed me dancing around it, side stepping to let me get a full look while I was listening to it's low throat ques to respond in kind. Wings were absent the beast, but not pricklefur and teeth and frills. A sea dragon by the look of it. Certainly not mine.

"What's your name love? I'm always happy to assume a new friend." Purred my voice rather than Iridanya's... the pasture gave a deep rumble at the impact and Tebes quirked her brow about the need for all of that while I crooned at the dragon.

"Sheebaat." Rattled out in a not-quite-voice from the open maw, showing me the forked tongue and the venom glans as I tilted my head to study his pallid interior. "Sheebaat"

"You are Sheebaat?" Curious as I dared closer, ignoring the hesitant stances that the butler and the beast tamer both assumed. Ready to extract me for being entirely too confident. The dragon replied by letting loose a frustrated howl-wail, thunder cascading in the sky for it before the beast turned unerring silver eyes to me. Gold had begun to streak in it's gaze, accepting me.

"I need your name to seal the connection, beauty. We will know each other as deep." My hand almost touching, grazing the air over his face quills. Patient and fascinated

"Wait - DON'T!" A moment too late the roar from the Castle window came, Lord Vaisen clambering through an open tower window and descending the walls with a flare of alarm in him that incited such athleticism.

Tebes and the butler shifted focus from me to instead intercept the oncoming Lord while my elegant hand touched dragon chin and we both whispered to one another "Pyrifaxius"

Flame in blue and violet for a ten kilometer radius of the place I stood, scales burning off the dragon and form making a grotesque change from snout to tail into human adjacent. Tebes and Vanderbaun took Vaisen with them as they fled the sudden dragonfire, all three presenting various degrees of concern in their expressions as I stood in trance with the beast during his compacting down to a narrow faced humanoid kneeling naked on the scorched earth before me. 

He was massive when my hand left his chin, standing tall over me at just over nine feet off sleek muscle wearing the symmetries of his scales in tattoo. Tebe took longer than she needed to to dash over with one of the saddle blankets from the barn for his hips, unabashedly fascinated that he kept his draconic loins and sported such intricate marking on the rich ochre tones of his skin.

“Apologies, the feral state is quite difficult to shed alone. I am Pyrifaxius, and I am here to offer my service to Ilkyr of War.” His tone still mostly hiss and venom as it came off the fork of his tongue through the dark of his lips. He wrapped the blanket around his hips willingly enough, though I didn’t get much sense he cared about being naked on two feet.

“You’re easily forgiven, beauty. Thank you for waiting on my arrival so patiently. You’ll talk with Vanderbaun about accomdations for your needs, and we’ll rejoin in a while. I need to talk with the Lord.” I did not miss the vengeful expression that crossed the dragon’s face at that statement, but he assented with a nod to walk away with the attending beastmaster and butler.

________________________________________________________

He walked with me out to the edge of the castle where the trees were thick and our conversation wouldn’t be listened to before he started to talk at all.

"We're married. You'd do well to remember that means something in your position as Grace. I won't have--" He placed a rough hand on my arm and emerald energy skittered out from bare feet, the branches of the nearby trees quivering and the roots creaking an answering warning as wood began to free from deep soil. I cast eyes on his hand first, then with my brow raised my gaze to his face.

"I see. This is why she was bedding a better mate. Take your hand off me or lose it." There was a moment of hesitation, but he did as asked. The moment he wasn't touching me the trees ceased their encroaching and I dusted the sleeve of the robes I wore while standing firmly in front of him. "I am not whoever she was. Your abuse of your position is over, you are the second seat to the Grace. You serve me in matrimony, not the other way around. If you want to continue claiming any position at all in court rather than ground and grave.... you will remember you are second at very best. Are we in understanding, Vaisen?"

"You can't change what's been, and you have no more right than she to--" He began to ague, fury compiling in his muscle and frame.

"Pyrifaxius." The summon in my voice and the mass was there at my side, snarling at the man in front of me and awaiting command.

"Are you threatening me? And with a familiar rather than your own power?" Sneering and looming forward, over me. Quickly reminded by a hiss that he was under the threat of the Dragon whether he wanted to ignore it or not. He shrunk back.

"Amatium." And the hooves landed in thunder before the boughs of the trees tangled in a dome over us and Vaisen. Sound would not be leaving between the leaves or the branches and the only light present was emanated from the stripes of radiance on my skin.

"What is this, Iri?" He was backing up now, a recognition that he was out of escape routes and power, and a realization I was not a creature interested in being argued with.

"I didn't marry you, and I am not Iridanya. I am Ilkyr of the fucking stars and I deal with enough human isolation planets where I am not respected for my position, child of the Edens." I was unfurling my spideresque limbs and exposing my fangs as I spoke, moving to him with more blade like spindles than legs. "You seem like you chose death. Make your final words better than a power play."

"Wait, wait, are you insane?" His piss running down his legs while he staggered yet further back and his hands were on the branches. Those which became vine and vice around his wrists, wood demanding access to vein and dragging out a panicked scream when he ripped free of the carnivorous inclination of the trees.

"I'm a war god. So probably." Agreed as I loomed above him, my familiars poised behind me waiting for command or his move out of my reach.

Before he could run roots shot up his feet through his shoes and my foreclaws slashed open not just his chest but his ribs and with them his lungs. He was dead before he could scream, suspended on two of my limbs for a thorough feasting before he could fall to ground. Fascination colored the expressions of the familiars while I stained my face and robes in viscera.

______________________________________________________

I left the scene to my familiars and the trees to tidy up, cleaning the red off myself on my walk to the castle before I strode my way to the library. "Ilkyr, we have guests coming." The butler's voice as I flicked through the family record in the castle library to do with the Der Thordel line. I looked up with a bright smile and my finger pointing at the mother and father recorded. Marta and Falel.

"Them?" Vanderbaun nodded and quirked his brow.

"Them, as in the High Lady Marta Der Thordel and the Warlord of Grace Falel Der Thordel, yes. They've just sent word to us that they'll be here in a few hours." The butler did not seem delighted with my twisted smirk at the news, and he was following my barefoot step with suspicion. He hadn't seen Vaisen in an hour or two already.

"Is there a reason the War house would need to make a sudden visit to the Religion house?" Pressing me for any kind of information as he trailed along behind me into the main hall.

"Tebe, bring the lions in for me." Called out to her where she was half dozing in her breezeway hammock. There was a furrow of her brow, a tilt of her head at my expression and body language. The beast tamer cracked her own mad grin and flung her way to command her charges.

"Vanderbaun, please do me two favors. Do we have a tailor attending?" A shake of his head, and therefore the weave of my Ai into the silk and not-quite cotton on my body, reshaping a battleworthy mail of the fabric and keeping a rank cape on shoulder while hair spun into a bun via thread. "That's fine, this will do. We'll find one and I'll teach them to loom like this. Secondly I'd like you to gather the groundsfolk for me. We'll be taking our guests in the Throne hall. Which way is Lucas?"

"Lucas was... in the western courtyard. He was training, today is a leisure day. No one but myself will be in dress for whatever it is you're planning, not in time for the arrival of the War House." Exhasperated in his tone, thinking of the image of the caste rather than the image of the social move.

"Darling, please -my hand ever lightly on his suit, and a smile reassuring him- I want them dressed as themselves. This is not a place of rank, after all, but of skill and faith. Yes?"

The expression on his face went bone white at the question. He knew exactly why the in-laws were coming after that.

____________________________________________________________

Into the courtyard to find Lucas trying to tease the cloth off me with a blindfold tied around his head and two daggers in his grasp. Sweat from every pore and his breathing easing in tides through his practice. I recollected my thoughts and cleared my throat.

Ears I had not yet noticed as pointed twitched and he swept the tip of a dagger through the ribbon holding his hair up as well as the blind around his eyes, focus sharp on me.

"You're... also divine." Acknowledged with a bow of my head and a gesture of respect from my right arm. "Forgive me for this morning. May I know what was said?"

"I told Iridanya the bruises had to stop. She was... covered in them. The moment before you came into her body she was broken at cheek and arm and leg. Bones. She said 'I have to go back to him'. And then she was you." He grit his teeth and spat on the courtyard ground, averting his eyes from me. "I was shocked at the way everything about her changed. The fear left her body and so did the brokenness."

"I came in somewhat uninformed of those facts. You fielded that well given the change. May I count you as an ally and perhaps ask you to take throne with me?" I watched the words process twice... three times. His face scrunched, slacked... firmed and furrowed... and slacked again into a blank stare of realization.

"You murdered him. That's why he hasn't been seen for hours posturing around the halls and gloating." Dull in his voice.

"There are soon to be consequences for my actions. I'm gathering the present attending to the throne hall, would you like to have a seat in the throne beside his?" Asked without missing a beat or any of my enthusiasm.

"You're insane." Softly after he sheathed his daggers and put his fingers up into his hair, showing those points again and giving into the mad grin I was getting used to seeing in these hallowhalls. "You're going to start a war with the Der Thordels. What have you done with his body?"

"There was nothing left, and they will prove no crime here. But we will mount a war anyway, I seek to cull the weak branch of Grace." An offer of my hand and Iridanya's smile, something in the dark eyes of him going between feral and quite unabashedly possessive. We left the courtyard hand in hand toward the throne room and convened with forty of the most clearly powerful exhibits of personality and figures I could fathom. I spoke my realization as I counted weapons with heads. "She's been preparing to do this for years, hasn't she?"

___________________________________________________________

"Lady Ilkyr, they will arrive soon. Folks, positions." Vanderbaun again, his gloved hands gesturing that the gaggle of seated, leaning and noisy castle attending in their tribal and casual wear split like a sea. His power in the fact they did, cleanly down the middle with twenty on the west hall side and twenty on the east, arranged according to the lands they came from and with their weapons of choice fastened loosely in their holsters.

Faces of various warpaint arrays stared the regal walk from cathedral door to Throne stage, where I lounged in my pants and cape upon the king seat and Lucas propped himself lazily upon my former throne. The butler brought us red wine and a platter of fresh red fruits were laid on the stage between us, cherries, rose petals and all manner of deep red berries strewn crushed across the pale white rug that ran the length of the black slate floor. When they came in, his mother screeched at the very moment she recognized me in his seat.

"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH MY SON?" Howling and falling to her knees in her billowing court skirt, already grieving, already wounded.

Her husband took better stock of the image of the hall, assessing his enemy. Measuring the distance and the gauntlet, holding fast to kneel with his wife and hold her delicate hand where they were. He whispered to her for a moment, squeezing her hand while I luxuriated in a melon that ran blood red juices down my chin to stain my fancy dress. "Does he hit you, Lady Der Thordel? I wonder this because your son was hitting me for the past 14 years. It kept me from lending an heir, from providing for the Holy Grace. I was ruined by your son and I truly hope he learned such from his father, that you might be spared." The speech falling out easily, and the line of my attending who had not been explicitly told what nature of bullshit we were on turning their heads in unison to the throne, already putting grip to weapons.

I stood.

They paused.

Lucas held his breath and I heard the cherry in his hand pop.

I started the level pace of an executioner walking the red stained path.

As I walked the sobbing woman shut up, her eyes going blank and darting to her husband. In the turn of her head I saw the swell of her cheek. And back to me, her body trembling while I paced as patient as death and with all the grace of any god she had ever praised. In me was salvation, I watched fear finally take ice into her husband when I passed the tenth row of my people.

"He has always struck me, Your Grace..." Admitted breathless. She was struck for it, hard enough she went unconscious beside him.

When he tried to turn and run he found the doors closed.

When he tried to gather her for hostage he found the snarl of a full grown lion to stagger him backwards.

I did not change my pace, although my arm lifted and the light in the hall was drawn out, shadow beckoned despite the sun while every thread and mote of illumination came to the call of my hand in the form of a curved longsword.

"I want you to know, this is for me. It has nothing to do with mercy for your wife. A grudge about your son. This is because you have the audacity to pray to me." I had the sword under his chin, and his skin was blistering from the heat. "Name me."