Another piece of fiction awaiting your judgement (an open hommage to FF6)

[sarahtasher]

I absolutely and positively consider Final Fantasy VI as one of the best story ever written or programmed, and this lenghty sequence is an hommage to the masterpiece of the masterpiece, the opera scene.

The full novella/short story is called Mene, Tekel, Upharsim and it's not just set at the opera. The opera is at the core of it. It's a 50 000 signs overall story, give or take, finished in French, but translating it in English boil downs to rewriting it, so I'm doing it in sequences (it's the first quarter tonight)

To summarize heavily, my book project, To Deceive, (which will likely never be published, I'm self conscious), is, to paraphrase Lieutenant Aldo Raine, about how thing and one thing only.

Killing Nazis. (Nazis expies, but very clearly Nazis. Not just because of the uniforms either)

A well-proven and efficient narrative, but maybe lacking in originality. There is therefore a drive to achieve some manner of narrative subtlety between sequences of Nazis-expies getting killed in ever increasing numbers and in ever more ingenious ways.

One key approach of To Deceive is to alternate between quiet set pieces (huis clos in French) and brutal warfare. Classic. Except that the said brutal warfare is usually of minor importance compared to the huis clos that occurs. Mene, Tekel, Upharsim, despite occurring at the opera, will be directly responsible for the deaths of ten of thousands of space Nazis (no, that does not involve burning down the opera house. That would have been awesome, but they use more intellectual approaches)

As a disclaimer, the opera itself is not supposed to be subtle. That's an in universe propaganda work. Suffice to say, it's first hand yet another boring version with people singing of Romeo and Juliette but genre savvy readers will notice that there is something really off with the libretto (hint : Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsim ). The easiest way to sum it up is that this '' The Murder of Gonzago ^2 '', a masterful demonstration of propaganda, that involve two layers : a somewhat surprising opera that masquerade (ZING) as yet another inane retelling of Romeo and Juliet, and a second spectacle organized in the boxes.

If there is something that The Phantom Menace shown, it's that it take pretty spiffy artifices to make things like trade deals look compelling. So it's going to be an hell out of a program out there.

Visual cue !

What the crowd and the POV character are somewhat excepting of the opera. What the male lead especially excepts.


What the male lead will get.

(I had a way better painting, but this painting featured a nipple-it's European art after all, so I'm still checking with the moderation if this okay...)

(The opening and closing verses of the aria are actually slightly changed versions of the original japanese version of Aria di Mezzo Caractere but with an untranslatable pun. The soprano sings both time
Pour toi je ferai tomber les cieux
But in French, I would make the Heaven falls is separate from I will make the Heaven falls by a single ''S'' after FERAI Needless to say, one is a tad more hostile than the other.

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Anssietam, federal capital of the Duchies ...

Why are you so far away?
I can’t wait to see you again,
Waiting is sometimes sad, sometimes bitter,
For you, I would make the Heavens fall...

Walters sighed. His education was limited to a pinch of rhetoric and grammar. This allowed him to describe this opera as heavy, pedantic and melodramatic, even for the genre. Those terms would have been quite applicable for the education itself, moreover. This verse was from an aria, and the object of it was the bishonen in armor at the other end of the stage. Despite a helmet that would have been considered ridiculous in a carnival, it was according to the libretto a valiant knight commanding a vast army invading the country of the soprano (understand, the other half of the scene, the one half occupied by the leading lady). Part of the of the forces of the former besieged the city of the second, a strong place commanding a strategic passage. The soprano, as always, was troubled and sang her torments. A spy of the general, concealed with cunning and artifice, that is to say two meters behind the soprano, listened carefully to what passed as characterization. In what was the only concession to the originality of the representation, the maiden was not a princess, which meant, no doubt, that she was one, but secret.

On one side, the paladin with the virile bearing had made to her apparently flattering proposals, but actually quite outrageous ones. The embassy secretary supposed that a chaste deaf-mute nun (or censorship) might not have understood the scabrous undertones in a succession of dubious puns about the leading lady « opening the doors of her bastion », thusly combining treachery and depravity. On the other side, the fortuitous meeting with the girl and the paladin with the creative armor had taken place under mediocre auspices. After all, she had been seeking the bodies of members of her family on a battlefield under the flag of truce after a victory of the bishonen. Of course, as this was an opera, it had been love at first sight and the start of a forbidden idyll. In short, while the music was excellent and the soloist displaying qualities as much physical as lyrical, the plot was an exercise of platitudes and conventions. Still, at least the verbs tenses could have been spellchecked. It was not, however, by far the worst attack for the ears this evening.

-You're gapping me ! , exclaimed the theoretical superior of Walters, or more precisely the powerful personage that he had to more or less chaperone to avoid this kind of outbursts
-Monseigneur, implored once more the man who had invited them into this box, lower your voice.

The Duke. A man of a glorious lineage, without apparent flaws of characters and whose land only mortgaged three times. The ideal candidate for an unofficial embassy, especially one that could not be paid and that thusly required someone devoted to the good cause. Like the royalist one. Or the loyalist one. Although in Jaerqui, four factions had claimed the first epithet since the…unpleasanteries…and five the second. Therefore, the actual capacities as a diplomat of the Duke have been a secondary concern, especially his capacities for negotiating in the Duchies.

For instance, the mere fact that some mere bourgeois below were booing and whistling loudly the noisy aristocrats was an indication like another about how Jaerqui was different than this nation, and not only because the subjects of this federation actually cared for the musical experience. As Walters had been trying to explain for the previous two weeks middle-class was not seen as an insult in the Duchies and merchant was not a social stigma.

-Why did you brought us here ?, continued the Duke, whose mood was not improved by the jeers of the crowd. I demand a clear answer : yes or…
-If you are absolutely anxious to have an answer, Monseigneur, I think you have been given several, most of them rather clear.

The third and last occupant of the box. A discreet individual, with gray-haired and thinning temples. The perfect image of a clerk in the Duchies as envisioned by Jaerquians. Well, with a hint of sarcasm pointing from time to time below the mask of politeness. The employee of some commercial house, one might suppose. At least he pretended to be courteous, unlike the financiers of that nation (or these nations?) They never hesitated to give an answer, indeed as clear as unwanted. When they deigned to receive the ambassador and his secretary, of course.

For the Duke and for Walters, avoiding by dilatory subterfuges creditors was almost a way of life. That or stifle them like beggars, which had been threatened by the Duke here on a few occasions, a truly constructive approach. But it was the bankers and the usurers (a term quite used by the Duke, which alone shown a rather dismal knowledge of modern finance) who sometimes refused to even see them, to say nothing of advancing them ducats. A troubling innovation. The later term was well chosen to explain the woes of the embassy, since, to quote a financier before a rather brutal expulsion from the premises, loans were not exactly a new thing for Jaerqui. However, the ones in charge of negotiating them presented a kaleidoscope of constantly renewed, allegiances, faces and above all excuses.

It was a way like another to explain that the five previous loans had been negotiated by six different governments, each rejecting the debts of the others. Backers were not jostling for the sixth: their host had at best suggested later contacts in the evening. His proposal to appreciate the opera in the meantime had not the good fortune to please the said ambassadors, although Walters made an effort to follow what passed as action. By Providence, he hated opera.

I swear on my love for you, my liege,
That I will not exhaust the provisions I have with me,
Before your glorious destiny,
By the hand of your handmaiden is accomplished ...

The general had arrived in person to conclude the siege with the whole of his powerful army (a tent and ten extras), as the fall of the city was to assure him renown and influence with his sovereign who commanded invincible armies (twenty extras?). With methods of questionable subtlety, he endeavored to obtain a double surrender, that of the city and that of the soloist. The latter had given herself up, and had been taken to the camp of the said general, to soften him to the fate of her compatriots. She refused, however, to share her table (and presumably another piece of furniture), pretending that she did not want to celebrate while the provisions were exhausted in the city. Exposing as much to the knight as to the spectators that the resistance would soon cease, but this young lady was reaching stygian depths of idiocy.

-The spectacle below seems poorly tuned with the spirit of this social happening,Walters finally said to draw attention from his superior who was throwing himself into another tirade on the insolence of « shopkeepers and grocers ».

According to the pamphlet given to him at the entrance by a very lovely lady, the Duchies were organizing another campaign of « defense bonds ». The terrestrial and naval forces of the Duchies, traditional sources of mockery abroad because of their modesty, were carrying out a massive rearmament. Few foreigners laughed upon seeing the magnitude of this program. Walters, like the Duke, did not understood a word out of ten in the prospectus (inflation-linked long-term bonds?). But the idea remained clear: the at the very least ambitious price of the opera tickets was to combine patriotism and love of the arts, making of this evening the spearhead of a public subscription for a new class of escort corvettes. The Duke's contempt for the « shopkeepers and grocers » could not hide the fact that the public, although clearly more popular than that the Jaerquian one, had answered with clear enthusiasm.

-The spectacle below? There is a spectacle above? asked their host in an innocent voice.

No need for veiled allusions this time. It was enough to merely stare ahead. On the circle segment formed by the boxes, the extremities were illuminated, in opposition to the central section, with a lightning as discreet as its occupants. The one visible from this position, that is. Directly opposite, Walters was able to see, like the audience, the official ambassador of Jaerqui, surrounded by a skewer of high-ranking envoys. Royalists / Loyalists, like everyone else, but part of the government that the faction of Walters and the Duke were denouncing with vehemence. Lofty proclamations affirming loud and clear that this faction was the one and only serving Jarerqui could not conceal that they were in the end vulgar rebels, convoluted protests about defending the crown beyond the man holding it notwithstanding.

-You did it on purpose, the Duke literally scolded.
-Monseigneur, why make such assumptions? We were only trying to avoid unpleasant clashes, hurtful words and, above all, stains that are difficult to remove on the new carpets. That is why we have placed you royalists/loyalists as far as possible from each other.
-I suppose it's pure coincidence if it makes our quarrels so obvious to your compatriots, so they can amuse themselves, hissed Walter.
-I would rather say that those quarrels are instructive, replied the clerk calmly.

Now I will drink and eat willingly, my liege;
As for all the days that passed ;
Ever since I saw you for the first time,
This one is the most exalting ...

Walters did not reflect on the double spectacle because of a thorough critical analysis. He might have been with a figurative silver spoon in the mouth, but the actual silverware had been long ago send to the pawnbroker. He had witnessed countless examples of keeping the appearance sat any cost, like getting further into debt to buy new court vestments, for the sole purpose of going to a reception and look wealthy. Operas and salons, in Jaerqui and other nations, were above anything social events, to see and show, for example to be seen with a new mistress or to have a violent quarrel. To exhibit to the citizens of the Duchies in such a visible manner the poisoned fruits of defeat (disunion, civil war, vassalization ... the recent history of Jaerqui was indeed a condensed of those concepts) could indeed have a powerful educational virtue. But why in this case an opera whose storyline was not exactly pushing for resistance to the invader ? With for instance the soprano falling for the manly features of the valiant knight that was a sworn enemy of her nation ?

-Our misfortunes are not a source of amusement for your nation, snarled the Duke.
-The situation of yours is far from being pleasant for ours, I assure you. And that is why I implore you once again, Monseigneur : discretion, please.

Since their arrival at the opera, their host had enjoined the Jaerquians to keep a calm, dignified and composed attitude. Injunctions that seemed not to have received their compatriots in front. They were somewhat…showcasing. Like the time when Walters' uncle tried to dissipate the rumors about their debts by being casual at the casino (casually dissipating the familial patrimony, that is). The uncle too had a forced voice and a false laugh. This way of slamming the doors, especially the discreet little door between the ambassador's box and the box immediately to his left, plunged in the darkness ...

As their host scrupulously abstained from looking to his left, Walters could see plainly a ray of light filtering below the door. He assumed strongly that, by play of symmetry, the neighboring box was occupied by a powerful personage. An individual whose identity was a mystery only to the two Jaerquians, since, besides the fact that this box was clearly more illuminated than the opposite one, the whole audience looked from time to time in that direction.

The attitude varied from a more or less visible sympathy for the mass of the spectators to the apparent hostility of the Jaerquian ambassador. The secretary of the embassy therefore hoped, logically, that all this was merely the prelude to a meeting with their neighbor. A comedy even more distressing than that which took place a few meters below, but when one was part of an embassy « as devoid of credit rating as accreditation » (or so said a financier with wits) one had to accept such processes. Still, matters were thankfully accelerating (sort off) below. The bishonen had just declaimed his verse on the irresistible power of his sovereign« whose destiny is to command all things by the right of the lance » a phrase which seemed to seduce the soloist in every respect. Walters thought the concept somewhat less pleasant.

Verily, thou, thy lord, and all thy nation live by the lance,
Therefore, it’s by the lance that you shall be justly rewarded,
It’s with your lance that the doors of our capital will swing open before you,
It’s with your lance that you will be greeted by thunderous applause…

It was the kind of circumstances in which Walters' education showed its utility: a sentence such as « this anaphora is wobbly» was difficulty to use frequently. The said education would not have been that dismal if Walters had not been going to the military college. The fact that the training of Jaerquian officers would have been judged inadequate and obsolete by the hapless bishonen below had played a huge part in the current destinies of Jaerqui. That right of the spear, Jaerqui had been completely submitted to it, to point of making good old looting and pillaging looks like teatime. That this was called now « requisitions of food, raw materials, bullion and labor for the payment of war indemnities » just made it more brutal and thorough.

The soprano seemed to find the idea very agreeable, as long as she understood what it meant : she was shockingly naïve. As shown by this to obtain the surrender of the capital (by the authority of this young lady ? The act was fast approaching the troubling revelation of kinship…) for the beautiful eyes of a paladin who was not forthcoming on the promises of clemency for her people.

In any case, as if to illustrate the general's remarks on the glorious destiny of his nation, an immense machine appeared on stage, descended by hoists. It was a particularly elaborate version of an armillary sphere representing the Heavens, animated in the usual graceful ballet which in the opinion of the knight« unquestionably marked the rights of the vanquisher over the vanquished » Another implication that was quite clear as much for the soloist as for the future vanquished. As far as the free visual representation was concerned, it was necessary to demonstrate the richness of the production. In Jaerqui too, one was fond of such machines, which served to conceal the poverty of the scenario with scenic effects. How it was called ? A machine, machina…

Why are you gone so far away from your lands, you and your soldiers ?
Your beloved ones are impatient for your return;
Only bitterness and sadness await them ;
For you, I WILL make the Heavens fall !

Walters was awaiting with such impatience the end of the act that he did not realized until after the fact about how unusual was this paraphrase of the aria. Despite how jaded he was, the Jaerquian still recoiled upon seeing Heavens actually falling on the star (sic) of the opera after a casual finger snap of the leading lady. Figuratively, of course : the plaster spheres standing in for Moon and Blackmoon impacted the scene a good five meters away from the knight. Who, in the context of the opera, had just spent several hours feasting and drinking, and who had conveniently taken off his armor for ending the night with the leading lady. The would-be paladin was nevertheless instantly killed, since he only sung for five quatrains about betrayal and treachery from his quite alleged promised one, who on her replied side venomously (quite an appropriate pun here) « that truly, the stars were crossed against us. »

-Surprising, isn’it ? said their host as their curtain fell. Especially the ending.
-So you knew about the outcome, said Walters. I thought it was a premiere
-As you have not failed to mention it, it is a patriotic evening. If propaganda pure and simple would have been unbecoming, it was still necessary to insure that all works presented tonight corresponded to this noble endeavour.

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If you wonder, the ''middle'' verses are heavily paraphrasing what could be called the...original material....while adding what amounts to four-liners (ZING) and tons of snark.

[sarahtasher]

Second part.


-I suppose, said the Duke, that celestial bodies following every command is not propaganda ?
-Who kept talking about star-ordained destiny ? merely asked the clerk. Who kept droning about the rights destiny gave him? She rightly thought that laughing at prophecies and other idiocies in which some revel would be more effective than long speeches. Plus it was really striking visually.

She…

-Do you mean the soprano or the character she plays in this production?, tried to say Walters while remaining as natural as possible. Or are you trying to introduce a yet unseen individual ?
-Touché, said the clerk, with a hint of irritation. I'm not very good at these things. It is not given for everyone to be skilled in compositional roles.

Walters had a moment of doubt. To remain in the purple prose style, had his terrible secret been laid bare? He had been chosen for this embassy because of certain skills at deception and dissimulation, more precisely to retain an impassive façade, as « the meritorious frankness of Monseigneur the Duke might prove unproductive in this situation ». Those skills allowed him to be suitably evasive when questioned about how he acquired them.

-Now, continued Walters, it might be a good idea to introduce this person to us so we can start negotiations.
-Ah, that's where I might have given a false idea. I represent only myself.

The Duke's reply made someone shout back from below to expel those pampered fools, who had just employed a gross and unbecoming vocabulary. A curious comment for Walters, considering that he had just saw a murder occurring in the context of an upcoming pleasant evening and that at least fifty people had died on scene and off scene in the previous hour.

-As I said, there is quite a spectacle going on up there. Walters said. At the risk of appearing discourteous, you invited us here only for your personal amusement?
-Certainly not for negotiating a loan with you.

This time, the Duke, did more than suggest violence. A discreet gesture from Walters stopped him. Their host did not seem disturbed, disturbed or even less frightened. He was…amusing himself. Oh, certainly, it could be an official deciding to make fun of two aristocrats. But always in this idea of the spectacle, it made him think of an enthusiastic amateur actor, of the kind who were delighted to wear costumes and ham it up to oblivion (the lucky souls who could pick both the role and costume…)

-I'm afraid you were not quite honest with us, said Walters. Who are you?
-Yes. I lied to you ! I fooled you : I’m not a mere junior vice president of accounting in an holding company : I am the chief executive officer of a major portfolio management group ! We have control blocks for three of the five main Duchy banking institutions and have a decisive influence on the following five banks !

An evocative pause, the two Jaerquians not knowing what to say and were unsure of the difference between the faked function and the actual one, or which job was escapism from the other, or what any of this meant. Embarrassing if one considered that the man had pronounced those words with the accent of revelation, of the kind used with the traditional troubling admission of paternity followed by an empathic denial. He looked quite disappointed.
-I suppose if I had said that my second-degree cousin is a marquis, it would have been more intelligible. To use terms that you will be more familiar with, for all matters and purpose my board of directors and our institutional shareholders as well as private investors... (new pause). Very well. I am a banker, or rather the Banker, the only one who can get you funds.
-That’s what give you the right to humiliate, not us, but our nation ? Vulgar ducats ?

The Duke, to paraphrase Walters' cautious verbal instructions, was in a delicate, if not impossible, situation. To keep an appearance of dignity for kingdom in the present circumstances amounted to the squaring of the circle. As much as this kind of outbursts appeared counterproductive, begging for subsidies abroad would not have helped either. Also, as they were giving a show for the ducal crowd, well, they might as well use it. Walters found that this display of «noble patriarch denouncing the loss of the sense of honor » was more touching than convincing: This said, he was ill placed to complain on his superior poor skills at declamation : what would haunt him to the end of his day was that he was too convincing in compositional roles.

-Are you really in position to comment on rather fictional qualities you grant to money you don’t actually have ? replied the Banker.
-On this point, said Walters to refocus the discussion, we have full negotiating power for this affair-
-If only your « government » had any powers to delegate.
-We are therefore able to offer you guarantees, continued the secretary ignoring the interruption.
-I have no doubt that your faction is disposed to offer me guarantees, even if the word offer is rather amusing in the circumstances. Alas, the whole concept of loan implies at some point to be paid back, in species or bullion rather than promises or thanks.
-But you knew our embarrassments before inviting us, said the Duke with good sense. Did you brought us here to test us?

Common sense had flown away in the second part of the sentence. Sometimes Walters wondered how much his superior lived in the past, or rather in the ideal. The valiant knights who underwent secret tests of character on quests to find assorted trinkets and were richly rewarded, it was a tad dated, of several decades. That Damaskia used and abused of specious arguments derived from chivalrous literature to make somewhat more presentable aggressions that were as numerous as characterized was one thing. That some Jaerquians tried to please their Damascan victors by copying with servility the genre back home was another. But for the vast majority of the Jaerquians, noble or commoners, classical operas (this one obviously took major creative liberties with the canons of the genre ...) with gallant paladins and enchantresses was escapism from a life of humiliation, rationing, and penuries. Walters, for all his snarkiness for the genre, understood the feeling. After all, the mere existence of his faction was puerile and absurd from a strictly material point of view.

-If this had been a secret test of character, you would have flunked it, Monseigneur. None of what you told goes in the way of you, your faction and your whole nation even entertaining to actually pay us back a single penny. All this while asking for a new loan.

It was at this moment that Walters realized, at last, the heavy insistence on the word loan.

-You will never loan us a single ducat. Whatever the conditions.
-I would be a very bad manager of the assets of our clients if was basing their returns on any payment from you, yes.

Another sentence which must have had a terrible meaning for the natives of the Duchies, but which strictly meant nothing to the Jaerquians, who nevertheless opined

-But…continued an hopeful Walters.
- ... but it would not be appropriate to completely abandon Jaerqui. Your faction, after all, remains the only one that at least pretend to resist Damaskia. In words at least.
-All this comedy to accept in the end? Ended by saying an incredulous Duke. You did not even heard our proposals.
-You misunderstand our respective positions, Monseigneur. The Duchies are willing to grant you a significant help. That being said, your proposals are only a questionable interest in the circumstances, if not negligible.

An unofficial embassy from a rebel faction constituted indeed a rather questionable partner for negotiations involving the fate of a state: once again, it was not a sudden understanding for Walters, but a truth that had been repeated several times to him over the previous weeks. It was necessary, however, to pretend that their side controlled more than a handful of ruined castles.

-The Crown will be grateful once the situation is restored.
-Are you going to offer us honors or the outsourcing of the excise taxes? Let’s be serious.

Some laughter for below punctuated what was for citizens of the duchies a joke. This curiously timely intervention was a bless for Walters. The locals were laughing even more when they were promised the perception of the salt tax or a title of baron. Offering such compensations combined in interesting ways looking like backward bumpkins and promising what was not yours in the first place : the Crown had made promissory notes for decades of revenues.

-You will lend us, insisted the Duke, anxious to at least pretend that it was not a question of charity, how many ducats under what conditions?
-A single one, actually. It concerns the destination and the use of our funds.
-We will use this gold to pay our troops and acquire weapons, said hastily the duke.
-Yes, yes, yes," the Banker said with some irritation. We will not ask you to keep strict accounting and won’t ask questions about pork-barreling (another sentence that struck Walters as odd-why the Duchies cared about the quality or lack thereof of what passed as the quartermaster services ?) I was talking about less folkloric misuses. To take a doubtful aphorism, it matters little to us that you use our funds for your mistresses: we are more concerned than your masters use them, as for the previous loans. You understand, we are well disposed to be insulted and despised as « grocers » but we are less inclined to subsidize the enemy.

One could obviously be an excellent financier and make bad puns. This was no less true. Protestations indignant of the Duke or not, previous loans, beyond any possible diversions to pay off gambling debts, had mainly served to pay Damakians leonine war indemnities. Occupation costs alone (not to mention requisitions under frivolous pretenses) would doubtless have been sufficient for the maintenance of an army ten times greater than the actual Damaskian forces present in major population centers, but those forces were far enough to composition what passed as the government. Chaos in the provinces did not mattered to Damaskians, as it was Jaerquians that impounded crops or seized goods.

-We will never deal with Damaskia ! replied the Duke with conviction. We will fight until our honor is restored and…
-How many loyalists or royalists have said this before you? (The Banker raised his hand to interrupt a reply in which the embarrassment was high). I do not doubt your good faith (Either he was a indeed a very bad comedian or he was letting it show : he obviously doubted a lot this faith). That why we only need to slightly nudge you the right way. With a simple encouragement.
-An encouragement, replied without thinking Walter , fearing where it was headed.
-The term seems adequate. You have just told me that you will never deal with the invaders. Well, with her, Damaskia will not even have
the presumption to offer you an arrangement. That should please everyone, correct ?

If Walters had yet doubted the concordance between the stage performance and the show in the boxes, this vanished when he realized that the very noisy way the Banker banged the door between the boxes was followed by the curtain rising. Yet their interlocutor faced them before depressing the handle.

-It goes without saying, Messeigneurs, that I would not put you in a delicate situation.
-As if we were not already, said Walters.
-You are free to withdraw from this box and refuse this meeting.
-Your offer will still hold ?
-Is that a real question? You are free to try in other institutions
-I have the impression that trying is the key word.
-I accept this meeting with this unknown person, said the Duke to Walters' surprise.
- « Unknown » said the Banker with a bemused voice. Truly, a patron of the arts whose mere protection is an anathema to Damaskia, that could be many people, is it not ? And as men of the world, you have obviously not seen her arms.
- I do not recognize this blazon, made with a pertinence that we no longer excepted the Duke.

It had taken a good deal of good-will for him and Walters not to see, on the door in question, what constituted for the aristocrats of Jaerqui a mockery of all the rules of heraldry (which was likely the point). Three playing cards. The Jaerquians, who knew the heraldry of all the houses of their nation and that of many foreign nations at their fingertips, had identified them as soon as they arrived. The instructions were to get a loan at any price, but that one was getting close to any.

The box beyond the door was vast, even a princely one. It was more of a cabinet than anything else, a table overloaded with documents being the first thing that was seen. Or that one wanted to see, rather than three high armchairs turned towards the scene.

While the Banker introduced a Duke who was making as good a face as possible to a small crowd of men around the table (captains of industry? And other functions seemingly important in the Duchies) Walters hesitated on how to approach the three ladies seated in the armchairs. If he had any doubts about their identities, the playing cards were very indicative on their gender : three queens. It was the opera which began again that gave him an inspiration. Especially the way the soprano brought the powerful general into the capital of her nation. With a spear. Which was more accurate than by the spear while being imprecise, but Walters supposed that even the bishonen would have suspected something if them damsel in distress had told him your head impaled on a spear.


-I suppose that's the advantage of having such a whimsical helmet : that make the scene more visual.

Two discreet laughters, and the leftmost armchair swiveled, with ease showing that the whole scene had been carefully prepared.

-The helmet did not protected anything important, this is true.

Walters smiled as much as was appropriate in front of the pun and appealed to the sense of etiquette that every Jaerquian of good family was inculcated, bowed and kissed the hand of the one who had just spoken. She was very fond of those marks of respect, as the rumor went.

Lady Teresa, the only one of the three to care for the word lady. That which, to take up a figure of style that was imposed by the evening, would have corresponded in a pastoral to a shepherdess proven to be of noble birth. He was glad it was she who turned, for it was probably the most acceptable of the three for the Duke: the only one who could at least pretend to be anything but a commoner ... or worse. She would have been of Gesthalian origin (or another vassal nation) and hundred stories ran on her account. Bastard of very high rank. Daughter legitimate, but sent hostage in Damaskia. Seduced by some lord. Hypotheses having the merit of allowing all the squires of Gesthal (and elsewhere) to claim that she inherited her talents from them.

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So two minuscules observation : the utter incomprehension by Jaerquians of modern finance terms is to give an indication about how backwater their nation is. For a French reader, this would be more obvious as both Walters and the Duke use expressions and concepts from the Ancient Régime (such as the outsourced excise tax, the Ferme Générale, or the salt taxe,the gabelle)

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If that point was not clear enough, that somewhat surprising opera is essentially Judith and Holofernes (from the eponymous non-canonical Book)

Then said Judith unto him :
As thy soul liveth, my lord, thine handmaid shall not spend those things that I have, before the Lord work by mine hand the things that he hath determined.

I swear on my love for you, my liege,
That I will not exhaust the provisions I have with me,
Before your glorious destiny,
By the hand of your handmaiden is accomplished ...

So Judith said:
I will drink now, my lord, because my life is magnified in me this day more than all the days since I was born

Now I will drink and eat willingly, my liege;
As for all the days that passed ;
Ever since I saw you for the first time,
This one is the most exalting ..

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I would be especially curious to know if the attempts at humor are remotely funny (the Banker being so boring that when given the opportunity to cosplay, which he love, he imagine being an accountant...) Last bump attempt before the next six pages, which will be done by next week .

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As a sort of teaser, this thing try, in a French way, to alternate mild comedy and dark as f... stuff.

For instance, Walters and the female main character (Jaina : I suck immensely at making up names) have both a rather hostile outlook on opera in general, especially leading ladies. Walters and her trade snark about dark and mysterious past explaining this disgust.

Walters, the POV character, it's mildly amusing : at an all male military college, someone had to do the part of the comely ingénues at end of year play, and someone was unfortunately convincing in that role. (No, before you scream, Walters have no issues with his gender : he is immensely embarassed at this)

Jaina, on her side, mention cheerfully that they organized a play at what sems to be some kind of boarding school (to Walters)when she was ten, with only a casual mention of this being a little on the PR side. Jaina wanted to be the lead, but she was (is) on the ugly duckling side and she sing like a hammer : she ended up having a role slightly above a tree. She mentions that this was truly a formative experience and that she only lives to insure that everyone involved in this production is justly rewarded for this (the sentence is carefully coined in French to looks at first hand like genuine thanks, but actually meaning ''kill them all'')

Jaina don't dwelve on this. She does not say anything precise about the play, or the ''boarding school''. The play, which is shown later in the piece, is something really innucuous looking, a children opera with talking animals and the like-while there is some pro-aristocratic bits, but nothing to overt-Jaina dutifully notes that this was the point, of suggestion normalcy.

That play with kids trying to raise money for buying medecine for mom with their street friends that looks like a crude version of the Little Rascals ? It's subverted to be (for the reader, at least) absolute darkness. To continue with the visual cues, Jaina means the equivalent of what is likely the most depressing opera ever made...

[Foosha]

Infracted

Don't post spam

[Zelk]

You're right that your book will never be published, but it's not because you're self-conscious.

[sarahtasher]

Thanks for answer, I'm quite aware that an opera scene (even a relatively clever one) is not exactly what people crave for.

[Darsithis]

This isn't really the purpose of Gen-OT.