Chapter 6: A Noble's Daughter

Lelouch had a hard time describing the situation in front of him as anything but tense. It was perhaps the most blatant display of absolute dismissal he had ever seen. The sir Barielle had either not been informed well enough, or perhaps been understating the exact level of split that the Astraea family was dealing with.

It might have been a strange coincidence, but one that Lelouch would not question, that a man in servant uniform who was greeted like a lord as he stepped out with a catgirl, turned out to be Reinhard's grandfather Wilhelm.

In between someone who, as he had learned from Rom, was called 'Sword Devil' and the 'Sword Saint', Lelouch felt the hairs on his neck stand up.

It seemed that there was more about the issues in the family than just the support of Crusch Karsten and Felt by two different family members.

"It's rather strange that you arrived so early, grandfather," Reinhard said, a polite smile tugging on his lips. The red-haired knight was, in Lelouch's eyes, sincere. Someone who would need an incredibly compelling reason to truly hate someone. While he was rather dismissive of Elsa Granhirte, and he seemed insulted and surprised that a royal candidate was living in the slums, he gave off the appearance of someone rather hard to anger.

Instead of saying anything, Wilhelm van Astraea kept silent, eating from the large steak prepared in front of him. Lelouch had barely touched his own meal.

"We'll be on our way soon," the catgirl said. Lelouch twitched when she added meows after the sentences at first, but had been able to control himself better by now. It was bizarre, but he wouldn't judge.

Milly would have loved it here.

"Then why are you here?" Reinhard asked of Ferris, the catgirl, instead. She had brown hair and ears, wearing feminine clothes despite a very flat chest.

Seeing that his grandfather wasn't being very responsive, the knight didn't miss a beat to keep the conversation going. Felt and Rom were eating in silence as well, obviously aware of the tension on the table.

Rom and Wilhelm had given each other weird stares earlier when they had first met, but nothing came of it. Lelouch would have to dig harder if he wanted to learn something new.

"Lady Karsten sent us to speak with the royal candidate Felt," Ferris answered. Reinhard nodded at this.

"I see, is it the same offer she gave Lady Hoshin and Lady Barielle?" he asked. Lelouch perked up slightly. It seemed the candidates have been a bit more active than he had first heard.

"Yes," she said, nodding.

"Then I believe there's nothing to do but refuse as they did," Reinhard said, smiling. Ferris grinned at him, looking towards Felt. The girl, still dressed in the clothes from the ghetto, was not very lady-like while eating her meal, but obviously tried to present herself slightly better.

"What offer?" Lelouch asked, cutting into the conversation. He hesitated slightly when Wilhelm's eyes moved towards him, but it was Reinhard who answered when Ferris didn't seem to acknowledge him.

"Lady Karsten offered everyone to step down instead of facing her," Reinhard explained. Lelouch blinked. Was she that confident? Dangerous? Arrogant, perhaps? "She offers the candidates all kinds of things, but I doubt anyone will accept when faced with the possibility of becoming the ruler."

"If she is that confident that she will win," Lelouch said. "Why would she go so far to offer people anything?"

"Because she is just," Reinhard said. "If I had to describe her, I would say she would be the one that worked the hardest, and she values hard work as well."

"So people who would fight her rather than just bow down to her should be more valued, right?"

"Ohhh," Ferris said, a glint in her eyes. Lelouch glanced towards her, and she seemed to actually pay attention to him for once. "Is that your new retainer? He seems smart."

"I'm merely a guest," Lelouch said, smiling. "Reinhard has been gracious enough to allow me to stay here until I can find more permanent housing."

Even with the money he had earned, and Lelouch knew that Reinhard had seen the coins, he would simply wait for a while longer to find a place to stay. The house of one of the nobles seemed to be the perfect place to build connections and dig up information.

And if he had spent enough time, going through all the loops to find everything that he could out, maybe Lelouch could even find a way to return home or possibly create something that would allow him to move in between the worlds.

Even communication wouldn't be bad. At least he could ask how his sister was doing.

And maybe solve the mystery of his corpse. Did he have one? Did it vanish when he appeared here? Shaking his head, Lelouch stared towards Reinhard again, still expecting an answer to his question.

"I didn't consider that," Reinhard said. The way he had said it made Lelouch sigh slightly. If he was just playing a role, then he was the best actor he had ever seen.

And if he was honestly this slow, then Lelouch feared for the kingdom if Felt could do everything she wanted without concern.

"What'd she offer me anyway?" Felt asked. She was sitting between Reinhard and Rom, stabbing at the steak with a fork.

As hard as she tried to eat like less of a slob, her attitude towards Ferris and Wilhelm, which seemed to be actively more hostile than against Reinhard, was accompanied by a perpetual glare that kept her from looking at her food.

Stains of the meat's juices were around her mouth. Reinhard bent over to her, wiping them away with a bit of napkin and dodged a punch from her. She made it look like she didn't like the whole mothering he did, but Lelouch could see that she seemed to dislike the fact that she appreciated it.

"Most simple stuff, homes, money, animals," Ferris counted them up. "It's not really a test of character."

"Isn't it?" Lelouch asked. "Then perhaps Lady Karsten simply likes to pamper her subjects?"

That got a reaction out of Wilhelm. He coughed slightly, as if he had just gotten a piece of meat into the wrong pipe. Ferris giggled.

"No," Ferris answered. "If there's something she won't do, it's pamper."

"I'm confused, then," Lelouch said. He had a lot to learn about the motivations and interests of one Crusch Karsten. What kind of person was she? A princess without concern for the world like Priscilla appeared to be?

No, even if they were so closely related as Tristan had said, people in the same family could be like fire and ice and everything in between. He wouldn't exactly compare Clovis to Cornelia, nor would he compare himself to someone like Odysseus.

Blood does not make a personality. Lelouch had learned that easily, a twisted emperor who took the world's hatred onto himself with the kindest soul on the entire planet as his little sister.

"She expects things in return, of course," Reinhard said. Ferris shrugged. That made more sense. "She needs all the support she can get out of the whole kingdom to justify ending the covenant with the dragon."

"That covenant," Lelouch said. "What does it mean for the kingdom?"

Ferris gave him a curious look. Felt glared at him. Rom just shrugged.

"Err, excuse my friend, he has led a rather sheltered life from what I've heard," Reinhard said. Lelouch's eyebrow twitched. A faux pass on his side. The dragon was mentioned in all the books, but the exact circumstances of the covenant and the implications it brought were not clear. "The dragon protects Lugnica. In case of a war, Lugnica will always be the strongest nation because of the Sword Saint's lineage and the dragon's protection."

The word Sword Saint made Wilhelm react. It was slight. Lelouch knew it, he had seen it many times at court, the slightest hesitation in between the next chew. Eating was always a time where people lowered their defenses, no matter how much they trained to avoid it.

"And what does it get in return?" Lelouch asked. He might have been playing the role of the fool a bit too much, and while getting underestimated could be an advantage, being dismissed didn't sit right with him.

"We protect the dragon in return, and he was the one who chose the five royal candidates."

"So the dragon chose Felt," Lelouch said. The girl glared at him, eating the last pieces of her steak swiftly. "And yet nobody knew where or who she was?"

"I have my suspicions," Reinhard said, smiling. "But you don't like my answer."

"Fate," Lelouch said, frowning. "You assumed she would turn up before the selection."

"The dragon wouldn't have chosen her if she didn't," Reinhard said.

"You have your suspicions on who she is, don't you?" Rom asked. The table turned towards him, and instead of a glare, Felt gave the old man that raised her a look that spoke volumes about her confusion. His question seemed directed at everyone, even Lelouch. There was the point where Lelouch could recoup slightly.

"The royal family's features," Lelouch said. Felt twitched. Nobles must have taken note of it as well. "All you would have to do was ask one of them, she might be a bastar-"

That was the wrong thing to say. Lelouch stared towards Wilhelm's plate, where the fork hard created cracks after being pressed in deeply. Reinhard interjected immediately.

"That's right, you don't know," Reinhard said. Lelouch didn't like the sound of that. There was a lot of things he didn't know, but where did he go wrong? "The Royal family was stricken by a plague and died, all of them. It's the reason for the royal election."

Ah. Another piece of the infinitely large puzzle fell into place. Kadomon had mentioned that the king was old and that a prophecy had demanded five new candidates instead of the royal family.

The nobles must have twisted the truth quite a bit to avoid panic. A whole royal family dying at once? That couldn't be a coincidence. Working with false information was problematic, yet he saw no reason to pull back.

"I apologize," Lelouch said, his eyes downcast. "I believe that information like this is confidential? As you said, I have not been very up to date with events."

"Yes," Wilhelm said, actually addressing him. The old man grimaced. "Not even the leaders of the foreign countries are aware of this. I believe that you should be aware what it would mean for information like this to leak out."

Reinhard laughed nervously at his grandfather's tone, and Lelouch felt dread building itself up inside him. Right now he went from 'clueless foreigner who led a sheltered life' to 'possible spy', in part to blame on Reinhard.

Rom and Felt looked surprised at the information.

"I would give you an oath that I will never reveal this information to anyone," Lelouch said. "I doubt you would so readily believe me, however."

As Wilhelm was about to respond, Felt interrupted them.

"You saying I'm some bastard kid from the castle?" she asked. Her tone betrayed her rather obvious dislike to that information. "Then I'm glad I grew up with old man Rom, dying like that didn't seem like a great way to go, probably choked on some stupid-"

"I would recommend that you do not disrespect the late royal family, Lady Felt," Wilhelm said. His eyes were hard, but his voice soft. Felt met his stare defiantly, crossing her arms. "With a personality like that, perhaps you are more of a Barielle than a Lugnica."

A subtle jab. One that Felt likely didn't recognize as such, considering her disinterest in noble matters outside of the latest possible item to steal. He knew she grabbed a few trinkets and hid them somewhere in her room despite being here for less than three hours. The maids had been quick to complain about the disappearance of all manner of objects since she appeared.

"Fuck you," she said simply. Lelouch could see Ferris' amusement in her eyes, and the way she was not so subtly trying to hold herself back from giggling like a child at the sight of someone speaking like this to the old swordsman didn't do her any favors.

"I apologize, grandfather," Reinhard said, trying to diffuse the situation. "Lady Felt has grown up with a rather biased view towards nobility due to her circumstances."

"Fuck you too!" Felt said, pointing at Reinhard. Her glare was almost adorable, and even Lelouch had a hard time to keep himself from chortling when Reinhard just took the napkin again to wipe away the last few stains from her lips. He ducked under her next swipe, coming rather close to his own already empty plate, and came back up to give her a smile.

"Perhaps growing up among nobility has given the nobles a biased view of both nobles and the commoners as well," Lelouch said diplomatically. Reinhard nodded.

"Perhaps," Wilhelm said. The man stood up, the broken plate still on the table, and left. The moment he did so, Rom followed suit, walking after the man for some reason.

Ferris gave Felt a look that was somehow both approving and disapproving before leaving the table, taking the same door out as Rom and Wilhelm.

The moment all of them were gone, Felt burped, leaning into the chair.

"Shit," she said. "That old man gave me the creeps."

"Grandfather Wilhelm has an… effect on people," Reinhard said. "It's hard to describe."

"He didn't seem to like you very much," Lelouch noted. Reinhard gave him a soft laugh. It sounded resigned.

"Because he doesn't," Reinhard explained. "But that's a matter for my family, I apologize that you had to witness it."

"I understand," Lelouch said. "My father wasn't a very affectionate man, either."

A small gamble on his part. Revealing parts of his past through half-truths and blatant lies could help him go forward.

"You haven't really talked about where you come from," Reinhard said. Lelouch hadn't, obviously. And most information he had given Reinhard was rather carefully selected. Knowing about the king being old, the royal selection and the emblems were all things that he could learn on the street. Reinhard had suspected that Lelouch was some disgraced noble from another country, which made sense enough that Lelouch had simply agreed to the assessment.

"Because it's not really important for the future," Lelouch said. He felt a pang of guilt at that. Of course he still had feelings for the other side, the other world he had built anew. He had people there, but all of them were unavailable, unreachable.

"If you don't want to talk about it-"

"I don't mind too much," Lelouch said quickly. "If I refuse to answer, that should be answer enough. Is there anything in particular you wanted to know?"

Giving Reinhard a puzzle of his own, trying to find out who Lelouch was while the whole picture was impossible without considering different worlds, could make the man more suspicious. Of course, everyone had their own suspicions already, and Lelouch might be able to steer the ideas Reinhard had with the right answers.

"You don't like your father," Reinhard mentioned. Lelouch nodded, and Felt listened in on the conversation. "What about your mother? Siblings?"

"My mother was," Lelouch began, thinking back. Before he erased her and his father. Back when Nunnally could walk. When Marianne pretended to be a mother. Even to this point, Lelouch couldn't say what her real personality was like. For someone who wanted a world without masks, Marianne vi Britannia was a very complex person. "She was a commoner. One of many wives my father took."

"Multiple wives?" Reinhard asked. Lelouch nodded. He didn't know if there was a country that allowed it here, but by the way Reinhard nodded back, and understanding dawned on his face, he had made his own conclusion.

"She didn't hesitate to pick a fight with the others, especially about us," Lelouch continued. Reinhard's smile told him a lot.

"Us, you said," Reinhard commented. "Your siblings?"

"I had many," Lelouch said, grimacing as he thought about them. At least he didn't have to be that careful with information like this, no matter where Reinhard had a chance to look, he wouldn't find anything about him. "If it's all the same, I would prefer not to talk about them."

Thinking about the only siblings he actually loved sent pangs of regret through his chest. All the mistakes he had made. All these things he could start again if he had this ability earlier.

"You sound like a bundle of joy," Felt said. He could see some kind of emotion in her eyes, but he couldn't quite place it. It wasn't the constant dislike and hostility she put up near nobles all the time.

"And you're quite the spitfire for a noble's daughter," Lelouch commented. She grinned at him, teeth showing.

"You wanna say that again?" she asked. Knowing just how much the daggers hurt when stabbed into his legs, Lelouch didn't. He smiled back at her, and she shrugged.

-#-

Lelouch did not have anything to spend the money he had earned on at the moment except for new clothes. So when Reinhard had suggested that they all should go to a tailor, the expensive noble clothing kind, Lelouch had to tag along.

While he also wanted simpler clothes, things that could make him look like a commoner when needed, he had absolutely nothing to wear except the custom made emperor's robes, which were nothing but a reminder of his failures and bitter victories, and the shirt and pants that he had received from Reinhard.

What might have ended up looking like a long and gracious shopping trip was actually a rather amusing stop at the tailor together with Felt, who had been very adamant about not going.

After Reinhard managed to bribe her with money, she went along.

Lelouch had the feeling that Felt would be very quick to step down from the election and let Karsten or Hoshin take the throne if she could make a quick buck without getting into the whole nobility thing. Luckily, Reinhard, as dense as he seemed, had a lot more common sense than she did.

And deep pockets.

"Welcome," a large woman said, turning around as they entered. When she caught sight of Reinhard, she immediately became red in the face. "Sir Reinhard! What a pleasure to see you!"

"Hello, Madame," Reinhard said, giving her a disarming smile. "I am in need of a dress, and an entire wardrobe in the future, for this young lady."

Felt was standing next to him with a large grin on her face, staring at the white coin in her hand with wide eyes.

"Oh my," she said. "A wedding dress? Sir Reinhard, are you to marry?"

"Nothing like that," Reinhard said, laughing. "This young lady is Felt, the fifth royal candidate. I have found her recently and have become her knight."

"Oh," she said. The older woman looked rather sad that it wouldn't be a wedding. "I see, please, look around for a dress that you like and I shall make it fit you."

Felt was still rather occupied and ignored the request by the madame. Instead, Reinhard began to walk through the shop and look at various dresses.

Lelouch approached the woman.

"Excuse me," he said. When the woman looked at him, she went red once again, this time actually aware of his presence next to the famous knight. "I seem to be in need of a few clothes myself. I'm afraid I don't know the actual prices, however."

"The price depends on the material mostly," the woman said. "I can give you five suits including shirts for two sacred gold."

Lelouch blinked. That did seem rather cheap.

"Of course, it's including our special discount," she said, swinging to the left and right. "Beautiful men can buy everything they want cheaper in Madame Loriot's tailorship. Women pay enough already."

Lelouch just shook his head at the blatant statement of discriminating against certain kinds of customers. He would take what he could.

It didn't take long for Felt to come out of her stupor. By that time, Lelouch had ordered some things already, and Reinhard returned with a rather expensive looking yellow dress that did indeed look like it would fit Felt.

"Nu-uh," Felt said, staring at the dress. Reinhard just nodded. "Nope, you're not going to make me wear that."

"One more coin of sacred gold?"

"Three," she said immediately, not denying that she could be bought.

"One, but you can wear what you want outside of important events."

"Deal."

Lelouch sighed as they shook hands.

-#-

By this point, Lelouch had already decided that he would try to amass wealth. He would have asked Rom about the entry costs to the expensive casinos he had mentioned, but the man had took off rather early, and Wilhelm was nowhere to be found as well.

No matter where, money helped. Be it to hire a teacher, or pay for the costs of living, or even have a bunch of mages study his body trying to find whatever cursed geass forced him to avoid speaking about his ability and buy their silence just in case.

It would help him with Felt, and he could buy magical items from the warehouse. All these possibilities would only be open if he could actually play with high stakes.

So when the invitation from Tristan Barielle was delivered to the Astraea mansion, asking him to visit to finally have their rematch, Lelouch couldn't say no. The fact that the invitation came right the next morning after he had won all that money made it reek of desperation. And where desperation was, there was money.

It did, however, make him uneasy. Unfortunately, the Barielle house was house to Priscilla Barielle, a woman that Lelouch had the pleasure of meeting once before, and could not measure up at all during that time. As a royal candidate, one who has been a noble since birth compared to Emilia and Felt, it was likely that she was rather dangerous in her own right.

Walking out of his room after the servant who had delivered the letter to him had excused themselves, Lelouch walked down from the first floor to ask Reinhard how he could reach the Barielle mansion. He had time, of course, the invitation was for this evening, and it would be a while until then.

When he walked in on Ferris giving Felt a massage with blue light all over her hands, Lelouch quickly closed the door. Only the presence of Reinhard made him open it again and look at the scene.

Power was in the room. The warm energy of mana moved around in a slow whirl, gathering near Ferris' hands.

After a few minutes, the light show had ended, and Lelouch felt strangely awake.

"Impressive, isn't it?" Reinhard asked. Lelouch turned to him, walking further into the room.

"Was that healing magic?" he asked. Reinhard nodded.

"'The Blue', they call him," Reinhard said. "The strongest healer in the country."

"So young? A Divine Protection, perhaps?" Lelouch asked. Ferris yawned, moving off Felt.

"She's a-ok, Rein," Ferris said. Lelouch frowned.

"Wait, 'him'?" Lelouch asked, pointing at the catgirl. He had met very feminine looking men in his time in the other world, but he didn't really expect this.

"Ferris is male," Reinhard said, nodding. "You didn't know?"

"WHAT!?" Felt shouted, jumping to her feet. At least she still had her clothes on. "That's something you tell me before you make them do their weird magic on me!"

While Lelouch was surprised, Felt's absolute outrage was the strongest emotion in the room.

"Don't worry about it," Ferris said, smiling widely. "Many people make that mistake."

"That's not the point!" Felt continued, pointing at Ferris' face from up close. She blinked, rolling her shoulder a few times. "Wow, what the fuck?"

She jumped around a bit, sometimes with bursts of speed that she used when she stole things, Making a few kicks towards Reinhard, all of which were blocked or dodged, the turned to Ferris again.

"What did you do?"

"Well, you are well-fed and without disease for someone from the ghettos," Ferris said, standing on her heels. His heels. That would take a while to get used to. "I just fixed the most simple stuff like Reinhard paid me to~"

"Thank you, Ferris," the red-haired knight said. Turning to Lelouch, he gave the black-haired young man a once over. "Do you need a checkup as well?"

Lelouch shook his head. He wasn't sure what Ferris might actually find inside him, and he couldn't really risk that information getting to the Lady Karsten.

"I don't even need to give him the full treatment," Ferris said. "You're training with your gate, aren't you?"

"Yes," Lelouch said. Of course a mage on that level would notice, they had those strange powers which he had to work towards figuring out. "Is something the matter?"

"Do you know the Bokko fruit?" he asked. Lelouch shook his head. "It's a fruit that regenerates the mana in your body quickly. People early in their study often abuse the effects of the fruit and damage their gate."

"It can be damaged?" Lelouch asked. Michel hadn't mentioned that.

"If you drive yourself to the brink of exhaustion and use the fruit repeatedly, your gate would be using much more mana than it can handle at first. You need to slowly open it more and more. Your control is good."

"Is it?" Lelouch asked. "I admit, I haven't really been able to learn a lot. Reinhard said he couldn't help me with his own brand of magic being the only thing he knows."

Felt had escaped the room during her bursts of speed at one point, Lelouch had been too absorbed by the conversation to notice. Reinhard had followed after her.

"It is, it's pretty simple. Don't try too hard, avoid using the fruit more than once every three day, and if possible, don't use it at all and simply rest to recover your strength."

Lelouch thought about it. The fruit was new, but if it was so dangerous, it might not be worth it.

"Of course, that's only for people like you," Ferris teased. "Geniuses like me learned all their tricks in a week and just perfected them."

Lelouch pursed his lips.

"Do you know how I can reach the Barielle mansion? I wanted to ask Reinhard but he seems to be occupied."

Ferris blinked at the sudden question. The cat...boy who had started a sudden conversation on the topic of magic and eating fruit answered without missing a beat.

"Yes, we've been there before leaving towards Hoshin~"

Lelouch smiled. The coins inside his bag made a small noise as he stepped to the side, letting Ferris leave the room. "Wonderful."