Chapter 311

The estate that Draudillon found herself entering was indeed fit for royalty, but she didn't fail to notice that there were no carriages or evidence of habitation in any of the estates around it. 'I guess the Bloody Emperor's reputation was based on truth.' How many nobles he'd exterminated to consolidate his iron grip on power was the stuff of legend. However, notably he'd always taken care of the estates the dead left behind. Now those estates would hold the royal parties of those who brought champions to compete over the throne the Bloody Emperor left behind, or those who came to simply watch the events unfold and hobnob with their peers.

'Deals will be struck, ties will be forged… and I'm… going to be pouring wine for the monster abusing my maids… disguising myself so he doesn't use me too…' Draudillon's sense of loathing could not have gone higher than it was, but it could linger. For him, for herself. For her bad luck.

She hefted the luggage that was handed her and scurried after the other servants of the King, the beastial, towering elf stood watching with indifference as his pregnant concubines struggled to bring his things into the estate alongside their cowed and broken husbands doing the same.

Draudillon, at least, bore the lowest expectations of physicality. It was the advantage of his contempt for all others being weak: he had no idea of what anyone could actually do.

So, after she made her way within, she went straight for the parlor after dropping off the things she carried into the kitchen. She had one hope and one hope only. 'Please be like home, please be like home, please be like home…' She prayed with desperation that she would find what she sought.

The parlor wasn't bare. In fact, the furnishings were exactly where their late owners left them. They were even dusted and clean, and though the wall-length bookshelves were empty, the tables, chairs and rugs all sat waiting to be used.

However, for the Queen, there was only one thing her eyes were seeking.

'A fireplace!' She almost fell to her knees and wept. 'It's not much… but it's a chance.'

It was a strange sensation for Ainz, to be riding in a carriage with both Albedo and Calca. 'If the rules of D&D applied to reality, and my personality could never grow from where I was, I'm sure I'd feel perpetually awkward about now.' He thought with almost wry bemusement. Which wasn't to say that there was none.

However, it was made easier precisely because Calca herself saw her arrangement with him as fundamentally transactional, and as a former salaryman, Suzuki Satorou could understand that. Her true love was Kelart. As for himself, 'We just happen to get along quite well, but she'd have acted the same even if she despised me… but it is nice that we understand each other as well as we do.'

Calca's relaxed air in his company was what made it easier, their son nursed quietly when he woke up, and in the meantime she chose to engage in conversation more with Albedo than himself. "Have you picked out a name for your child yet?" She asked of the Allmother, and Albedo's eyes lit up as they always did when the discussion of the child arose.

"Chagama if it's a girl, Goan if it's a boy." She said as the noise of the carriage continued to rattle outside, they could feel the ascent of the carriage as it rose over a low hill, and its descent pulling them back against their seats as they went down again, outside, the noise of hooves carried on as their mounted escorts acted as bodyguards for the royals of five nations.

"Lovely names." Calca said with a little smile spread over her face. "I hope it goes easier for you than it did for me. I'm afraid I can bear no more children. Aurelion's birth nearly killed me, some said it did."

"Is that so?" Albedo asked, her curiosity piqued, "So your hair?"

"It's not a fashion change, no dye, this is just… what happened." Calca said, and Ainz did a double take, jerking his head away from watching the scenery pass by out the window.

"I guess now I know why. I was birthing the child of a god… I did hear that in legends, back when the six were among us, they lost their women and children in childbirth, except for a handful of great warriors or powerful mages. Thankfully I'm one of the most powerful casters in the Holy Kingdom, and I had the help of Kelart and my court magicians to help as well. Otherwise, Aurelion and I might not be here." Calca finished, and Albedo leaned backwards in the seat.

"I suppose that means we can't just have my husband marry the Queens or Princesses of different countries and put all his children on the thrones." Albedo said with a tittering laugh, at which Calca quickly joined in.

"No, no I suppose not. That would become… complicated. Since I have my Kelart I am obviously not one to care, and Kings are generally not much for fidelity, let alone gods, the legend of the bird god made that clear enough." She chortled a little, "What a story that one was, but others wouldn't feel the same."

"The what?" Ainz and Albedo asked at once, leaning forward with sudden interest.

Calca cocked her head, "The legend of the bird god… a silly story told by bards to entertain lewd male nobles. Supposedly in a land far, far to the east that was cut by the Long River, a birdman god appeared who began a cult devoted to pleasure and sex of all kinds."

"And this… birdman, did he have a name?" Ainz asked intensely.

"No… at least not that I've ever heard. Maybe he did when the story was first told, but it was an old story before my Kingdom was born, the bards might know more if you're interested in music history, all I know is that it was passed around by someone on a pilgrimage down the Long River, chasing after his god… there's a story there too, but it's not as lewd." Calca explained and when her son began to snooze, she set him in a small rocker secured to her wide seat and began to rock him back and forth.

"I've never heard of this before… nobody ever sang that song when I was in Hoburns." Ainz pointed out, and Calca shook her head.

"No, you wouldn't have, my husband, it's sung to entertain drunkards in happy times, and the days when you came to my Kingdom, we were lost in darkness. But there are plenty of stories like that, of gods passing down the long river to sail off into the sea and never return." Calca said as she reclined. "I found those interesting as a girl, most young people do, but nobody takes them seriously, they're just old myths."

"I see." Ainz said, and then wearing a bemused face he asked, "Would my wife indulge her husband, and sing a few bars?"

Calca tried to glower at him, but when he blinked his eyes a few times, her glower fell apart and she relaxed.

"I can deny you nothing, however lewd." She chuckled a little at that, and began to recite.

"Birds of a feather they flock together

Birdman with feathers he fucks forever

The arrow he loosed from bow so strong

Hard as his cock and twice as long

He'd hit his targets every day

With countless women he proudly lay

Pale of skin

Full of lustful sin

The birdgod's schlong would always win

Lost from the forty-one

Always hard and never done

Happy to sleep with any-one

Tits for his pillows and lips for his feast

Could no one ever satis-fy that beast

Hungry to sate his wounded soul

He turned to the use of his hungry pole

Hole in a heart that bent at the waist

Eater so hungry, he wanted a taste…"

Calca rolled her eyes, "It gets worse, but I'm afraid I don't remember more."

'If that's not Peroroncino, I will eat my staff.' Ainz thought, but he kept his thoughts to himself on that matter, speaking only with a glance to Albedo.

Albedo felt his eyes on her and answered with her glances, 'I will gather up every bardic story I can find… a clue, at long last a clue!' She realized, and added another tally in her heart's ledger for the unlooked for gift of Calca of the Holy Kingdom.