Honorable friendship under a life of intrigue
Vaterian brought Viridiana to the hall, she passed through the crowd of people waiting outside, all of them looked at these two teenagers because of their clothing. One dressed in a full Hellandic custom another dressed like an Alpinian girl just went out for a lunch, either of it was seen as a full disgrace to these Talismania's Noble, but neither could they deny the beauty of the teenagers surpassed them by a lot.
Vaterian finally stopped when he reached the highest points of the theater, he lead Viridiana to a loge. Viridiana looked around her, this is her first time to walk in into a private loge in theater, fences and pillars built with marbles and decorated with bronze and brass, the red curtain and purple carpet made the interior darken a bit, but the light from the candles placed in a cage hanging on the wall compensates the lack of the presence of light.
"Seems like we get here just in time, the Opera was about to start." Vaterian looked at the stage, the musicians were walking in, followed by Wagner. Wagner dressed exactly like in the morning, but just without the coat.
"Was he always so 'Special'?" Viridiana asked Vaterian about it, Veteran didn't reply. She looked at Vaterian, his looking at the stage with full concentration, a smile hanging on Vaterian's face, his eyes shining while looking at the performance from the musician like a child looking at his favorite candy.
"Might just stay silence now," Viridiana spoke silently and smiled. She turned her head and concentrate on the Opera, she quickly being dragged into the story and forget about the time.
___Hours later__
Hours later, this Act of the Opera comes to an end, the waiter came in and snap off all the candles. Viridiana being brought back to reality by it, she looked around her, Vaterian was no longer sitting beside her, only his coat showed he had been here before, the entire hall turned into darkness.
Just as the girl searching for the boy, a strong chord from the stage dragged her attention. It's the music Vaterian played before, despite she didn't see anything through the darkness, but she could imagine the teenager's posture.
"Kling!" Viridiana heard glasses falling on the ground at the loge across her, "Mister Liszt?" she heard a sounding question from there. She looked in that direction and she saw a shade of a man standing and facing toward the stage.
It didn't take long for her to realize that it was Friedrich, the heir of Von Nassau. She kept herself calm and tried to not drag his attention, she listened to the music silently and waited for Valerian to come back.
__minutes later__
Valerian came back with his old clothing, before Viridiana even asked him about his clothing he told her the reasons, "Sitting on the stage, staying concentrated and playing such a difficult piece was a challenge for a musician, even me sweated a lot." Valerian laughed at his incompetence, he never expect playing 15 minutes of music enough to dry him up.
"You might need to be prepared, Friedrich was eager to meet his 'Mister Liszt', he might come in anytime." Viridiana kindly noticed Vaterian over this issue, he held the glasses and rub them with a piece of cloth, didn't worry about the arrival of the heir that would happen soon.
"He would need to ask for Mister Wagner's permission before coming here, Mister Wagner will give us a notice if the heir was coming."
"Wait! Dear legatarius, you are not allowed to get in here." "I am the heir of von Nassau! Know your positions, you non-titled commoner!" Just at the time when Vaterian finished his word, they heard a bunch of people arguing outside their loge.
"Hmmm" Viridiana tried her best to not leak her laughter, Vaterian's face was now filled with awkwardness he never felt so embarrassed by people other than Igor.
Soon, the door was being opened gently, a teenager with bright gold hair and wearing Alpinian style silk clothing walked in slowly and slightly bowed down. He was holding a wig in his hand, obviously, he just took it off and didn't even have the time to place it in another place.
"Such an amazing performance, Teacher. I admire the talent and skill you possess. I hope to have a private talk about …our issue." Friedrich spoke with a shaky voice, his nervousness was shown clearly, he only saw the back of the chair, thus didn't notice it wasn't his teacher sitting on it.
"Hahaha…" Viridiana couldn't hold herself anymore, she laughed out soundly, just barely able to recover seconds later.
"Viridiana, maintain your manners," Valerian spoke in a dim sound. "Teacher, maybe you should let this lady stay away from our conversation. Those words might be heard by your wife, but not your lovers." Friedrich wasn't happy to be insulted by a woman, but he held it because of his teacher. At least what he thought.
"I'm afraid I can't kick her out. Not because of favoritism, but because I didn't want to talk with you!" Viridiana nearly lost herself again after hearing Vaterian scold Friedrich.
"Why Teacher? I tried so hard to save Vaterian, but I didn't hold the power at that time. Now I was 19 enough to influence the politic, I would do anything to save him." Friedrich kneeled toward Vaterian, who had yet to stand up from the chair.
"You sure you would do anything?" "Yes, Mister Liszt. The greed of the von Talismania must be punished." Friedrich lay down his head and swore like the knight in fantasy.
"It might let you feel disappointed, but I can't forgive you." "Why! Teacher?" Shouted Friedrich.
"Because I'm not Mister Liszt, you idiot!" Valerian stood up from the chair and start laughing alongside Viridiana, who already almost passed out from laughter.
Friedrich was stunned for a long time until he recognized who was standing in front of him, "You tiny mushroom(short person)! How dare you prank me?" Friedrich pulled Vaterian toward him and locked him under his elbow while laughing at the same time.
It didn't take a long time for Friedrich to realize something, he quickly asked Vaterian, "Why are you here? Weren't you supposed to be at the academy?" Valerian didn't reply but pointed at Viridiana.
Friedrich gazed through Vaterian, "So you like this kind of lady, no wonder I never heard you had any relationship during school time." "Shut up Friedrich, she was my…employer, she asked me to help with her problem." Vaterian tried to find a good way to explain his relationship with Viridiana.
"Employer? What was her name? I hope her name was not taboo and not allowed to be mentioned. It won't surprise me if she able to 'employed' you." Freidrich brought out his question, a rather easy one.
"Viridiana de Montferrat, nice to meet you, legatarius of Niederwester." Viridiana recovered herself from laughter and introduce herself, but her smile show the effect hasn't fully gone away.
"Don't need to be so polite toward me. Look at this guy, I was 3 years older than him, and yet he dare to prank me." Friedrich turn his head around, he looked at Vaterian waiting for his explanation.
"Stop staring at me, I didn't do that on purpose. If your servant told you a commoner wanted to meet you, you won't even care about it." Veteran explain it as simple as possible, but Friedrich wasn't happy about the answer. "The more important thing was, why are you here? You shouldn't be here even you are 'employed' by someone." Friedrich grinned, he didn't believe Vaterian's explanation.
"How was the 'Secret Hearing' going, Friedrich?" Vaterian didn't reply instead he asked Friedrich a question that didn't sound related to anything. "What, you mean the hearing over the murder? It's…" Friedrich instantly capture the reason why Vaterian came to Talismania, the border of the Kingdom.
"Are you crazy? You know this would let the civil war start all over again!" Friedrich lost his manner, he panicky grab Vaterian on his over and yelled at him. "You say you would do anything to me right?" Vaterian whispered quietly to Friedrich, Friedrich stunned and dropped down to the couch beside him.
He seems like he lost all his strength, he hides his face from others by covering it with his hand, he said his words desperately. "Yes, I promised you. It's different from the last time, last time…you were the justice, so we stayed neutral. This time you were guilty, and my father will join against you, I might convince him to stay neutral but you still need to face against the Talismania and Orange alone, just like the last time."
"Yes, The Orange and others minors under Talismania would face against me…, but not until they found out they been betrayed." Vaterian slowly took the letter out from his cloak, he passed it to the Successor of von Nassau.
"What?" The 'Avant-Garde Prince' finally had once behind others on information, he gently opened the letter and was shocked by the things written on it."
"Is it enough?" Asked Vaterian.
"Yes, it is," replied by the von Nassau.