The Weight of Legacy

Chapter 139 - The Divorcee Cult

Filling up plates without Abelard was monumentally harder, seeing as Malwine couldn’t exactly send any into her inventory when there were witnesses around. The variations of hams and cheeses had gotten her very interested, even if she couldn’t quite find anything that resembled proper olives. It was still close enough—truly, tapas were a universal experience. Her only complaint would have been that she couldn’t find anything close to txistorra… not that it mattered that much, when she could remember the widow had liked that but just what it had tasted like. Only the faintest memory of its appearance had survived to this next life.

Malwine wanted some for the principle of it, if nothing else.

Still, she wasn’t exactly in the mood to waste time mourning her fractured memories, or how they impaired her ability to pick foods out. Not when there was a man nearby casually explaining details she’d yet to find in any of the books she’d skimmed.

Lambrecht had all but dragged the bride and groom further way, and other guests were keeping their distance now. Whatever the man was, it seemed to garner respect.

If they moved away a second time, Malwine was going to start suspecting they were discussing something they didn’t want an eight-year-old to overhear.

People trying to keep anything away from her only served as further motivation for her to try and overhear it. Even if she hadn’t already been interested in whatever she could learn about Grēdôcava from this, Malwine would have suddenly developed an interest for whatever they were saying purely because of that.

Gliding in their general direction with grace that would have probably raised eyebrows had anyone been paying attention to her, Malwine carried the two plates closer, raising a hand to offer one to Lambrecht.

“I find couples who address the matter from the start tend to last longer,” he said. Almost absentmindedly, he accepted the plate—Abelard’s method truly worked far better than it had any right to—before muttering a without even bothering to look. If he found it odd that the plate came from below, he didn’t let it show. “So you have my respect in that regard.”

“I shan’t pretend I have experience with how marriages between mortals and mages usually go,” Abelard admitted. “Between mortals and cultivators, I suppose, since that’s the preferred term here.”

“Right, Lizanąn. I’ll admit it was a pleasant surprise—then again, you are quite far from home. Only in Lizaną could the divide between those with and without potential ever be called unsurmountable.”

“I have always hated that terminology,” Thekla all but hissed out. Her eyes passed over Malwine briefly—being the best aunt ever, she did not call her out for having snuck back into their group.

Lambrecht raised an eyebrow between eating mouthfuls from a block of cheese. “How so?”

Before Thekla could respond, Malwine took a moment to nibble on the corresponding block on her own plate, curious as to why he seemed quite close to prioritizing the snack over their conversation—she couldn’t blame him, it was certainly a sound choice.

, Malwine chided herself. She’d been paranoid about trying out more solids for far too long, and with how lost and confused the adults in her life had been in their own right, they hadn’t complained. On the bright side, that also meant no one batted an eye when she made the leap from soups to fuller meals.

“To call those who simply didn’t luck out at birth ‘without potential’ is offensive,” Thekla raised a hand. “And before you say, , I will warn you I have a reputation.”

Lambrecht simply bit down on another piece of cheese. “I assure you I would not say that, nor anything along those lines.”

“Good,” her aunt said, her eyes narrowing only briefly. “Abelard has an Affinity, while I do not, and which one of us can change the appearance of any room within minutes, with naught but the wave of a hand?” Thekla wiggled her eyebrows. “. The idea that mortals have no potential is laughable.”

“It’s a nuanced topic,” Abelard mumbled.

“Are you fond of those tiles I put up in your office, dear? Because they might not be there forever.”

Clearing his throat, Lambrecht shifted to meet Thekla’s gaze. “I have always been under the impression that the term comes from something not unlike the beliefs that are so prevalent in Lizaną, which I don’t doubt you are familiar with—”

Malwine struggled not to grumble at how he casually glossed over that after bringing it up, considering how wasn’t familiar with whatever he was referring to.

“—and likely rooted in something much older. With our lifespans, it can be easy to forget the cyclical nature of humankind. Devils, even among us with po— us , it’s not unseen. We make laws, learn of the flaws in them and remove them, then make the same laws millennia later. Society’s memory is very short.”

“It being old does not make it any less inane,” Thekla nonetheless seemed to be mulling over that, looking a bit unsure—it reminded Malwine of when she couldn’t decide whether to be annoyed by something or not.

“I bring it up because you will find those who use that terminology everywhere, not just in Grēdôcava or Lizaną. Probably even beyond the waves. Yet never will you find someone who can tell you the terms are so prevalent. Is it part of our nature, to develop such categories independently, in each nation? The Devils’ Empire cannot be at the root of this—not when their very power stemmed from many who had once been mortals before they became Executors. So, perhaps, it might be something older still… or coincidence.”

And with that, the man bit into a slice of ham. If he meant to leave them mulling over that while he ate in peace, he hadn’t entirely succeeded, no matter how lost in thought Abelard seemed. Even Malwine found herself wondering if she should dedicate more than five seconds to pondering the potentially cyclical nature of society.

Thekla just shook her head. “I have always believed it’s just in the nature of those who are special—or —to just be drawn to some inevitable pitfall. And some pitfalls must be as natural as humanity’s ability to stumble upon them. Anyhow,” she took a moment to smile, and something about the glint in her eye was concerning, “I wonder, Lambrecht. How did you meet Old Hildegard?”

“Her?” Lambrecht’s annoyance at being interrupted showed for a split second before his affable mask reasserted itself. “We met through a mutual acquaintance of ours some years back,—I will give credit to the crone, for she deserves it. I was quite pleasantly surprised to see she wasn’t as bothersome as most natives to this country are, no personal offense meant. She was understanding of our ways, and while I did not see her for years, it thrilled me to see she not only remembered our organization, but sought to call upon us.”

She had a feeling he wasn’t even intentionally being unhelpful, in the sense that whatever interaction they’d had in the ambiguous past probably wasn’t some kind of secret, but the man generally struck her as currently still too annoyed to volunteer more details if not prodded for them.

Malwine couldn’t help but wonder if [The Way of the Clave] was helping her out or if the sanctity of snacktime was just a universally understandable concept.

Then again, there was also the fact that he’d left the bait hanging right there. Thekla probably noticed that too—it wasn’t easy to miss when someone blatantly mentioned something that could turn into a convenient topic change—and presumably chose to just roll with it.

“When I first heard of you lot, I confess I was startled—not by your organization’s existence, but by the implication that these kinds of matters have been a problem enough times for… well, for your work to be necessary.”

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Only the knowledge that she might get kicked right out of the conversation if she reminded anyone she was there kept Malwine from intersecting, because she was still missing too much context. She could only hope they’d double back on whatever Lambrecht’s purpose for being here was—and —because all these vague allusions were truly testing her patience.

“They’ve been a problem far more times than what even we know of—likely, since the dawn of time, or for as long as humanity has understood what it means to amass power,” Lambrecht shook his head. “Our oldest members theorize that once lifespans started growing past any variance ancient societies were used to dealing with, a conundrum arose—they could not easily let go of the marital customs and familial alliances they often tied themselves with, yet those grew less and less binding. How much of a difference can a marriage between two individuals make, not across decades but across centuries? Not to mention, lifelong commitments are much heavier a burden when ‘lifelong’ goes from fifty-odd years to .”

In any case, she tentatively approved.

“My parents are of the sort to cling to the idea of… eternal arrangements,” Abelard shook his head in palpable disappointment, and Malwine couldn’t help but stare—especially after Thekla started patting him on the back. “I know, from all I have Sought, that they were at odds long before my own birth. Odds are, they still agree on absolutely nothing.”

“It’s why we picked fifty years, honestly. I find it amusing that such is the range you chose to make an example out of,” Thekla snorted. “I will not pretend my family situation is much better, though my mother did die quite young. Who knows what those two would be up to, if they were still together.”

“From what you’ve told me, nothing good.”

“Yet the mind wanders,” her aunt wiggled her eyebrows. “I mean no offense towards our dearest lady of the house but… you know what, I wish someone had called you people when my father remarried.”

Malwine’s brief shock at learning her aunt and uncle-to-be were apparently not meaning to be married was swiftly overshadowed by an urge to cackle. Thekla was absolutely right—neither Bernadette nor Kristian seemed like the type who could endure this kind of conversation without getting into an argument with someone.

“Right, the patriarch and matriarch of your House. Mortal marriages are to be celebrated,” Lambrecht said carefully, giving his surroundings a glance. Presumably, he deemed the situation safe, as caution fled his tone immediately. “For ages now, we have lived in a world where people can theoretically live forever—and one cannot expect to stick to an agreement forever. Even mortals may yet live for longer than what they could back when most customs were established, and any who cling to that idiocy are naught but fools. Time changes people, and who they choose to spend their time with can change too, especially after centuries.”

“You hear that,” Thekla teased, tugging at Abelard’s hair not unlike how a certain peculiar guest had earlier, “I’ll have better things to spend my time on a hundred years for now.”

“Indeed—such as the grave.”

Malwine choked.

“Wave take you, I’ll outlive even your parents,” her aunt maturely stuck her tongue out at her future husband.

“The last I saw of them, they were both closing in on the peak of Tree Veins,” Abelard suddenly did not seem to find the topic as amusing as she clearly did.

“Yeah, and?”

“Their lifespans—”

“Lifespans matter little when old age isn’t the only thing people have to worry about—you know that.”

The thought alone was enough for Malwine to call up her favorite panel and quickly scribble an additional entry on it.

MAIN THINGS TO FIGURE OUT:

— Why was Beryl cursed?

— How can I make Flōsblome the Elflorescent regret Existing and/or possibly handle the aforementioned ?

— How did I become me if Beryl’s kid was supposed to be dead?

— When was I born and how did stasis affect the timeline for me?

—

— Who does {Ore} come from?

— What’s up with Katrina’s parentage?

— Was OBeryl in a cult?

— What the hell do you mean, ?

— Seriously, what this area called?

— What's up with the supposedly inanimate Devils being credited for actions in the past?

— What happened with the Tacit Saint and should I be looking into what the Saint equivalent of deicide is?

— Where’s Widuzhain and what’s the fastest way to raid their archives? Orphanage and local.

— What the hell is going on with Anselm and ominous golden text?

— How do I bribe an elf into removing my curse?

— What's the Lange family history and how can I write it down before Thekla ends that bloodline?

The teasing continued as she considered that further. Before today, Malwine wouldn’t have considered it, but after that stunt with the window? Apparently, Kristian had fought people much stronger than himself. Katrina had killed elves who were a stage above her.

Was it bad that she could actually imagine her aunt somehow managing to get the drop on Abelard’s parents, whoever and wherever they were?

She spent long enough fantasizing about how a mortal with an apparent thing for tiles could ever beat people around Veit’s power level that she initially didn’t notice how Thekla had started grinning and pointing—no amount of Perception could ever make up for the fact that sometimes, she just didn’t pay attention to everything.

“You’re late,” Thekla pouted, the gesture’s falsehood quite transparent.

Alaric scoffed as he caught up, flanked by another boy. “You can’t say I’m late when you haven’t even started the wedding.”

“They did specifically request I wait until all family members were here,” Lambrecht noted, pulling a book out of thin air and flipping the pages as if he were ready to start the ceremony then and there. “I take it all have arrived by now?”

“Aside from the missing ones,” the boy next to Alaric muttered. “Which we were out searching for, of course.”

“No luck?” Thekla’s expression momentarily darkened, and the boy shook his head. It was somewhat surprising to see Thekla accept the answer without looking to Alaric for confirmation. “Theo, I take it.”

Lambrecht started ringing a bell he similarly materialized on thin air—how he managed to keep making the act look strange enough for Malwine to forget they were probably from his inventory was beyond her. She couldn’t quite wrap her finger around how he kept making it look so intrinsically . “Esteemed guests, please take your seats! The ceremony will soon begin.”

A handful of guests appeared clearly displeased as the man who had shamelessly spent minutes eating next to the bride and groom all but ordered them to stop filling their plates—not that it kept them from doing as he said. Kristian emerged from who knew where, Bernadette in arm, and their presence alone seemed to be enough for no one to throw a fit.

“Indeed,” the boy—Theo—confirmed as he shook Thekla’s hand. His eyes wandered to the retreating crowd, and he broke into a smile. “Thank you for extending this invitation to me—when Alaric told me his dearest sister was to be wed, I knew I would not forgive myself if I failed to attend.”

“How could I not? Poor baby Alaric has never had any friends, I wouldn’t have it in my heart to exclude the one he finally got.”

The teenager in question appeared mortified. “Thekla!”

“Ha, my own predicament is not too dissimilar, so I can relate,” Theo rubbed the back of his neck. “I am certainly glad to call him a friend.”

Thekla’s smile widened—Abelard’s mouth had started to move by the time Adelheid appeared in front of them.

“Yay!” the little girl cheered. “You finally stopped hiding your friend in your room! Now I can stop pretending I don’t know him!”

Alaric had a look like he would fall over if touched by the lightest breeze, while Theo seemed unsure whether to laugh or cry. The bride and groom froze.

The minimal effort Malwine put into noticing and trying to parse their reactions paid off.

Your [The Way of the Clave] Skill has improved! 26 → 27

Adelheid had outdone herself, and the best part was that the chaos about to erupt was unlikely to have been an intentional goal of hers—Malwine was so proud of her little sister.

“Pardon?”

Kristian’s voice cut through the silence, low and even in a way that was very much unbecoming of him. It was much more concerning than it probably would have been had he shouted.

Apparently, someone be throwing a fit, after all.