The Opulent Quarrel - Round One: Mademoiselle Primfel's

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SpoilerHaha whoops sorry for the holdup this post is only half of what I wanted to cover, the rest up hopefully not in four months' time

Völsung and the Queen found the meeting point for Horsemanship more by accident, more focused were they on the spirit's search for any signs of life. Not bodies of the student variety, no; the Queen insisted there was something growing here, however more vital it managed to be than the fettered, declawed mockeries of nature that were the manicured topiaries.

"Ah!"

The spirit bounded across the courtyard, the stress of her situation forgotten however briefly as she gazed up at the neon-pink willow. Völsung was more cautious, evaluating the space and how its features might serve them in a fight. She was giving the writing at the plinth's base critical look when a sharp voice snapped her to attention:

"Girl! Get down from there this instant!"

The voice came from the rooftops - wait, what-

There was a clatter of hooves, the rare but rewarding scream of a horse that actually knows what it's doing, and Madam Sigrdrífa Ascot and her pearlescent steed plunged from the Academie roof and stuck a perfect landing from three stories up. The horse's hooves glowed with a terrible fire that left the flagstones faintly steaming, and it shone like it stood under a blazing noon sun. The smattering of students who'd occupied the courtyard not moments before had retreated, quicksmart, to a safe distance. Völsung was impressed, until she realised that was her partner attracting attention.

Confound it. The Verdant Queen made her descent, gentle and blithely fearless as any leaf on the willow. The faculty was... scrying? Some phantasm was certainly lingering on their raised wrist, as Madam Ascot looked hawkishly over the display and down at Her Viridience. "Spirit," she said, making a snap decision on how best to not address her as royalty, "attempt to explain yourself." The horse was a striking creature, naturally drawing Verdant's admiration. It snorted at the earth's sovereign, pleased to earn her regard but professional distance keeping its hooves tied. Völsung was just considering stepping in, when the Queen spoke up.

"This place is... unfamiliar. We sought a finer vantage point, and I heard this one. It's a beautiful tree; I'm disappointed there's no dryad to protect it."

"Hmph. A fine course of action in combat, girl, but practical warfare is not in the Academie curriculum. Aesthetic admiration, perhaps." Her disapproval wasn't completely directed at the Queen, or so it seemed to Völsung on the sidelines of this dispute. Perhaps there were folk among the faculty who might be reasoned with. The horse turned its head Völsung's way, and its rider followed after another glance at her wrist.

"Miss Völsung," barked Madam Ascot. "Co-enrollment of vassals is a privilege, not a right, and extended by the Madamoiselle herself to students of high peerage." She here jerked her spear, in a deferential movement to the empty plinth. "If you are to continue to enjoy this privilege, you are expected to take personal responsibility in ensuring your detail comports themselves to the same standards set for yourself. Do I make myself clear, girl?"

The last word stung, a sharp reminder of enemies and too-stupid-to-know-better-opposition, taunting her stature before she tore them down and made them pay. A crowd was pooling at each of the courtyard's entranceways, students just wanting to cross the courtyard to get to class, unwilling to get involved. Völsung mulled no shortage of arguments, to let this haughty mortal know just who she spoke down to. "Absolutely, madam," she said stiffly.

"Seven demerits for disruptive and unladylike behaviour, then." She almost smiled, though it could have just as easily been her horse casting shadows. "I daresay I did worse on my first day here, and my instructors weren't nearly as sympathetic to my stubbornly bucolic habits."

It took Völsung a moment to realise, she was supposed to be grateful. On Verdant's behalf. At an age: "Thank you, madam."

"The pair of you are attending Horsemanship with myself in five minutes, so you will wait here, uneventfully, until the rest of your class assembles. Radicorn here shall retrieve the lot of you shortly and lead you to the stables."

The horse (Radicorn, presumably) took a few steps like clanging church bells, then leapt high enough to clear the pink willow twice over. The courtyard returned to dull normalcy, complete with mundane-overcast lighting change without a celestial horse to set it noon-ablaze.

"Hah. I Chose right skipping calculus for this."

Völsung spun about; one of the students had broken ranks from the nervous lookers-on. An unsettling juxtaposition of organic form and demonic cladding, the summoner recognised it from that Sophisticate's introduction. Alex sized the pair up - the dryad or whoever she was seemed nice, but you had to wonder why she was under the thumb of this little magician.

"I'll cut to the chase. That So-farce-ticate can bite my impervious curse-chassis, I'm not murdering anyone on his orders." Red-glow behind the diamantine screen of her mask. "For both our sakes, I hope you and your friend there feel the same way."

Verdant and Völsung shared a look. The Sophisticate had called this one a bound djinn, and the flame internal attested to that, but she didn't talk much like the fire spirits the Queen knew. They were caprice and wild passion and gleeful abandon; this one was tamed. Focused. Cool. Völsung weighed her words, before finally speaking.

"We have no choice. Satisfying as it would be to bring our kidnapper to justice, distasteful as it is to be complicit in innocent blood spilt, in our case more than two lives are at stake."

Justifying a dozen-odd bodycount for a greater good. Great. Awesome. "Nnnnot exactly the attitude I was hoping for, but you've clearly got your reasons."

"We face an invasion!" Alex would've blinked, she hadn't anticipated the dryad piping up. "Separated from our people and land, against foes that are tireless, mindless, consuming all in their path." There was an intensity to the Queen that struck Alex, effortlessly accidentally charming next to her politico-tongued bossmage. She resolved to find out just what this dryad's deal was as soon as Alex could peel her off Völsung.

"Point taken. We weren't introduced? Alex Alameda."

The spirit accepted an extended hand, the texture not dissimilar to a polished stone left in the sun. "Well met, ifrit Alex. I am the Verdant Queen."

"Wait. If you're royalty, what's she- I mean, uh, do you prefer 'your majesty', or 'your royal highness'-"

"I've no crown but those of the treetops," laughed the Queen. "You may call me Verdant."

"Right, well, Verdant. Völsung-" there Alex settled for a polite nod in the dragúnsídhe's direction- "How about a truce? This school's got loads of powerful students - I think I saw a dorm for 'deities', even-"

"-and the faculty capable of corralling them could be of assistance against the Sophisticate. It crossed my mind, however. Verdant and I do not have weeks to familiarise ourselves with this place, or spend time earning the favour of its residents."

"Pliable god-teachers or none, whatever," the djinn insisted. "That shitwizard said we're all stuck here until somebody dies, so first person to do as he said spends next round trying to convince the rest of us it was for a "greater good". Double down on that if we were making actual headway here."

It smacked of idealism - still, tearing Alex down for the crime of a little blithe goodwill would only foster resentment, which didn't suit the dragúnsídhe's plans. And with some caveats, her terms weren't exactly unreasonable either.

"Protocol of distinction," said Völsung, nodding as she looked to Verdant. "To not take lives unless they actively threaten us first, and to condemn those who fail to uphold the same. No advantage in singling ourselves out among the contestants as the first to heed the command."

Ugh. A dragon that speaks legalese. "Great. No need to go making unnecessary enemies, yeah?" Völsung tried not to smile, but she'd just figured an argument to sway the djinn.

"Indeed. And, if we're in agreement on not squandering our, ah, brief education, we should neutralise contestants too unreasonable to agree on a ceasefire. I'm speaking, of course, about the demon."

Alex frowned. "Iiiiiiii'm taking a total stab in the dark here. The fairy hunter?"

"...the mechanthropoid?" Völsung said, a little wow-how-are-you-not-following for Alex's liking. "The machine man."

"Oooh. Gunserface."

"If it's anything like the demons Verdant and I have fought, it's likely already caused enough mindless damage to be detained by the school. Grant it any intelligence to speak of - enough to understand the Sophisticate - and we face a truly dangerous foe."

"EXCUSE-ME-I-AM. COMING-THROUGH" someone bellowed down a hallway, though to the the trio's in the courtyard it would've sounded more like a thoroughly ignorable public address system, distant and muffled by architecture. What did draw their attention was a flurry of panicked students briskly walking (demerits for running, recall) the hell away from one of the entranceways into the plaza.

Gunzelurge, to her credit, screeched to a halt before almost palm-thrusting the grand oak doors off their hinges.

"GOOD-MORNING. FELLOW STUDENTS OF. HORSEMANSHIP." Gunzelurge greeted. She figured say it loud enough, and she'd greet everyone at once, even the ones who weren't quite in the vicinity yet. Late to the first and most important class of the day or no, they still deserved Gunzelurge's courtesy.

Not like Gunzelurge had too much time for pleasantries, however. She had a horse that needed exercising.