Prince Dalatriene stood on a parapet, lost in thought. A slight noise alerted him to the approach of a messenger. As he turned, a young page appeared, handing the General a small piece of paper. The paper was indigo and midnight blue and folded into the form of tree. When unfolded, the note was brief and, as usual, unsigned:

Please meet me at 8 PM. I would like to discuss some things with you.

The bottom half of the note contained the picture of a study, which felt cool to the touch.

Dala took the letter and smiled at seeing that for once Mercury had his colors right. He looked at the page and nodded. "Thank you miss. You're dismissed." Once she was gone he started reading. His brow rose slightly with concern. Hopefully his big sister was okay. Father's death had been a hard blow and Mercury had known him longer than any of them save Mother. He stared out over the parapet, considering the peace that had been won with Father's passing and with it, the arrival of two new brothers to the family.

At 8 P.M. he held up the sketch and let the familiar sensation of coolness envelop him. Briefly, he wondered why Mercury hadn't just asked him to use her Trump, but he pushed that aside. "Sister, are you there?"

The study into which Dala stepped was very clearly not in Ebony. Three walls were covered floor-to-ceiling in books, with a variety of naval artifacts, navigational instruments, and ships' flags scattered about. Several comfortable chairs were placed near the fourth wall, which was made entirely of glass, with a pair of French doors leading out to a balcony, which overlooked a massive port city. From a brief glance, the General determined that the books all dealt with naval topics. He also noted that there was a glass and a bottle of his favorite Totoberry wine sitting on a small round table between two of the chairs.

Standing with her back to her brother and facing out toward the harbor was Mercury. Despite her frequent changes in appearance, there always seemed to be something recognizable about Ebony's only Princess. The slight woman gazed out at the small pin-pricks of light coming from the houses and ships that were reflected in the waters of the harbor.

At Dala's entrance, Mercury turned and greeted her brother. "Welcome to Lorian. Sorry about the subterfuge, but I do not always trust our personal Trumps. One never knows who might be listening or watching." She gestured to the closest chair, "sit, have a drink."

Mercury looked drawn. Her hair was long, straight, and a midnight black, and her eyes the green of their father's. She wore Cymneo's colors as well, heeled black boots that came to her knees, black pants, a wide black belt and a green blouse. There appeared to be a couple of dark spots on Mercury's blouse just to the right of the top-most button.

Titania's daughter sat in the second chair and asked her brother rhetorically, "do you know what today is?"

Dala nodded, his face and voice an expression in sadness. "The anniversary of the day that Father died. I laid a wreath at his tomb earlier today but I must have missed you." He looked about at the study, swallowing a lump in his throat.

"But Mercury, why do you think someone would listen in on the Trumps? Even if someone did, the only ones who could do so are family members and Rozel. There is no need to hide from our kin." He smiled at her, hoping to jolly her away from the bleak mood that bringing up Cymneo's death had created.

Mercury chuckled mirthlessly, "No need at all," she replied unconvincingly. She paused to stroke a black cat that had walked over and rubbed its chin against her leg. After a couple of pets, the cat wandered to the windows and looked out, its green eyes tracing the path of a moth.

Mercury looked over at her brother, locking his eyes with hers. There was a fiery determination within the green depths as she asked, "Has it ever occurred to you how strange it is that father's murderer is sleeping with Mom, and in the process laying the groundwork to take over Ebony through inheritance rather than war?" She continued with a snort, "it is like the script from a bad tragedy."

Dala blinked, genuine startlement in his eyes. "No. I mean, I can't say I exactly *approved* of Mother taking up with King Neptune, but I figure it's not my place to determine Mother's love life. Besides, if something should ever happen to Mother then you inherit. I mean, you're the oldest out of all of us." His tone of voice made it clear that this was something he'd taken as given fact. "Besides, even if King Neptune wanted to take over, and even if Grobian and Asterion wanted to help him, they can't stand against all four of the children of Cymneo. Plus I command the armies and you're an expert on the sea. I'm pretty confident in our abilities to defend the realm if your suspicions are true."

He reached into his pocket and withdrew a handkerchief. "But I know you wouldn't have called me here and gone to the effort you did if you weren't convinced you were onto something. You might pull pranks, big sister, but I can see you're serious. Have you tried reaching out to our new brothers? They may not be the danger you think. And if they are, well, wouldn't you want to be close to them so you could keep an eye on them? Oh, you have something on your dress." He held out the handkerchief.

Mercury shook her head slowly, "we are a lot alike, brother. We are both striving for the same things, unified clans and a strong Ebony. And we are going about achieving our goals in much the same way. I have not been around our half-brothers enough to get to know them well, but what I have seen has not inspired confidence that they share our vision. They are more like Vestige then like us." She sighed heavily, thinking about her largely absent brother.

"As to our abilities, Neptune came within inches of defeating Ebony the last time, after he killed father and incapacitated mother. If mother had not recovered, all would have been lost, despite your heroic efforts. Neither of us can control the Ruby of Redemption and without it I am not sure that we would be able to hold them back. While you are, in fact, in charge of the army, I have little control at present over the navy. I expect that I will soon, but it will take me a while to consolidate command and exert any real authority. I fear that we do not have the luxury of waiting for that to occur." Cymneo's daughter drew in a deep breath before continuing.

"I am not even so sure that I would inherit after mother's death." Mercury said, in a way that suggested that the events about which she spoke were rapidly approaching. "Neptune could make a claim to the throne with the support of his children, promising a united Ebony and Y'Nobe. And perhaps my claim and yours would be clouded by evidence that we were responsible for Titania's death. Such evidence would be easy enough to manufacture. It would only need to be sufficient to convince others to support Neptune during the crisis following Titania's death. Once he was in power we could be dispatched with relative ease."

The black cat, having tired of the moth it could not reach, returned to Mercury, who absently scritched its head as she continued. "I am keeping an eye or two on our half brothers, but I think it is their father who presents the most serious danger to the realm."

The Princess looked down at the spots on her blouse and an annoyed, and perhaps embarrassed, expression drew across her face. She took the proferred handkerchief and unbuttoned her top button, revealing a bandage across the top of her left breast, with blood soaked through it. She removed the bandage to reveal a small heraldic griffin, which had been carved into her chest with a fine blade. Cymneo's daughter looked up apologetically and explained, "the scars keep healing, so I need to redraw it every year." She placed the handkerchief over the wound and rebuttoned her top button.

Dala seemed to be thunderstruck. Absently, he asked "Why don't you simply have it tattooed?" He put his head on his hand and his brows came together as he thought. In the evening light he vaguely resembled some brooding statue.

The young woman smiled at the suggestion. "Don't you recall the tattoo I got when I joined the Navy? The anchor and net on my right bicep?" She rolled up her sleeve to show her blemish-free skin.

Dala blinked, and then nodded. "My scars from the Battle disappeared soon after too for some reason."

"Ebony is at peace now and I doubt Mother could ever be near to defeat again. It took hours of using the Ruby and the grief of Father's passing to incapacitate her before, and that opportunity won't come again." He was gathering his thoughts as he spoke. "It seems impossible that someone could get away with lying against us. We're the heroes of the Battle of Y'Nobe and everyone in Ebony has been a witness to how we've grown up and done our best for the Realm. I don't fear for our future, sister, but I will spend some time with our brothers and try to see how they feel about the Realm and their places in it. At any rate, it would take a long time for anything like what you fear to happen. Mother is young and strong, and it would take a mighty force to overcome her. If you'd like, I could start seeing to quietly improving the Realm's defenses just in case something ever does happen. I'd like to hope that the end of the Battle meant the end of the threat to Ebony." He chuckled sadly. "In fact, I'd like to hope that my position of General can one day just be a needless title. But I'll start preparing on my end, okay?"

"Ah Dala, always the optimist," Mercury replied with a chuckle. "There is no peace, there is only a pause. Ebony and Y'Nobe cannot both exist equally. Eventually one of them has to conquer the other before the victor's influence can start to flow out into the surrounding shadows. The five clans, Ebony, and Y'Nobe all need to be subsumed into a single identity. Only then can Ebony create the kind of peace you seek. It is inevitable."

For a while the princess appeared lost in thought, but eventually she continued. "Ebony did not defeat Y'Nobe, Neptune saw the writing on the wall and surrendered without being conquered. He moved to Plan B and now is his opportunity. Very few from Ebony have ever been into Y'Nobe, I certainly have not. What secrets lie below the Shimmering Sea only Neptune's army and the dead know." She allowed her voice to trail off and turned her attention to stroking the cat that had just jumped up into her lap.

Dala smiled. "Well someone in this family has to be the optimist. You and Natania are the realists, Vestige is the pessimist, so Asterion and I get to be the optimists. I do agree with you though, about Ebony and Y'Nobe becoming one entity. I have a few ideas about that and hopefully that union can be a merging rather than a conquest.

Speaking of Shadow, what do you think of it so far?"

Seeing no point in further attempts to convince her brother of the danger, Mercury allowed him to change the subject. "I wish I had more time to explore. I saw a bit of shadow while in the navy, but I simply have not had time to just roam about." She left unsaid her belief that things were too unstable at home for her to feel comfortable leaving Ebony for too long at a time.

A second black cat walked over to Mercury's chair and started to bat at the first cat's tail.