I had opted for a suit of soft leather in various shades of gray. It wasn't quite a body glove, but it seemed a good combination between the stylish and the practical. Each exposed edge was impressed with various verses of the prayer of Saint Euphratii in gold stitching. It was a common patron among academics, the woman who had documented the Crusade, the greatest expansion of human knowledge in history. The ensemble was finished off with a large floppy hat of woven fabric and a pair of jet black boots with heels that would have been a little impractical at a dig site. The jewelry Hadrian had prepared was secure. After a brief discussion we had decided that I should carry a compact snub. It was an elegant weapon, long and thin with a single powerpack that would exhaust after a half dozen shots, the kind of weapon a noblewoman might carry for personal defense. Given the unpleasantness at the ball, it seemed unlikely anyone would think twice about me taking precautions.

The flyer roared up into the mountains, the air growing cooler and the manicured agri-farms below giving way to wild forests of twisted pines. We headed up a long valley between spur like ranges with glistening caps of white snow. The Ignatius family owned vast swaths of land in the Seaward mountains, their ancestral seat high in the mountains surrounded by hundreds of miles of wilderness that formed a private hunting reserve. As we approached the top of the valley the forest thinned into manicured orchards of cherry and ploin trees. A great house stood at the peak where the two ranges met, four wings in a neo-gothic style around a central spire. The intersities of the cross were filled with complicated looking gardens of hedges and rock gardens. We called ahead on the vox and saw a guard of men in silver and sky blue armor tramp out of the main doors of the house to form an honor guard on either side of a field of crushed rock that served as a landing field. Urien goosed the throttle and brought us in at a sedate pace that was more worthy of a limosine driver than a backwater barbarian.

Ignatius himself stood on the steps as I climbed out of the flier, his long black and gold coat billowing in the reflected down draft of our lift fans. His radiant smile dimmed slightly as he saw Hadrian emerging behind me.

"Welcome Lady Von Morganstern," he called over the wind rush, "and... to you also... of course."