Rudhek Verith finally gets home, a week after the secondary academy has let out, because the portal network was down for normal but irregular problems. He sighs deeply and wipes sweat from his brow as he strides up to the gate. “Hail the castle!”

“Welcome home, Rudhek!” Caswellon disappears from the wall and the gates swing open.

“Good to be back. How have Mother and Father been?”

“Quite well. Even the unexpected reinforcements from the Casmenoc margravate were easily dealt with.”

Rudhek curls his lip in distaste. He has had the misfortune of socializing with most of the Casmenocs, and they are one and all odious, spoiled, and casually cruel. Their parents seem to encourage the worse habits of the children. It’s infuriating.

His parents regard his grudge against the Casmenoc family with slightly befuddled amusement, but the Casmenocs are polite to them. They’re not polite to Rudhek’s adopted cousins or anyone they think are lesser. His parents have never had to thrash a Casmenoc for talking shit about someone whose only crime was commoner blood.

“Your cousins are here and settled in until their parents come to pick them up after Winternight.”

“Excellent!” That puts him in a much better mood. Rudhek hates the Casmenocs, but he adores his little cousins. “Little” both in age order and size; he’s got his mother’s height (as well as her looks in almost everything) and was taller than his dad by the time he was fifteen, to everyone’s surprise including his own. He’s nineteen now and his next year at the academy will be setting him up to graduate… if he doesn’t get thrown out for thrashing the guy in his year who is definitely a two-faced, elitist, hypocritical Casmenoc. Ugh.

The main doors slam open and cousins come streaming out. “Rudhek Rudhek Rudhek hi!!”

Rudhek laughs and kneels to catch Rusal, the smallest. “Hello, I’m very glad to see you all.”

Adulene shows him her most recent handkerchief; she’s ready to move on to embroidering dresses, if she’d only stop poring over the minute flaws in her stitching.

Inran and Cordis talk a mile a minute about the game they’re inventing. It sounds complex and card-based, like most of their games.

Gwenlin gives him the rundown of all the gossip that happened in the primary academy. He’s graduating next year and will be entering Rudhek’s academy. Rudhek will have to keep an eye out for him.

Cinmahr eagerly talks about swordsmanship and obviously glosses over some incident.

Pegirn is quiet, but holds onto his hand. Brinan toddles alongside her, babbling about something or other.

Kelstren has a new obsession: birds. Hawking, to be precise. She wants to go hawking later. Rudhek genuinely hates having to tell her that he’s too tired to go hawking today.

The cousins peel off as he heads for the baths. As Rudhek heads in, already loosening the buttons on his travel-dusted shirt, a small blue head bobs past his elbow. That shade of blue annoys him immediately, because it’s the exact Casmenoc sapphire, but it’s not accompanied by a sneering tone. He turns and frowns down the hall after the tiny girl darting away and the dame knight jogging after her. Huh. Aw, don’t tell me she’s another orphan? He wouldn’t mind another cousin, but he doesn’t like that now that his aunts and uncles are getting older, new cousins are usually adopted orphans. He’d take fewer cousins if it meant fewer orphans in general.

And he’s getting distracted from his bath. Yay, baths. Rudhek strips out of his clothes and settles into the hottest bath with a sigh of relief. The water at the academy is convenient and mineral-free, but not nearly hot enough for him. Then he sits up and starts unbraiding his hair to wash it.

He hears the knights before they all come chattering into the baths. He’s washed his hair and is currently brushing oils into it, because he got his father’s hair and it breaks horribly if he tries to wash his hair like Mom does hers.

Captain Bernsek calls, “Glad to see you back, Rudhek! And that you’re as insane as ever!”

Rudhek cackles. “You all are just wimps! This is the only properly hot pool!”

“Even Maedis doesn’t get in that pool!”

Rudhek ducks underwater briefly to help spread the oils evenly through his hair. “We all know Dad got used to cooler temperatures instead specifically so he could come live with Mom! He gets a pass for love.” It’s one of the sweetest parts about his parents’ love story, in an odd sort of way. But then, the Veriths are an odd sort of family. From what Rudhek hears, his maternal uncles didn’t even chase Dad around the training yard before approving of their courtship. They decided that a man willing to acclimate himself to his sweetheart’s home climate was a man who would listen to her concerns and heed them.

He finishes washing and conditioning his hair and then gets up to get dry and dressed. He wraps a long bit of towelling around his hair to let it dry for a bit. Once it’s dried out some, he’ll put it back into the many small braids he favors. It’s a style from Dad’s homeland and he very much likes it.

Cousin reunion, baths, now it’s time to get his bags unpacked. Once again, Rudhek rains blessings upon Briensyn’s head, because his bags are neatly lined up in his room and otherwise untouched. He, like his father, has a very particular system and finds it easier to unpack his stuff himself than to let the maids do it and have to fix everything later.

The cousins have not invaded by the time he’s put up his clothes and schoolbooks. What’s keeping them? The new kid?

Ah, yeah, it would be the new kid. Rudhek files blue_hair_small under the headings Category:orphan and Relation:unknown_pending_update. He adds the note liked_by Category:cousin and puts that file away for now.

And now it is time to go eat snacks with Mom and Dad. Rudhek gives his hair one last scrunch and drops the towel on the water closet floor, where it won’t get anything wet before it’s picked up.

Mom and Dad are in their suite with tea all set up. Dad stands up immediately to give him a hug. “Rudhek, welcome home.”

Rudhek melts into his embrace. “Hi, Dad. I missed you.”

Mom stands up to give him a kiss on the forehead. “Look at you, you’re growing a beard!”

Rudhek pats his chin. He’s got a nice, clean goatee and he rather likes it. “I am. Does it look good?”

“Quite good. Do you want me to do your braids?”

“Yes, please!” Rudhek sits down and shakes his hair out so Mom can start working on it. He takes a cake and bites into it. Mm, raspberry jam. “So what’s new here? Caswellon mentioned something about the Casmenocs sending unexpected reinforcements?”

Dad looks very, very angry all of a sudden. “Yes. They did. Twenty knights and a girl we thought was sent for training until she opened her mouth.”

Rudhek clenches his fists in his trousers. “How bad was it?”

“Poor little Irenis was sent here to die for the crime of being a genius. She blames herself and fully expected to be sent to the ramparts for ‘showing up’ her cousin.” Mom takes a deep breath and redoes part of the braid she’s working on. “And the knights around her, with few exceptions, ranged from indifferent to actively malicious toward her.”

Rudhek sets his cake down. It tastes like ash and grit now. “Merkyn above.”

Dad looks a little horrified, like he always does when people invoke a god by name, but doesn’t protest. That hammers in just how awful this is.

“I just didn’t like them for their attitudes. They’re so rude to those beneath them and think they’re better for their lineage, rather than any more worthwhile quality.”

“That makes sense.” Dad drums his fingers on the table. “Irenis’s father is Triolun Casmenoc, but her mother was a maid. I’ve gone ahead and categorized her as an orphan, given that she speaks of her mother in the past tense and clearly her father doesn’t care about her.”

“That makes sense,” Rudhek says weakly. No wonder that girl was so tiny. “How old is she?”

“Twelve. From what she’s let slip to the nieflings, she was conceived the last time Triolun’s wife had to go south.” Mom sighs. “And sent off to us on her birthday.”

“What a rotten gift.”

“Yes.”

Dad stands up and starts pacing. “And we had to throw out almost all their knights almost before the week was up, because they saw no issue in letting a man who bragged about harming vulnerable women run free around a vulnerable girl. We completely understand your grudge now.”

Rudhek would really rather they didn’t. This is almost worse than a new cousin turning up through being orphaned.

“We will do all we can to assist you in taking them down.”

“Right.” Rudhek recategorizes Irenis from Category:orphan to the new Category:baby_sister and adds the notes pump for information and cherish. He’ll do all he can to bring down the Casmenocs and erase all the pain they brought her. This he swears on his very name.

(Bonus: The Verith family *attempts* to get a family portrait done with only two adults present, three if you count Rudhek. L-R: Maedis, Kelstren, Brinan, Gwenlin, Rudhek, Pegirn, Sefer, Adulene, Bealuen, Inran, Cordis, Rusal, Cinmahr)