Chapter 334 — Splitsone Keep

The ancient castle that House Glan had inhabited for generations stood quietly before Gao Yang.

It sat at the summit, a steep cliff at its side. Years of wind and rain, erosion and collapse, had eaten the cliff back until it almost began to curve inward, and the castle perched above it seemed poised to topple at any moment—an unease only deepened by the castle's own decrepitude, which preyed on every visitor's mind. Yet regardless, a fortress set upon a mountaintop, snug against a sheer precipice, could not help but strike the eye with a breathtaking beauty.

Gao Yang had been studying that old castle since they were still at the foot of the mountain. Only when the carriage followed the broad ramp up to the summit and drew to a halt before the fortress did he murmur softly, "The Glans have broad shoulders..."

Beside him, Amber gaped. "You've been marveling over that the whole way?"

Gao Yang gave the half-elf girl an odd look. "What did you think?"

Amber opened her mouth, choked on a word for a long while without finding a better one, and then joined him in tilting back her head with a sigh. "The Glans have broad shoulders..."

"Enough marveling. Go knock on the door."

The heavy black gates of Glan Keep swung slowly open before Gao Yang, and as the oak doors inlaid with purple steel and bronze runes parted to either side, his gaze swept across their surfaces.

He saw mottled wounds and patches of charred black, faintly visible despite the repairs.

Beyond the gates lay a long, brilliantly lit hall, a red carpet running from the main door to the steps at its far end, maids and attendants standing on either side, and at the very front a rather tall, middle-aged steward, who bowed, extending his left hand like a swan's wing to guide the honored guest over the threshold.

The lady of House Glan stood in the center of the hall.

She was a tall woman but too thin, somewhere around thirty, with slightly wavy black hair that fell past her shoulders, deep-set eyes, and a somewhat pale complexion. Yet time had not left its weary marks on her face; she remained a woman who could still draw every eye in a banquet hall.

As Gao Yang stepped forward, the noblewoman came to meet him with perfect timing.

All was courteous and correct, the full ceremony observed, and Gao Yang could not help recalling the last place he had visited—Kant Keep. Only there had been nothing but a chaotic, hollow dream. What would he find here?

Gao Yang showed a faint smile. "I hope my unannounced visit won't trouble my neighbor."

"Your arrival brings this land unprecedented honor." Robenia Glan bowed, paying her respects to Gao Yang according to her own rank, and Gao Yang noted that the noblewoman performed the courtly obeisance of a male aristocrat—though he was not surprised.

Since House Glan had lost its master, this widow had taken on the master's role; she was the lady of this land, and no rumor of remarriage had ever reached his ears—which was itself an attitude of a kind. Now she greeted a duke with a male noble's obeisance, and that too was a kind of "language" that only nobles could understand.

Gao Yang raised his eyes toward the end of the hall, and sure enough, on the wall between the two curved staircases, he saw a great portrait: a handsome young man with black hair, dressed in a black coat and a snow-white shirt, standing in the painting with a faint, composed smile. Before the portrait stood white candlesticks and, just as white, "death's chrysanthemums."

That must be the late Viscount Glan—hardly strange that his portrait hung there. But the white candlesticks and the death's chrysanthemums were rather unusual. For many nobles of the present age, marital fidelity held only under the premise that both parties were alive and their houses stable; once one of them died, the survivor—husband or wife alike—would naturally, after a brief mourning, seek a new spouse as quickly as possible. This was not counted as "infidelity," for a timely and wise marriage was precisely the necessary means of preserving a house's strength and sustaining a domain's development. A widow or widower who had married several times could, in certain circumstances, even be called much sought after.

It was in such "marriage wars" that Ansor's vast, complex, bloated, and filthy noble genealogies and histories of land transfer had been shaped.

Gao Yang drew his gaze back from the viscount's portrait, turning over the intelligence Amber had gathered in his mind, then looked at Robenia Glan with a slight smile. "My lady, you must have heard that Kant Province has been incorporated into House Cecil, and that by His Majesty's new grant, Cecil Province now adjoins Glan Province. I've come only to call on a new neighbor."

"By propriety, it is I who should have called on you first," said Robenia Glan, showing a somewhat stiff smile—as though smiling had left her so long ago that even summoning the muscles of her face had grown awkward. "Only I left the domain some time ago and have been back but a few days..."

"Propriety," Gao Yang waved a hand, "we drew up the proprieties back then, so as long as I don't mind, you needn't mind them either."

After this brief and entirely insubstantial exchange of courtesies, the viscountess invited Gao Yang and his personal attendant (Amber) to the castle's reception hall, where she had ordered the finest pastries and the best wine prepared, along with the finest harpist and bard in Glan Province to entertain them.

After the afternoon tea, a rather grand ball would be held in the castle, with the banquet to be served midway through the dancing.

To be honest, Gao Yang had no interest in balls—no interest in any welcome ceremony, really—but these were necessary formalities. And the ball was nominally held on his account, for him, yet in truth a duke had little to do at a ball in such a "small castle"; no one would dare invite him to dance. The ball's real purpose was simply to serve as a social stage for the great and small nobles who came drawn by his name.

Using a duke's visit as the marquee, Robenia could invite lords great and small from the surrounding lands, and could even invite nobles more powerful than herself from above her station. So long as she brought off this feast, House Glan's prestige would surely soar. Even if the southern nobles cared little for the name Cecil, they would have to acknowledge the ability the viscountess displayed in organizing such an event. On occasions unsuited to baring blades, hosting feasts and balls of every scale was the usual means by which nobles displayed their strength.

Gao Yang and Amber cared nothing for such convolutions, though the latter was at least well pleased by the fact of "a whole crowd standing behind you to serve your meal." Nibbling at the pastries a maid brought over, the half-elf girl muttered to Gao Yang, "Look at them, then look at you. Such a grand ducal residence, and you've probably got fewer maids and attendants than this place."

"Why would I want that many people watching me eat? It's noisy enough as it is," said Gao Yang. He had been chatting with Robenia Glan, and now that the viscountess had gone to check on the banquet hall, he fell to talking with Amber. "Eat slower, there's another meal tonight."

"Who knows what a 'proper meal' even is—radishes dressed up with feathers, or raw meat ringed with colored stones? I've seen the 'ceremonial dinner' at a noble's formal banquet, and it's not as good as Betty's flatbread," Amber stuffed a small cake into her mouth, forced it down, and winked at Gao Yang. "Hey, hey—have you spotted any clues? Any of that... dream-like wrongness?"

"No," Gao Yang hadn't expected that Amber, even while stuffing her face, had truly not forgotten the real business. He glanced at her and shook his head. "But I don't think this place is like Kant Keep was. This one genuinely seems untouched by the real dream."

Amber looked at him curiously. "How do you know?"