Fostering Faust 3

by Randi Darren

  The Tilly and Lin families laughed at that. They were both martial baronies that had lived and thrived on battle.

  The Rift family looked unnerved to a degree.

  “As you might know, recently we were granted a very large tract of land. Unfortunately, it is currently inside contested lands. We were able to make some alterations, and a few purchases, so that all the land is one conjoined property. It’s roughly the size of Brit or Ridge itself,” Alex said. It had taken some last-minute tap dancing while he was with the king, as well as some bribery, but it had happened. “It also thankfully has a border with territories controlled by our duchess.”

  Turning, he began to slowly walk toward Anna and her family. Thankfully, everyone was seated nearby, and he wouldn’t need to shout to be heard.

  Anna was wearing a massive, blazing smile. Only she knew what was coming.

  Both her father and mother sitting behind her had no idea. Nor any of her extended family behind them.

  “This will be a rather dangerous territory, one with no lack of problems to solve. But I think it’s going to be a massively profitable territory due to its location,” Alex said. “And to that end, I can only trust one man with its handling.

  “Charles Ulles, Father, I’d like to make you a baron,” Alex said. Reaching to the box laid out in front of Anna, which she’d prepared herself, Alex picked it up. Inside was the formal barony as assigned by the king himself. “I’ve already had it drafted formally, written out, and signed by our king. You need only accept it.”

  Staring at Alex with a shocked look on his face was his father-in-law. A short, balding, pudgy man with graying brown hair and clear brown eyes. He normally had an infectious smile and seemed to be made of energy.

  One of the scariest merchants to grace the empire, a man who took a no-holds-barred approach to his enemies and who’d been working behind the scenes to help Alex. Charles had done this immediately once he’d found out his only daughter loved Alex.

  Sitting next to him was his wife. Anna’s mother. She was an older, almost identical clone of Anna. It was obvious where Anna had gotten all her looks.

  Alex had only briefly met her today and hadn’t been given a chance to really talk with her.

  “Come on up here, Chuck,” Alex said, waving the box a little. “Become Baron Ulles, House of Ulles, of the Ulles Barony.”

  Anna turned in her seat and clapped happily, smiling at her father.

  Who did nothing but sit there.

  “I’m sorry, dear, but I think he doesn’t know what to do or say,” said his mother-in-law, Sherin. “There’s a first time for everything.”

  The room erupted in laughter at that.

  “What to do is easy. Come up here and receive your barony and title,” Alex said. “Come on, Dad, or people are going to think you’ve lost your edge.”

  Standing up, Charles tottered over to Alex, seemingly lost in his own world.

  Smiling, Alex presented the Ulles pedigree, coat of arms, and official landed nobility paperwork.

  “Congratulations, Baron Ulles,” Alex said, grinning at the other man. “Now we just have to go wrest your lands from the duke. Good thing your… err… quasi daughter-in-law is our duchess.”

  Charles only nodded his head as he stared at the box in his hands.

  “Yes,” he said finally.

  It was all he said.

  Chapter 15

  Watching the doors shut, Alex let out a slow breath.

  “You don’t care for these things,” Sylvia said from beside him.

  “Not in any way, shape, or form,” Alex said honestly. “I’m glad it was only a day and that it’s over.”

  “They normally run for two days, but I didn’t think you’d like that,” Sylvia said with a shrug. “I have to watch out for you, Alex.”

  Oh?

  Turning his head, he leaned over and kissed Sylvia, laying his fingers gently on her jaw as he did.

  He lingered there, kissing her for far longer than would be prudent in public. After a time, he eased away from her and smiled when he opened his eyes to find her staring at him.

  “Thank you, Four. I love you,” Alex said.

  Sylvia nodded her head fractionally, her eyes wide. “I… I love you, too, Alex.”

  Time to free her. We’re batting a thousand. Let’s see if we keep that perfect streak.

  “I release you from all your oaths, Sylvia,” Alex said, reaching up to pat her cheek twice. “Live as you wish.”

  Lifting his eyes to the room, Alex looked around.

  Anna was holding court with all his wives. Alanna, Katherine, Quinn, and Mary. There were also several of her own Numbered running around.

  They were easy to spot, all wearing uniforms very similar to Riley’s except with blue colors rather than the black she had picked out.

  That and Alex could remember bedding almost every single one of them. Apparently, they weren’t allowed to be around Anna until Alex had taken them.

  Looking back at Sylvia, Alex waited.

  She looked shocked. Shocked and without a single thought in her head.

  Maybe I’m finally going to lose one.

  Sylvia came back to herself, giving her head a small shake. She cleared her throat, then gave him an angry stare and a smirk.

  “What’s this?” she growled. “Are you just ending the game again? You’re bored and you’re just going to… going to flip the table over and ruin it all again?”

  Alex had no idea how to respond to that.

  “Ah… no. I’m just freeing you so you can play by your own rules, in whatever game you wish,” Alex said.

  “You’re a fucking idiot, you know that?” Sylvia asked, her tone dark and dangerous. “An idiot. Idiot! Fine. My rules? My game? Fine. I willingly rebind myself to all my previous oaths, except I retain the right to call this stupid sack of offal an idiot or whatever else I want, whenever I want.”

  Sylvia clicked her tongue, looking at him with an angry bent to her features. “Even called me by a name that doesn’t exist anymore. You’re an idiot, Alex. An idiot. Pay more attention.”

  Shivering from head to toe as if in a rage, Sylvia’s mouth was a flat line. “Go meet with Baron Ulles in your study. I’m going to go complain to Mistress Anna about you. Stupid idiot.”

  Marching off, Sylvia headed straight for Anna.

  Shit. Not… not really what I was expecting.

  Rubbing a hand against the back of his head, Alex felt rather sheepish.

  Anna would scold him as well. She wasn’t a trained lapdog, after all. She was a woman who had a mind of her own. She might do what he asked her, but so far all he’d ever asked of her was to be more normal.

  “Alright, uh… let’s talk to Chuck and maybe hide for a bit,” Alex said. Turning in place, he quickly marched off to his meeting with his father-in-law.

  Except apparently Charles was even more nervous than Alex, or he was hiding as well. The man was already waiting in the study when Alex entered.

  “I thought I was going to be early,” Alex said, closing the door.

  “Uhm, yeah. Couldn’t… sit still. Sherin slapped me behind the head and told me to go talk to you or wait for you,” Charles said.

  “Don’t let the baroness bully you, Baron Ulles,” Alex said with a smirk, walking over to sit down in front of the man recently made baron.

  Charles’s machine-gun laugh tore through the room, and the man seemed to loosen up a bit.

  “Yeah, that’s part of the problem, I guess. I don’t know how to act or what to do now. Merchants aren’t typically made gentry. Especially successful ones,” Charles said.

  “Act like yourself,” Alex said with a shrug of his shoulders. “Your goal is simple. Make the barony of Ulles successful, and by extension of that, make the county of Brit successful.”

  “County… you do realize that if you put both pieces of Ridge together, that and Ulles are just as big as Brit, right? You’re going to have to increase the lands of Bri
t or get your title changed soon,” Charles said.

  Alex shrugged at that. He didn’t care.

  “You don’t care, do you?” Alex asked. “About Brit being the same size, or my title?”

  “Well, no—”

  “And Alanna doesn’t care. She’s Baroness of Ridge, both north and south. I had Amy killed; she was a spy. Two should be reporting back to me tonight and tell me how it went,” Alex said.

  “She was? Oh, I suppose she was. That’d make sense, wouldn’t it?” Charles said, looking thoughtful, and then he shook his head. “No, Alanna wouldn’t care.”

  “And the Lin family won’t; their daughter is one of my many wives,” Alex said, rolling his eyes. “And what is wrong with your daughter, by the way? She keeps marrying me to more and more women. It’s like she’s… she’s… it’s a doll collection. She’s collecting women like dolls.”

  Charles laughed ruefully at that, one hand coming up to rub at the top of his bald head. “My Annie is… she’s a good girl, but you know how she is. I’m afraid I don’t have any idea on this one. Sherin either. Annie just… she just wants pretty women in her marriage, I guess.”

  “Anyways. The Lins won’t care, the Rift family is hoping I don’t have them all put to death, and I’m married to almost the entire Tilly family. Quinn is also my wife,” Alex said. “I’m either married to or sleeping with someone from every family that is my vassal. I don’t think anyone will care.”

  Charles nodded his head at that.

  “As for how to act, act yourself. You’re my dad, aren’t you?” Alex said with a grin. It was weird to talk to Charles at times because Alex had been older than this man when he’d died.

  Charles grinned, looking slightly embarrassed. “Yeah.”

  “There. Now. How goes the moneylending business? I keep getting reports that the Bank of Brit is expanding throughout the whole of Regina’s lands,” Alex said.

  “Oh! Good! Very well, in fact. We pay a small percentage to Regina of the profit we make on our investments,” Charles said, looking much more sure of himself. “The loans we’ve been giving out have been very lucrative for us, and businesses are sprouting up all over the duchy. It’s… it’s amazing. Sure, we lose a loan here and there, but the collateral is always enough to cover our investment.

  “You should be getting your first ‘dividend’ as you called it at the end of the month. It’s… very large.”

  Alex smiled. He’d sunk a massive amount of his own money into Charles’s banking system. Charles had the controlling share, though, and Alex didn’t want any part of the day-to-day business.

  “Re-invest it into the barony of Ulles,” Alex said dismissively with a hand. “You’re going to need a great deal of infrastructure. In fact, put this year’s profits for me back into the barony. I have more than enough money in my treasury today and coming in from taxes, as well as the horse trade. I have no immediate needs.”

  War had been very profitable for Brit as a whole. It didn’t hurt that blacksmiths of all types had been flocking to his city. Having so many soldiers, a standing army, and a war had made him the nexus point to get work as a smith.

  Turning Brit into the weapons capital of the duchy.

  “I… I… okay. I can do that. I’ll… make sure I put it in the books,” Charles said. “I’ll not be a debtor to my son.”

  Alex laughed at that and leaned forward in his seat. “I wouldn’t care if you were. You gave me Anna. There is no price too large for her existence.”

  Charles laughed awkwardly at that, shaking his head. “Never thought Annie would settle down, let alone become a countess. You do realize that’s what you did, right? She can’t be anything but your countess now that you’ve elevated my standing.”

  Alex nodded.

  He didn’t care. He didn’t actually want more women in his life.

  “Let’s talk about our clients. I want to see if we can’t start freezing out supporters of Gaelis as we branch out into the rest of the kingdom,” Alex said. “And maybe tempt some people away from him.”

  ***

  Alex knocked on the door to the “Numbered Lounge” as he’d begun to refer to it in his head.

  It was where his Numbered often retreated to.

  He’d personally never entered it, and he’d made a point of that to them. On top of this, none of his wives ever entered it either.

  It really was the domain of the Numbered, and the Numbered only. He’d even seen some of Anna’s Numbered enter. There was apparently a friendly cross-section between the two groups.

  He’d come here to try and talk to Sylvia. They’d ended on a terrible note, and he wanted to talk to her.

  He’d spent the last hour trying to find her and finally resorting to asking Eleanor, who didn’t know.

  In the end, Riley had known exactly where Sylvia was.

  And had promptly directed him to this very door.

  Several seconds passed in silence as Alex stood awkwardly at the door. Eleanor waited at the far end of the hallway, giving him some distance and privacy.

  When he raised his hand to knock again, he heard the door handle creak and turn.

  Taking two steps back, Alex folded his hands behind him and waited.

  The door opened slowly, and he found Sylvia standing on the other side. She was wearing a light-blue dress that looked comfortable, something worn around a home more than in public.

  She immediately frowned, her eyebrows coming together and her mouth turning downward.

  “What?” she asked when he said nothing.

  “I was hoping we could speak privately,” Alex said. “I think perhaps my actions were mis-understood. I’d very much like to discuss them, rather than leave the situation where it was.”

  Sylvia’s brow smoothed out partially, some of the anger starting to evaporate from her pretty face.

  “Really?” she asked.

  “Really. It’s not a game. I’m not angling for anything, I just really would like to talk to you,” Alex said. “I truly dislike where we ended up earlier today. I think I didn’t explain myself very well.”

  “You didn’t explain anything,” Sylvia grumbled.

  “I… yes. Could we please talk somewhere? I don’t think the Numbered Lounge is a good place for this,” Alex said.

  “That’s… fine. Yes,” Sylvia said. Then she turned her head and said something to someone else inside. He couldn’t make out what was said, but the voice that responded sounded like Valeria’s.

  Sylvia turned back to Alex with a small smile, then exited the Numbered Lounge and closed the door behind her.

  Alex offered her his arm.

  Giving him a side glance, Sylvia slipped her arm in his and huffed lightly. She said nothing.

  It was clear the gears in her head were running at full speed, however. There was no mistaking that Sylvia was nothing if not highly intelligent and resourceful.

  “You’re not supposed to be like this, you know,” Sylvia murmured as Alex led her into his private detached study and closed the door firmly.

  “What’s that?” Alex asked, leading her over to the small table he kept here.

  “Kind. Caring. Worrying over my feelings,” Sylvia said. “None of this matches with how you’ve treated me up to this point.”

  “Mm. I could see how it doesn’t quite line up in your head. Especially with how smart you are,” Alex said honestly. He deliberately eased Sylvia toward the chair he wanted her to sit in and waited for her to do so.

  Watching him, Sylvia took the offered seat and smoothed out her dress with two flicks of her hand.

  “You’ve done nothing but manipulate me to where you wanted me this entire time,” Sylvia said. “Three was right the whole time. And Seven knew it before I had even truly considered it.”

  Alex nodded once and took the seat across from her.

  “I did, and I continue to do it for some of the Numbered,” Alex admitted. “Though most of you are already healthier and… well… mine. Don�
�t speak of this to anyone else, please. It would skew their own development.”

  Sylvia rolled her eyes and sighed, shaking her head.

  “Which means Three and Seven already knew and just told no one. They experienced the same situation I now find myself in,” Sylvia said, looking back at Alex. “They wouldn’t talk to me about it at all, by the way. Not until I started making my own thoughts and beliefs known. Even then, they refused to really discuss it.”

  “Good, I’m glad to hear it,” Alex said. “Their loyalty warms me.”

  Sylvia grunted and folded her arms across her chest.

  “You wanted to talk, so do it,” she said.

  Frowning, Alex stared at her for several seconds.

  “I wasn’t trying to get rid of you,” Alex said finally. “I wasn’t trying to end the game or toss you out. I was trying to free you, so you could remain of your own volition if you chose to. You could choose to be with me, or choose to leave.”

  “I gathered that later on,” Sylvia said with a sniff. “At the time, though, it felt like you were just… ending the game again.

  “That you were flipping the table over and that was the end.”

  “No,” Alex said, shaking his head. “Not at all.”

  “Obviously.” Sylvia’s mouth turned into a frown again. “I don’t like it when you change the rules on me. I can’t play the game if I don’t know what the boundaries are. Do you understand?”

  “I do. With that being said… is there anything I can do or say to help you put the boundaries back in place, so to speak?” Alex asked.

  Sylvia looked like she wanted to fight more rather than talk things out. He got the distinct impression she was fighting her inner nature right now.

  “I want to be in charge for tonight. You have to answer my questions and let me do what I want,” Sylvia said. “If you do that, I’ll say everything is as it should be.”

  “Okay, I can do that,” Alex said.