Great strides carried Foster to the Saintess, the Pope, and the King. The whispering of the crowd grew to murmurs, and the nobility of Ether discussed the brazen newcomer's arrival. From what he overheard, the people who recognized Foster as the hero were gloating, as if merely knowing his face were a badge of honor.
In a way, it was. Foster rarely made public appearances and had only ever been in the very first public broadcast, way back in the background when Monica first unveiled her revolutionary method of disseminating information to the people. Nowadays, a receiving device for the broadcasts sat in every town square, every public gathering place, and every noble sitting room.
As Foster approached, the three of them turned to look, their expressions varying greatly. With an incline of his head, Foster managed to both acknowledge and dismiss the leaders of church and state. Turning to Regina, Foster gave her a subtle bow, one that signified respect.
"I hope I'm not interrupting, I just felt a tad left out sulking in the corner."
The lavender beard, streaked with shocks of silver, shifted subtly as the king spoke, "I had not heard your arrival, Sir Hero. One would think you snuck in."
"Oh, that. Yeah, I did sneak in. Your home seems to be overrun with vermin these days."
The king smiled. Perhaps it was even a little genuine, "For once we agree on something, Hero."
Foster cast his gaze about the crowd once more, "So, Your Majesty, Your Holiness, what is all the fanfare for?"
The pope followed Foster's line of sight to the crowd. The ancient craigs in his face shifted to deepen his frown lines, and his features took on a weary and dull edge. "Hero Foster, you have done this kingdom an incredible service in slaying the Demon Lord. You have earned your retirement from the battlefield, and—trust me when I say this—nobody wishes to take Your Eminece's long-deserved rest from you.
"However, some in the church are wary of another Demon Lord wishing to reach past their station and have come to a decision to take action against such a scenario. Since we would not dare inconvenience Your Eminence any further, my people in the church have come up with an alternative solution, as you will soon see."
"I see."
Foster took a lot of issues with what the pope just said. From allusions to demon genocide to a cease and desist from the church, the pope's head started looking awfully decapitatable. He wouldn't even need to toss his head anywhere because it would land on the marble right where he wanted it—at Sebastian's feet. Seeing as Foster chose not to speak further, the pope and king resumed their previous conversation. Foster didn't have an ear for it but pretended to listen nonetheless.
Regina spoke to him telepathically, "The pope has over thirty people preparing for some sort of ritual. Considering the scale, I'd say it is either a resurrection or some sort of summoning."
"When did you find out about this?"
"Right before I came to see you at the War Room. How did you find out?" Forget beating her here—she seemed more perplexed that he knew about this at all.
"Dumb luck? And I'm not seeing any dead bodies, so what exactly is he planning on summoning?"
"Not sure—but Foster, I have a really bad feeling about this. They're trying to push you out of the sphere of influence."
"What else is new?" You can't teach an old dog new tricks. Sebastian and the pope were the oldest dogs around, and the consolidation of power came to them like breathing. For people like them, people who weaponized fear and faith, a spark of hope carried with it great danger. The spark might be singular, but once it hits the rug, the blaze could consume the house.
Not that Foster had any plans to nurture the spark. Then again, did the spark ever want to burn the house down? Did the nature of the spark ignore its will? Foster tried his damndest to avoid the rug, but floating around directionless got lonelier and lonelier with each passing day.
His apathetic blanket slowly slipped from his shoulders.
A door creaked open, silencing both the crowd and Foster's thoughts. Through it marched Monica and Randall, as well as several of their lesser-known siblings born to concubines, all their heads different shades of the same lavender. The Crown Prince led the whole precession, walking in step with Monica and Randall at the front as they passed under the arching door of the main entrance to the hall. When Barnik noticed Foster's gaze, his lips split into a shit-eating grin.
Poisoned by his mother's words in his ear all his life, the crown prince adopted the elitist attitude that came from the dangerous mix of authority, sycophantic ass-kissing, and a lack of moral guidance in recent years as he matured from boy to man. Foster kept his face impassive, letting his gaze slide off Barnik as if he did not exist.
Somehow, Foster's gaze naturally landed on Monica, who… held the hand of a little white-haired girl? No, not white-haired, very faintly lavender—so faint it looked white, at least at a passing glance. The girl looked to be around six or seven and wore a frilly sky-blue dress with white trim and black bows. Her not-white-not-purple hair pulled tight against her scalp, forming two high ponytails that bounced in curls she walked, her timid eyes glancing every which way as she trailed half a step behind Monica.
Nevina Ether. The youngest and only member of the royal family to be born out of wedlock. He didn't recognize her at all; the image of a babe with wispy white hair wrapped in fresh linens his only memory of the girl. A sad story, really. The child of a maid and a monarch, a mother dying while bringing life into the world, leaving nobody to claim the child as their own.
Luckily, not everyone saw her as a lowborn bastard worth less than the sum of her parents. The little white-haired girl found her family in her three eldest siblings. Sebastian stripped her of the name Ether before she could speak, disavowing any relation to her on account of the absence of lavender in her hair. She only got the name back when Monica adopted her, raising her little sister the only way she knew how—the way the late Queen raised her. Foster looked to the girl's father, catching Sebastian barely giving his own children a dismissive glance before resuming his chat with the pope.
Twelve children. The man had twelve children, yet held not a shred of warmth in his rotting heart for any of them. Ruthless and ambitious, cunning and cold—all words that described Sebastian Ether. But Sebastian had another layer to him, scrawled away behind the polished exterior—a Sebastian few saw and even fewer understood. A man of passion and vise, a slave to his reckless emotions—the two sides of him constantly warring for dominance. Violence, money, pleasure, and faith were his tools and his drugs—his sword and his shield.
Foster recognized it, hating how easily he understood the struggle. But he knew the heady rush of want and power so well—after all, pathos and logos fought battles within him, too. Foster tried his best to be a good person and thought of himself as such, but the similarities between them were hard to ignore. For Foster, rather than ambition and vise, reason and longing fought in his soul. A small distinction, sure, but an important one nonetheless. To Foster, that was the difference between man and monster.