#as for how she convinced heim to get caught up in this

[sparrowwritings]

Writing Challenge Day Thirty-one: Engaged

Day Thirty -- Masterpost

Lady Musali Strebor frowned just enough to not show any wrinkles on her face. In her hands was a letter with her name on it in a practical but still elegant script. A member of the Knight Defenders of the Wall had arrived with a letter for her, with strict instructions attached to it.

Looking up at the man in question, she gauged his worth as quickly as court life had taught her. He was of average height. She couldn’t immediately tell his build due to the heavy black armor he wore, but from the way his unhelmeted face appeared, the knight was probably of average build. He gave a nervous grin at her scrutiny, his hazel eyes darting around the room. The Lady was certain that even the modest couch she had taken a seat in was worth more than any amount of money he could make in his life. 

If this was a joke, it was a poorly thought out one.

“And you are certain you need to be present during the reading of the letter.” She spoke delicately, though any who was more used to the ways of nobility could detect the note of poison in her words. 

The knight was no such thing, so he babbled loud enough that Lady Musali could hear his nervousness bouncing off the walls. “A-absolutely ma’am. UH I mean, my lady?” He bowed for what must have been the twentieth time in the most inappropriate manner and time. It was starting to get tiresome instead of amusing. “Er, anyway I-I have to uh, stand here while you read it. There’s--well, you’ll see in the letter I guess?” 

With a gentle sigh, she pulled her reticule from where she had placed it down. “If you must, then.” She’d have to have a word with his superiors, later. According to her handmaid, he’d come with an older partner. The instructions were that this Knight in particular--Heimdall, she remembered--be present alone. Perhaps she could speak with him? After she read the letter, of course. From the reticule the Lady produced a letter opener in an elaborately carved sheath. It took a practiced few seconds for her to draw the blade, cut open the envelope, then return it to its rightful place. She even noted from the corner of her eye that Heimdall had flinched from the quickness.

For all that the Wall Knights supposedly faced down evil mages on the regular, this one would be eaten alive at court. Lady Musali held back a satisfied smile and took out the small sheaf of papers and started to read. 

To Her Ladyship Musali Strebor of the noble house of Strebor, The letter began with some if not all of the usual pleasantries that she was used to, but she was thankful to have less to read. After the hundredth time of having to read off the lands that her family had control over, all of the letterheads started to blur together. This one was already unusual in that the only indication that the paper had come from the Wall was a stamp on the top left corner of each page with the symbol of the Knight’s order--a section of wall in the shape of a shield.

She continued to read. We do not know each other, and neither of us have had the opportunity to have our paths cross before now, but I write to you this day on a matter most urgent. It is my utmost hope that this letter reaches you before it is too late and that I can spare you the pain that I have suffered these last seven years. Lady Musali blinked. “A matter most urgent?” “Before it’s too late?” What could this person mean?

I am getting ahead of myself. 

My name is Sagacious Torrent, though I have taken to only being called Saga as of late. I am the current archivist of the Knight Defenders of the Wall. Before that, however, I was a candidate to inherit my family’s business. I am not certain how versed you are in the merchantry of the Turkon Islands, Lady Strebor, but the Torrent family specializes in inter-island trade. Due to the nebulous nature of the smaller islands in the archipelago, as well as the threat that pirates have on foreign ships, transporting goods from one place to another is a difficult endeavor for many, and impossible for most mainlanders. The Torrent family has made its business by stationing their headquarters on the safest island of Kiteltera and (either through direct trade or transportation on Islander ships) help foreign merchants ply their wares on the archipelago. 

To put it simply: My family has a lot of money, and with my cousin determining that he was male and that he would rather join the Queensmen than be forced into a role he did not desire, I was far more likely to inherit the entirety of the business. At this point I must ask that you ask Heimdall to provide the first portrait to accompany this letter.

Raising a thin eyebrow, Lady Musali looked up at the man in question. “Apparently I am supposed to ask you for the first portrait?” At the Wall, an archivist was a higher rank than a knight? That must be the only explanation as to why she was being put through this odd game. Still, the intrigue of the beginning of the letter was far too tempting to miss out on, even if she had to wade through an explanation of a part of the world that her family didn’t ever interact with.

“Ah! Right!” Heimdall patted himself until he found the item in question and handed it over. The portrait was the size of her hand, and clearly painted some years ago. The woman depicted had many of the traits associated with someone born in the Turkon Islands. Her skin was browned by the sun, and her straight dark hair--which grew long enough that the ends couldn’t be seen in the portrait--alongside the pure confidence in her deep brown eyes and posture, all were signs that pointed towards a woman who had been born into a society where she benefited most. She even had a scar that split her left eyebrow in two--something that would be talked about behind her back for years if she had attended court, but to the woman in the portrait it was hardly anything of note.

Lady Musali couldn’t help the pang of jealousy in her breast as she examined the portrait of Saga. This was a woman who had a plethora of choices in her life. Even if her family business had gotten run into the ground, this Saga could rise again in any position she desired. Even nobles with their life of excess had their duties picked out for them for most of their lives.

She glanced at the elaborately carved silver ring on her left hand. This was something she had been given a choice about, at least. Setting the portrait aside, she went back to the letter.

This is how I looked eight years ago. This is how I looked when I met the one who I thought was the love of my life. I am aware of what name he uses for himself now, but back then he called himself Orden Namil. The one he uses now is decidedly different. I apologize for being vague, but this next part is as difficult for me to write as it undoubtedly will be for you to read and you must understand why it is that I decided to write to you now.

Orden was a foreign mage. He came to the Islands, he’d told me later, to find his fortune as best as a man could. I had met him while wandering the capital city of Novel during one of my cousin’s rare visits. The three of us flirted, but he had a special focus on me and foolishly I believed with all my heart that his eyes were set on me for my own traits.  Instead of leaving to travel to other islands, Orden had picked up a job in the city and soon after we started seeing each other more officially. 

He asked me to marry him when we had been together for ten months. I am certain you can sympathize with the feeling, being engaged yourself as I write this letter. Lady Musali wasn’t surprised that an archivist, especially one for the Wall, had found out about the engagement. There were rumors that the Wall had connections to all of the kingdoms in Adronis, as well as the few human-run places on Bibliano and Sanatig. She was more surprised that the regimented straight lines of the words were becoming more and more shaky as the letter went on. Perhaps this wasn’t a joke, as she’d first thought.

Now, inheritance on the Islands works very similarly to how it does on the mainland. Normally, the firstborn girlchild is the one who is the heir to the lands and titles that the family owns, followed by the second one, and so on. If somehow a family only has male living relatives left, then it passes onto the oldest male up until an heir is born, then she will inherit. 

There is one notable exception to any inheritance. That being: when the living heir of a noble or wealthy family decides that she (or he, in this case) wishes to deny their rightful claim, the Queen must be the one to decide who the next heir will be. Each Queen has her own way of determining such. I will spare you old stories of contests and wagers and the like to tell you this: the day after Orden and I had announced our engagement, Her Majesty Queen Doranté III decided that Galline--the young niece to the former heir but still cousin to me--would inherit after her grandmother--my aunt--passed on. 

I was fine with this. At the time, I thought it would make married life that much easier. My children and I could be more free to pursue what we wished, and Orden would still be able to keep at his work. In fact, because he would have my name attached to his, he would be far more able to gain the trust (and business) of any Islander.

He did not agree. Here, the lines were harsh and regimented. As if Saga had been pushing the quill deeply into the paper as she wrote. We fought for the first and last time that night. Kindness and understanding had been utterly replaced by malice and jealousy. He railed against what he saw was an unfair and unjust appointment. Nothing I pointed out about the benefits of not being the heir were heard and were in fact shouted over. He kept going on about lost opportunities and how he had wasted his time. 

It was then that I realized that nothing short of pure greed had motivated Orden into asking for my hand. He hadn’t cared for me from the start.

I took off the ring he’d given me--a silver one, carved elaborately with all the correct signs for a long and happy marriage and extra flourishes besides--and smacked it onto the table. It quieted him down long enough for me to order him to leave and never return. 

I never mentioned what elemental affinity my ex-fiancé has when I mentioned that he is a mage. He is attuned to Fire. 

Fire was his magic of choice when he used it against me. Please ask Heimdall for the second portrait that is to come with this letter.

It took a lot to shake Lady Musali Strebor. Nobility in general had to act as if nothing other than gossip mattered in their lives while around other nobility. Playing the game was how one could make connections and rise ever higher in standing with each other. Being neutral about most everything could mean the difference between a very successful arrangement or being the laughing stock of the court. 

The fact that she was currently trembling as she lowered the letter and stared directly at the silver ring on her hand would have shocked the entire court. With her audience of one (and him being from outside nobility at that), this was the rawest emotion she had shown to someone outside of--

“I am at the part of the letter where I am to see the next portrait.” Lady Strebor’s voice was even, though her body was actively trying to betray her. She took that as a victory, although it didn’t feel like one.

“Uh, right.” Heimdall gave her an odd look as he handed over the second portrait. With shaking hands, she cradled the picture in front of her. Instead of being fully painted, this was more of a drawing that had been outlined in dark ink. The woman depicted was like night to the previous one’s day. She was hunched forward with a deep frown. The lack of color or even shading to her skin told of years of staying indoors. Her arms crossed her chest protectively, though her dark eyes were tiredly looking outward. It was clearly still Saga--the scar on her eyebrow was in the same place, and her face was still the same shape.

The biggest difference was her hair. Or lack thereof.

Instead of long dark locks, there was an almost bare scalp of rippled skin. Tufts of black hair seemed to be growing, but not nearly enough to hide the extent of the damage. This was a broken woman if Lady Musali had ever seen one. And the cause of it all, was…

She went back to the letter as she slowly removed the silver ring from her finger. I hope I do not need to elaborate any further. Your fiancé is a dangerous man, Lady Strebor. I would highly recommend that you break the engagement at your earliest convenience, but please take caution when you do so.

Heimdall and Gawain are two of the best Knights that the Wall has to offer. This is why I sent them with the letter, although I did not tell either of them the true reasons why. Tell them that their final task is to defend you from your mage fiancé and they will listen. If you do not wish for their presence, just send them back to the Wall. I only offer suggestions, you are allowed to do what you wish with this information. 

I understand that the pressures of nobility do not always give much by way of choice, but I pray that you will find happiness with a marriage to someone that is nothing like him.

Yours truly,

Sagacious Torrent

Lady Musali Strebor put the final page down and stared into the middle distance for what felt like ages. Finally she looked down at the ring in her hand and closed it tight. “Sir Heimdall.” She called.

He immediately snapped back to attention. “Ma’am! Er, uh--”

“Ma’am will do.” She snapped, but she went back to using her gentle tone immediately after. “It seems I need the help of you and your partner with a spot of personal business involving a mage. Will you both protect me while I handle this matter?”

A worried look flashed across his face, but Heimdall ended up saluting anyway. “We’re here to protect those who are in danger from those who would use magic for evil. So. I’m not really supposed to say yes without Gawain here but I think he’ll let it slide.” His smile was still nervous as he added, “You’ll send us a glowing review after, right?”

“That remains to be seen.” Lady Strebor carefully folded the letter and placed it and the portraits into her reticule before rising. “My fiancé shall be returning this evening. I’d like you both to join us for supper so we can take care of this matter today.”

From how he lit up, she was very certain that he was far more interested in the food than in any protecting he needed to do. Hopefully Gawain was more responsible. “Yes ma’am! Thank you, ma’am! I’ll, uh, go get him then.” 

She gave a dismissal wave towards his retreating back. With a sigh she stared at the ceiling, and then daintily tread to her writing desk.

Lady Musali Strebor had a reply to compose.

[wavenetinfo]

GRETNA, Neb. — Lanyard Burgett sits uncomfortably outside a coffee shop in an outlet mall, occasionally craning his neck to see whether someone is behind him. Burgett says he served in the Air Force in Saudi Arabia in the 1990s, but was never as afraid there as he is right now.

His angst is over the events of a youth soccer tournament in Nebraska last weekend.

Burgett says his life has been threatened, and his phone has been bombarded with numerous intimidating calls from blocked numbers. He has filed a report with the Sarpy County Sheriff’s Office. Burgett is not normally a paranoid man, but he was awoken Tuesday night to what he believes was the sound of someone trying to break into his house. He’d been asleep for three hours at that point. It was one of the longest nights he has slept since all this started five days ago.

His body language is a contorted mess of anger, fear and resignation. Burgett has been a ref and a coach and a soccer dad, but right now, the volunteer director of the Ray Heimes Springfield Soccer Invitational never wants to be involved in a soccer tournament again. He is seated across from a public relations person named Gina Pappas, and has come with a stapled packet of soccer rules and a roster — evidence, if you will. Less than a week ago, Burgett’s world was grandkids and making sure he had enough medals for his tournament — a simple life in the small town of Springfield, Nebraska, population 1,600. Now Burgett has a P.R. person.

About 30 minutes away, in Omaha, an 8-year-old girl is being flooded with media requests. Mili Hernandez had two TV interviews on Tuesday night, and she was late because her father, Gerardo, couldn’t find her. She was out playing with a friend, oblivious to the fact that she has become the face of a debate over sports and gender rights. Mili doesn’t have Barbie dolls; she has soccer balls. On Sunday, when her Azzurri Cachorros Chicas team was disqualified from the tournament in Springfield, reportedly because tournament officials were convinced the short-haired Mili was a boy, the story took off, thrusting her into international prominence.

U.S. Soccer legends Mia Hamm and Abby Wambach sent their support to young Mili, whose full name is Milagros, which in Spanish means “miracles.”

“You’re inspiring,” Wambach told Mili in a video. “You’re a natural-born leader, honey, and I’m so proud of you.”

But like most scenarios involving parents, youth sports and about 1,000 kids running around a grassy patch of land, this story is far from simple.

Burgett tugs on his plastic water bottle. At least twice in the conversation, he looks as if he’s going to cry. He was torn when he heard about Hamm and Wambach reaching out to Mili. He’s happy that the little girl might get to meet them, and upset that he, in this equation, is portrayed as the monster who created the controversy.

He thumbs through his packet of soccer papers, which are marked in yellow highlighter. Two decades in the military taught him to be regimented, even in chaos. It taught him to follow the rules.

“I would like to have the opportunity to maybe sit down with the parents and talk to them and apologize to her,” he says. “Because I want her to know it wasn’t about her. I’ve got grandkids. I wouldn’t want somebody to do it to them when they play soccer.

“I’d like to give them my side. They might understand; they might not. At least then they’d know from my side why I did what I did.”

Many sides to the story

Where do we begin? With the coach who complained about a rule that has nothing to do with gender confusion? With the anonymous parents who asked why a boy was playing on a girls’ team?

Burgett contends that young Mili had nothing to do with the Azzurri girls’ team being kicked out of the Springfield tournament Saturday night. He says he disqualified three Azzurri teams, not just Mili’s. Yes, there was a dispute over whether Mili was a girl that became even more confusing when the team’s roster, a list that has been used for months, had an “M” for male next to her name. There are 14 girls on that roster, and the only one who fell victim to the typo is the kid who just happens to have short hair. How that happened remains unclear.

But Burgett says the teams were disqualified because they violated another rule. Azzurri played kids on multiple teams in the tournament. Burgett presents a piece of paper that Mo Farivari, the director of the Azzurri soccer club, signed at check-in. Six lines above his signature, in caps, is a sentence that says if illegal players are caught, they face possible removal from the tournament. Then Burgett shows a highlighted page that explains the rule, that a kid can’t play on two teams.

Farivari doesn’t deny that the club had players competing on multiple teams during the tournament. Three girls on Mili’s team also played for Azzurri’s 11/12 boys’ team during the tournament. So did a few players on the club’s 10-and-under boys’ team. But Farivari says they’ve done this before, it’s legal at his tournament, and he was never told that it was against Springfield’s rules. Farivari is also convinced Mili’s team was disqualified because of the gender controversy.

“The only reason he disqualified them,” Farivari says, “is because Mili looks like a boy and is listed [with] a typo on the roster. I went over this to clarify, but he didn’t want to listen.”

The gender flap, in and of itself, is confusing. Soccer clubs have a registrar who types in the names of each player, along with information such as date of birth and gender. Months ago, when Azzurri’s registrar was inputting the 300-plus club names into the Nebraska State Soccer Association system, Farivari says, the registrar accidentally hit “male” instead of “female” for Mili. That error apparently was never corrected.

So for months, Mili played soccer games with the wrong gender attached to her name, and heard nary a peep about it. Even a rules-stickler like Burgett didn’t notice during registration as he pored through hundreds of names last week.

Tournament officials first noticed it Saturday. Burgett was gone for a few hours to attend a wedding, leaving duties to his assistants. That morning, Mili’s team was scheduled to play the Norris Titans Blue team after 11 o’clock. Norris had played earlier that morning, and members of the team were watching a boys’ game before warm-ups.

When three girls who played on that Azzurri boys’ team took the field for warm-ups before the Titans’ girls’ game against Mili’s team, Norris coach Brad Kester took notice. It bothered him a bit. “If that was legal,” Kester says, “I would’ve had two teams in the tournament if I could’ve shared players.”

There are reasons for that rule, Kester says. Temperatures climbed into the 90s in Eastern Nebraska this past weekend, and he says safety is an issue when a kid is possibly playing eight games over the course of three days.

Kester alerted a referee about the rules infraction, but he did not protest the game, which he says Norris won 4-0. It was the Chicas’ first loss of the tournament. During the game, Kester says that his players could hear parents yelling for Azzurri to “pass HIM the ball.” That puzzled Kester. He says the shouts were coming from Azzurri parents.

“It didn’t really matter to me,” Kester says. “We didn’t complain about Mili’s role in the game. It had no impact on the game. It’s not like we saw Mili before the game and we’re like, ‘Hey, that player looks like a boy.'”

After the game, when Kester was talking to a tournament official about the player-swapping infraction, he said at least one parent from Norris chimed in and asked, “Why do they have a boy on the team?” Kester declined to identify the parent. Burgett says multiple parents asked that question.

By late Saturday, Burgett and his staff were investigating both issues. Burgett went through the roster and saw the “M” for male. He says he did not actually see what Mili looked like until Monday night, when he finally turned on a television and saw her on the news. (He says he intentionally avoided TV and the internet before that.) Burgett says it didn’t matter what documentation Mili’s family, or the club, presented. His official document, the roster, said she was a boy. And in his mind, the point was moot anyway, because her team, along with two other Azzurri squads, were being disqualified for the player-sharing infraction.

At 11:12 p.m. on Saturday night, he sent Farivari an email informing him that the teams were disqualified. In detail, he listed four infractions. Three of them were about sharing players. But the first one on the list dealt with Mili.

She was not named — Burgett says he made a point throughout the whole process not to single her out — but the paragraph said the Chicas’ first infraction was having a male play three games on a female team.

“I am sorry to inform of this decision,” Burgett wrote about the infractions, “but cheating is not taken lightly and they will forfeit their remaining games.”

Mili back on the field; Burgett not so quick to return

Gerardo Hernandez’s phone has been ringing nonstop. When he got word Sunday morning that his daughter’s team was being disqualified from the tournament, he rushed from his home in midtown Omaha to Springfield, desperately — and unthinkably — trying to prove that Mili was a girl.

Gerardo was angry, but he had to get there so Mili’s team could play. He brought with him an insurance card to prove his daughter’s gender. He was ready to recite any information they needed.

“I said I have something in my wallet I want to show him,” Gerardo says. “He didn’t even take it. He didn’t care. He said somebody was a boy on the team, and there’s nothing we can do.”

Mili went with him to Springfield. Gerardo says she felt like the whole team got kicked out because of her, and she felt terrible. She cried the whole ride home, he says.

“She went to sleep thinking she was going to play … ” Gerardo says. “Early morning, they told her she was out.”

The Nebraska State Soccer Association did not respond to questions from espnW.com, but said in an email that Springfield tournament officials disqualified an all-girls team for incorrectly listing a member as “male” on its roster in violation of tournament rules. The NSSA said that despite initial media reports, team officials said the squad was not disqualified because of physical appearances but because of incorrect paperwork submitted. The NSSA said it was suspending the sanctioning of the Springfield Invitational until a detailed review took place.

In a statement, executive director Casey Mann said Nebraska State Soccer “was founded on the values of teamwork and inclusion.”

Mili hasn’t had to worry about exclusion in the days since her story went viral. Hamm has invited her to her camp this summer, and Mili plans to go. Farivari says he got a call from Columbus, Nebraska, offering the team a chance to play in a tournament there this weekend, free of charge.

Thursday night, according to Azzurri coach Mario Torres, Mili’s teammates plan to cut their hair after practice as a sign of support for her.

Mili is kicking a soccer ball around again and playing with her friends. She seems ready for things to go back to normal. “I want to forget about all this,” she told Omaha ABC affiliate KETV.

Burgett isn’t sure when things will be normal again, but he has no plans to help out with soccer anymore. “I don’t have the passion for it right now,” he says.

For years, when he handed out medals at the tournament, he choked up with emotion. He’s not quite sure why a strict military man would do that, almost cry when a kid received a medal. He just did.

“I’ve had angry parents, angry coaches when I’ve refereed,” he says. “But I’ve never felt that I had to protect myself.

“My wife and daughter are worried right now. They’re just worried because we’ve never been in this situation.”

9 June 2017 | 10:25 am

Source : ABC News

>>>Click Here To View Original Press Release>>>

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