by House Alexin (Posted February 2nd, 2012, 2:04 pm)
Since his return from Kaitain the younger of the Alexin siblings had been surprised by how much his views of the planet had changed. He'd left Gansireed terrified by the thought of the Imperial homeworld, yet now he found himself disdainful of the untamed world. Even his relationship with his sister, with whom he had once been extremely close (the loss of their father and brother had made a strong relationship between them a necessity), seemed to have changed in ways he couldn't define.
Despite having arrived on the planet a few days earlier, he was bored with the underdeveloped wretched world that existed on the edge of poverty in the galactic backwaters and had resolved to return to Kaitain via the next guildship.
Not for the first time he wondered what things would be like if he had been the elder sibling, could he have done better? He thought so, but wasn't sure. Despite his loathing for the planet he had begun to second guess the actions of the Baroness.
On Kaitain a man could live a happy life, from the pleasure gardens that littered the southern hemisphere to the refinement of the Imperial philharmonic orchestra he was never short of entertainment. Had he been 'running the show' he would have encouraged the growth of such ventures on Gansireed, instead of wasting so much money on housing the pyons and other liberal projects.
As he paced around the starport, waiting for guests to greet, he sported one of his more expensive outfits. A white shirt, patterned with ornate gold-coated thread that wove itself into fantastically elaborate patterns, frilly white collar, a gold coloured silk cloak with small diamonds worked into the fabric and pants to match the shirt. As with all of his expenses he was reimbursed the cost of the outfit by his sister.
Like many diplomats he was prone to fiddling his expenses list to cover the cost of one or two luxuries. If he was remembering rightly, this outfit had gone down as the cost of s a luncheon with wealthy businessmen who may or may not invest in Gansireed and as several bribes. He didn't feel any guilt for scamming money out of his own House, in fact he felt it was worth it. After all, He looked splendid and was confident he would make a good impression on anyone he met.
When the Imperial delegation arrived he knew it would be a few minutes before the Baroness would turn up to greet the princess. At the time he couldn't have said what force compelled him towards the princess, but he did. In fact he ran down the empty corridors. As hurriedly made his way down a corridor he noticed the troop of guardsmen the Lady of the House would use as an escort for the princess Irulan.
He was at least two foot from the thirty men he stopped dead and snapped “Follow me” over his shoulder. He may not have been on the planet for a while, but most people still recognised him from his coming of age celebrations a few years earlier, and so the troop naturally fell in behind him.
The young man strode confidently through the final few corridors and into the imperial presence and imagined he made an impressive figure. Dressed in gold, diamonds reflecting any light to give the illusion he glowed and at the head of thirty uniformed soldiers. Each man had fell into position and marched in perfect synch with his comrades. Each wore a crisp rust coloured uniform with a tangelo coloured sash and silver metal scabbards at their sides.
The young nobleman strode towards the princess and dropped to one knee with a flourish of his cloak and a reverent bow of the head. The princess instructed him to rise, moving as elegantly as possible, he snapped his fingers by way of instruction for the troop of men to assume their position around the Sardukar troops. The Alexin troops caused a slight stir as they pulled their rapiers from their scabbards and held them vertically before them, probably under prior instructions from the Baroness or that oafish Ludwig – a crude attempt at theatrical flare.
“Princess, please accept our humblest greetings. I am Anton Alexin, I've had the honour of being in your presence during sessions of congress. The Baroness is on her way to greet you but the thought of your grace waiting all alone was intolerable!”. Taking in the sight of the princess he felt a masculine stirring that would be inappropriate on this occasion, so he hurriedly continued, “So I have assumed the honour of greeting you myself”.
As he spoke he became dimly aware of just why he had rushed ahead of the Baroness, he wanted to be the Baron, and the favour of the Imperial princess was an excellent first step towards that goal. While his words spewed out he promised himself that when Shaddam forced his sister to step aside for the man of the House, he would leave his sister to run the back water world while he lived on Kaitain.
(( Edit: Had to edit, the previous post was wrote in five minutes and sucked! ))
Read Main Topic 