Beautancus
Well-Known Member
The August Novelization
Of Princes And Prices
Of Princes And Prices
The view afforded upon the uppermost of the Princely Estate's balconies was, to say the least, amazing. Though he'd had the better part of a decade to become accustomed to it, Patrycjusz Ignacy Mniszech- Patryk to those that knew him personally, still found some small part of his serpentine mind that held this singular perch in high regard- as something majestic, perhaps belonging more to an age bygone.
Nearly every night that he'd spent in the Estate, which had begun its illustrious history as the residence of the mayor of Old Hrodino, he'd found, or in most cases, made the time to step out upon his personal refuge from the labyrinthine world of bureaucrats, plutocrats, stratocrats, and most recently technocrats that he held rather questionable sway over. Even on raw and damp winter evenings such as this, he stepped through the great cedar and crystalline glass Franconian style doors of his "personal" (in that he rarely allowed the more official sort of state business to occur within those finely paneled four walls) office, and out onto the exquisitely ornate balcony.
A fine haze hung over The City- Cassiopeia, which shared its name with the country- a mixture of every possible sort of precipitation, both natural and man-made. That haze created an eerily beautiful and, in Patryk's opinion, entirely unique aura for the sprawling metropolis. As a youthful "Republican" partisan, he'd held a much different opinion of the haze that had clung to Old Hrodino's skyline. In those days, more often than not, the haze had been due to the various fires that raged throughout the city, which at that time had been home to one of the oldest, and most draconian Royal Houses in all of Europe. Ironically, he'd been one of the bitter child-soldiers who'd ignited some of those fires- in the name of equality, and freedom. He'd even fired upon this very building as a young man, though no living person remained to let that secret slip.
Now...life had schooled him on the necessities of sovereignty, and though he still remembered the long-dead monarchy with utter contempt, he understood some of what those old jackals had done in their quest to maintain an orderly and "prosperous" society. Despite that slightly impersonal contempt, which had decades ago been nothing less that zealous hatred, Patryk had been amongst the first of the die-hard Republicans to accept the necessity of negotiating with the remnants of the old szlachta for the soul of what had once been the Kingdom of Międzymorze. There had simply been too much blood spilt, too many sons and daughters of the nation sown into the earth, for the conflict to rage on a single day longer. And after all, the King and his line had been extinguished, and the hard-hearted warlords that had waged war so well on their behalf were willing enough to accept a peace that was at least somewhat palatable for both sides.
Through that acceptance- and the lifetime of public servitude that followed, he'd become the first former "Republican" partisan to be elevated to the highest office of The Most Serene Commonwealth. Truly, it had been a scandal at the time- April of 2002- when the Electorate had chosen him to become Cassiopeia's Prince...but it had probably done more to heal the last, lingering festering wounds of the Civil War. Not that his bad knee didn't still ache- especially in this sort of cold, shattered as it had been, by a well placed 7.62x39mm hollow-point round.
Glancing down at the nearly priceless watch on his thick- farmers- wrist, a Skamieniełość time-piece, and without a doubt from the best designer brand that Cassiopeia, or Międzymorze, had ever produced, he sighed. The hour had grown late, and his postponed address before both the Electorate and the Senate would have to be delivered tomorrow. There wouldn't be enough of the Hajr-style coffee (that he swore by) in all the world to set his mind alight in the morning if he didn't turn in soon. Likewise however, there weren't enough Coronadic cigarettes (that he considered the best in the world) to set his mind at ease tonight. A full pack worth of them bore silent testament to that, twenty or more gold-flecked cigarette butts stood bunched together in the simple ash-tray on the table beside him.
Lighting one more, and exhaling fully into the frigid sub-arctic air of the Cassiopeian night, his mind touched lightly on all the points that he would attempt to pound into the minds of that fickle lot of business-men and would-be politicians on the morrow. If Patryk were to maintain his position beyond April, which he fully intended to- he would have to convince the lot of them of the necessity of yet more radical changes in the manner in which The Most Serene Commonwealth viewed, and conducted business with the wider world.
It was all damned fine and good to continue using models that had been proven acceptable, and efficient within their own borders, but everything beyond that was as much quicksilver, constantly coalescing into dynamic new forms and schema. Still, he had all confidence in his oratory...it just came down to keeping the bastards on the same course long enough to establish the order which he, the Prince of the Most Serene Commonwealth of Cassiopeia, wished to see born- on all foreign shores, on all distant mountaintops and valleys.
The price for seeing that course taken would no doubt be high.