Gold Throne in Shadow by M.C. Planck

arm’s reach. The habits of a lifetime asserted themselves, and she dropped to one knee, spreading her arms in supplication. “I swear my service, my lord. I will bind my future to yours, for as long as you will have me.” The shining in her eyes made it hard for him to concentrate, and the abject surrender of her pose completely unbalanced him.
    The women working in the shop grew still and quiet, while Torme struggled not to stare. Karl, of course, was just Karl.
    â€œI suggest you accept, Christopher,” he said conversationally. “Wizards rarely pledge fealty beyond apprenticeship.”
    â€œThen—why?” Christopher could not fathom this sea change in the woman.
    â€œYour advance is rapid,” Torme softly explained, “and your purse is generous. Many will kneel to clutch at your cloak, to climb up the ranks in your shadow.
    â€œNot all will pledge to your cause, as I have,” he added with only a very little defensiveness, “but there is no shame in pledging to your rise. The crumbs from your high table are fortunes to the low.” The cost of rank doubled every step; for the price of Christopher’s last promotion, they could have made thirty-two first-rank wizards.
    â€œI’m not going to be promoting people willy-nilly,” Christopher objected in plain contradiction to the fact that he had been promoting ordinary craftsmen since he’d first gotten his hands on tael. “I’ve got big plans, and I need all the tael I can get,” he said with just a little defensiveness of his own. After all, craft-ranks were a fraction of the price of a professional one, and their skills were necessary to his schemes.
    But Fae was part of his plans, too. He needed her magic, and she knew it. He had already made this commitment and accepted responsibility for her career when he’d hired her away from Flayn. “What does this bind me to?” he demanded angrily.
    â€œYou are bound to promote her as her service warrants,” Torme said, “or so is the rule in my experience.” Torme had the most experience, having been both warrior and priest now. “Of course, there is sufficient wrangling over the niceties to strangle a pig. I cannot imagine it would be less so with wizards.”
    â€œDo with me as you will, my lord,” Fae said, and arched her neck in submission, exposing her fine white throat. Christopher had the very concrete experience of being trapped between a rock and a hard place.
    â€œGet up, Fae,” he growled in defeat. He wanted to lather on the disclaimers and exceptions, but he knew it wouldn’t matter. No speech he could give would trump their ancient customs. In the brief flash of her eyes as she stood, he thought he saw something like genuine happiness, and his tongue was stilled.

    â€œYou should probably promote Torme, too,” Karl suggested that night over dinner in the chapel. The stone hall, still the biggest room in the village, no longer served as sleeping quarters for a gang of boys or as a chemical refinery. Without conscious intent on Christopher’s part, it had become the center of his empire. For a medieval lord, that meant it served as reception, lecture, and dinner hall. Mealtimes were not such simple affairs here; a lord showed who mattered and who didn’t by who got to sit at his table. For Christopher, this had grown to be a very large table. “A first-rank would be adequate to the ordinary scrapes and bruises the regiment sustains on a daily basis.”
    â€œCost,” Christopher grumbled through a slice of bread. His lurking distrust made the argument seem more compelling, at least to him.
    â€œA strange Church you have, Brother, that promotes wizards ahead of priests.” Christopher couldn’t tell if Svengusta was really objecting or just bringing the topic up to be dealt with before it rotted into something truly ugly.
    â€œI do not question,” Torme