A Lady of Wealth and Cultivation (Patreon)

I dunno. It's been a while since I posted anything outside of my regular series, but this kinda dropped fully formed out of my head Sunday morning. I think it might go somewhere if I put time into it. But I do have two series in publication and a third that people already enjoy, and and a fourth on hiatus, so...

ANYWAY! This was lots of fun to write! I've been thinking about trying my hand at one of them cultivation yarns for a bit, but since I'm too proud to do anything by the numbers I ended up putting it in an 18th century Europe kinda setting, which apparently means that I have to write it like babby's first imitation of Pride and Prejudice.

The following would probably be the opening chapter. I don't think needs any content warnings, except possibly for overdone prose. I'll put some thoughts for what the story would be about at the bottom, thought they'll be pretty spoilery for what would be the first arc or two if I continue. Enjoy!

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This is not a romance.

You might be forgiven for thinking so, considering that my marriage and its circumstances are fairly central to events. But, no, this is no tale of courtship and budding love. Despite the difference in our ages, I will not be rescued from my spinsterhood by some young scoundrel fresh out of university — not because the descriptions do not fit, but because that would imply that I was in any way discontent with my unmarried state. But neither is it a tragedy. Once I got to know the man to whom I was eventually wed, I actually grew to quite like him, and we held a great deal of friendship and affection for each other. But no such grand emotion as passion. There shall be no yearning.

Knowing that, you will find it easier to accept that neither is this a tale of a villainess being redeemed by the tender heart of some unexpected lover. I mention this since we will begin with the night I robbed my future husband, and you may well be tempted into thinking so. For one, I most certainly was never a villainess! When I participated in that one spot of brigandage, it was out of loyalty to a friend and a constant, desperate need for money, and nothing else. I did not enjoy it, and even if it did not have the consequences that it did I certainly would not have found myself with any desire to ever repeat the event. I was quite ashamed of myself, if you must know. I was also dressed as a man, and doing my utmost to convince my victims that this was, in fact, what I was. And though dear Allard was ever a libertine with a very ‘love and let love’ approach to life, I am quite sure that I was the least feminine person he ever lusted after. Not entirely certain, but quite. There was no meeting of eyes, mine masked and his filled with fiery indignance; no spark igniting an ember which lay stubbornly ignored until it lit a flame which would no longer be denied.

You’ll have to forgive me. My dear sister was ever fond of romance. I may have picked up some ideas from her through unwilling exposure.

But no, this is not a story of love. It is a story of dragons and magic, and of the dual quest for power and immortality through the media of wealth and cultivation. I, Emestri Carielle née Sartarian, am your humble protagonist. I bid you welcome, and hope you will enjoy my tale.

*

On a warm summer’s night, in the woods only a handful of kilometers outside the grand harbor city of Haven, I stood with my rapier bared. My pistol was drawn in my off-hand and aimed at the door of a well-appointed carriage — one of the smooth-riding ones, with large, spoked wheels and leather thoroughbracing for suspension, and with flat, even glass in the windows. Inside the carriage sat two men, currently peering sullenly out one of said windows. Outside was myself, Scarlet and Silver and the rest of Scarlet’s crew, as well as the carriage-driver and two guards that they had pinned to the ground.

Nobody had been hurt beyond some bruising, which I thanked the stars for. Scarlet had promised that they wouldn’t be, but this was literal highway robbery. A single mistake was all it would have taken.

I was, as I mentioned previously, dressed as a man. It was easy to pass myself off as that gender — easy enough that a woman more attached to her feminine identity might have been embarrassed. I was tall for a woman, if only average for a man, with a wide set to my shoulders and a strong jaw. My clothes were fine but a bit slovenly, as though I were one of those gentleman robbers trying to put a veneer of culture on his villainy. I’d really gone all out, too; tall, black riding boots and dark blue breeches; a frilly white shirt; and an embroidered waistcoat and long jacket in a slightly lighter blue, to complement the breeches. I’d even crown-braided my hair so I could hide it under a fashionable, roundbrimmed hat. With a bit of solid binding and a loose shirt, only my hips really gave me away as a woman, and with my pistol pointed at their faces, the two gentlemen in the carriage really should not have been dropping their eyes that low.

I was also wearing a cloth mask over my eyes and brow, in the hope it might make me even further unidentifiable. I had no idea who these men were, other than they were rich. Scarlet had been hired to rob them for the sake of a small box they were supposed to be carrying, and preferred I did not know their names lest I lose my nerve.

“Come on, now, gentlemen,” I said, keeping my voice as low as it would comfortably go. “Your money and your replaceable valuables, that’s all we want. Your health is safe so long as you cooperate, as is anything of sentimental value. We’re here for cash, not treasured family heirlooms. So do us all a favor and open that lock before I’m forced to shoot it out, would you?”

I could also just smash in the glass and turn the lock myself, but Scarlet had recommended against it. Far too much risk of cutting oneself, she’d said, and then there might be traces of my blood left behind. The stars only knew what might happen if a sufficiently determined robbery victim got that into the hands of one of the city’s few sorcerers, and not even the Ascended could help us if they were to contract a disciple of one of the colleges. Not that we had any colleges in Have, but the duchess was always playing host to a handful of disciples — had to keep good relations with the demigods, after all. And while hiring one of them to track down a robber was severe overkill, I’d heard of worse. It could be done. It would cost a fortune, but the man we were robbing, Scarlet assured me, was from a family which could afford it.

And being from a similar family myself, I truly could not risk the social fallout for my family if I were to be found to have robbed one of ‘our own’, so to speak. Robbing the common people a crown at a time, that was to be expected. Robbing a young gentleman of the aristocracy at gunpoint, well, that was quite another. Father would never live it down.

Oh, did I not say? My father was count of Varian, and I, his heiress. I should perhaps have mentioned that from the start — it will be quite important going forward. As for why we resided in Haven, two days’ ride from the nearest edge of our county and three from our seat… we’ll get to that.

Now, where were we? Ah, yes! The robbery. Men at gunpoint and all that.

“I don’t see why we should just roll over,” one of the men in the carriage said. This, I found later, was Allard’s dear friend Malec Tallery. I’d never met either man at that point — though if I’d been less stressed I might have seen Allard's resemblance to his father, whom I’d met regularly over the years — but they were life-long friends and partners in all sorts of petty crime. Malec was ever the more belligerent of the two. “If you fire your pistol,” the man I did not yet know to be Malec continued, “then it will be the two of us against the one of you.”

Malec was the more belligerent; Allard the more intelligent.

“There are at least three more of them out there, Mal, and probably more,” the other man, the one I was later horrified to recognize as Allard, said tiredly. “And he has a second pistol under his coat. See the bulge, there? Besides, he could just position himself so he shoots one of us and the lock in one go. Just… open the door and let’s get this over with. It’s only money.”

“It’s the principle of the thing!” Malec argued. “Pride, and such!”

“Most admirable, young sir,” I said. I put some steel into my voice, though my tenor made me sound no less than five years his junior. I shifted my aim toward his head. “I’m sure the Ascended will hold your pride in the highest esteem.”

“Hold! Hold, damn you!” Allard called. He pushed himself past Malec, and there was a click from the door, which swung open lazily. “Stars above, Mal, it’s not worth getting shot over! Do you know what I’m paying for this carriage? It would be a fortune in cleaning and repairs!”

Malec snorted at that, and I was surprised to see him smile, small and relieved. But I didn’t know either man at that point, nor the dynamic of their friendship. As for me, I didn’t question it. I was no less relieved than the belligerent man. I’d been planning to fire and ‘miss’, hoping to scare them, but I truly did not want to hurt either man — and you never could tell with shattered glass and splintered wood.

“I applaud your good sense, sir,” I told Allard, stepping back. I still had my pistol on them, and my rapier at the ready in a low guard. “If you both would be so good as to step outside and divest yourselves of your purses and any jewellery not of historic value, my associate will search the inside of your carriage.”

That was, of course, the moment Malec chose to be brave rather than clever. As he came down off the step he pretended to stumble, and when he straightened again he drew his smallsword with a flourish, a hot challenge in his eyes.

I really don't know— well, I do know what he was thinking. It's just not very complementary to him, so I shan't recount it. It doesn’t matter anyway. He might have ten centimetres on me in stature, but with my rapier I had twenty more in reach. Not that I needed it; I was just better.

Malec thrust. I parried, pushing his point out of line while keeping my own on him. He disengaged around my blade, as I’d been confident he would, and in one movement I slid my point forward so it rested on his shoulder, trapped his blade between the barrel and trigger guard of my pistol, and forced his blade over my own, out and away, leaving it at a right angle from the both of us. Then I simply pushed down with the pistol and up with the blade, leaving Malec with two choices: drop his blade, or have his wrist broken, then drop his blade.

He chose the first. His weapon clattered to the ground, and in the next moment I had the point of my sword at his throat, my gun pointed at his friend.

“Are you quite done?” I asked, pretending a calm that had abandoned me hours earlier. “If you’ve expressed your bravado sufficiently, you may sheathe your blade and stand over there with your friend. There's a good lad.”

He had the temerity to be sullen about his instant defeat. School-boy fencers. I swear.

With the two gentlemen suitably humbled, the process was quick. The men and their escort grumbled that they’d remember us, and that the law would catch up one day, but did nothing foolish. The horses tossed and snorted, but one of Scarlet’s girls kept them calm enough, and Scarlet herself found the box she’d come for hidden in a secret compartment. Both men looked surprised at its existence, offering no particular complaint.

Everything was going remarkably well until the goblins attacked.

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Feel free to let me know what you think!

SPOILERS FOR GENERAL IDEAS FOR THE STORY:

Much of the story would be driven by two events over which the main character, Emestri, has very little influence: an arranged marriage, and becoming a cultivator.

The marriage, as Emestri herself tells us right at the start, would not be a cause of any kind of suffering. Neither she nor Allard would be particularly happy about it, but they'd also both recognize that and be willing to work together to make the best of the situation — which would essentially mean that they'd be spouses in name only, but ones with a great deal of friendly affection for one another.

The other part, with Emestri becoming a cultivator, would entail her having to choose between becoming a disciple to and being the (mostly) mortal agent of a dragon, or getting eaten. Hard choice, I know. She'd have to think long and hard about that one. It would mean her catapulting to being one of the most powerful people in the city, but since she would not be connected to a College (My Sects Are Different) she'd have to hide her status as a cultivator lest someone kill her ass dead on sight.

Oh, and she'd be able to eat and refine gold into qi. That bit's important. The whole "Wealth and Cultivation" thing, you see. Gotta be able to cheat somehow.

Expect any and all techniques to be dragon themed, and to occasionally involve physical transformations, possibly permanent. Because why not get some magical girl evolution in here, too? 'tis the season, apparently.