The academy letter looked expensive enough to qualify as a minor noble.
Thick cream paper. Blue ribbon. A royal seal pressed into silver wax.
I held it up to the morning light.
"Think they'll refund the packaging if I bring it back?"
Mother smiled over her tea.
Father did not.
Veronica took the letter out of my hands.
"Your assessment date is in ten weeks."
"Assessment?"
She unfolded the second sheet.
"Written examinations. Practical evaluation. Placement interviews. Etiquette review."
"I thought getting a system meant I could attend."
"It means you qualify to apply," Father said.
I stared at him.
He drank his tea.
That man had excellent comedic timing when he wasn't the victim.
"So the last thirteen years of tutoring were what? A free trial?"
"Preparation," Veronica replied.
Then she placed a stack of books beside my breakfast.
It was taller than the teapot.
I looked at Mother.
She buttered a piece of toast.
"Eat well, sweetheart."
Betrayal looked lovely in emerald green.
Hold on a damn minute. I was the protagonist, wasn't I? Shouldn't this be more fun?
Where was the mysterious invitation delivered by a beautiful elf? The entrance exam where I accidentally shattered a legendary testing crystal? The ancient headmaster taking one look at me and whispering, Impossible?
Apparently, my grand destiny involved homework.
I had kept the faith for eighty-eight years, died, crossed dimensions, and acquired a magical rocket launcher just to find myself studying for standardized testing.
Somewhere, the universe was laughing its ass off.
"Something amusing?" Veronica asked.
"I'm questioning the pacing of my character arc."
"Question it after breakfast. Geography begins in twenty minutes."
History came first.
Not the enjoyable kind with heroic last stands and kings dying in increasingly creative ways.
Trade routes.
Succession disputes.
River access.
Veronica pinned a large map of Cambria across the study wall and handed me a wooden pointer.
"Berken."
I tapped the familiar shape near the continent's center.
"Capital?"
"Crownstead."
"Major eastern trade route?"
"The King's Road through our province, then northeast through Dorkchestire toward the Veyran border."
"Why does that matter?"
"Because merchants use roads."
She folded her arms.
I sighed.
"Because imported iron, salt, and grain travel through those roads. Closing them affects food prices, weapons production, and how quickly the crown can supply troops."
"Better."
I had spent years memorizing names.
Apparently, now I had to understand why anyone cared about them.
Inconsiderate.
Berken shared its eastern frontier with the Veyran Dominion.
On our maps, a strip of wooded uplands between the two countries was called the Gray March.
According to Veronica, Veyran maps called it western Veyra.
That seemed like the sort of disagreement that eventually required shovels.
"Who owns it?" I asked.
"That depends on which century you find most persuasive."
"Wonderful."
Berken claimed an old royal grant.
Veyra claimed older settlements.
The people actually living there apparently claimed they would appreciate being left the hell alone.
For decades, the frontier had remained mostly quiet. There were arguments over grazing rights, customs fees, and the occasional patrol wandering somewhere it shouldn't.
Recently, those arguments had acquired bodies.
"A Berken customs officer was killed last autumn," Veronica said. "Two Veyran collectors disappeared during the winter. Each side insists the other is responsible."
"Are they?"
"We don't know."
I looked at the thin red line marking the border.
On paper, it seemed so clean.
No mud. No frightened villagers. No man with a bow insisting he had orders.
Just a line.
I remembered other maps from another life.
They had looked clean too.
North of Berken lay the Karsen Holds, a collection of mountain territories united by an elected high thane and a mutual dislike of being told what to do.
They sold us ore, worked metal, and sturdy mountain horses.
We sold them grain, timber, and access to southern markets.
Our relationship was friendly in the way two people holding opposite ends of the same ladder were friendly.
Nobody wanted the other to let go.
To the southwest, the Lyran Compact controlled a chain of wealthy cities along the River Lyr.
They possessed bankers, barge fleets, and contracts long enough to serve as emergency bandages.
"Are they allies?" I asked.
"They are trading partners."
"Meaning?"
"An ally might help you because you are in danger. A trading partner will first check what helping you costs."
"Honest people."
"Frequently not."
Beyond those neighbors lay territories I knew mostly by reputation: forest principalities, independent cities, scattered kingdoms, and a southern coast whose harbors connected to seas nobody had mapped completely.
Cambria was one known landmass.
That didn't mean anyone understood all of it.
"Then why do people talk as though the world ends at the coastline?" I asked.
"Because ships that travel far enough stop returning."
I lowered the pointer.
That was considerably more interesting than customs duties.
Veronica handed me a book about customs duties.
Cruel woman.
Dungeons made the political map stranger.
They weren't just holes full of monsters waiting patiently for protagonists.
A reliable dungeon meant resources.
Materials. Skill books. Specialized goods that ordinary craftsmen couldn't reproduce.
That meant jobs, roads, settlements, taxes, and arguments about who deserved the taxes.
A weak dungeon near a village might support a small adventuring trade.
A powerful one could change the fortunes of a province.
"Can anyone enter?" I asked.
"Usually after registration and payment of applicable fees."
"Of course there are fees."
"There are also rescue services, road maintenance, guards, record keepers, and people who dispose of what adventurers drag outside."
That sounded depressingly reasonable.
Some dungeons remained under direct royal control.
Others were administered by noble houses or chartered guilds.
A few disputed sites had already produced small wars.
I looked at the Gray March again.
Veronica noticed.
"Yes," she said. "There are dungeons there."
Naturally.
Nobody ever fought over a barren patch of dirt that was conveniently free of useful things.
Father joined one of our afternoon lessons carrying a dispatch.
Veronica stopped speaking when she saw his expression.
That got my attention faster than a shouted warning.
"Another caravan delayed?" I asked.
"Turned back."
"Bandits?"
"Veyran officials."
He set the folded paper on the desk.
"New inspection requirements. Three additional customs charges. Goods held until payment."
"That's robbery with a nicer hat."
"Sometimes government is a matter of hats," Father said.
Veronica almost smiled.
Almost.
I pointed toward the map.
"Are we going to war?"
Father didn't answer immediately.
That was answer enough to make the room feel colder.
"We are trying not to."
"Does the crown think they're preparing?"
"The crown thinks several things. The difficulty is deciding which are true."
He drew a finger along the eastern road.
"Armies require grain, draft animals, leather, iron, and money. We watch for unusual purchases. Changes in garrisons. Roads being improved where trade does not justify the expense."
I understood that language.
Logistics.
The quiet machinery behind the noisy part.
"Have you seen those things?"
"Some."
"Enough?"
"Not yet."
I asked about the slavers.
The question had been sitting in the back of my head since the map went up.
"They were operating along a major road. Moving prisoners. Stealing expensive deliveries. Does that connect to any of this?"
Father looked at Veronica.
Then back at me.
"We found evidence of several buyers. Some local. Some outside Berken."
"Veyran?"
"Possibly."
"Possibly as in you don't know, or possibly as in I'm fourteen?"
"Both."
Fair.
Annoying, but fair.
"People will try to use uncertainty," he continued. "Someone will tell you those men prove Veyra is our enemy. Someone else will tell you there is no connection at all. Neither statement is supported yet."
I thought about Milo.
About the way he had offered to eat less.
It would have been easy to choose an enemy and pour everything ugly into their name.
Father seemed to read that thought.
"Knowing whom to blame is not the same as knowing whom to strike."
I nodded.
For once, I had nothing clever to add.
That evening, Milo found me staring at the map.
He carried an empty basket from the kitchens.
"Is that where the school is?"
I pointed to Crownstead.
"Here."
"Far?"
"Far enough that Veronica can't throw a fireball at me from home."
He considered that.
"Could she ride after you?"
"Let's not give her ideas."
He smiled, then studied the eastern border.
"What are the little flags?"
"Places where people are arguing."
"There are lots."
"People are very committed to it."
His finger stopped near Bellweather.
Veronica had marked it at my request.
A tiny black square.
Too small to hold everything that had happened there.
"Will they rebuild?" he asked.
"I don't know."
He nodded as if he'd expected that.
Then he adjusted the basket against his hip.
"Lottie's learning her letters."
"Already?"
"She can write my name."
I looked away from the map.
"Show me."
There would be more lessons tomorrow. More borders. More dead kings explaining why living people had to be angry.
For tonight, a six-year-old had written her brother's name.
That seemed like history worth attending.