I proceeded to the queue to get processed and drew some aghast looks from the aide and some security guards.
“What?” I asked, half to Treth and half to the aide.
Treth shrugged. The aide leaned in and whispered conspiratorially.
“You don’t need to queue, Ms Drummond. You are a special guest! Please, this way…”
“What about my weapons?”
The aide didn’t show an ounce of concern. Seems that the checkpoint was basically just to prevent stationary theft. I looked a bit sheepish as I observed the rest of the queue for their reactions. They didn’t seem perturbed by my special treatment. Torn between a desire for fairness and the undeniable benefits of skipping a queue, I decided to go with the latter and followed the aide.
A security guard opened a gate next to the queue and I followed the aide towards it, just as a guard stepped in front of me.
I prepared my wittiest jab, until I noticed that he was wearing a Crusader branded cap.
“Last Light! Sorry to bother you, but…” he took off his hat shyly and held it out towards me. “Could you sign this please?”
You might think I would sigh in a situation like this. But, of all the pressures of being a celebrity, this was one I didn’t mind too much. There was genuine admiration in this man’s eyes. And a sincere joy as I used a marker to sign my Conrad-approved signature onto the cap, next to the Crusader’s Aegis and Ithalen logo.
The guard thanked me and then saluted. I somehow managed to not blush as the checkpoint went silent, watching me disappear into the bowels of this den of bureaucracy.
“Do you sign a lot of merchandise, Ms Drummond?” the aide asked, sounding half curious and half anxious to keep to his employer’s schedule.
“Only when I’m around a lot of civvies. Monsters seldom carry a pen. Mostly, people want photos, which can be a bit inconvenient when I’m covered in guts.”
The aide grinned. Slightly, but there was some humour there after all.
“Tell him about that guy who tried to get you to sign a dozen t-shirts. All of them being Conrad’s discontinued warrior princess design,” Treth insisted. It appeared that while he seemed to age physically, and now sported a dark blonde goatee, he had become increasingly childish.
The aide finally stopped by a dark wooden door and knocked twice. A muffled voice on the other side bade us enter and the aide opened the door for me.
The Chairperson was, in practicality, the leader of the State of Good Hope. The leader was much more than a mayor, less than a president, and somewhat superior to a prime minister. Between keeping the Council respectable, making the first and final decision on all matters of governance, and being, effectively, the top dog of the State of Good Hope’s government, the Chairperson was, arguably, the most powerful person in the country.
As such, I had expected a larger office.
Riaan Haggenort sat at a plain wooden desk, topped with a desktop PC, three thick tomes on civics and law, and one of those metal balls physics thingies. There were two floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, lined with tomes similar to those already on Riaan’s desk.
Riaan stood to greet me, and I couldn’t help but recall my preconceptions of him. Timid. Nervous. An uninspiring candidate who had won by default. Riaan was not a popular politician. He did not have that xenophobic populism of the late Radebe, or the appeal to the reasonable majority that Jane had boasted.
Riaan was a scholar. He had written an apparently interesting treatise on the effects of lawmancy on a modern republic. Colin probably would have found it interesting.
There had been many doubts about Riaan, including calls for re-election. But, in the interest of maintaining the favour of the Spirit of the Law, and because finding new candidates would disrupt the fabric of Hope City yet again, Riaan was now our dear leader.
Well, we weren’t dead yet, so he had to be doing something right. Still, Jane would have been better.
“Good morning, Last Light…Ms Drummond,” Riaan stammered, just a bit, as he considered which was more appropriate.
“Ms Drummond is fine. Rifts, just call me Kat!”
Riaan seemed a bit shocked at my casualness, but smiled, before indicating a seat at his desk. I sat down, adjusting my sheathed short-sword and holstered pistol to make myself more comfortable. I hadn’t expected to be allowed them during this meeting. But it was always nice to have them on me. Never knew when a rift could open up and swallow you whole. Trust me. I know!
“It’s good to finally meet you, Kat,” Riaan continued. “Personally, I would have liked to have had this meeting sooner. But, we are both busy officials…”
Following his election, I had put down a dozen undead outbreaks and put all manner of beasts in the ground. I wasn’t sure his form of busyness was the same.
Riaan visibly fidgeted, his gaze falling on the metal orbs slowly clicking away as they swayed this way and that.
“I must ask, Chair…”
“Please, call me Riaan. It’s only fair. And we are a modern republic. Social niceties and titles belong in days long gone, or in Europe today depending on whom you ask.”
“Riaan,” I continued, mentally shelving his reference to the budding feudal societies popping up in central Europe. “I understand the delay in our meeting perfectly well, but I must ask: why meet at all? I know it isn’t customary to meet with hunters. Even agency heads. You have not met with the leaders of Drakenbane or Puretide. Why me?”
Riaan, very much unpolitician-like, frowned. He lacked that cold calculating exterior that Jane had excelled at. In a way, he was a lot more sincere. But that sincerity revealed something that I couldn’t help but note. He wasn’t leadership material.
“I think it is common knowledge that you are not a usual hunter in this city of private contracting…” he stopped to consider his words. “Which puts you in a privileged position. For good or ill…”
I got the impression he believed the latter. Great!
“I am not a fan of my celebrity status, Riaan. Perhaps even less a fan of it than you are.”
Riaan showed some subtle surprise, but then seemed to calm a bit, as his shoulders relaxed.
“That is…refreshing to hear. But, like it or not, you saved the city. You became the Last Light. And Ms Phoenix’s marketing didn’t help to maintain your humble status. I know you are friends with her. And that you backed her for the position I now hold. That is something I personally found distasteful. Not because you backed her, in particular, but because a private citizen was made to hold too much sway over the politics of this city.”
“Is that any different from hiring a publicist?” I retorted, crossing my arms just a bit defensively.
“A publicist helps to spread a message. But Jane, whom I have a lot of respect for professionally, used your fame to win votes. It was akin to tabloid-electioneering.”
“Jane was a politician, yes. And she and almost every other candidate in this city perhaps do not represent the ideal of democracy that you hold dear. But do not think that Jane didn’t have principles. A message. She believed in the importance of freelance monster hunting in keeping this city safe. It’s a belief I shared. And I spread that message alongside her.”
Riaan frowned again. He reached out slowly towards the metal spheres and caught one, stopping the chain reaction. The click-clack of metal stopped.