Anastasia, Servant of the Pattern, nodded and tried vainly not to smile at her father's discomfort. "Yes, Father. It is the the wish of The Pattern that you and Mother take Their place."
As he turned away to begin pacing the garden path, Janelle looked from Random and Vialle, to him, and then to their daughter, "But, Ana, we both have always been very clear about our wishes in this matter. It's not something we want."
As she started to respond, the silence was broken by the sound of a single hoofbeat on marble. Suddenly, there by the fountain that bore her image, stood the Unicorn of Amber.
The silence seemed to stretch on forever while they all watched in reverent awe as the Unicorn moved to stand in front of Benedict. After several minutes of staring Her in the eye, he nodded and turned to Janelle with a sigh, "Well, Grasshopper, it looks as if you will once again be my Queen."
With a nod and a toss of Her head, the Unicorn wheeled around and disappeared back into the trees.
Looking supremely distressed at the retreating Unicorn, Janelle muttered, "I told you we should have stayed in Avalon." Turning to Random, she sighs, "How soon?"
"I guess today is out of the question..." he said with a hopeful look at Janelle, which quickly turned to something else when he saw the look on her face. "Ah, next week. We would like to step down next week. That gives us a chance to notify everybody and bring you guys up to date on what's been going on since you were here last." He looked from Janelle to his eldest brother, "Aw, come on guys. It's not like we're leaving you in the middle of a crisis. It's so quiet around here it's boring."
Vialle cleared her throat softly, "Random..."
He scowled briefly, "Oh, well...it's not anything, really. Just little things that will probably straighten themselves out. Hell, if Janelle talks to her brother, she can probably have this whole fall off in trade thing with Chaos staightened out over dinner. As for Begma and Kashfa, well...they're always fighting among themselves. Nothing to concern ourselves with, all they're doing is posturing and yelling insults at each other. Flora's handling it. Julian's raising a ruckus over some campfire that got outta hand and scorched a grove of his precious trees, the fishing fleet says that their average catch is down and our siblings are all a pain in the ass." He looks up at his brother and shrugs, "See? Bullshit stuff."
Janelle glared at him and Benedict growled, "The 'bullshit stuff' is one of the biggest reasons we aren't real thrilled with this, Random."
"Well," he said, trying not to gloat as he helped his wife to her feet. "The choice is outta all our hands now, isn't it? Look, you guys had your time to be left alone and raise a family, now it's our turn. We'll leave you alone now to get used to the idea and I'll tell Flora she has a shin dig to plan."
Anastasia looked to her parents and smiled, "It will be alright. You'll see. Would I willing deliver my parents to an awful fate?" She hugged them both and, with a wave of her hand, disappeared from the garden.
Janelle waited until they were alone and laid her head on Benedict's shoulder, "I don't want to do this."
Wrapping his arms tightly about his wife, he whispered in her hair, "Neither do I. But as my brother so generously pointed out, the choice is no longer ours. Look at it this way," pulling back slightly, he tilted her chin up so he could see her face. "We, who have conquered worlds, can surely handle the 'bullshit stuff'."
Janelle studied his face carefully, "Benedict..."
"I said we could handle it," he chuckled quietly and began walking her back into his gardens. "I didn't say we were going to like it."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
As they crossed the formal gardens, Vialle stopped and turned to face her husband, "I couldn't help but notice that you did not tell them everything."
He looked around to make sure no one was around and leaned over to whisper to her, "Well, no," he said a little guiltily. "But they aren't happy about this and if I told them every little unimportant thing now, Unicorn or no, they'd graciously decline and you know it."
"That's a bit selfish, don't you think?"
"Well of course it is," he grumbled.