A Game of Kings

One hand rested lightly on Kallen's crimson locks, barely touching her. In the early days, Andrew had to guide her, but that wasn't necessary anymore. She'd taken him in her mouth often enough to know what he liked. The feather-light touch was meant to signify his control over her; not to actually control her.

The other hand was wrapped around the thin waist of Milly Ashford. He turned his head away from Kallen and towards Milly, leaning in for a kiss. She eagerly replied, meeting him halfway. Tongues intertwined- and Milly's mouth swallowed his groan as Kallen dived deeper as though to say 'Pay attention to me!' A glance at her showed her glaring at Milly- not at him. Never him.

The hand on her head scratched her scalp gently, both in appreciation and as a sign that he hadn't forgotten her. It encouraged her to go even further, plunging until she choked on his member. She knew he liked it when his women sacrificed her pleasure for his own.

Not to be outdone, Milly wrapped herself around tighter, placing his arm between the valley of her generous bosom. An attempt to exploit one of the greatest advantages she held over her chief rival. The other was, of course, her pedigree.

Andrew- and every other living Britannian- was involved in a great game of sorts. Their society was a meritocracy aligned with the Darwinistic principle of survival of the fittest. The ranks were laid out clearly- royalty, nobility, commoners, and numbers- and the chance to climb the ranks was also laid out for those clever and enterprising enough to take it.

Numbers could become commoners by submitting the paperwork to become Honorary Brittanians. Commoners could prove themselves worthy by excelling at certain tasks- typically militaristic or bureaucratic- and become nobles, who in turn could marry into royalty.

People could climb and become great on their merits- but Andrew was self-aware enough to know that he didn't have many merits. He was a man of middling intellect, lacking the decisiveness needed to excel in either the military or the government. A job at middle management would be the height of his attainments at the best of times. He anticipated no great feats in his future- and no title of nobility.

Through that route, at least. There was an alternative route to becoming ennobled, one that required a wholly different skill set than the other. It was marriage, and Andrew's success in this route depended entirely on his ability to seduce an heiress. If Andrew could get an heiress to fall in love with him and convince her to marry below her station, he could become a noble through her.

At first glance, Kallen Stadtfelt appeared perfect for what Andrew had in mind. Common knowledge had that she was fragile in body and temperament. Kallen was often ill, which caused her to miss school frequently. When she did appear, she was demure and quiet, with impeccable manners.

Altogether the archetypal sheltered rich girl- perfect for a husband looking for a trophy wife. Once her father, Duke of Stadtfelt-Wasser, died she'd inherit his title as his only child, and with it, she'd attain one of the richest provinces in North America and a booming real-estate empire.

In addition to her inheritance, the girl herself was quite the catch. She was gorgeous, with unmarred porcelain skin, blood-red hair, and eyes that changed from stormy-grey to a dark blue depending on the lighting.

Unfortunately, Andrew wasn't the only one to notice what a catch Kallen was. It seemed as though half the men at Ashford Academy had been gearing for her. Consequently, Lady Stadtfelt had gotten a lot of practice identifying gold diggers and rejecting them. Andrew lasted less than ten minutes in a conversation with her before she politely but firmly told him she wasn't interested.

The rejection stung, but there was little that Andrew could do about it. He bowed out as gracefully as he could and considered his options. While Kallen had been perfect, she was hardly the only noble lady in the world. Perhaps he could try his luck with someone else- or if everything else failed, honest work was still on the table.

He hadn't made up his mind when he met V.V. and got his geass; something he was glad for. He'd have hated to waste his time. After getting his geass, his choice became very easy to make.

After the initial meeting, Andrew remembered reaching out to V.V. to ask why him. The power to make people believe everything you say was a powerful one. Why would V.V. give it to him?

In response, V.V. told him about the Geass Order. According to him, they were a super-powered branch of the Britannian Special Forces commanded directly by the Emperor. They had a wide range of powers at their disposal; among them precognition. A few months ago almost all of the pre-cogs threw up red flags, warning of an incoming disaster.

The best way to avoid said disaster with the fewest unintended consequences? Giving Andrew a geass.

Andrew had been intrigued and asked what the disaster was. If V.V. had been telling the truth and had been working for the Emperor, Andrew would have happily helped- in exchange for a title of nobility, of course.

V.V. hadn't answered directly, instead telling him of the biblical story of King Cyrus. Cyrus had been a Shah of Persia who had expanded his empire to take over Babylonia, where the Jews had been enslaved. The Persians didn't practice slavery and so as an afterthought, Cyrus freed them and let them go home to Israel. It hadn't been his initial intentions- he had been invading to further the interests of Persia, the empire he was ruling. Helping the Jews was an afterthought, but he still helped them. The moral of the story was that on occasion, good things happen as a tangential consequence of someone pursuing their self-interest.

V.V. told Andrew that he didn't need to know what the disaster was- in fact, the pre-cogs said that the results were better in the scenarios that he didn't know what he was fighting against. By using the geass to pursue his self-interest, Andrew would avert the crisis even without intending to.

Andrew had been dubious but was cognizant of the fact that he was talking to the head of a special forces unit. It wasn't his place to question, especially given how powerful V.V. had already proven to be. If V.V. wanted Andrew to use his power for his own benefit, then Andrew wasn't going to complain. V.V. wasn't telling him to do something he didn't want to do, after all.

The very next day, Andrew sought out Kallen. Immediately, things became clear to him. V.V. had been onto something with that Cyrus analogy.

Andrew had first noticed something was amiss when he made Kallen strip out of her uniform. She had a fantastic body, with a chiseled physique that sang of a very active lifestyle. Wasn't she supposed to be sick? Andrew asked- and the answers shocked him.

He let his gaze slip away from Milly and back to Kallen, awarding her a warm smile that contrasted sharply with his next words. "You make a fantastic cocksucker. If your mom was half as good, I can see why Duke Stadtfelt decided to abandon his pride to marry an eleven." From anyone else, the words would have been taken as an insult, but nothing Andrew said could be taken badly by Kallen. She smiled at being called a fantastic cocksucker, happy that she'd pleased him.

It turned out that Kallen was a fraction- an unofficial category in the social hierarchy.

Britannia was a mostly monogamous society, with exceptions made for the powerful. The Emperor, for instance, had ninety-seven consorts. Nobles weren't nearly as prolific, but the more powerful men tended to keep harems. It wasn't uncommon for these harems to include 'exotic' women- or in other words, numbers. The children of these couplings were called fractions; half-Britannian noble and half-number.

How highly they ranked in society tended to vary based on their father's favor, as well as on how Britannian they looked. Those who looked completely Britannian- like Kallen- tended to racially pass as full Britannians and got treated better as a result.

Fractions were more common than one might imagine, but Andrew hadn't ever heard of someone like Kallen. Kallen was unique in several ways. Her parents being married was the main one, but perhaps even more striking was Duke Stadtfelt's subsequent decision to marry an infertile woman so that Kallen could be adopted into the main family and made heir. It was a decision that spoke of love... and of foolishness.

While Duke Stadtfelt had done a good job hiding Kallen's heritage, the truth would forever hang over her family's neck like the Sword of Damocles. If ever revealed, the family would stand to lose everything, from their title to their wealth. A fraction couldn't inherit, after all.

Worse still, it was a transitive sword of Damocles. Andrew's claim to power was supposed to be Kallen. Marrying and impregnating her was supposed to secure nobility for him and his children. If it came out that she was a fraction while he were married to her, he'd lose everything alongside the Stadtfelt's.

Compared to that, the revelation of her being a terrorist working against Britannia was a minor revelation. It occurred to Andrew that the cell that Kallen was part of, the Shinjuku Group, might have something to do with the upcoming crisis. Consequently, he'd done his duty and anonymously reported all the details Kallen gave him to the police. The day after, the news showed the entire cell had been eradicated.

It didn't make a splash, for all the potential ramifications. Whatever the group might have accomplished in the future, at present they were small and disorganized. Destroying them had been a quick fight; not the spectacle that the news searched for. They moved on quickly, and Andrew followed them in forgetting about the Shinjuku Group.

His thoughts were instead spent on how to get around this predicament he found himself in. He had been fucking Kallen on the side because whatever else she might have been, she was still a very attractive woman. The revelation of her heritage had soured him on the prospects of actually marrying her, however.

Instead, he'd started to search for an alternative bride. It didn't take him long to find Milly Ashford, a buxom blonde who had the opposite problem of Kallen.

Kallen had the titles but not the bloodline. Milly had the bloodline, but not the titles.

The Ashford's had been awarded peerage three generations prior by the Emperor for military service. They grew rapidly, becoming one of the pioneers of the Knightmare frame and even sponsoring an Empress, before falling just as rapidly with the of that Empress. They were censored, stripped of their titles, and exiled to Area 11.

That should've been the end of the Ashfords, but with his help, it didn't have to be. If he acted subtly enough, he was sure he could get them their titles back- and then take control of said titles through Milly.

The options were open to him, he just had to decide on a course of action. It would be a year until he graduated- a year until he could put either plan into motion. Speaking true to his indecisive nature, he put off the decision making until the last moment. This choice presented Kallen and Milly an opportunity to earn his favor and sway his decision in their favor.

Neither of the women were fully aware of the details, but they did understand that their status was at stake. They understood that the coming months would determine which of them was going to be standing beside him in a white dress and calling herself wife, and which one was going to be serving as a mistress. They understood they would have only one chance at this and that this would determine their fates. And they understood that all was fair in love and war.

Let the games begin.

This story was commissioned by Earl Hardrick. Right now, I have too few patrons to do the patron prompt poll, so I'm giving all my patrons one free commission. This is what the Earl chose to spend his on.

If you want to see another chapter of this story, you can wait till next month or you can support me at patreon.com/malkuthze. Or you can commission something else entirely. Up to you.