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"I can't believe all this is happening," Louise finally managed to get out. The room was probably spinning for her. Guiche, getting an order of knights? Her Servant becoming the unofficial threat that her queen held over those who would be disloyal? A rumor about her majesty being indiscreet that Henrietta had agreed to start herself? It looked like just as with combat, Louise was going to be starting at the deep end and learning in tried and true sink or swim manner. I resolved to use our tea drinking custom at the end of each night to help her get a handle on it later. "I thought you hated politics," she finally settled on accusing me. "What happened to preferring blunt?"

"I do hate politics, and I prefer bluntness," I told her directly. "But I've been screwed over enough by back door deals like this that I eventually had no choice but to pick up the basics, if only so that I could keep from being manipulated too much by them." My face serious, I continued, giving her a stern glare that caused her to flinch. "And the sad part is that you too are probably going to have to get used to things like this. Whether you like it or not, eventually people are going to find out about you. Someday you're going to have to keep an eye out for manipulative people trying to use you from the shadows."

She gulped. "This was not what I was expecting at all," she sighed, looking once more very small despite her recent growth spurts.

I put a comforting hand on her shoulder. "Don't worry, Master," I assured her seriously. "As always, I shall be your sword, defending you from those who would deal you harm. This is nothing more than one more avenue of attack. Those who would seek to use you in this manner I shall deal with as I always have."

"No killing faceless manipulators until we're certain that her majesty won't need them anymore," she told me absently, before blinking and realizing the absurdity of what she had just said. "I can't believe you've corrupted me this much," she mumbled sinking her head in her hands. "You were right. You're a terrible influence on me."

I grinned, my familiar half smirk. "Well, on the plus side, now that I'm a noble I can finally stop treating everyone around me without kid's gloves." Louise blinked, not understanding what I was saying, but definitely not liking the implications. "Before hand there was always the worry that if I killed whatever idiot was threatening you that I would have to deal with the consequences of a commoner raising a blade against a noble. Now I can just issue a challenge and stick a sword in them from the front!" Louise's eyes widened and she let loose a horrified 'eep' as she realized I had just attained a viable justification for slaughter with impunity. "Now," I murmured, accepting the belt that the maid had just returned with, "I wonder where I can find that idiot Wimpfenn."

Though Louise didn't seem to take that very well, from the dagger in her eyes as she approached with the newly rewritten appointment letter, Henrietta seemed to find this an agreeable course of action.

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6154638/17/