Whether the court be that of an ascetic relic of an age gone by, or one which swore fealty to a renegade king of illegitimate birth, there were always obsequious fawners. Men and women who flattered unrepentantly and seemed to serve no purpose beyond swelling a sovereign's (often already considerable) hubris. Estevan Mendoza, the first of his name, King of Segovia and would-be conqueror of the entirety of Bocacielo, had wasted no time in weeding them out and replacing them with those he trusted. It just so happened that the majority were considered scandalous for one reason or another. Illicit links, sullied reputations, fortunes lost or stolen-- there was not a soul amongst them who could honestly claim clean hands. What was patricide to them? They were a demi-monde group he elevated in his own scramble for power, whose pasts he overlooked and forgave in return for their loyalty, and<i>perhaps</i>, he thought, considering the man kneeling before him, the fates had delivered another to his door.<br/><br/>The night beyond the castle's sandstone walls had barely cooled from its sunlight swelter, and even with the windows flung wide, no breeze stirred the air to alleviate the stagnancy. Sweat prickled the nape of his neck beneath collar and hair, left a sheen on a tawny brow prematurely lined. He'd set aside formality to sprawl in his chair louchely, linen shirt unlaced at the throat and clavicle, without even the faintest pretense at caring about what might be considered the glass of fashion. Not that it mattered, here in his study. He'd had the vitamancer escorted there under guard, rather than address him before a cautious crowd. Even a court full of miscreants might be alarmed by a creature such as this.<br/><br/>"I came across one of your kind in my adolescence," he confided, chin settling on the back of his knuckles. "An old man who looked almost a corpse himself. He'd drawn quite a crowd, and my companions and I had arrived expecting to see some horrifying fable brought to life. We were rather disappointed when the garrote did its work and he died like any other man. No grisly resurrection, no wailing souls or twitching abominations come to save him. For years I thought the stories must have been embellished. That necromancers were a fiction whispered by the supersitious commonfolk and the religious zealots wielding fear like a whip. But then I travelled. The tales varied a little of course, depending on the region, but the underlying theme never did. Monstrous amalgamations of the miserable dead, warped into abominations that feel no pain and fight for as long as the nails hold them together."<br/><br/>There was strange faience to his eyes courtesy of the candlelight, their hybrid grey-green almost lost to the amber glaze. His attention was uncomfortably intent, a fixated viper, keen and hungry, seeking out Orsa's through the veil of his hair.<br/><br/>"Someone who could bring the strength of an unfeeling soldier to my armies would be a valuable addition indeed." It was a silky admission, cool and deliberate. "The fear is another thing entirely. A double edged blade, if you might forgive the cliche. What inherantly scares the opposition could just as easily unnerve my own men."<br/><br/>He did not urge Orsa to rise. There was a cruel pleasure to be taken in testing the limits of a defiant man, and Eestevan recognised one with a measure of pride. For now, he merely left the silence for his petitioner to fill. Perhaps he might offer some remedy to the dilemma he'd proposed.