Quoted By:
“Tell me about Hayner, kid. His order’s in the tourney, but his house is half of the oversight committee. Sounds like a raw deal for everyone else. There must be something you can say…” You ask. As usual, you’re blunt with the questioning. Alphonse gives you a look, and you know he’s not going to budge…
“I can’t divulge anything relating to the Hallowed Hunt or House Hayner with respect to tournament operations. Rest assured, this legal obligation is for your benefit, it’s to avoid the collusion you’re fearing, not feed into it. The royal guards are also acting independently in oversight, they all keep eachother in check.” He says, cordially. You’re about to roll your eyes in defeat, but then, that spark in his eyes seems to appear once again. He lowers his head. “But, for the record, while I have a legal obligation to House Hayner, I have an obligation to you as well. Strategy, goings-on, I’m not allowed to relay anything unofficial about the Storks. However…” He pushes up his glasses. “It may be prudent to release some details, not now, but after the first round. Build a “narrative”, fuel that story. I can tell you with certainty. You’re unknown to almost everyone attending. Even the majority of the orders think the Storks are meant to fail, to spice up the first round by giving their opponent a big win early. Having no reputation can prove worse than having a bad reputation in this battlefield. There’s rivalries, and most of these rival match-ups are saved for the second and third rounds. As they say, the enemy of my enemy is my friend. If you make an enemy, you can have a friend, here.”
Kid sure knows how to get your attention. “And what of these narratives? Do you have an opinion?” You emphasize the wording of opinion. He nods, understanding.
“Your first opponents are favorites to win, as are Hayner’s Hunters.”
“What about the royal orders?”
“They never win. Popular sentiment always wants them to fight eachother. The Kingsguard and the Queensguard, bitter rivals, what a show! It’s always the rival battle of the first round, and the losers never attempt a sponsorship, could you imagine? A royal order sponsoring beneath a noble one? They’ve got too much pride for that. Someone always picks off the straggler. They’re formidable orders, but nobody ever has them down to win.”
“What makes Hayner so favored?”
“Nothing. He owns the city, I see the sentiment regarding him as the product of, well, a narrative he himself built. He’s been the house’s patriarch for some thirty years now. I know this sentiment well. Sometimes the Hunt performs well enough to win, and the story is that it’s the ethics of how he’s ruled his claim. Often, they lose, and the narrative becomes that his opponents were desperate and dishonorable. See? With the power of a lord and a repeatedly insistent narrative, it’s like you can never lose!”
<—>CONTINUED<—>
