Streets of Hope

Since you didn't tell Meris about the final fates of other Heirs and Heiresses, are you still testing her? How long has it been since finding another candidate that reminded you of Solomon? What else does Meris not know about you?

"If the Seal were just any other mark of office, our initial interview would have sufficed. My guard would be lowered and I would become complacent in my service. While the interview has ended, the life of an Heir is one of trials and tribulations. If the trials are passed, the Heir's worth is reinforced. If the tribulations are survived, his skill is confirmed. What they are is specific to each Heir and not the sort of thing to be divined or speculated on. They will manifest at the opportune time.

Based on the date of my encountering Meris, it has been four hundred years since my finding someone of an adequate pedigree. Oliver Cromwell was his name, and his fall from grace was regrettable. I had groomed a nameless member of the gentry into a recognizable member of the House of Lords - only to watch him wrest all laurels from a crown he unjustly coveted, citing moral, religious and political imperatives that I was too late in recognizing as covers for unfettered greed. I held and still hold that a Statesman must act in service of his people, but Oliver posited that the citizens of the British Crown should respect the Lord Protector's power. I poured water in the proverbial wine for years on end, but the vicissitudes endured by Spanish colonists in the Caribbean at his behest repulsed me.

In the end, I gave him a king's death before he could twist his Freemason brethren into an irredeemable Infernalist cult. A urinary tract infection and malaria both did him in. Meris has no need to know of the ways in which I may end those who do more than simply disappoint the Court. Mere disappointment only means we shall part amicably, should this ever arise - but those who make a mockery of my master's goals and do so in full awareness of their actions will suffer the fullest extent of my wrath."