Monarchic Nemesis Revealed

Sir Angel Joe is writing his memoirs.  He's become quite a popular hero back in the Wild Parliamentary Monarchy; apparently one of the reasons he was attached to this particular delegation rather than given a posting on his home soil was that he was very unnerved by the attention he was receiving.  The poor chap couldn't walk down the street without being recognised.  Complete strangers wanted to come up and touch him.  You can see how this would have interacted badly with Angel Joe's already fractured nerves.

But now that he's been away for a while, and is feeling a bit better, he's decided to write his memoirs.  He's hoping that people will stop asking him questions if his memoirs have been published, especially if they're published while he's still away from home.  All the details of his heroic mission will be there in the public record, but he won't be around for interviews, so (he hopes) everyone will just read his memoirs, and by the time he returns he'll be uninteresting and everyone will leave him alone.

Consequently, he's been talking a bit more about his mission. Angel Joe finds it difficult to express himself in prose, so he came up with the idea of dictating his story to himself on a digital recorder, and then he takes his own dictation.  He does a lot of wandering around muttering to himself (so does Zebulon, but Angel Joe isn't crazy), and sometimes he tries telling bits of his story to someone first, so that if he skips over something or is somehow unclear, his audience will tell him.

So we've learned where Angel Joe and Winidavefred the badger were sent on their mission.  This is something AJD and I had been wondering about.  We knew that the Wild Parliamentary Monarchy and the Wild Republic are on good terms, so it didn't make sense to us that the Wild Republic would have stolen sensitive documents from the Wild Parliamentary Monarchy; but we didn't know whether there were any other candidates for the Wild Parlimentary Monarchy's natural enemy.

Now we know: the Wild Parliamentary Monarchy is the sworn enemy of the Wild Fascist Dictatorship, which is governed by a tyrannical, power-mad sheep named Ebenezer Popcorn, whose bloodthirsty ambition is equalled only by his personal insanity.  If you're thinking a sheep could not possibly be that convincing a dictator, and that a carnivore would be a more likely candidate, think again.  Carnivores have to be very careful, you see, lest they make herbivores uncomfortable.  Herbivores have rather more laxity and sometimes feel like they have something to prove.  Ebenezer Popcorn is just such a sheep.  He carries a spiky staff and has a habit of randomly slamming into anyone unfortunate enough to be in his immediate vicinity.  He's also very paranoid, frequently spontaneously deciding that those closest to him are conspiring against him and then thinking of creative ways of executing them.

You do not want to get taken prisoner by Ebenezer Popcorn.  Angel Joe's torture sessions were overseen by the infamous Popcorn himself, and he is one of the few to live to tell about it.  No wonder his country holds him in such awe.

The Investiture; or I Hereby Dub Thee Sir Angel Joe

Ever since the arrival of the Wild Parliamentary Monarchy, there have been rumours afoot that Angel Joe was going to be knighted for his service to the Crown - that same service that left him severely traumatised and permanently if only slightly disfigured.  These rumours were confirmed earlier this week, when a special medal for Distinguished Service arrived.  The official ceremony of investiture was held this afternoon, and naturally we took pictures of the entire thing.  So many pictures.

Now, under ordinary circumstances, a knighthood of merit would be conveyed by the Monarch, but in this case the honoured recipient is away from home on another assignment, and so the Monarch is unable to be present and the ranking members of the delegation are officiating in the Monarch's stead.  The Wild Republic has graciously allowed the use of their facilities on this solemn and august occasion.

This was taken shortly before the ceremony, once the audience had all been seated.  I don't know if you can tell, but a great deal of attention went into the seating arrangement here.  

They're more or less seated by rank.  In the upper left corner by the dais are the members of the Wild Parliamentary Monarchy who are not participating in the investiture; on the other side are the ranking members of the Wild Republic, many of whom have not previously been featured in pictures on this blog.  After them come the ordinary members of the WR, in approximate order of rank, and then the young ones are all grouped at the bottom.  Alcindarias, the griffin, kept himself a bit aloof, as is typical.  He's a member of the Wild Free Alliance of Mythical Beasts, not the Wild Republic.

Here, look how attentive they all are.

Here are the ranking members of the Wild Republic.  You don't hear as much about them because they're largely retired.

Seal in front there is the highest-ranked Wild Republican in our local chapter; the Fox, to his left, is also of very high rank.  Behind them you can see Casper and Seymour, who are retired.

Now the procession is underway.  Alfredo, as the head of the local Wild Republic chapter, is the official host for the occasion, so he's leading the procession, followed by Lord Twilby, the only peer present.  Note that Beppe managed not to call out to his father as Alfredo went by.

Now that Alfredo and Lord Twilby are in position (Twilby is on the side where the Wild Parliamentary Monarchy delegates are seated), the officiating officers, Sir Theo and Lady Faraday, are making their way to the dais.

Angel Joe, of course, entered last.  Sir Theo seems to have given him a few words of support when he reached the dais.

The ceremony was opened by Alfredo, as the official host.  He didn't really have much to say, so we didn't take a picture.  The first real speech was Sir Theo's, and it wasn't really all that interesting.  Actually, it wasn't interesting at all, although it was very inspiring.  It was all about honour and valour and rigour and other virtues of that nature - not Angel Joe's specifically, you understand, just sort of in the abstract.

Beppe got bored.  He was really only interested in his father's speech anyway, so once Alfredo was done, he decided to take off.  No one stopped him, partly because he was at the back and partly because the adults were all just a little bit worried that he'd try to join his father on the dais or something and cause an International Incident.  Averting an International Incident was much more important than having Beppe at the ceremony.

Now, to be fair, Beppe wasn't the only one of the kids who got a bit bored.  You can see in this picture that Vim and Flurry are having some sort of conversation, Khamsin is doing... something (actually, I'm not sure quite what he's doing), and Rebus has fallen asleep facedown.  Tibby, though, despite his youth, is paying rapt attention.  Imperial penguins love ceremonies; it's in their blood.

But then it was time for Lady Faraday to give her speech, and everything suddenly got more interesting.  She is less long-winded than Sir Theo, and she got the better material: her job was to relate the stirring story of Angel Joe's heroism to all present.  The only creature present not paying attention was Alfredo, who was wondering where his son had got to.

It turns out that Angel Joe had been on a very serious and highly dangerous mission to recover some vital stolen documents from enemy headquarters.  The documents were encoded, but they contained state secrets, and if the enemy had had them long enough to decipher them, they would have learned the identities and code names of all of the Wild Parliamentary Monarchy secret agents, among other highly classified information.  Angel Joe, along with his partner (a badger named Winidavefred who, like Angel Joe, is no longer a field agent), was tasked with their perilous retrieval.  They successfully snuck into enemy headquarters and stole the documents, but they were unable to sneak back out without attracting attention, so Angel Joe bravely created a diversion to enable Winidavefred to escape with the documents safely.  As part of the diversion, he arranged his own capture and was held as a prisoner of war.  Winidavefred, fortunately, made a safe escape, and reported to his superiors the fate of Angel Joe.  The Wild Parliamentary Monarchy sent some of their best agents to raid enemy headquarters and recover Angel Joe.  He was still alive, but had been subjected to terrible torture in an effort to get him to reveal state secrets; however, he had refused to talk.  Upon his return home, Angel Joe retired from active field duty and became some sort of cultural attache instead.  He has recovered from most of his physical wounds; his whiskers had been taped to his face, and although Pedro was able to successfully free them, the tape cannot be removed and will mark him for the rest of his days.  In addition, he suffers from severe PTSD and has lost the ability to shift his coat with the seasons.

This story was a big hit with the audience, naturally, but the most exciting part of the ceremony was the investiture itself, which was also performed by Lady Faraday.

After the investiture, everyone cheered long and hard.  They cheered so long and so hard, in fact, that they scared Plouie and he fainted.  This was probably to the good: it eliminated the other potential for an International Incident.

Unfortunately for the audience, this was not the end of the ceremony: Lord Twilby had yet to give his speech, which was all the historical importance of this momentous occasion.  Here you can see the audience already getting restless and Twilby is still in the middle of his opening remarks (which are about how he is going to keep his remarks brief).  See how the kittens and baby polar bears are starting to creep away? 

Twilby went on speaking for like forty-five minutes (I asked Lady Faraday afterwards if that really was "brief" for him, and she winced and said yes it was).  He looks awfully cute, though.  I really like Twilby's "I'm Being Rhetorical Here" pose.

Here the youngest animals are all sneaking off, except for Mahler (who is old enough to feel he needs to stay put), Navarre (who feels he must stay for the honour of lions, and is also too far front to sneak out inobtrusively), and Tibby (who is totally eating this up; he's paying attention to Twilby every bit as closely as he did to Lady Faraday).  Poor Navarre; he looks so bored and woebegone.  The younger animals are not the only bored audience members here, though.  Hrithik, next to Navarre, was listing state capitals in his head the whole time.

Here's the other side of the aisle, with the tail end of the exodus of the younger generation.  Cami, like Mahler and Navarre, felt he had to stick out. 

He's actually paying better attention than the adult members nearby.  Barry and Gilly are busily whispering anagrams of everyone's names to each other, while Parsley tries to figure out what on earth they're talking about.

But Twilby's speech didn't actually last forever (only forty-five minutes), and eventually the ceremony ended with a very dignified recessional march.  You'll note that the audience is conspicuously smaller than it was at the beginning of the ceremony, and that Plouie is still unconscious.

Now Angel Joe - or rather Sir Angel Joe - has this awesome medal.  It says Avag Co Bepsig and everything.

Afterwards, there was a reception for everyone.  Well, not quite actually.  The younger animals who left the ceremony early didn't realise there was a reception, so they weren't there, and Plouie sort of never woke up. He's kinda still there.

But everyone else certainly went to the reception, which was a great success.  The main hors d'oeurves were field mice, at Sir Angel Joe's request.  Here the other attendees of rank are congratulating him while everyone else mills about.  The Ice Age animals are sticking together and kvetching about how different these things were in their day (more bonfires, more spears, less speeches) and the three remaining younger cats are trying to eat as many field mice as possible.  Good times.

I don't know how well you can see this, but there are some poker chips over there under the papa-san, sort of by Nicodemus's hind quarters and Leprosy's snout.  When the reception was dwindling, and Angel Joe had been whisked off to a special dinner with various high-ranking individuals, Magick and a few of the others decided to put those poker chips to good use.  I'll tell you all about how that went later.

A Charming Tale of Friendship and Romance

Once upon a time, some years ago, a new class of students began their tenure at the most venerable and exclusive public boys' school in the Wild Parliamentary Monarchy.  Among the class were two young cats who could not possibly be more different.  One of them was the eldest son of an ocelot baronet; he was dutiful, responsible, and impeccably well-mannered for one so young.  The other was the eldest son of the eldest son of a panther marquess and clearly destined for a life of trouble, even at such a young age.  When their classmates started teasing the baronet's son for his overly proper mien, they fully expected the marquess's grandson to join in, but he surprised them by taking the baronet's side.  And so began the highly unlikely friendship of Tristan Rivers (Sir Tristan, upon the death of his father) and Ruthven Jet Shadewater, later Lord Ebonwood, known to his schoolmates as "Magick".

There are two key elements holding Sir Tristan and Magick together.  The first is that, despite their many differences in opinion and character, they have rather a lot more in common than one might at first suspect.  They were, for instance, easily the two most intelligent members of their class, which meant that they found each other much more interesting company than the rest of their classmates; they also had interests in many of the same areas, from the arts to politics and diplomacy.  The second important factor in their friendship was that they complemented each other very well in a number of ways.  Sir Tristan was responsible for ensuring that Magick did not slack off on his studies and performed at the level at which he was capable, while Magick ensured that Sir Tristan had a bit of fun.  In short, they balanced each other very nicely and were intelligent enough to appreciate it rather than fear it. 

 The greatest test of their friendship came about after they had left university and had begun their training for a career in diplomacy.  Among the other newbies was a formidably brilliant young serval named Lady Faraday Pebble-Stone, the daughter of an important earl.  She was clearly destined for greatness every bit as much as the boys were, and the three of them swiftly became the best of friends.

(Left to right: Sir Tristan, Lady Faraday, Lord Ebonwood.)

The next phase of this drama, of course, is entirely predictable, given knowledge of the general character of the particulars.  Females, especially intelligent females, were already one of Magick's great weaknesses, so he, predictably, began pursuing Lady Faraday.  Since females tend to have a corresponding weakness  for Magick, and Lady Faraday was quite definitely female, as well as already very fond of her two new friends, she was quite susceptible.  Sir Tristan was terribly in love with Lady Faraday himself, but elected not to compete with his best friend, not least because he had far less experience with females and suspected that, being quieter and less flamboyant than his friend, he was unlikely to be successful with any female Magick already had his eye on.

Nevertheless, the relationship between Magick and Lady Faraday did not last all long, as they swiftly discovered that they were not particularly compatible as romantic partners.  They decided to return to simply being friends and cheerfully explained to Sir Tristan (and others) that they were rather confused about the whole affair.  Everything went back to the way it had been before.

Sir Tristan, of course, was still desperately in love with Lady Faraday, but he was too conditioned by the expectations of behaviour for a gentleman of his class and station to actually tell her about it.  Eventually Magick realised what the score was and started trying to coax his friend into revealing his feelings for her.  Being a rake rather than a gentleman, Magick found the situation rather exasperating, especially as he was coming to suspect that Lady Faraday was in love with Sir Tristan herself, although she, of course, being a lady, was much too genteel to show it. 

After a number of conversations with Sir Tristan explaining that, as Lady Faraday was a lady, he really did need to make the first move (these conversations were tremendously frustrating for both parties), Magick accepted an assignment in India.  Since the other two were still posted locally, they started spending more and more time in each other's company.  Even then, they might well have gone on pining for each other oh-so-politely, except that Sir Tristan accidentally dropped one of his (highly embarrassing) sonnets praising the intelligence and wit and beauty and talent of Lady Faraday, and she found it.

Exactly what happened next has never been revealed by either party, both of them being immensely proper and private individuals, but they've been together ever since.

Sir Tristan and Lady Faraday are difficult to photograph together because of their characteristic poses, but we did our best.

After a while, Sir Tristan was posted to the Wild Republic, which forced him and Lady Faraday to carry on their romance long-distance.  They wrote each other letters every week, (rumour has it that Sir Tristan's letters often contain sonnets, while Lady Faraday prefers haiku).  Nevertheless, the situation was less than ideal, particularly given that the Wild Republic had made Plouie Postmaster General to keep him out of trouble.  Every now and then Plouie would happily present Sir Tristan with a bundle of six or so of his own letters to Lady Faraday.

But when their superiors decided that Sir Tristan's mission had been so successful that a full diplomatic delegation should be sent to the Wild Republic, the lovers finally found themselves reunited.  Lady Faraday requested to be included in the delegation; she now is sufficiently high-ranked that she has a measure of choice over her assignments, and this one is suited to her rank and talents as well as advantageous to her personal life.  Magick somehow found himself attached to the delegation as well.  Thus the trio of best friends has been reunited, to their considerable satisfaction.

And, of course, Sir Tristan and Magick are still the very best of friends.

The Wild Republic Meets the New Delegation

On Wednesday night, while the Thundersnowstorm raged in the background, the Wild Parliamentary Monarchy was formally introduced to the Wild Republic.  They'd been staying in the south room until they'd had a chance to recover from jet lag and Alfredo and Sir Theo had had an opportunity to confer for a few days, but now everything was in place for their visit.  We made certain to document this historic event.

First of all, we got a group picture of the eight members of the delegation from the Wild Parliamentary Monarchy.

Back row, left to right: Lady Faraday, Viscount Twilby.
Middle row, left to right: Lord Ebonwood (Magick), Nicodemus, Sir Tristan.
Front row, left to right: Sir Theo, Dr Pedro, Angel Joe.

It's really hard to photograph Magick so that he doesn't look like a void of darkness; it's probably highly symbolic.

The leaders of the various factions had a small summit meeting while the rest of the groups were getting to know each other.  Here you can see Sir Theo, Alfredo, and the Fox.

Neither of the canines is particularly small; Sir Theo really is that enormous.  He's about the size of a pillow.   In addition, he's incredibly wise; you can see it in his face.  This combination makes him approximately the cuddliest creature in all of the cosmos.  Holding Sir Theo and having him put his giant paws on your chest or face is guaranteed to make you feel better about life.

Nicodemus was delighted to discover that he's not the only ungulate around.  He really hit it off with Parsley, in particular; they spent quite a while chatting.  Then he met Rochester, and discovered he'd found a friend for life.  Rochester is, in some respects, not particularly sophisticated: he has this thing for head-butting.  It's a sign of affection with him, actually.  So far we've been unable to train him out of it in even a tiny way; we haven't even been able to convince him not to terrify the more sensitive members of the group, like Cami.  He doesn't understand how anyone would fail to understand how affectionate he's being if he head-butts you.  Nicodemus also really likes head-butting, however, so the two of them will doubtless have numerous happy hours together.  This might take the pressure off the members of the group less keen on this particular bonding activity... or it might make it worse.  Too soon to tell.

Here's Nicodemus and Rochester, demonstrating their newfound friendship.  You can see Laszlo in the background (Nicodemus was very impressed with his equipment); Laszlo's okay with head-butting, but doesn't show the same marked enthusiasm for it as the other two.

 The one we're really worried about, of course, is poor Angel Joe.  We've worked out a bit why he's here, and what happened to him: he was on some sort of highly dangerous secret mission, in the course of which he was captured and tortured and left seriously traumatised.  He is to be knighted for his service, although the official ceremony is still some time away.  AJD, with the assistance of Pedro, was able to successfully extract his whiskers from their confinement, but the tape will remain forever, unfortunately.  And the psychological damage is much worse.  The Wild Parliamentary Monarchy has been very solicitous of Angel Joe since his rescue, appropriately so; they sent him here on an easy assignment in hopes that he might have a chance to heal.  He'd been kept in isolation for a while, but they don't want him to spend the rest of his life cowering in a room alone.

The fact that Angel Joe is willing to go along with this plan when he is clearly mortally terrified speaks highly of his intrinsic bravery.  To put it bluntly, the poor fellow is afraid of his own shadow, and being surrounded by lots of cats and wolves and the like is a major strain on his nerves.  He's particularly afraid of Lord Ebonwood, which is really quite sensible of him, because Magick is pretty scary.  Magick tries to keep away from him for fear of scaring him and tries to look out for him (he might be scary, but he's a fundamentally decent individual), but Angel Joe still cowers whenever they get too close.  Lady Faraday and Pedro are particularly protective of him.

We were very worried at how Angel Joe would react to the Wild Republicans, since a lot of them are kind of larger than life and/or possessed of bizarre quirks.  Fortunately, he quickly found two good friends.  Butterfinger, being a teddy bear, will probably be very good for him; and Cami is as sensitive a creature as one is likely to meet.  He isn't a trauma victim, but he's shy himself.  We suspect their friendship will be good for both of them, as well as being aesthetically pleasing, as you can see here:

Of course, the single most-anticipated meeting was that between Viscount Twilby and the two penguins, and this did not disappoint. Tibby was just so excited to meet a real live owl.  He was jumping up and down, flapping his little wings, and talking a mile a minute in Birdish - such a delight to finally get to speak his native tongue again!  Twilby, for his part, was delighted to meet such an intelligent and earnest little fellow and promptly took him under his wing (...ouch... pun not intended, I swear); he's offered to be Tibby's primary tutor.

As predicted, Plouie went into palpitations upon meeting Twilby; he was so confused that he fell over, and when we picked him up and put him on the iceberg, he promptly fell off and landed on his head.  Being a responsible doctor, Pedro immediately dashed over to him to ascertain whether he was all right. His primary mode of examination involves sniffing you at warp speed, which made Plouie twitch a lot.  Pedro eventually concluded that Plouie was all right, but he's not really sure why Plouie is all right; you could almost see him writing an article for a medical journal.

Twilby took Tibby for a flight around the room, to their mutual enjoyment.  Plouie was not similarly favoured because of the near-certainty that he would start wiggling around in mid-air and fall on his head again.  We didn't get a picture of the flight, but we do have a picture of the birds together.

Left to right: Tibby, Twilby, Plouie.  They've all hit very characteristic poses here, which is kind of neat.

I mustn't forget the cats, since the delegation contains four cats, three of them new, and the Wild Republic already has a healthy feline population.  Much of the local feline population is on the juvenile side, and consequently all three of the new cats were going to produce strong reactions in them: Sir Theo is intimidatingly enormous; Magick is intimidatingly bad-ass; and Lady Faraday is... a girl.  They reacted to these three revelations exactly as predicted.

First, they're all kind of terrified of Sir Theo.  Well, except for Flurry.  Flurry's the youngest animal we have, and he has the fearlessness of some young creatures before they're old enough to know better.  He just thinks Sir Theo is Awesome.  Which he is, of course, but the others are too intimidated yet to realise how essentially avuncular he is.  Sir Theo knew the correct address for lions, which Navarre appreciated - although then he sort of passed out in terror.  He handled Rusty with proper respect for tigers without any deference. 

They also all have a massive case of hero worship for Magick.  You can't blame them, really: he's a confident, mysterious, clearly dangerous panther with a reputation for getting himself into dangerous situations and ladies' bedrooms.  Mahler, being a teenager, is particularly obsequious, but Rusty, who wants to be just like that when he's bigger, is more obnoxious about it.  Magick is basically a good guy; he sees a bit of himself in both of them and this makes him somewhat sympathetic, although he's not inclined to give quarter.  Khamsin he finds more interesting, but the one he seems most inclined to like is Cami, although Cami, being the shyest, has so far kept his distance and conducted his hero-worship remotely.

And then, of course, there's Lady Faraday.  Most of the cats are too young for her presence to be a serious distraction; all of them adore her, but not in a way likely to be annoying.  They're just sweet.  Cami's old enough to have a crush on her, but he's Cami, so he's mostly just sweet too.  The ones likely to be problems are Mahler, who has hormones out the wazoo, and Rusty, who is younger but somewhat precocious.  Fortunately, Lady Faraday knows how to handle these things, and she has both Sir Tristan and Magick to intimidate them into leaving her alone.

Speaking of Magick and ladies, AJD has a little grey cat named Skwidjit who lives on his windowsill.  She's not part of the Wild Republic and doesn't really pay them much attention, although Mahler's had a crush on her for ages.  Magick's already taken notice of her.  She's not his type, but she's the only available female feline around and we're talking about Magick.  He took far too much notice of Sithri when he was in the south room, too.  Sithri's too in love with Skandar to fall for him, but she's a little diva and she's not above generating drama, so I was kind of glad when Magick relocated.

Here we have all of our cats, except the ones who live in my room.  Once again, you get a sense of just how huge Sir Theo really is.

Back row, left to right: Flurry, Rusty, Navarre.

Front row, left to right: Mahler, Sir Theo, Lady Faraday, Cami, Sir Tristan, Khamsin, Lord Ebonwood.

Minor dramas involving cats and fainting Plouies aside, everything seems to be working out well so far.  Here's Twilby in rapt conversation with Tibby, Lady Faraday, and Sir Tristan.

And here's Sir Theo clowning around with, of all individuals, Leprosy:

Leprosy is not the clowning-around sort; think Sam the Eagle from The Muppet Show, and you'll have a fair idea of what he's like.  But he approves of Sir Theo, and apparently this inspired him to chill out for a bit.

Here's one of Sir Theo and Twilby together, celebrating the initial success of their mission.  These two are old friends; they've known each other since their days at university.

Finally, here you can see more or less everybody (the "less" are the Ice and Snow animals, who by this point were all gathering at the windows) all mingling and getting to know each other.  I think they were probably preparing for a Jingo by this point, too.

Wild Parliamentary Onomastics

It took some doing, but we finally figured out the names of all seven members of the new Wild Parliamentary Monarchy delegation.  I am particularly proud of us given that three of said members are felines and two of them also have titles.  

Some of these names are old news, of course, i.e.,

• The capybara is named Pedro, which is a reference to The Twenty-fifth Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee.
• The lynx is named Sir Theophilus Pearl, Bart., commonly called Sir Theo; the surname is a reference to the almost pearlescent quality of his fur.
• The ermine is, yes, named Angel Joe.  It came to me in a dream.  I don't know why.

 Others of them are not old news.

• The goat is named Nicodemus, probably because his nouveau riche parents were trying too hard.  My cousins had a black cat named Nicodemus, so it seemed like a good name for a white goat.  [This is not a complete reconstruction of my thought process, but it's kind of very close.]
• The owl is named Hrothgar Q. Hornbeam, Viscount Twilby.  Since he's a viscount, he'll typically be called Twilby, although Sir Theo addresses him as Hrothgar because they're old friends.  He has graciously given his permission to me to address him thus myself, which makes me very happy because I am uncommonly fond of the name Hrothgar, but I'll probably end up using both names.
• The serval is named Lady Faraday Pebble-Stone; the "lady" is due to her status as an earl's daughter.  Her surname is a reference to the markings on her coat, which look rather a lot like pebbles; we agreed that plain Pebble felt a bit too Flintstonian, and surely one of these guys would have a double-barrelled name.
• The panther is named Ruthven Jet Shadewater, Earl of Ebonwood, although his intimates (including Sir Tristan and Lady Faraday) call him Magick.  Coming up with a surname for him that was a) a reference to nature and b) a reference to black things and c) not a totally obvious reference to black things and d) vaguely plausible as English pseudo-aristocratic was remarkably hard.  I'm rather proud of both his title (by which most of the Wild Republic will be required to address him) and his nickname, which is a very indirect reference to blackness.

Everyone has a name now, which is a relief.  Tomorrow we're going to introduce the new delegation to the Wild Republic, who so far have met only Sir Theo, who has been in AJD's room to confer with Alfredo.  This promises to be memorable and we fully intend there to be photographic evidence.

Also at some point I really ought to tell everyone the story behind the Sir Tristan-Lady Faraday-Magick relationship, now that I've learned it.

Monarchic Miscellany

Pedro's form of diagnosis is to smell you.  He sort of scurries around you - very like a guinea pig - sniffing maniacally. It's not really a particularly inspiring mode of practice, but apparently it works.

AJD says that the panther has clearly survived a number of duels and has probably been in the army and is probably here now as Sir Theo's bodyguard.  It's a slightly unconventional career path, given that he's the heir apparent to a marquessate, but we figure he was probably packed into the army to keep him from getting into more duels.  Clearly he has a fractious relationship with his father and has been rebelling from the cradle.  He and Sir Tristan really are a curious pair of best friends.

The serval is a good example of the way women are treated in the Wild Parliamentary Monarchy: she hasn't had any trouble on her chosen career path because of her gender.  She's here now because she chose a mission that would put her nearer Sir Tristan; she's not here exclusively because of him, and she has enough clout that the choice was hers to make.

With the exception of the egalitarian role of women, the Wild Parlimentary Monarchy comports itself much less like the modern British monarchy of today and more like Britain of, say, two hundred years ago.  I don't think this is because I read too many historical romance novels.

Getting to Know the New Ambassadors

Some of the members of the new delegation are more secretive than others, but here's what I've managed to learn about them so far.

Pedro, the capybara, is in fact Sir Pedro.  He was knighted for his merits as a doctor.  At first glance, he seems an unlikely candidate for such distinctions: he looks like a very large guinea pig.  He's got this sort of steely-eyed glare, though, which indicates that he's a force to be reckoned with.  All of the others clearly respect him - including the panther - and he's the sort of person who doesn't say much, but always says something worth listening to when he decides to say something.  He also has a rather caustic sense of humour and remarkably cute little ears.  (I'm not going to let him see that last part.)

The only other member of the delegation I've successfully put a name to thus far is the lynx, who is, somewhat improbably, the largest cat I have.  (Go figure.)  His name is Sir Theophilus Pearl, Sir Theo to his friends; like Sir Tristan, he's a baronet.  "Pearl" is an appropriate name for him because his fur has this sort of pearlescent quality. He's been in diplomacy since he was a young kitten, and is the official head of the delegation, with appropriate gravitas, although he's more genial and avuncular than Sir Tristan.  I'm quite fond of him, actually.  He seems to be both level-headed and compassionate, and I can already tell that he and Alfredo will get along swimmingly.

I haven't learned the owl's name yet, but I suspect it's even more eccentric than Sir Theo's.  What I have learned is that he's a scholar, in the grand old tradition of half-dotty abstracted gentlemen.   Sometimes the others refer to him affectionately as "the Professor", but in fact he's not officially affiliated with any university; he's a viscount. He's quite intelligent and (of course) very wise, but a bit absent-minded.  His academic tastes are quite eclectic: officially he's here because of his work on behavioural dynamics, but he spends at least as much time musing about philosophy and he also collects rocks.  Tibby is going to love him.

The goat is not a viscount; he doesn't have a title and is the son of self-made goats.  I feel a bit bad for him.  He was sent to all the best public schools, and his behaviour is generally impeccable, and he's done quite well for himself; but... he's a goat.  Goats aren't really known for their elegance, gentility, or decorum - quite the opposite.  Every now and then he starts randomly eating something, or his speech  sounds a little suspiciously Cockney, and then he gets all embarrassed.  He must be quite brilliant - the others clearly respect him and tactfully look the other way when he starts trying to eat the carpet - but he's a little insecure.

Then there's the panther, whom I find terribly intriguing.  Black felines in general, and black panthers specifically, really take my breath away, and this particular specimen is quite splendidly beautiful.  He's also  (as I said before) very clearly dangerous.  It amuses and astounds me that he and Sir Tristan are best friends from school, because they're so very different and Sir Tristan's impeccable decorum makes him seem much older.  I'm not entirely clear on exactly what his role here is: he seems a highly unlikely candidate for a diplomatic delegation, because he's definitely a loose cannon.  (Also probably a ladies' man, so it's a good thing that he and Sir Tristan are so close.)   Possibly it has something to do with his familial connections;  he holds the courtesy title of earl, as the eldest son of a marquess.  I've yet to learn his name or the specifics of his title, although apparently his friends often call him Magick.

I haven't had much of a chance to get to know the serval yet; she and Sir Tristan are still enjoying their reunion and I'm reluctant to interrupt that.  My impression of her is favourable, both in general and as an appropriate partner for Sir Tristan.  She's very much a lady (officially, even, as the daughter of an earl), and everything she does is eminently dignified.  But she's not here merely because of her association with Sir Tristan.  Apparently she's extraordinarily brilliant and knows absolutely everything one could possibly know about policy.

This leaves the ermine.  I'm still kind of baffled about the ermine; he's so damaged, and I'm not entirely sure of their intentions in sending him off on a mission like this.  Possibly it's a clever disguise, but it doesn't really feel like one.

I Think My Ermine Has Problems

The new ermine - who has an improbably pink nose and a first-rate tail - may have some problems.  Clearly there's an interesting backstory there, only I haven't learned what it is yet.

A lot of the time when you buy a new animal, it arrives with its whiskers taped, so it didn't faze me when I noticed that the ermine's had been taped.  But when I went to take the tape off, I discovered that the tape couldn't be removed without removing a lot of fur with it.  As I was unwilling to remove any of the ermine's fur, the whiskers are still taped.  This implies to me that someone, somewhere, has done something very nasty to the poor guy.

This impression is further borne out by a general consideration of the ermine's demeanour: he's wary and watchful and seems slightly traumatised, and he's the first animal who has taken Sleepyhead's narcolepsy completely in stride (he just seems to appreciate having someone unthreatening to cuddle with).  Possibly he'll be feeling less shell-shocked when he's less jet-lagged, and I do think he'll get along well with Cami, but I'm kind of worried about him all the same, and I'd really like to know what happened. 

All the details are currently obscure.  I'm not even sure whether something happened to him recently or whether it happened a long time ago.  Maybe he's so wary because it was very recent; maybe it was a long time ago and new situations dredge it up.  Whether the ermine's trauma has any connection to his dual citizenship is another point of mystery.  None of this is clear.

I don't think the other members of the Wild Parliamentary Monarchy delegation were in any way responsible; the black panther is clearly dangerous, but I don't think he had anything to do with this.  They all, including the panther, seem very protective of the ermine.  This implies that they know his story, or some of his story, but they haven't said anything about it.  Poor little fellow.

He's in very good hands at the moment, though.  Few things in life are more therapeutic than cuddling with Sleepyhead, and the ermine seems content to do that for the rest of the day.

That went well...

SIR TRISTAN IS SO HAPPY!

The Delegation from the Wild Parliamentary Monarchy Has Arrived

The long-awaited delegation from the Wild Parliamentary Monarchy is finally here!

They're kind of large, so they required two boxes, and of course Murphy's Law mandated that we were at house parties, so I had to go down to the post office to get them.  I'm rather proud that I managed to walk back with them unassisted, and even stop at the store to get milk.  The boxes weren't heavy, but they were decidedly cumbersome.

Seven delegates arrived in all.  They've yet to explain their respective positions, or (of course) reveal their names, but that will come.  Here's the list:

• An ermine.  The ermine is slightly confusing because he's labelled as belonging to the Wild Republic.  I assume this means he's a dual citizen; presumably one of his parents was from the WR and the other from the WPM, where he was raised.
• A serval.  She, of course, is Sir Tristan's much-missed girlfriend, and she's faced with the rather daunting prospect of being the only female in a sea of males.
• A lynx.  He is kind of huge; I think he's the largest animal we have so far.
• A capybara.  He's the only one we know something about: he's a doctor (being from the Amazon), and his name is Pedro.
• A snow owl.  Also rather large, but not as big as the lynx.  The penguins will be thrilled, or something.
• A white goat.  I'm glad he's medium-sized, because he's going to be living with lots of carnivores.  He's just about the only herbivore who is neither naturally armed nor known for speed.
• A black panther.  Sir Tristan's best friend from school.  He looks rather dangerous, and will need to be watched.  Murchison will be delighted to have something obvious to do.

More details to follow.  (For one thing, some of them, like Sir Tristan, probably have a title of some kind, but they haven't yet revealed them to me.)  At the moment, they're kind of jet-lagged, and also a bit confused from languishing at the post office for a few days, so I'm not introducing them to the animals in the main room until tomorrow.  (Yes, this has everything to do with Plouie.  No one should have to deal with Plouie while jet-lagged.)  They can stay in my room, where it's quieter; I'll just move Sir Tristan in here so that he can finally be reunited with his beloved.