"Sir, having old Tobias teach Chronos could be seen as a breach of secrecy for the crucible knights." Chris said with a hard look in her eyes.
"I'm aware, I'll take responsibility and inform the king. I doubt anybody who knows the Beklaedning's will complain. Besides I'm only having old Tobias teach him about basic and intermediate enchanting, nothing that would reveal the secrets of the knights." Magnus said.
"Understood sir." Chris took the map and went to fulfill her orders.
While she was leaving Chronos was rapidly looking between her and Magnus giving them a strange look.
Getting annoyed at his looks Magnus spoke up, "What is it Chronos?"
"You two smell the same."
"Haha, all the knights use the same soap and shampoo. It's not too surprising if we smell the same." Magnus nervously said.
"That would only make you smell similar. To smell the same, you would have to sle..." Magnus put Chronos in a headlock and started walking towards the grove.
"That's right you said you would show me around the grove, right? Let's go now, hahaha." A slight blush crept up his neck as he started dragging Chronos towards the grove.
Looking at the knights Chronos could see them pointedly ignoring what they were talking about which made it clear to him that all of them knew about Magnus and Chris and weren't saying anything.
Magnus didn't let go of Chronos until they were inside of the tree house on the edge of the grove. Lyla, Sariah, and Gregory followed them inside the room to watch the show. Putting his hands on Chronos's shoulders he started interrogating him.
"Okay, how did you figure it out? And how much do you know?"
Chronos stared at him in exasperation.
"Magnus old friend you two smell the same, you can only smell the same if you're sleeping together. Any werewolf within half a kilometer of you would be able to tell what kind of relationship you two are in as long as you're near each other."
Magnus looked shocked at that revelation.
"How many other werewolves are here?" He quietly asked.
"None right now but they'll be here soon enough. Does the king know about you two? I know that the knights are already aware and just pretending not to know."
"They know!? No wonder they've been giving us room when nothing is going on. As for my father, if the knights know then he probably knows as well but the two of us only got together on this trip so maybe not." He said hopefully.
"Do I need to report this to the king?" As a part of the Leighla assassins, it was a part of Gregory's job to report any new developments to the king.
New developments included the relationships of his children.
"No, I was planning to tell him once this mission was over and I'd like to tell him myself."
Magnus wasn't looking forward to the lecture that would come from sleeping with Chris before they were married but he wasn't going to back down either.
"Isn't anybody concerned about the potential scandal of a king's potential heir sleeping with a female knight? Won't the nobles be upset with this?" Sariah asked.
They all looked at her with confusion for a moment before Gregory explained.
"We were raised in a dragon orphanage. The Blue Dragon followers don't really care about politics."
Ah, that made sense. For the Blue Dragon it was more important for orphans to grow up knowing how to survive and politics wouldn't matter to most of them. It didn't help that inheritance within the Leighla Kingdom wasn't as straightforward as other nations.
"Do you mind if I explain?" Magnus offered.
Everyone nodded.
Sitting down he began, "In most nations when a noble dies the eldest son or oldest male relative inherits their parent's position but in the Leighla Kingdom our training methods and knowledge of medicine is so advanced that even if a noble never trains, they can live for 150 or possibly 200 years.
Naturally these long lives can cause some issues where succession is concerned. The children of a noble might be almost as old as their parents which means that nobles' positions can change hands rapidly if the eldest inherits the position.
So, for the sake of long-term stability, it was decided that the first generation of a noble or royal would be forbidden to inherit their parent's position except in extenuating circumstances or where the noble chose to retire early on."
"So, because you're in the first generation you can't inherit the throne." Sariah said as realization set in.
"Well yes and no. I'm the youngest son of the king and I'm currently only thirty years old so I expect to live at least a couple more centuries.
That means that if my father were to retire tomorrow, I would be one of the potential heirs, but I don't have a solid backing amongst the nobles or in the court due to the succession law. On the other hand, my first brother's children are older than I am, and my second brother's children are around my age. If the king does step down right now, I believe that one of my second brother's children will become the next king.
I do have one nephew that is younger than me and he is skilled enough to become king if needed. And I think my own children will also have a shot at becoming king too but that is a matter for the future." Magnus explained.
"Wait, the first prince's children are older than you?" Sariah asked after a few seconds of considering what she heard.
Chronos looked confused at her question. Didn't she know how old the king was? Or had the blue matron not told her about that either.
"Sariah, our king is more than three hundred years old, and the first prince just turned two hundred. Most of the first prince's children are more than a hundred years old. He would have had younger children, but his wife has been in a coma for a couple decades after falling ill." Chronos said.
"Eeehh, then how old is the second prince?" Sariah asked in shock.
"My second brother is one hundred and twelve years old. His children are all around my age, it took him a while to get married. Apparently, mother used to nag him a lot for not getting married sooner." Magnus chuckled as he had been experiencing that himself recently.
The more she heard the more shocked she was but wait, "Then how many siblings do you have?"
"Seventeen sisters and two brothers." Magnus said.
Sariah and Lyla practically fell over when they heard those numbers. They had always known that there were a lot of members in the royal family but finding out that the king had 20 children still came as a shock.
What shocked them even more was that the queen had given birth to all of them. It was well known that the king only had one wife and no concubines and had never had a child out of wedlock, at least not that anybody knew of.
"Is the queen okay?" Lyla couldn't help asking.
"Hm, yeah mother is doing fine. Actually, she is the one that wanted all of us the most. Every few decades she starts bothering father about having another child. Which means she will start bothering him again in the next decade or so." Magnus smiled as he was looking forward to being a big brother.
Sariah knew that the more powerful you were the longer you lived and the harder it was to have a child she didn't know what medicine the queen was taking to have so many children, but she wanted some.
Still adding up the numbers only left her somewhat confused.
"The numbers don't add up. If she only had a child every few decades, then there should only be twelve or thirteen of you after three centuries of marriage." She gave Magnus a look demanding answers.
"Ah, well before my first brother was born, they were trying to have a son almost every other decade if not faster. After he was born, they slowed down and if you add in the twins and the triplets the numbers are correct." Magnus said.
Lyla realized that all of his siblings probably had children of their own too and couldn't help asking, "How many people are in the royal family?"
"Hm, the last time we announced it there were 155 of us. That means I have 92 nieces and nephews and 41 grand nieces and nephews."
"That announcement was from twenty years ago so there are probably more than 165 people in the royal family. Young royals aren't allowed to be in the public eye until they come of age." Chronos added.
Magnus glared at him. Chronos was one of the few people who might know some of the royals hidden from the public eye and revealing them was a criminal act.
Chronos however started innocently whistling, pretending he had done nothing wrong.
"At any rate, there are a lot of us. You'll meet more of us the more active you become in the nation's affairs. Most of us have taken up some sort of government position to help keep the nation running." Magnus said.