Once he had returned to the castle from the Family Tomb, dropping off his horse at the stable, he met with the Constable who was carrying two official-looking rolls of parchment in his hands. This he took to be his brother’s will and wedding contract or something like that.
“As requested your late brother’s last will and testament and the wedding contract for his second marriage. I had a look for the one from his first unfortunately I couldn’t locate it, I’ll keep an eye out for it but I don’t imagine anything mentioned in it can still be in effect with her death and there having been no children involved. Now, where do you wish to read them, your brother’s office might be best or I could lend you mine.”
Not wanting to take over his brother’s office until talking with his sister in law Amondo opted for the constables. It was located in the second largest of the castles three towers, were most of the administration of the domain took place. It wasn’t that big of an office but it had a table which was currently piled to overflowing with all kinds of documents which appeared to be in no particular order. Amondo cleared a space before taking the first documents from the constable.
The will had been written at the time of his second wedding and it named him and his second wife as his executors. He left some money to all the shrines and temples in the area, to his brothers and sisters. This didn’t surprise Amondo nor did the sums he left to a few servants, what did was the small sum he left to a woman in the village.
She had given birth to their illegitimate daughter that had died a month later. Amondo remembered her from his youth, she was a comely enough looking lass but not the kind of girl he would have thought his brother would have been interested in. At least the affair had occurred between the death of his first wife and his marriage to the second.
Hopefully, there were enough funds left after his brother’s death for his executors to payout the money mentioned in the will. Well if that wasn’t the case he would pay it using his funds or the reputation of the family would suffer and the creditors would come out of the woodwork even quicker.
Eugene was bound not to be the only one, the biggest hopefully but not the only one. He decided to wait until after the birth of the child before deciding how much of his funds to invest in the Barony. He had the funds to pay all the debits of course or so he thought but he wasn’t willing to spend in all if it was someone else Barony, some but not all.
As well as being named as one of the executors of the will he acknowledged me as his heir if he died without male issue and named him as regent for any male child he might have if he had died before they obtained their majority. Amondo wasn’t sure if this part of the will surprised him or not but he quickly realised that at the time it must have made sense to his brother. Why it hadn’t been changed since was another matter but things had been quiet in the Barony and Leonid probably imagined this would continue to be the case.
In the case Amondo was also dead then he had left the regency in the hands of a five-member regency council. This would be made up of our brother Dako or if he hadn’t yet reached his majority Leonids wife or a representative named by her. The other four would be the Lords of Hasford, Wainthe, Antwa and Ruehasen.
Since Antwa and Ruehasen were no longer a part of the Barony of Membe but rather the Barony of Dagleana this would present a problem. A problem with one simple solution, stay alive and since Amondo had every intention to do so he could only move on to the wedding contract.
To tell the truth, he was more interested in his document than the will, it would in some ways have more of an effect upon the relationship between him and his brother’s widow, especially if the expected child was female or died young. The contract stated that if his wife was to become a widow then she was to receive lifetime control of the income of her dowry. In her case, the dowry mainly consisted of a townhouse in the Ducal capital of Comburgh and five hundred acres of farmland in what had been her mothers family’s domain of Carlette until seventy years ago when it had been lost to the crown of Bantis for failure to pay their non-imperial taxes.
The constable informed him that the townhouse had been sold three years ago and all but ten percent of the farmland a year later. As well as the dowry she was due a dower or marriage portion which automatically became hers upon his death. In the case of Leonid widow, this included the right to live in certain sections of the castle, the income from the yeomanry’s of Nonsuch Bend and Athans Hold plus that of seven hundred acres near where the toll booth that Amondo had used the previous day was located.
This income should be enough for her to live in relative comfort for the rest of her life. If she were ever to remarry then she would be able to keep this income but she would need the permission of her late husband’s heir or regent to marry. She would, however, have to move out of the castle but on the other hand, no one could force her to remarry.
Amondo had heard that his fathers third wife Kelbelle had repetitively asked for Leanids permission to marry some knight but been refused. He imagined she would sooner or later get around to asking the same of him and would wait until he met the knight in question before coming to a decision. His brother might have had a good reason for denying it, not that he thought it was anything more than spite, from the little he remembered before she had died Leonid had never gotten on well with Amondo mother Medrine and his relationship with Kelbelle was even worse.
Once he had finished reading the two documents Amndo asked the Constable about the new manor house and several other matters. These included what the Steward and the Seneschal were up to, the state of the Barony’s two remaining lordships and Membe itself.
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