Lore + Storyworld Info

The story is set in a alternate-19th century agrarian society where all power is organized according to birth order. Wealth is maintained through a rigid inheritance system that gives control of family money, property, business affairs, and lower born family members to the first born on their thirtieth birthday. Until reaching this age first borns take a variety of paths, some begin working as apprentice heads of family, others exist in a kind of leisurely extended adolescence. They party, travel, “network,” and otherwise engage in miscellaneous forms of debauchery. First borns inherit everything and occupy the public sphere of commerce, industry, the economy, etc. Lower borns often stay attached to their family of origin and most commonly perform unpaid labour for their family for the duration of their lives. This can be anything related to their family’s work (such as farm or factory labour), or be educational or domestic in nature. Other lower borns may be employed in any industry and their wages (if any) are paid to the first born they exist beneath. Lower borns generally do not occupy positions of power or influence. Where no first born exists or are otherwise incapacitated, lower borns become wards of the state and are placed in unpaid or low paid positions in prison-esque government facilities (called “state farms” in rural areas or “the city center” in urban areas). Lower borns across the story fear these places, living and working conditions within them are abhorrent.

First borns wear a ring made of yellow brass on their right hand as a status signifier. Silver for first born parents whose children have inherited. Nothing for lower borns, who are indentured to their family until marriage or until an emancipation – a legal process that grants independence or legal person hood – occurs. Emancipation can only be given by the first born head of a family, or from a first born married partner. There is no situation where this happens automatically, all rights for lower borns require someone with power over them to opt in. Because of this, the birthright inheritance system functions in practice as a class difference. It also can be read to function in a gendered way, where first borns typically occupy the historically masculine, powerful sociocultural position, lower borns the feminized, subjugated one.

More or less, this is an extreme version of primogeniture that treats every lower born as the property of the first born. Think women under coverture and turn it up to 11. Lower borns are not considered to be people in this world.

The primary locations within the story are Grace’s family estate, the neighbour family’s farm, the town that is about a half-day ride away, and the city, which is several days away.

Current Plot Summary (This is the broad strokes!)

Part One: Grace

My protagonist is Grace, a wealthy only child (and thus a first born) whose parents run a very successful business selling agricultural machinery to government facilities. Parents are rarely around, much of their work occurs in the nearby town, leaving Grace alone with the household staff (Emma and Ethan, both lower borns) for most of the time.

Grace has no interest in taking over this business, she finds it dull. Her parents would like to retire early to access government benefits, and are exploiting a loophole that would see Grace inherit at twenty five. Grace struggles with this. Against her family’s wishes and knowledge, she and her long term partner Adrian (a lower born farm labourer who lives nearby), are planning to liquidate the inheritance and move to the city, where they could be together and the class difference between them would not be frowned upon. They want to be married, they’re very in love. Grace wants to remove Adrian from the control of his father, who grows increasingly abusive as their farm slowly fails.

When they do find out, the are very opposed, and place a residency requirement on Grace’s inheritance. In order to liquidate, she has to stay in the area for five years and demonstrate to the parents and the inheritance executor that she is competent and prepared to manage until she is thirty. Her parents believe that a marraige between Grace and Adrian, even if he were emancipated, would be improper, a sign that Grace was too led by emotion to be an effective leader/she willingly lessens her own position by elevating him/etc. Grace is conflicted, she and Adrian butt heads about this at several occasions, most notably at community events with Grace’s first born friends. Her friends do not like her, they view her as a connection to wealth, and are trying to position themselves prior to their own inheritances, still several years away. They despise Adrian and are overly pleasant to Grace, which she perceives as falseness.

Without telling anyone, Grace quietly approaches Owen about her desire to marry Adrian. He declines to give an answer, instead offering to set her up with Adrian’s older brother, Thomas (first born), with whom Grace is friendly. Owen suggests that Grace could still maintain her relationship with Adrian if she were to partner with Thomas. Through a match with him, she could keep the community’s respect and get Adrian anyway, since Thomas will inherit him in a year or two. The match would be more beneficial to both parties (a merger, rather than a sale, as he puts it). Grace rejects this idea. Owen tells her the terms would need to be more favorable before he would permit anything that would remove Adrian from the farm, he relies too much on Adrian’s (unpaid) labour to run things. Discouraged, Grace leaves.

Grace and Adrian deal with tension between themselves over this. Adrian intends to leave anyway. Grace urges him to wait, he will not. He accuses her of stalling, prioritizing her inheritance over their happiness. In the heat of the moment she calls him a slur. He tells her he will leave with or without her.

The next day, Adrian is not in the field. Grace goes to their usual meeting place at the fence and speaks to Owen, who tells her that Adrian left overnight and did not say where he was going. Grace is distraught and heartbroken. Later that day Thomas comes to her house and she tells him about their fight. Thomas says he will head toward town and see if anyone there has seen him.

Several days pass. Grace’s parents invite Thomas and Owen over for dinner. Owen tells them that Hannah (One of Thomas and Adrian’s younger siblings) refused to come because she was too tired. Since Adrian left she has had to replace him, which she was not yet equipped for. Grace’s parents pity Owen and offer to send Ethan over for the time being. Owen accepts. They mutually blame Adrian for his irresponsibility. Grace tries to defend him, Thomas joins her, they are both shut down. Thomas tells her he had no luck in his initial search but that he will keep looking.

A few more days pass. Owen takes Thomas and their other siblings into town with the hope of using a location service to find Adrian. He asks Grace if she will stop in and water their garden while they are away, which she agrees to. Over the next several days, she searches the property extensively, looking for evidence of where Adrian may have gone. Eventually she discovers that all of his belongings, shoes, etc. are still in his bedroom and she begins to believe the worst. She takes a long route back through the backline of the field.

She takes a break near the old barn at the back of Owen’s property. Once a livestock barn, it now sits in disrepair, unused and far from anything. She processes what she thinks Adrian being dead might mean. She hears a noise coming from inside the barn. Confused, she enters.

Inside she finds Adrian, who has been trapped here since the night of their fight. He tells her that Owen had overheard them and was now punishing him for seeking independence (and by extension Grace), and trying to take it himself. The door of the barn is not locked. A chain locked around Adrian’s neck is mounted into the wall. Owen has visited a few times but left “to look for him” three days prior, leaving Adrian alone here when Grace finds him. She spends the next two days trying to free him with various tools, lockpicks, and so on to no avail. The chain slowly harms Adrian. It is snug enough that it does not choke him but tight enough that motion slowly damages the skin of his neck.

When Owen and the family return, Grace has to move her visits to the late night hours when they won’t be seen. Over a period of time she slowly loses faith as more and more attempts fail. She inherits and starts to resent Adrian for being trapped there. She befriends Owen, who (alongside Thomas) help her navigate her inheritance. Adrian becomes a chore. He accuses her of no longer caring for him. She cannot dispute it. Eventually she breaks up with him, saying she will no longer visit the barn. Adrian tries to persuade her to stay, telling her he will starve without her visits, but she leaves anyway.

She feels very guilty and visits over the next several nights while he sleeps. On the third night he catches her and they tentatively reconcile. Owen catches them in the barn. He beats Adrian in front of Grace, severely injuring him. When this is done, Grace asks Owen to let Adrian go, she promises to pay for everything and return him in good health. Owen agrees and gives her the keys. She frees Adrian and takes him back to her house.

When she arrives, Thomas is there with Mara (more on her later). Grace accuses Thomas of knowing about the barn and threatens him. Thomas denies this. Grace sends for a doctor, who treats Adrian’s extensive wounds. Grace pays the large bill and has Adrian moved to a bedroom in her house.

*Parts 2 and 3 Coming soon*