by S L Farrell
“Yes, Hirzgin,” the girl was saying. “I mean, the Hirzg told Paulus, and Paulus told me…”
“Ah.” Brie sniffed. “I see.” The jealousy subsided, allowing the sadness and fear to return with a shiver. “The White Stone… Here, in this palais. I simply can’t believe it. The last time…”
She stopped. The last time, the White Stone had killed the Hirzg. She couldn’t say that, afraid that saying it might cause history to repeat itself.
“Please don’t worry, Hirzgin,” Rhianna said. “You’ve nothing to fear.”
Brie looked at the young woman. The words had sounded so firm, so certain, her face lifting, though now she flushed again, lowering her gaze once more. “I mean,” she continued, “that with all the gardai on alert… The White Stone is surely gone by now… Paulus thinks she was most likely hired by somebody with a personal grudge… The White Stone wouldn’t… wouldn’t…”
Brie continued to stare at her as Rhianna’s voice faded and went silent. “You should leave the staff gossip and speculations at the door, Rhianna,” she said to her. “It’s been a stressful day, but that doesn’t excuse spreading rumors.”
Rhianna flushed furiously, curtsying at the rebuke. “I apologize, Hirzgin. I’m sorry.”
Brie waved her silent. “Don’t let it happen again,” she said.
“I won’t, Hirzgin. Ma’am, Paulus also told me to have your domestiques de chambre and those of the Hirzg start packing for Stag Fall. With your leave, Hirzgin, I should go find them and tell them.”
“Yes, certainly,” Brie said. “Go on with you, then.”
Rhianna curtsied again. She turned and hurried away. Brie stared at the door for several breaths after it closed behind her. Then she sighed. “Come, children. Your vatarh has sent up some fruit. Let’s eat, and then perhaps we can have a game of chevaritt…”
Allesandra ca’Vorl
Erik rolled away from her, leaving her body momentarily chilled. Allesandra reached down and pulled the blanket up over herself. She glanced over at Erik, panting next to her. “Satisfied?” she asked. His body, in the candlelight, was heavy and dark, the light glimmering from the polished flesh of his skull and glinting from the white hairs snagged in his midnight beard.
From above the fireplace at the foot of the bed, Kraljica Marguerite stared down at the lovers from her painting, her expression severe.
Erik groaned and nodded. “By Cenzi, woman, you’re a tigress. A danger to all men. You’ve destroyed me entirely.” His voice was a purr, a low growl, and his eyes regarded her possessively.
She smiled at that. But he didn’t ask her the same question she’d asked him; he never did. She wondered if that would begin to do more than annoy her one day. She wondered if he looked at her, saw her age and the way her breasts sagged and her stomach rounded, and whether he wished he were with someone younger, someone who could give him children. She would never give him that, even if she wanted it; her monthly flow had ended a few years ago. The seed that filled her belly now could do nothing.
But she could offer him things that no younger woman could, that no other woman in the world could. She wondered again if she would make that offer to him.
“Perhaps.”
“Hmm?”
Allesandra laughed, not realizing she’d said the word aloud. “Perhaps you would like some refreshment, my love? I could ring for the servants…”
“No, not unless you want something for yourself.” There was silence for a moment; she wondered whether he was falling asleep. “Allesandra?”
“Yes, love?”
“This offer to the Hirzg. If he accepts it. What then happens with me?”
He was staring at her; she could feel his gaze. She held it in the darkness. “I’ve already told you that when the Holdings are one again, I will make certain that a true Gyula sits on West Magyaria’s throne. You shouldn’t worry yourself.”
“Yet I do. When the Holdings are one again, the Kraljica might not want to cause yet more dissent.”
“You talk of this Kraljica as if she were some other woman.”
His hand stroked her side. “My family has been involved in the politics of the Holdings all my life, by necessity. Forgive me for saying this, but one thing my vatarh always told me was that the promise of a Kralji could not buy a beer in the tavern: even a barkeep knows that the Kralji might decide that the folia is better spent somewhere else, and leave you with the tab.”
“You believe I’m that cold?” she asked, and she knew he could hear the warning in her voice. “You think you mean that little to me?” His hand stroked her arm and found her hand, but she didn’t return the pressure of his fingers. He hurried to answer.
“No, of course not.” A breath. A sigh. “I would be lost without you. Truly. Being with you, well, I’ve never felt this way with anyone, not even the matarh of my children. I just hate to think.. .”
“Then don’t think,” she told him. Her voice snapped more sharply than she intended, and she softened her tone. “Just feel what I tell you, and accept it.”
He laughed then, and his hands roamed the slope of her side, falling into the hollow of her hips. His hands tightened there, and he pulled her toward him. His mouth sought hers, his beard brushing her skin. His hands cupped her as he brought her on top of him. She looked down at him, and he seemed vulnerable and almost boyish.
She smiled at that thought. She brought her head down and kissed him deeply, her mouth opening, her hands on either side of his face. When she finally pulled away, gasping, she leaned on her elbows, a cloud hovering above his landscape. Firelight rippled across his face and she saw the eager expression there. “No more thinking, and no more worrying,” she told him. “At least not for a bit…”
Sergei sat in his chair like a wizened toad, one hand clutching the end of his staff, his silver nose reflecting the morning light from the window overlooking the palais gardens. Erik was seated near him, and his face was dark and red with a flush. Allesandra had left her own chair behind her desk, pacing near the balcony entrance.
“I wonder, sometimes, if you aren’t conspiring with my son, Ambassador,” she said. “I thought that you believed you could convince him to accept the offer we tendered.”
“I told you, Kraljica, that I thought he would listen to it sympathetically. And he did exactly that.”
“Yet he requires that I abdicate the throne in seven years in favor of him.”
Sergei gave a nod that sent motes of light scattering along the wall like bright cockroaches. “Yes,” he answered simply. “If you agree to that and state so publicly, the Hirzg will dissolve the Coalition, freeing the member countries to make whatever choice they wish: to rejoin the Holdings or remain independent.” Sergei smiled slightly. “Like you, Kraljica, he doesn’t expect any of them to choose the latter course. And he will bring the army of Firenzcia here to help defend Nessantico against the Tehuantin.”
“What of West Magyaria and the false Gyula he set on its throne?” Erik interjected before Allesandra could respond. “What does the Hirzg say of that?”
Sergei glanced over at Erik. He seemed to look the man up and down with a smirk of disdain. “Of that he said nothing at all,” he said. “He didn’t seem to consider the throne of the Gyula important enough for comment or negotiation.”
“Then he’s a fool,” Erik spat. “With West Magyaria at the Kraljica’s side, the Holdings wouldn’t need Firenzcia at all.”
“The Hirzg, I believe, would disagree with you, Vajiki ca’Vikej. For that matter, so would I. And I note that the Kraljica didn’t send an Ambassador to West Magyaria asking for their help.”
Erik sucked in a breath through clenched teeth, and Allesandra whirled to face them. “Be quiet, both of you,” she snapped. “Your bickering makes my head ache so that I can’t think.” She kneaded her forehead with a hand. She felt confined, trapped, as if the palais walls were constricting around her. You have no choice in this. The thought hammered at her skull in time with
her pulse. You really have no choice. The Holdings can’t stand alone against the Westlanders, and the Holdings can’t survive another long recovery.
She stared out the window, to the walls where she could still see the marks of the repairs that had been done after the Tehuantin bombardment. She remembered how the city had looked in the days and weeks and months after the Firenzcian army had finally smashed the Westlander forces and sent them reeling back across the Strettosei. She remembered the misery and the pain of those times. She remembered how desolate she had been herself then, abandoned by her own son.
“We’re stronger now,” she said to both of them. “We no longer have half of our army fighting a war across the sea.” She tried to say it with confidence, but even she could hear the uncertain quaver in her voice.
“And the Tehuantin, from all reports, are also stronger-they’ve brought easily three times the ships they had before,” Sergei answered. “Between Karnmor and Fossano, they’ve already destroyed most of our navy. Kraljica, if I thought that Commandant ca’Talin could defeat the Tehuantin alone, I would counsel you to ignore the Hirzg’s counteroffer. But I can’t do that, not in good conscience. Not as a loyal subject of the Sun Throne, who wishes nothing more than the Holdings’ success. I wish I were wrong in this, but I fear that I’m not.” She wasn’t looking at him. She didn’t wish to see his face. “And I think that you know it as well,” he finished.
She continued to stare out at the palais grounds. She could feel her fists clenched at her waist, as if she’d eaten bad shellfish and was trying to quell a rebellious stomach. The damnable man was right; the Garde Civile would fight courageously and well, but in the end, they would fall. And Jan, as he had before, was in position to sweep in and clean up the mess. If he wanted the Sun Throne, he could have it in mere months; all he need do was wait and do nothing until Nessantico was taken and Allesandra herself dead or fled.
“Don’t listen to him,” Erik was saying. “You should be Kraljica for the rest of your life. This offer; it is an insult.”
“Insult or not,” she told the air, “I have no choice.” She turned to the two men. “Sergei, you will have Talbot draft the agreement; I will sign it this afternoon. A’Teni ca’Paim will read the proclamation at service tomorrow. We’ll also send it by fast-rider to Brezno; you will follow as soon as you can, and you will remain with the Hirzg as my representative until he arrives here in Nessantico with his army.”
She watched Erik’s face as she spoke. She saw the anger he tried to hide. She suspected it was not rage at the decision, but a fear that he might not have what he wanted. Which one of us is using the other? She told herself that she had no answer to that question, but a voice deeper inside laughed at that evasion. You don’t just want to admit the truth…
“Why are you both still sitting there?” she barked at the two men. “We’re done here.”
With that, she waved her hand and turned back to the landscape outside once again. She listened as they bowed and hurried away, Sergei’s cane tapping at the marble flags. She stared at the isle and at the buildings of Nessantico, and they no longer seemed hers alone.
Varina ca’Pallo
“How have you been recovering?” Sergei asked her. “You certainly look well, like you’re a decade younger than you are.”
Sergei had come to the Numetodo House, and Johannes had escorted him down to Varina’s workroom. Varina saw him eyeing the sparkwheel prototype she had set in a vise, pointing at the straw dummy at the far end of the room. This version of the sparkwheel had a significantly longer barrel; she had wondered whether that might improve the accuracy of the shot. Varina flipped a sheet over the apparatus as she laughed at the blatant compliment. “I have to believe that your eyes are failing in your old age then, Sergei. But thank you for the lie.”
“Karl saw your beauty, as I do-though it took him longer than it should have.”
She managed to smile at that, remembering. In the midst of the war, in the midst of death and terror, there had been Karl, and that had made it all bearable. Yet now it seemed those times were to return, and Karl was gone. She didn’t know how she was going to live through another war and more battles.
She wasn’t certain she wanted to.
“The Morellis are becoming more than a simple nuisance, I’m afraid,” Sergei was saying. “Unfortunately, I need to leave the city again, so I can’t join the hunt for Morel himself. However, I’ll make certain that Commandant cu’Ingres understands the importance both the Kraljica and I place on tracking down the man. You were lucky that you were with your people. I understand it was your magic that killed one of them-I hope that you’re not too upset by that. You truly had no choice.” She thought that his gaze was strangely intense on her as he said the last, as if he were watching her for a reaction. She wondered what he’d heard, what he suspected. She forced herself not to look at the covered sparkwheel.
Not magic. Something more dangerous.
“I regret that it came to that,” she told him, truthfully. “If I could have avoided it, I would have. But…” She lifted a shoulder. Over her warped reflection in his nose, Sergei’s gaze flicked to the sheet on the table and back again. He leaned heavily on his cane, his back bowed.
“You wouldn’t be who you are if you didn’t feel that way,” Sergei said, “but I assure you that no one blames you in the slightest. The man brought his death upon himself. He has no one to blame but himself and his actions, and-you’ll pardon my saying this here-Cenzi will give him the eternal punishment he deserves.”
“Mentioning Cenzi in the Numetodo House seems almost sacrilegious.”
“It does, doesn’t it?” he answered, chuckling. “I’ll admit I was surprised to find you here. I called at your house, and your house servant said that you’d been working here for the last several days and often staying overnight. I worry about you, Varina, especially after what you’ve been through.”
“A few aches and pains is all,” she told him, “and I had those in plenty before the attack. It comes with age, you know.”
“As we both know.” His gaze went back to the covered apparatus again. “Varina, I think you should leave Nessantico. Go north, perhaps. Maybe go to Il Trebbio. Or even go visit Karl’s homeland. I hear the Isle of Paeti is gorgeous.”
“You think it’s going to be that bad, Sergei?”
His fingers tightened around the knob of his cane. His tongue licked his upper lip. “Yes,” he said. “And no. When Jan brings the Firenzcian army, we should prevail, but that still won’t be without loss and it won’t be without hardship, and it may be that the battle will take place here again, in Nessantico. I hope not, but if the Tehuantin ships move quickly…” He nodded, as if he were agreeing with a new thought he’d had. “I think it would be best if you were gone from here.”
“If the battle does come here, then here is where I’m needed.”
He glanced at the sheet again with that. “Talbot could be A’Morce Numetodo for the time being. He can lead and direct them. Unless… Unless there is something that only you can do.”
“You’re not very subtle, Sergei.”
“And you’re not very good at keeping secrets, Varina.”
She stared at him blandly. “The Numetodo don’t keep secrets. We want knowledge to flourish. I gave the formula for black sand to you and the Kraljica, if you remember. Freely.”
“Yes, you did. And Nico Morel stole some and used it against you.”
Varina flushed at the memory. “It’s ignorance and secrecy that causes problems with the world,” she said. “Not knowledge.”
“What causes problems is what people do with the knowledge.”
“Strange how often it’s the ca’-and-cu’ who always say that. It’s underneath half the platitudes I hear from the rich: they feel that the lower ranks should be kept uneducated and ignorant.”
Sergei’s eyebrows rose at that. “What strange philosophies have you been listening to, Varina? Next I know, you’ll be claiming t
hat the peasants should enjoy everything that the ca’-and-cu’ have.”
“I grew up in a ce’ family,” she answered. “I know what it’s like to be on the bottom of society.”
“And now you’re ca’, and you also know that it’s possible to be rewarded for your hard work and your intelligence. You’re an example of what every unranked and ce’ person can aspire to accomplish.”
“Possible, perhaps,” she said, “but I would argue that I am the exception rather than the rule, and that there are many unranked and ce’ who deserve better, and ca’-andcu’ who deserve less.”
Sergei lifted a hand. “No doubt. But who is to determine which? We have to leave that to Cenzi-ah, sorry. There I go again-or, as I suppose you would say, to an accident of fate.” He chuckled again. “And this is an argument neither of us will win, and I’ve no desire to leave you in a poorer mood than I found you. Varina, promise me that you’ll consider leaving the city.”
“I will consider it,” she told him. She didn’t tell him that she had already considered it and made up her mind. Instead, she smiled and put her own hands atop his. Her hands were like his: knobby and wrinkled, the flesh loose on the bones; the hands of an ancient. “Come,” she told him. “Let’s go upstairs where it’s more comfortable, and we can continue our talk over tea and scones.”
Gently, she ushered him from the workroom, locking the door behind them.
Nico Morel
They snuggled together in the bed, and Nico kissed the slope of Liana’s shoulder, tasting the salt of her sweat. Her arms and her legs clutched him tightly, as if she wanted to hold him there forever, though he was held back by the surprising mound of her stomach. He laughed, stroking her hair and staring into her eyes. They were the color of rich earth after a rain, and he could see his own thin, bearded face reflected in them.
