by C. S. Pacat
Memory was sudden; long days training on the sawdust, evenings in the hall, his father presiding from the throne, himself walking those marble halls with surety and unconcern, an unreal former self, who spent evenings in the great hall laughing with friends, being served as he wished by slaves.
A yapping dog cut across his path. A woman with a parcel under her arm jostled him, then shouted at him in southern dialect to watch where he was going.
He kept walking. He passed the outer homes, with their small windows of differently sized rectangles and squares. He passed the outer storehouses, the granaries, a stone revolving on a millbase, pushed by oxen. He passed the shouts of a dozen market stalls that were all selling fish, pulled from the ocean in the pre-dawn.
He passed the traitor’s walk, thick with flies. He scanned the tops of the spikes, but the dead were all dark-haired.
A burst of a cavalcade came trotting out on horses. He stepped to the side; they trotted past him, red-cloaked and regimented, without a second glance.
It was all uphill in the city, because the palace was built on the peak, with the sea at its back. He realised as he walked that he had never done this on foot before. When he reached the palace square, a feeling of disorientation came over him again, because he only knew the square from the opposite angle: as a view from the white balcony, where his father used to emerge sometimes to raise a hand and address the crowd.
Now he walked into the square as a visitor from one of the city entrances. From this angle, the palace loomed impressively, the guards like gleaming statues, the bases of their spears fixed to the ground.
He locked his eyes on the closest of the guards and began to walk forward.
At first no one paid any attention to him. He was just one man in the busy columned square. But by the time he reached the first of the guards he had garnered a few looks. It was rare to approach the steps to the high gate directly.
He could feel the growing attention, could feel eyes turning to look at him, could feel the guards’ awareness of him, though they held their impassive positions. He put his sandalled foot on the first step.
Crossed spears blocked his way, and the men and women of the square began to turn, to create a semicircle of curiosity, nudging each other.
‘Halt,’ said the guard. ‘State your business, traveller.’
He waited, until he had the eyes of everyone near the gate on him, then he let the hood of his cloak fall back. He heard the shocked murmurs, the outbreak of sound as he spoke, his words, clear and unmistakable.
‘I am Damianos of Akielos, and I surrender to my brother.’
* * *
The soldiers were nervous.
Damianos. In the moments before they hurriedly ushered him in through the gate, the crowd grew. Damianos. The name spread from mouth to mouth, like a spark into a line of leaping fire, awed, fearful, shocked. Damianos of Akielos. The guard to the right just continued to look at him blankly, but there was growing recognition on the face of the guard to the left, who said, fatally, ‘It’s him.’
It’s him—and the spark ignited into a blaze, seizing the crowd. It’s him. It’s him. Damianos. Suddenly it was everywhere. The crowd was jostling, exclaiming. A woman fell down onto her knees. A man shoved forward. The guards were close to being overwhelmed.
They pushed him inside, roughly. His public surrender had accomplished that much: he had won himself the privilege of being manhandled into the palace.
If it worked, if he was in time—how long could a trial last? How long could Laurent stall for time? The trial would have commenced in the morning—how long until the Council returned their verdict, and Laurent was taken to the public square to be shoved to his knees, his head lowered, the sword brought down on his neck—?
He needed them to take him into the hall to face Kastor. He had given up his freedom for that single chance, gambling everything. He’s alive. Damianos is alive. The whole city knew, they couldn’t dispatch him in secret. They must take him to the hall.
In fact, they took him to an empty set of apartments on the eastern side of the palace, and discussed in hushed whispers what to do. He sat under guard on one of the low seats and didn’t scream in frustration, as time passed, and then more time. This was already different to all his hopes; there were too many things that could go wrong.
The latch on the doors was thrown open, and a new set of soldiers entered, heavily armed. One was an officer. Another carried irons. He stopped dead when he saw Damen.
‘Cuff him,’ said the officer.
The soldier holding the irons didn’t move, his wide eyes staring at Damen.
‘Do it,’ came the order.
‘Do it, soldier,’ said Damen.
‘Yes, Exalted,’ said the soldier, and then flushed, as though he had done something wrong. He might have. It might have been treason to say that.
Or it might be treason to step forward and close the iron around Damen’s wrists. Damen held his arms ready behind his back and still the man hesitated. This was a complex political proposition for the soldiers. They were nervous.
The moment the iron closed around Damen’s wrists, the nerves showed themselves in a different way. The soldiers had done something irrevocable. They had to think of Damen as a prisoner now, and they grew rougher, shouting and shoving him in the back, out of the apartment, blustering and too loud.
Damen’s heartbeat sped up. Was it enough? Was he in time? The soldiers pushed him around a corner, and he saw the first stretch of corridor. It was happening, he was being taken to the great hall.
High, shocked faces lined the passages as they passed. The first person to recognise him was a household official carrying a vase which smashed, dropping from his hands. Damianos. A slave, caught in a crisis of etiquette, fell half to his knees and then stopped, agonisingly uncertain whether he should complete his prostration. A soldier froze in his tracks, eyes wide with horror. It was unthinkable that any man should lay hands on the King’s son. And yet Damianos was being escorted in shackles, pushed forward by a spear butt when he walked too slowly.
Thrust into the crush of the great hall, Damen saw several things at once.
There was a ceremony underway—the columned hall was full of soldiers. Half of the thick crowd were soldiers. Soldiers guarded the entrance. Soldiers lined the walls. But they were the Regent’s soldiers. Only a small Akielon honour guard stood near the dais. Veretian and Akielon courtiers were packed into the hall with them, assembled for a spectacle.
And there wasn’t one throne on the dais, there were two.
Kastor and the Regent sat side by side, presiding over the hall. Damen’s whole body reacted against the wrongness of it—the Regent sitting on his father’s throne. Sickeningly, there was a boy of about eleven on a stool beside the Regent. Damen’s gaze fixed on the Regent’s bearded face, the wide shoulders swathed in red velvet, the heavily ringed hands.
It was strange—he had waited for so long to face Kastor, and now he found him simply extraneous. The Regent was the sole intrusion, the sole threat.
Kastor looked satisfied. He didn’t see the danger. He didn’t understand what he had let into Akielos. The Regent’s soldiers thronged the hall. The entire Veretian Council was here, gathered in assembly near the dais, as if Akielos was already their country. A part of Damen’s mind registered all of that, as the rest of him kept looking, kept scanning the faces—
And then, as the crowd parted slightly, he saw what he was searching for: the first glimpse of a yellow head.
Alive, alive, Laurent was alive. Damen’s heart leapt, and for a moment he just stood and drank the sight in, giddy with relief.
Laurent stood alone, in a cleared space to the left of the dais steps, flanked by his own set of guards. He was still wearing the short Akielon chiton that he had worn to the Kingsmeet, but it was dirty and ripped. Skimpy and showing the signs of r
ough wear, it was a humiliating garment for him to stand in before the Council. Like Damen, he had his hands chained behind his back.
It was suddenly obvious that this spectacle was Laurent’s trial, and that it had been underway for hours, Laurent’s straight-backed posture by now held in place by will alone. The physical act of standing for hours in irons must be taking its toll, the sheer ache of muscle exhaustion, the rough treatment, and the examination itself, the Regent’s questions, and Laurent’s steady, determined answers.
But he wore the clothes and the chains with disregard, his posture, as ever, coolly untouchable. His expression could not be read, except for, if you knew him, the courage that he sustained though he was alone, and tired, and without friends, and he must know that it was close to the end.
And then Damen was pricked into the hall at sword point, and Laurent turned and saw him.
It was clear from the open look of horrified recognition on Laurent’s face that he had not expected Damen—that he had not expected anyone. On the dais, Kastor made a small gesture to the Regent, as if to say, You see? I have had him brought for you. The whole hall seemed to swing around at the disruption.
‘No,’ said Laurent, swinging his gaze back to his uncle. ‘You promised.’ Damen saw Laurent take physical control over himself, forcing back further reaction.
‘I promised what, nephew?’
The Regent sat calmly on his throne. His next words addressed the Council.
‘This is Damianos of Akielos. He was captured at the gates this morning. He’s the man responsible for the death of King Theomedes, and for my nephew’s treason. He is my nephew’s lover.’
Close to, Damen saw the faces of the Council: the elderly, loyal Herode; the vacillating Audin, the reasonable Chelaut, and Jeurre, who was frowning. And then he saw other faces in the crowd. There was the soldier who had entered Laurent’s rooms after the assassination attempt in Arles. There was an officer from the army of Lord Touars. There was a man in the clothing of the Vaskian clans. They were witnessess, all of them.
He had not been brought here to face Kastor or to answer for their father’s death. He had been brought here as a final piece of evidence in Laurent’s trial.
‘We’ve all heard the evidence of the Prince’s treason,’ said the Regent’s newest Councillor, Mathe. ‘We’ve heard how he planted evidence in Arles to incite a war with Akielos, how he sent clan raiders to slaughter innocents on the border.’
Mathe gestured to Damen. ‘Now we see the proof of all these claims. Damianos, the prince-killer, is here, giving the lie to all the Prince has been saying—proving once and for all that they are in league. Our Prince lies in the depraved embrace of his brother’s killer.’
Damen was shoved to the front of the hall, with every pair of eyes fixed on him. He was suddenly an exhibit, a kind of proof none of them had imagined: Damianos of Akielos, captured and bound.
The Regent’s voice searched for understanding. ‘Even with all that we have heard today, I cannot bring myself to believe that Laurent allowed the hands that killed his brother to touch him. That he lay in the sweat of an Akielon bed, and let a killer have his body.’
The Regent stood, and as he spoke he began to descend the dais. A concerned uncle looking for answers, he stopped in front of Laurent. Damen saw one or two of the Councillors react to the proximity, fearing for the Regent’s physical safety, though it was Laurent who was immobilised, held in the grip of a soldier, his wrists chained hard behind his back.
In a loving gesture, the Regent lifted his fingers and brushed a strand of yellow hair from Laurent’s face, searching Laurent’s eyes.
‘Nephew, Damianos is restrained. You can speak honestly. You are safe from harm.’ Laurent weathered the slow, caring touch, as the Regent said, gently, ‘Is there some explanation? Perhaps you were not willing? Perhaps he forced you?’
Laurent’s eyes met his uncle’s. Laurent’s chest rose and fell shallowly under the thin white fabric of the chiton.
‘He didn’t force me,’ said Laurent. ‘I lay with him because I wanted to.’
The hall erupted in comment. Damen could feel it: in a day’s worth of questioning, this was the first admission.
‘You don’t have to lie for him, Laurent,’ said the Regent. ‘You can tell the truth.’
‘I don’t lie. We lay together,’ said Laurent, ‘at my behest. I ordered him to my bed. Damianos is innocent of all the charges brought against me. He suffered my company only under force. He is a good man, who has never acted against his own country.’
‘I’m afraid the guilt or innocence of Damianos is for Akielos to decide, not Vere,’ said the Regent.
Damen could feel what Laurent was trying to do, and his heart ached at it, that even now, Laurent was trying to protect him. Damen let his voice carry, cutting across the hall.
‘And what am I accused of? That I have lain with Laurent of Vere?’ Damen’s eyes raked the Council. ‘I have. I found him honest and true. He stands before you wrongly accused. And if this is a fair trial, you will hear me.’
‘This is insupportable!’ Mathe said. ‘We won’t hear testimony from the prince-killer of Akielos—’
‘You will hear me,’ said Damen. ‘You will hear me, and if when you have heard me you still find him guilty, then I will meet my fate alongside him. Or does the Council fear the truth?’
Damen found himself with his eyes on the Regent, who had re-ascended the dais of four shallow steps and now sat, enthroned beside Kastor, supremely comfortable. His gaze rested on Damen in turn.
The Regent said, ‘By all means, speak.’
It was a challenge. To have Laurent’s lover in his power pleased the Regent, as a demonstration of his larger power. Damen could feel that. The Regent wanted Damen to entangle himself, wanted a victory over Laurent that was total.
Damen drew in a breath. He knew the stakes. He knew that if he failed, he would die alongside Laurent, and the Regent would rule in Vere and in Akielos. He would have given over his life and his kingdom.
He looked around at the columned hall. It was his home, his birthright, and his legacy, more precious to him than anything. And Laurent had given him the means to secure it. At the Kingsmeet he could have left Laurent to his fate and ridden back to Karthas and his army. He was undefeated on the field, and not even the Regent would have been able to stand against him.
Even now, all he had to do was denounce Laurent and he could face Kastor with a real chance of taking back his throne.
But he had asked himself the question in Ravenel, and now he knew the answer.
A kingdom, or this.
‘I met the Prince in Vere. I thought as you did. I didn’t know his heart.’
It was Laurent who said, ‘No.’
‘I came to learn it slowly.’
‘Damen, don’t do this.’
‘I came to learn his honesty, his integrity, his strength of mind.’
‘Damen—’
Of course Laurent wanted everything done his own way. But today it was going to be different.
‘I was a fool, blinded by prejudice. I didn’t understand that he was fighting alone, that he had been fighting alone for a very long time.
‘And then I saw the men he commanded, disciplined and loyal. I saw the way his household loved him, because he knew their concerns, cared for their lives. I saw him protect slaves.
‘And when I left him, drugged and without friends after an attack on his life, I saw him stand up in front of his uncle and argue to save my life because he felt he owed me a debt.
‘He knew that it might cost him his life. He knew he’d be sent to the border, to ride into the very same plot to kill him. And he still argued for me. He did it because it was owed, because in the very private code with which he ran his life, it was right.’
He looked at Laurent, and he understood now
what he had not understood then: that Laurent had known who he was that night. Laurent had known who he was and had still protected him, out of a sense of fairness that had somehow survived what had happened to him.
‘That is the man you face. He has more honour and integrity than any man I have ever met. He is dedicated to his people and his country. And I am proud to have been his lover.’
Damen said it with his eyes on Laurent, willing him to know how much he meant it, and for a moment Laurent just gazed back at him, his eyes blue and wide.
The Regent’s voice interrupted. ‘A heartfelt declaration is not evidence. I am afraid to say that there is nothing here to change the Council’s decision. You offered no proof, only accusations of an unlikely plot against Laurent, with no hint as to who the architect of it might be.’
‘You are the architect,’ said Damen, lifting his eyes to the Regent, ‘and I do have proof.’
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
‘I CALL GUION OF Fortaine to speak.’
That is outrageous! came the exclamation, and, How dare you accuse our King! Damen said it steadily into the furious shouts, his eyes locked with those of the Regent.
‘Very well,’ the Regent said, leaning back in his seat and gesturing to the Council.
Then they had to wait, while runners were sent to the place on the outskirts of the city where Damen had told his men to camp.
The Councillors got to sit down, and so did the Regent and Kastor. Lucky them. Next to the Regent, the brown-haired eleven-year-old was drumming his heels on the base of his stool, obviously bored. The Regent leaned in and murmured something into the boy’s ear, and then gestured for one of the slaves to bring a plate of sweetmeats. It kept the boy occupied.
