Tyrant's Throne

by de Castell, Sebastien

  He stumbled backwards and fell to his knees. At first I thought it was Ethalia’s power, but then I saw blood spout from Brasti’s nose. Kest had just punched him in the face.

  ‘You shouldn’t speak of Valiana that way,’ Kest said, his voice perfectly calm.

  ‘Thanks,’ I said.

  ‘Oh, that’s just great,’ Brasti said, checking his nose to make sure it wasn’t broken. ‘Falcio gets slapped in the face and won’t retaliate, but I make one innocent comment and get a bloody nose for it!’

  ‘I guess you don’t have any important agricultural holdings,’ Chalmers said.

  ‘Also, you’re behaving like an idiot,’ Kest added.

  I turned to Ethalia. ‘So this . . . thing with Pastien – the scratches on his back? This was all just . . .’

  ‘It was her first time,’ Ethalia said. ‘Not all women are delicate flowers during lovemaking. Some have an . . . especially strong ardour. That is what overtook her, not adoracia poisoning.’

  ‘So Pastien just—’

  ‘He was scared,’ she said. Her eyes narrowed. ‘Which is no crime. He too is young. However, he has chosen to deal with the embarrassment caused by his overreaction by claiming that Valiana has lost her mind, and I suspect word is spreading quickly.’

  Brasti got to his feet and looked at me, still holding his nose. ‘Right, so, simple then: Valiana was a little rowdy, Pastien got scared and now he’s trying to cover up having run naked into the hallway by telling everyone she’s nuts. So which one of us is going to pay him a visit first?’

  ‘Weren’t you mocking Valiana just a few seconds ago?’ Kest asked.

  ‘First of all, you celibate barbarian, I wasn’t mocking her. I consider sexual passion to be an outstanding quality in an individual. Second, Valiana’s family: we’re allowed to mock her. It’s practically a law.’

  ‘It really isn’t,’ Kest said.

  ‘Well, it should be, along with an attendant penalty that says anyone who does what Pastien did gets his arse kicked up and down the stairs a few times until he fully appreciates the consequences of his actions.’

  The door swung open again, this time revealing Valiana herself. She was dressed now, thank whatever Gods or Saints remain, and had cleaned herself up. ‘No,’ she said.

  Brasti nodded. ‘Quite right. You should get to beat him up first.’ He looked thoughtfully at the rest of us. ‘Then Falcio.’ He tapped his nose and turned to Kest. ‘Then Chalmers. You go last because you already got your aggression out tonight.’

  ‘That’s fair,’ Kest replied.

  ‘No!’ Valiana’s voice was a mixture of frustration and heartache. ‘No one goes near Pastien. Regardless of my personal relationship with him, Aline needs him on her side. We can’t risk the chance that—’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said.

  She turned to me. ‘It’s not your fault, Falcio. I’m a grown woman and—’

  ‘No, I mean, I’m sorry, but if you think I’m going to allow that primping fop of a man to wander around masking his own inadequacies by telling lies about you, then you really are suffering from adoracia poisoning.’

  She shook her head, closing her eyes to stop the tears. ‘I don’t want this – don’t you understand? I don’t want you running off fighting my battles for me. I’m trying to do what’s right for the country and you’re just making it worse.’ When she opened her eyes she looked straight into mine. ‘You’re not my real father. Don’t pretend to be.’

  ‘I’m not trying to—’

  She cut me off, and in that voice she had perfected for just these occasions said, ‘Until a new monarch sits the throne, I am Realm’s Protector of Tristia, First Cantor. You may not give that title the respect it warrants, but rest assured, the soldiers who guard this castle do. Touch one hair on Lord Pastien’s head and I will have you arrested.’

  She turned and left me feeling like twice the fool I usually am.

  ‘Give her time,’ Ethalia said, watching as Valiana strode down the hall away from us. ‘For a brief moment she saw a future that might be hers, one that might not be governed by the toxin in her veins or the circumstances of her birth.’

  ‘I’m not the one denying her that,’ I said, ‘but her situation won’t get better with Pastien running around saying—’

  ‘When she is in pain, Falcio, she hides from her fear by retreating into the one thing she knows: duty.’ Ethalia let her fingers graze against mine. ‘You of all people should understand.’

  I tried to take her hand in mine but she pulled away. ‘I have duties of my own to which I must attend,’ she said, and left.

  I cursed myself for misreading the moment.

  After the fall of the Blacksmith and his God, Ethalia and I had spent what little free time we’d had together, walking among the broken remains of the castle, exploring the town or wandering the nearby hills. I found myself fascinated by all those things we’d foregone in our rush to become lovers: we talked about books we’d read, foods we loved or hated, places we hoped one day to visit. As a Sister of Merciful Light, Ethalia had received a wide-ranging education in the arts and sciences, but she’d never travelled outside of Rijou and Aramor. The little island off the coast of Baern she spoke of so often was just a place in a story to her. So I told her about the nine Duchies, and in return she instructed me in botany, chemistry and any number of other subjects I was woefully ignorant of. It wasn’t a promise of anything beyond friendship, I understood that, but nothing I did felt complete until I’d shared it with Ethalia. I found it a strange and confusing compulsion, but I hoped perhaps it was simply how people who don’t spend every waking minute of their lives fighting go about the business of falling in love.

  Except maybe it wasn’t that at all.

  ‘Well?’ Brasti asked, bringing me back to the present. ‘What’s your plan now, First Cantor? Do we go and beat the shit out of Pastien anyway, or find some other nobleman’s arse to kiss?’

  Lack of sleep and seasickness must have caught up with me, because I’d actually forgotten that he, Kest and Chalmers were standing there, waiting for me to say something. Saints! Why do people keep looking to me for answers when every decision I make just creates more problems?

  ‘Part of caring for Valiana is respecting her decisions,’ Kest said to me. ‘She’s asked you to stay out of this.’

  ‘It’s the logical thing to do,’ I agreed.

  Brasti was unconvinced. ‘Except that now we’re saying it’s okay for a nobleman to besmirch Valiana’s reputation just because we might need his vote . . .’

  ‘That’s politics,’ Kest said. ‘We may not like it, but since none of us are very good at it, we’re going to have to trust in Valiana’s judgement.’

  A refined, deeply self-satisfied voice replied silkily, ‘Any man who uses the words “politics” and “trust” in the same sentence has disqualified himself from talking about either.’

  Jillard, Duke of Rijou, was leaning against the wall a few feet away. For a nobleman, he had a remarkable ability to move silently.

  ‘Who’s he?’ Chalmers asked.

  Brasti snorted. ‘Oh, just a lying, vicious, self-important lunatic who’s tried to murder Falcio on more than one occasion.’

  ‘Let me guess: that makes him one of our closest allies?’ she asked.

  ‘Now you’re catching on.’

  ‘You look well, your Grace,’ I lied. While Jillard retained his immaculately styled hair and fashionably cut red and silver brocade coat, his eyes looked just as they had the last time I’d seen him, standing over his son’s dead body: emptied of all joy and filled instead with a hollowed-out darkness.

  ‘As do you, Falcio,’ he said.

  That was okay; I knew I looked like shit.

  I felt an odd kinship with the Duke of Rijou, and occasionally had to remind myself that Brasti was right: he was as mu
ch a monster as anyone else in this benighted country. I had hoped that grief might improve him somehow, but as he approached us, I saw Bendain had been hiding behind him.

  ‘You’ve added bribing royal pages to your list of crimes now?’

  ‘Don’t think poorly of the boy, Falcio. He wasn’t spying on Valiana.’

  ‘Then who—?’

  Jillard spread out his hands and gestured: the rooms around us were occupied by the various nobles who made up Pastien’s entourage. ‘What you imagine to be a private matter between young lovers is, of course, nothing of the kind.’

  ‘You’re saying this situation was . . . arranged somehow?’ Kest asked.

  ‘Don’t be silly,’ Jillard replied. ‘Those skilled in the arts of manipulation don’t stoop to anything as simplistic as plans. Rather, they set up the conditions necessary to ensure they can take advantage of otherwise unpredictable events. For example—’

  ‘A young, naïve nobleman panicking at his lover’s ardour?’ I asked.

  Jillard smiled in that way of his that signals neither pleasure nor friendship but simply the satisfaction of knowing something you don’t. ‘That, or a dozen other outcomes, all of which Valiana’s enemies would be happy to use to damage her standing among my fellow Dukes, lessening her influence with those whose support she needs most if Aline is to be crowned.’

  I tried to ignore his smugness as I made sense of his words. ‘Let me guess: if we don’t do something about Pastien, the nobles around him will encourage him to keep spreading this story of Valiana’s madness. And if we do—’

  ‘They’ll say she’s using the Greatcoats to threaten nobles.’

  ‘So, either way I’m damned, is that it?’

  Jillard turned and headed back down the hall. ‘I would think you’d be used to it by now, Falcio.’

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Subtle Forms of Persuasion

  The one good thing about having two equally terrible options is that you needn’t waste time considering your choices. I followed the others outside and arranged for space in one of the tents, then used my well-deserved reputation for brooding and pacing to go for a walk through the castle grounds.

  The next two hours involved a great deal of crouching and silently padding past guards too busy gossiping about the recent excitement and sharing their own rather unsavoury predictions for Valiana’s future to pay attention to their duties. Finally, I reached the spot where I could climb up the back of the keep to the window that led to the antechamber next to Pastien’s bedroom. With no other suitably grand apartments available within the castle, I reasoned that the young Ducal Protector would have to end up back there eventually, ready to snuggle down in his bed and dream of new ways to be a pain in my arse.

  It was only a paltry fifteen feet, but the climb was a slow, pain­staking process and by the time I had worked the window open and squirmed through it into the little side room I was so exhausted I had to sit down to catch my breath. Breaking into a castle is a lot harder work than the ballads suggest – it’s no wonder spies and assassins are so expensive.

  Once I’d settled myself, I approached the adjoining door between the antechamber and the bedroom. For a heartbeat I considered knocking, before deciding that quietly turning the handle just enough would enable me to kick it open; that would be, I thought, a suitably grand and menacing entrance.

  Except that Pastien wasn’t alone.

  *

  I found the Ducal Protector of Luth standing naked on his bed, pressed against the wall behind him, his arms stretched out wide. His eyes were shining with terror as he tried very hard not to look at the small woman standing on her tip-toes in front of him and whispering in his ear, the very sharp blade of a poignard held to his genitals.

  ‘You’re late, Falcio,’ Darriana said. ‘You can have him when I’m done.’

  ‘Please,’ Pastien pleaded with me, quickly deciding I was the lesser of two evils, ‘make her stop!’

  ‘I sympathise, my Lord, I really do.’ I thought about that for a moment, then corrected myself. ‘Actually, no, I don’t at all, you feckless piece of dung.’

  Darriana whispered something else into his ear and I saw her blade move just a hair.

  His eyes widened. ‘Saint Laina-who—’

  ‘Wrong choice of Saint in this particular situation,’ Darri warned. ‘Also, Laina-who-whores-for-Gods is one of the dead ones.’

  ‘Please,’ Pastien whispered, ‘I’ll do anything.’

  ‘Oh, don’t trouble yourself,’ she said. ‘I’ll take care of the hard parts.’

  ‘Darriana?’ I said casually.

  ‘Yes, Falcio?’

  ‘What if – and I’m not trying to interfere in your personal affairs here – but what if the Ducal Protector were to swear to us that he would go round and personally tell the truth to every single person he’s impugned Valiana’s name to and promise to never do it again?’

  ‘He can still do that with just the one testicle, can’t he?’ she asked.

  ‘In theory,’ I conceded, ‘but I suspect that would require a certain period of convalescence and I’m sure we’d all rather this was wrapped up quickly.’

  Darri looked up into Pastien’s eyes. ‘Is that true, my Lord? Would it really be that much more difficult to make up for your little . . . mistake . . . if you had only one testicle?’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, looking miserable enough that I almost believed him, ‘I was scared, all right? I hadn’t expected . . . I just thought, she always seemed so demure and then when she—’

  ‘Go ahead,’ Darriana said, ‘don’t be shy: tell us what horrible crime the slut committed upon your person.’

  ‘I didn’t know what to do! Like a fool, I ran, and then all of a sudden I was in the hallway, standing there with guardsmen who don’t respect me and my nobles coming out of their rooms, already laughing at me – I knew they’d use it against me.’ He looked at me. ‘Falcio, you know how hard it is, trying to keep my nobles from conspiring against me—’

  ‘Indeed – and imagine how hard it would be if you were a young woman,’ I said, ‘one whom everyone knew to be of common blood and who was, according to someone – oh yes, that would be the Ducal Protector of Luth – a madwoman.’

  He hung his head. ‘I know. I’m sorry – I’ll do whatever must be done to make up for this, I swear.’

  I let his oath hang in the air for a while before I said, ‘Darriana?’

  She glanced back at me with that look in her eyes that most days just means she thinks I’m a gullible fool but one of these days will mean she’s about to try and kill me. ‘Are you going to give me the “I’m the First Cantor of the Greatcoats” speech?’

  ‘Only if you don’t let him go now.’

  She sighed theatrically, then said to Pastien, ‘It’s very important you don’t move now.’

  ‘What? Why?’

  Suddenly her blade whipped up and out and an instant later it was back in the sheath at her side. Pastien had gone completely white. He didn’t dare to look down, but gingerly let his right hand feel around his private parts to make sure everything was still attached.

  ‘I’m thirsty,’ Darriana said, punching me in the shoulder far harder than was necessary. ‘You owe me a drink.’

  *

  Finding alcohol proved to be more difficult than either of us had anticipated: apparently neither wine nor ale flow from magical spigots embedded into castle walls. Imagine this: someone has to actually grow stuff – things like grapes and wheat – and then spend weeks working some sort of alchemical miracle to make them drinkable.

  As we searched high and low, Darri told me about the Dashini’s own favoured drink. It sounded like more of a poison to me, but what else would one expect from the Dashini? Its effects included hallucinations and a powerful urge to commit suicide. I’d spent much of the last
fifteen years experiencing both those phenomena and had never needed alcohol to achieve them. Darriana didn’t appear to find that funny. I’d noticed she only normally laughed when someone had embarrassed themselves horribly – or if a great deal of blood was involved.

  It was strangely awkward, wandering the ruined halls of Aramor with Darri. We had never spent much private time together before, and I doubt either of us had any particular desire to do so now, but our need to find alcohol had become a kind of holy quest. We would not rest until we had our drink.

  Eventually I remembered that the King had had a small collection of bottles he’d received from foreign dignitaries, kept in a cabinet in the fifth tower – and it just so happened that part of the fifth tower was still standing. Anxiously, I counted the remaining boarded-up windows. The good news was that I reckoned that particular room was still there. The bad news was the tower stairs had fallen when the Blacksmith’s God had wreaked his wrath upon the castle, which meant there was no safe way to get there.

  I took this as a sign we should look elsewhere. Darriana took it as a challenge.

  ‘Come on, old man,’ she called from her perch several feet above me on the outside of the tower. She claimed it would be easier and safer to climb from the outside; I suspect she just thought it would be funny if I fell. ‘Weren’t the Greatcoats supposed to be good at sneaking in and out of places? Castles, palaces, pig-pens, that sort of thing?’

  ‘You’re thinking of the Dashini,’ I replied, clinging to a narrow ledge. It says something about my vanity that I’d allowed her to convince me to climb a second time in one night. I had a nasty moment when I groped for my climbing spikes and came up empty, only then remembering I’d changed pockets after sharpening the metal spikes and replacing the leather straps used to tie them to our palms in these situations, figuring it would be easier to grab them in a hurry from the back. Without them, I’m quite sure I’d have fallen when the stone crumbled beneath my boot.