‘Even if they’ll die in the attempt? Even for a country not worth defending any more? How is that—?’
‘Justice? It’s not. That’s my point: if you want justice, then go and murder Trin right now. Kill Filian too, and put someone else on the throne – someone you believe will serve the people and not the foul plans of a dead Duchess whose visceral loathing of her own country has brought us here, to the brink of destruction.’
‘Except . . .’ Brasti began.
‘Neither of you are here as witnesses,’ Nehra said.
‘Oh well, forgive me. In that case . . .’ Brasti turned back to me. ‘Anyway, what I was going to say – and I can’t believe I’m saying it, by the way – is that . . . wasn’t Trin ill-treated herself? Wasn’t she tormented, tortured and manipulated, forced into this pattern, this life by that bitch Patriana? And had Jillard even a hint of her existence, he’d have killed her as a child, wouldn’t he? So she has as much right to demand justice as anyone else, and, Saint Agnita-who-vomits-men’s-bones, what might that look like?’
‘Vendetta,’ Valiana said quietly. ‘An endless cycle of revenge in which each death is merely fair payment for a previous one.’
Vendetta. How close had I come to triggering one of my own? Had I succeeded in murdering Trin, how many citizens of Hervor might rightfully have sought vengeance for the Duchess they so admired? This was why Valiana had been so insistent that we bring Trin back for trial rather than simply killing her on sight.
How did you ever become so wise? I wondered, staring at the young woman who had taken my name. Soon she would have to shed that name and instead become Valiana, Duchess of Rijou. She would never be known by the title I had secretly hoped she would one day take: she would never be First Cantor of the Greatcoats.
Of course, neither title would have much meaning if the country ceased to exist. How, by all the Gods and Saints, was I supposed to choose between ending a country or bringing even greater sorrow to its people?
King Paelis, I don’t know if the dead can hear the thoughts of the living, but I really wish you’d picked someone other than me for this job.
I looked at Nehra, then at the others. ‘I’m leaving now,’ I said.
‘Where are you going?’ Kest asked.
‘Back to my cell.’
‘You have to render your verdict,’ Nehra said. ‘You must decide what course w—’
‘Tomorrow,’ I said. ‘Right now I have one more witness to question.’
Nehra’s eyes narrowed as if she didn’t quite believe me. ‘What witness? Tell us who and we will bring them to you.’
‘You won’t have to,’ I replied. ‘The witness will be coming to me.’
CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE
The Royal Consort
There’s always been a fundamental flaw with the whole idea of the Greatcoats. It all sounds great in theory, of course: travelling magistrates who can navigate not only the esoteric laws of the Kingdom and its nine Duchies, but who also possess the skill with a blade to enforce their verdicts through trial by combat when necessary. In a country like Tristia, where the duel is an almost sacred tradition, wouldn’t you want your judges to be able to fight?
The only problem is that the mind of a duellist works very differently from that of a magistrate. When conducting a trial, the judge must be open-minded, able to weigh every aspect of the case, to carefully consider each argument and to withhold judgement until the most balanced verdict can be identified and declared. Any duellist who thinks that way will be killed in the first exchange of blows. To survive as a swordsman, you have to find an opening and exploit it without hesitation, finishing the fight before the opponent even realises it’s begun.
For someone like me, this can be problematic.
‘A pleasant evening to you, Duchess Tarindelle,’ I said, proud of myself not only for remembering to use her full name, but also for keeping my hands from reaching through the bars and throttling her. Although self-restraint in this particular case was profoundly unsatisfying, the country was balanced on a knife’s edge, my King’s dream was in tatters and my instincts as a duellist had led to no end of stupid mistakes. Time for the magistrate to be in charge for a while.
She curtsied, letting pale blue silk rustle against the stone flags of the dungeon. It was an almost perfect copy in colour and style of Ethalia’s favourite gown. ‘And a pleasant evening to you, First Cantor. You don’t seem surprised to see me.’
‘I’m not.’ Nor was I surprised that she would use even the clothes she wore as a tool to manipulate me.
Trin tilted her head like a cat, as though she needed both her eyes to see me through the gap in the bars. ‘How did you know I was listening to that little sham of a “trial” your so-called Dal Verteri friends held? I thought I’d been remarkably silent.’
‘You were,’ I replied. ‘I neither saw nor heard you, nor did anyone else.’
She looked surprised. ‘Then how did you—?’
‘Because you’re you, Duchess. Spying and intrigue and murder are what you do. You ask how I knew you were there? Because a hundred guards didn’t come in to arrest everyone in the room. That’s how I knew.’
That earned me a smile. ‘So clever, Falcio. It’s just one of the things I love about—’
‘Enough,’ I said.
She stared through the bars at me and for once I tried to keep the anger from my features, to remove all the disdain and outrage, the disgust and despair. I wanted her to see me for who I really was – and perhaps she in turn might drop her mask and reveal her true self to me.
The coquettish smile disappeared. ‘Enough,’ she agreed.
We stood there silently for a long time. There is something strange, almost otherworldly, about being so close to your bitterest enemy. We shared a terrible intimacy in that moment, a brief pause in our endless sparring, and I found myself wondering if in some other life we might have been friends, or more.
‘I am pleased to see you,’ she said. The words had no inflection, no forced charm or smirking contempt.
The one common bond between magistrate and duellist is that both must be skilled in discerning intent, no matter how well hidden it might be. Trin was genuinely pleased to see me; on some peculiar level she really did like me. ‘Ask me your question,’ she said.
‘What question is that, your Grace?’
‘Are you testing me, Falcio? You want to know what happens next, if by some miracle you do find a way to save this poor little country of ours. You want some sense of what your sacrifice – and that of all the others – would yield.’
I sat down on the cot. ‘And will you answer me truthfully, your Grace?’
‘I’m offended, my tatter-cloak.’ Trin looked around until she spotted the guard’s stool and brought it over. She sat, altogether too elegant for her rough surroundings. ‘Ask yourself a question, Falcio: have I ever lied to you?’
‘Everything about you is deception.’
She spread her hands. ‘Then you should have no difficulty naming a single instance in which I lied to you.’
I couldn’t, of course: for all her schemes and games, for all the conspiracies she’d hatched, the falsehoods she’d told others – even when she’d been masquerading as Valiana’s handmaiden – I realised she’d never actually lied to me.
‘Remarkable,’ I said at last.
Again that smile. ‘I am besotted with you, Falcio val Mond. I honestly can’t explain why, but there is something about you that draws me in. I sometimes wish . . .’
She let that word – ‘wish’ – dangle before me.
Sitting there on opposite sides of the bars of a cell, I felt like I finally truly understood Trin: she was a monster who revelled in destroying her enemies and she was also a tormented young woman genuinely able to admire people, perhaps even to love them. And scarily, the two Trins weren’t separa
te sides of a coin but inextricably intertwined with each other.
I really would have preferred it if she’d just picked one side.
‘Don’t look so apprehensive, Falcio,’ she said. ‘I’m not in love with you – entranced, certainly, but not in love.’
‘Well, to be fair, your Grace, you don’t know me that well – other than having tortured me and tried to have me killed several times, of course.’
I’d expected a laugh or some clever reply, but instead she shook her head. ‘I do know the difference between love and infatuation. I love Filian. I quite expected to hate him, growing up – the idea that my mother was raising the King’s son to rule in my stead if her plans for me failed?’ She shuddered, very elegantly. ‘Believe me, I considered killing him any number of times, just to remove the temptation that she might switch horses in midstream.’
‘Why didn’t you?’
She sighed theatrically – but for her, every move, every sentence was a performance. ‘You spoke to him, didn’t you? On the journey back from Avares?’
‘I did.’
‘And what did you find?’
‘He is intelligent, like his father, and curious about people. He’s given a great deal of thought to what it means to rule a nation wisely. He has studied many different philosophies on how to govern, and he balances those against the plight of this country.’
‘Does he remind you of King Paelis?’
‘Very much.’
‘And do you think he would make a good King?’
‘He would,’ I admitted.
‘Then you must—’
‘If it weren’t for you.’
She smiled then, as if I’d complimented her, before rising from her stool.
‘Have you decided not to answer my questions, your Grace?’ I asked.
She stopped. ‘I’ve answered the only question that matters, Falcio. You are trying to judge whether it is best for you and the other Orders to fight for Tristia, or whether to let the Magdan and his warriors take it over in favour of a new system of government. Before you can render your verdict, you wish to know what Filian’s rule would mean for our people.’
‘And how have you helped me make that decision?’
She turned back to me, not smiling this time; there was neither delight nor deceit in her gaze. ‘You know that it is in Filian’s nature to be a good King, and that the law demands his coronation, yet you fear that my influence will – to your way of thinking – corrupt him.’
‘Succinct, but it hardly leads to a decision.’
‘It is simple, Falcio. The daring idealist you once were can’t help but believe Filian’s intrinsic decency would win out. The bitter cynic swayed by Ossia’s cold logic no longer trusts in such things.’
I considered that for a moment, then said, ‘If you’re counting on my idealism to sway me to your side, your Grace—’
‘Trin,’ she said.
‘Excuse me?’
She looked up and our eyes met across the bars separating us. ‘You never call me by my name, Falcio, did you know that? In all our encounters, only once have you called me Trin.’
Oddly, I remembered the occasion: it had been at the Ducal palace of Rijou when I still believed her to be Valiana’s shy and innocent handmaiden who I’d offended by refusing her invitation to wander the halls with her.
‘Would you call me by my name now?’ she asked.
‘Why does it matter?’
Her shoulders rose and fell in a barely perceptible shrug. ‘Because I liked the way you said it that night in Rijou, because, for reasons I will never understand, such things as words and names mean a great deal to you.’
‘Trin,’ I said, as much to prove she was wrong as out of any courtesy.
She smiled, just a little. It seemed genuine. ‘Thank you, Falcio.’ She drew a key from a thin silver chain around her neck and unlocked my cell door.
‘I haven’t agreed to rule in the country’s favour, your Grace.’
‘I know.’
‘Then why are you unlocking my door?’
‘Because whatever your decision, I am done with this game of ours.’ She turned and started to walk away, but then she stopped. ‘I’m sorry I laughed when Aline died. I know that must have hurt you.’
The words were genuine, sincere, but Trin was in the shadows, facing away from me, so I couldn’t make out the expression on her face.
‘Then why did you?’ Despite all my efforts not to show weakness, a racking sob escaped my lips. ‘Aline was bright and brilliant and decent – she ran to save Filian’s life at the cost of her own. How could you laugh?’
She remained silent for a moment longer, then said, ‘Because it was funny.’
CHAPTER SIXTY-TWO
The Verdict
You would think, given my propensity for delirium and hallucination, that I would have been visited that night by a host of Gods or Saints, dead Kings or dead wives, all assaulting me with acerbic remarks before gifting me with their enigmatic guidance. No one came – possibly because the dead rarely appear when you actually want them too, or maybe because they likely knew that this was a question beyond the legal reckoning of any magistrate.
I wondered if Morn, having so effectively predicted and manipulated events thus far, had known I’d wind up in this position. He must be laughing himself silly right about now.
You almost have to pity him, I could imagine him telling the other Greatcoats. Falcio’s become so accustomed to following a dead man’s dream that now he’s awake, he finds himself utterly lost.
Somehow it wasn’t surprising that even in my imagination Morn was an arrogant bastard. I just wished he wasn’t right.
Every day since the King had died, I’d fought and bled in a desperate bid to bring about his vision for the country – at least, what I understood of it. I’d searched far and wide for his so-called Charoites, and when I found Aline, I’d become convinced he’d meant me to put her on the throne – only to discover there was a second living heir. I’d risked my life – and those of so many others – to save the Dukes from assassination and the country from falling into civil war, only to now have those same Dukes carve up the country for themselves. And if that wasn’t enough, Kest, Brasti, Valiana, Aline – we’d all had to face the wrath of a God to defend the rule of law. Now it turned out the greatest threat to King Paelis’ plan – the one thing I couldn’t defeat – was his own loyal Order of travelling magistrates. It was the Greatcoats who would finally kill the King’s mad, hopeful dream.
And what did he expect me to do about it?
I could really use a sign right about now, you skinny bastard.
I rose from the cot, pushed open the door to my cell and walked unhurriedly down the hall.
Dezerick saw me coming. ‘Taking your leave of us, are you?’
I couldn’t tell if he was being sarcastic. ‘Are you planning to stop me?’
‘Nope. Don’t think I could if I wanted, which I don’t, and anyway, the Royal Consort left word that you were free to go.’
‘Thanks.’
He started following me down the corridor. ‘So, what do you plan to do now?’ he asked.
‘Don’t know,’ I replied. ‘Probably go for a walk and start swimming when I hit water. Actually, I’m a fairly rubbish swimmer, so I might need a boat.’
‘Ah, well, this might help with that.’
I turned to see what he was holding, but his fingers were closed over his palm. ‘I want you to know that I got this fair and square. Perfectly legitimate bribe.’
‘So noted.’
‘It’s just that . . . my daughter, she recognised what it was and wouldn’t stop shouting at me until I promised to give it to you, then my missus got in on the act and pretty soon I was outnumbered.’
‘What are you holding, Dezerick?’
>
He opened his hand and held it out to me. There on his callused palm sat a single gold coin with the seal of the Greatcoats impressed on its surface. ‘Someone bribed you with a juror’s coin?’
He nodded. ‘Reckon so. My little girl certainly thinks that’s what it is.’
I took the coin. It was old, the symbols worn. Beneath the rubbed crown were the distinctive markings of the particular Greatcoat who’d given out the coin. They were my marks.
‘Who gave this to you?’ I asked.
He jerked a thumb up towards one of the windows near the ceiling. ‘One of them conscripts, well, a volunteer, actually.’ He chuckled. ‘Who in all the hells is crazy enough to volunteer for military service? And now of all times, eh?’
I rolled the coin over in my hand. Each minting had been slightly different; this one had to be at least fifteen years old. A coin like this could feed a family for a year. To keep one unspent for so long? ‘Dezerick, can you take me to the person who gave you this?’
The guard shook his head. ‘Din’t see ’em. It was dark and I was paying more attention to the coin than the person offering it to me.’
‘What did they ask for?’
‘Same as the others. “Show him kindness,” he said, “or mercy if you can manage it”.’
I let the weight of the coin settle into my hand, then found my fingers closing tightly around it as my feet walked me down the hall and up the stairs, through the corridors of the keep and out past the guards, through the front gate where the morning sun was just beginning to reflect off the dew on what little grass had struggled up through the rubble left in the wake of a God’s destructive power.
I walked up and down the rows of tents for a while before I realised there was no point; there were far more soldiers now than when I’d first returned to the castle weeks ago and it would take me days to check all the faces slowly joining the queue for the meagre rations that passed for breakfast in this ragtag army.
How could anyone ask these people to die in a hopeless battle? They were smiths and crafters and farmers, not soldiers. The Greatcoats and the other Orders of the “Dal Verteri” might have been formed to protect the country, but these men and women were the country. They were the ones who stoked the smithy fires or shaped wood in workshops, who turned dirt and sweat into the crops that fed a nation. If the God of War himself descended from his chariot and demanded they march in his name, I’d duel the bastard on the spot.
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