The Born Queen

by Greg Keyes

“Nevertheless,” Brinna replied, “it is my wish.”

  His gaze attracted by the conversation, Neil saw Berimund looking at him.

  The Hansan walked over. “You have been alone with my sister on more than one occasion.”

  “That’s true,” Neil said.

  “Have you been improper with her?”

  Neil straightened. “I understand you might doubt me, but why would you cast such aspersions on your sister, sir?”

  “My sister is both very wise and very naïve. She has not known many men, Sir Neil. I’m only asking you for the truth.”

  “Nothing inappropriate happened,” Neil said. “Not when we were alone. When she set me off her ship in Paldh, I did kiss her. I did not mean to dishonor her in any way.”

  “She told me about that. She told me she asked you to kiss her.”

  He nodded.

  “You did not think that part worth telling, although not doing so would put you in my ill graces?”

  “It is her business,” Neil said, “and not my place to make excuses.”

  “You admit, then, that you should have refused her?”

  “I should have. I can’t say I’m sorry I didn’t.”

  “I see.”

  He looked out at the half-vanished sun. “She wants to ride with you for a while,” he said. “I don’t think it’s right, but she is my sister, and I love her. Do not take undue advantage, sir.”

  He returned to Brinna and helped her over and up behind Neil. He felt her there, taut as a cord, as Berimund strapped them together. Her arms went awkwardly around his waist, as if she were trying somehow to hold on to him without touching him.

  Resupplied and rehorsed, they continued on along the coast. Small, scallop-winged silhouettes appeared and fluttered against the bedimmed sky, and a chill breeze came off the waves. Far out at sea he made out the lantern on the prow of a lonely ship. Inland, a nightjar churred.

  “I’m sorry about your queen,” Brinna said. “I wish I could have met her.”

  “I wish you could have, too,” Neil replied. “I wish I could have saved her.”

  “You’re thinking if you hadn’t been in our prison, you might have.”

  “Maybe.”

  “I can’t say. But I couldn’t act until Berimund came, and I wouldn’t have been able to find where she was without him. Neither could you have.”

  He nodded but didn’t answer.

  “He thought she was safe. He intended to keep her safe.”

  “I know,” Neil said. “I don’t blame you.”

  “You blame yourself.”

  “I shouldn’t have let her come.”

  “How would you have stopped her?”

  He didn’t have anything to reply to that, so they rode on tacitly for a bit. “It sounds so easy in the stories, riding a horse,” Brinna finally ventured.

  “It’s not so bad when you’re used to it,” he said. “How are you doing?”

  “Parts of me are on fire, and others feel dead,” she said.

  “Then let’s rest for a day or so,” he urged. “Let’s get you out of the saddle.”

  “We can’t,” she murmured. “We have to reach her before Robert does.”

  “Anne?”

  “Not Anne. A little girl. She’s in Haundwarpen with a man and a woman. There is music all around them, some terrible, some beautiful, some both.”

  “That sounds familiar,” Neil said.

  “The man and woman are newly wed. The child is not theirs.”

  “There was a composer named Ackenzal,” Neil said. “A favorite of—of the queen’s. She attended the wedding, and I went with her. She and his wife have a girl in their care: Mery, the daughter of Lady Gramme.”

  “Yes. And half sister to Anne, yes?”

  “So they say.”

  “You can guide us when we’re near?”

  “What has this to do with mending the law of death?” Neil asked.

  “Everything,” she replied. “And if Robert knows that, she is in terrible danger.”

  “How should Robert know it?”

  “I don’t know. But I see him there.” She paused for a moment. “I know what killed Queen Muriele and Berimund’s wulfbrothars.”

  “It nearly killed you, too.”

  “Yes. It’s music, horrible and yet somehow lovely. Once you begin listening, it is very difficult to stop. If you hadn’t stopped me, if you hadn’t called that other name, I would be gone now.”

  “The name from the ship.”

  “Yes,” she whispered. He wished he could turn and see her face. “The ship, when I wasn’t me and you weren’t you.”

  “But now we are who we are.”

  “Yes,” she replied. “We are who we are.”

  He thought she paused, as if meaning to go on, but she didn’t, at least following from that thought.

  “I told you I had a higher purpose,” she finally said.

  “You did.”

  Again she seemed to feud with herself for a moment before going on.

  “I once had three sisters,” she said. “We were called by many names, but in Crotheny and Liery we were most often known as the Faiths.”

  “As in the stories? The four queens of Tier na Seid?”

  “Yes and no. There are many stories. I am what is real.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “There were Faiths before me who wore my masks. Many of them, going back to the hard days after Virgenya Dare vanished. We were known as Vhatii then. Time changes tongues and twists names. We have lived, some of us hiding in the open, others secluded in distant places. We’re not real sisters, you understand, but women born with the gift. When we grow old, when our powers fail and even the drugs no longer open our vision, we find our replacements.”

  “But what do you do?”

  “It’s hard to explain. We are very much creatures of two natures. Here, we are human; we eat and breathe, live and die. But in the Ambhitus, the Not World, we are the sum of all who have gone before us—more and less than human. And we see need. Until recently our visions were rarely specific; we reacted as plants bend toward the sun. But since the law of death has been broken, our visions have become more like true prescience. My sisters and I worked for years to assure that Anne would take the throne, and in one terrible, clear moment I saw how mistaken we were to do so.

  “My sisters would not believe me, and so they died, along with the order we founded, or at least most of them. Your Alis was once one of ours.”

  “She knew who you were.”

  “When she saw me, yes. Not before.”

  “How did your sisters die?”

  “That’s complicated, too. Anne killed them, in a way—the Anne that was and will be, not the one you know. The one she is becoming.”

  “How did you escape?”

  “I withdrew from the Ambhitus and hid. I abandoned my role as a Faith and dedicated myself to correcting our mistake.”

  “And now?”

  “As I said, Anne is beyond me. But I have a chance to mend the law of death. The girl, Mery—we’ve been watching her. She has a strange and wonderful power—like mine in ways but also unlike anything that has ever been. Before she died, one of my sisters planted the seed in the composer so that he and Mery could undo the damage to the law. I must now see that to fruition.”

  “If the law of death is mended—”

  “Yes. Robert will die.”

  “Let’s do that, then,” he muttered.

  The moon set, and stars jeweled the sky. They moved from canter to trot and back to delay wearing out their mounts.

  Brinna, shivering from fatigue, sagged into him and then straightened.

  “Hold on or you’ll fall off,” he said.

  “I wish…” she sighed.

  “What?” He managed to croak, though he knew he shouldn’t.

  She didn’t answer, and behind him she felt even more rigid than when she first had been placed there.

  “I said there were
three reasons I risked having you brought up from the dungeons,” she murmured.

  “Yes. You said the third didn’t matter.”

  “I said it didn’t matter then,” she said. “I never meant it didn’t matter. Do you remember the first two reasons?”

  “You said that you didn’t believe I could be an assassin and that you thought we could help each other.”

  “You have to understand my world,” she said. “The way I lived. Four attempts that I know of were made on my life; one was by one of my own cousins, who was afraid I would see that he was cuckolding my father. A coven-trained assassin sent from Crotheny when I was ten. I don’t know who sent her. A Black Talon killer from the dark forests of Vestrana came closest. He actually had the dagger to my throat. I want you to understand all of that because although I didn’t want to think you would kill me, part of me still thought you might.”

  “Then why? What was the third reason?”

  “The third reason was that I was willing to risk death to touch you again.”

  The horse thunked along in silence as a great bloody moon sank toward the dark sea.

  “I love you,” he said.

  He felt her soften, then mold against his back, and her arms were suddenly comfortable and familiar around his waist. He couldn’t, didn’t dare turn around to kiss her, but it didn’t matter. It was the best thing he had ever felt in his life, and for the next few bells nothing, not his failure, not his grief, not even his thirst for revenge, could distract him from the woman who had her arms around him, from the mystery and wonder of her.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  ACMEMENO

  CAZIO STROKED Austra’s face, then gently prized open her lips and dribbled some watered wine between them. After a moment her throat worked, and the liquid went down.

  He regarded her still features, trying not to let the strange panic rise.

  She’s still alive, and so there’s hope, he thought.

  “Anne will have chirgeons who can cure you,” he assured the sleeping girl. “This always turns out well in the stories, doesn’t it? Although there it’s usually the kiss of the handsome prince. Am I not handsome or princely enough?”

  The carriage rumbled on for a moment.

  “We might not even have to go all the way to Eslen,” he told her. “We’ll be at Glenchest by this afternoon. Probably the duchess can help us.”

  Austra, of course, said nothing.

  They ran into a knight and his retainers about half a league from Glenchest, one Sir William, a servant of the duchess. He escorted them back to the rather baroque and defenseless mansion. The duchess did not meet them, which was rather uncharacteristic, but after the men were settled in quarters in the village, Cazio received an invitation to dine with her. He took z’Acatto and Austra in the carriage.

  Elyoner Dare was a petite woman whose demure composure gave little immediate hint of her deep satisfaction in the pursuit of vice. One usually discovered her pleasantly wicked nature early in conversation, but this day she was very different from the last time he had seen her. She wore a black dress and a black net on her hair, and her courtiers and servants, usually quite colorfully attired, were also dressed in muted tones.

  When they entered, she rose and offered her hand. Once they all had kissed it, she bent and kissed Cazio on the cheeks.

  “It’s good to see you, mi dello,” the duchess said. “All is dark, but you are still a light to these eyes.”

  “Duchess Elyoner, I would be pleased to present my swordmaster and mentor—” He realized he did not know the old man’s real name. Z’Acatto was the family nickname and simply meant “the cursed.”

  “Acmemeno d’Eriestia dachi Vesseriatii,” z’Acatto said. “At your service, Duchess.”

  Cazio blinked, trying not to show his surprise. The duochi of the Vesseriatii were some of the richest, most powerful men in Vitellio.

  Elyoner kissed him on the cheeks as well.

  “Austra is with us,” Cazio said. “She isn’t well. I was hoping your chirgeons could help her.”

  “Austra? Ill? Of course we shall do what we can.” Her forehead puckered in a small frown. “How is it you were not with Anne when…” She didn’t finish, but her eyes seemed to glisten a bit.

  “She sent us away, to Dunmrogh,” Cazio replied, then caught Elyoner’s tone.

  “When what?” he grated.

  Cazio sat on the very bench where he first had kissed Austra and took a deep pull from the carafe of harsh red wine. He glanced at z’Acatto as the old man came up and then handed him the stoneware jug.

  Oddly, the older man hesitated, then took a drink.

  “Anything else you have to tell me?” Cazio asked, trying to work up some anger and finding he couldn’t. “Are you actually a duoco? Or perhaps meddicio of z’Irbina?”

  “My brother is duoco,” z’Acatto said. “I assume he is. I haven’t seen or heard from him in years.”

  “Why? Why did you live in my house as if you were my father’s servant? Some vagabond soldier he dragged back from the wars?”

  Z’Acatto took another drink, then another.

  “I always told you I did not know the face of the man who killed your father,” he said.

  “Yes.”

  “I lied.”

  Cazio stared at the old man, and his life seemed to stretch out behind him like a rope he was trying—and failing—to balance on. Was anything he knew true?

  “Who killed him?” he demanded.

  Z’Acatto squinted off into the middle distance. “We were in a little town called Fierra, in the Uvadro Mountains. They make a fortified wine there called uchapira. We were drinking a lot of it, your father and I. There was a man; I don’t even remember his name. Turned out I had slept with his woman the night before, and he called me to steel. Only I was too drunk. When I got up to fight, my legs failed me. When I awoke, your father was out in the street with him. I was only out for a few moments, so I was still drunk and mean. I only meant to fight my own duel, but when I came screaming out of the tavern, Mamercio was distracted, and the man stabbed him right through the spleen.” He looked back at Cazio. “I killed your father, Cazio. My drunken stupidity killed him. Do you understand?”

  Cazio stood jerkily. “All this time—”

  “I did the only thing I knew to do,” he said. “I took his place, raised you.”

  “The man he fought?”

  “I killed him, of course.”

  “You could have told me. You could have told me a lot of things.”

  “I could have. I was a coward.”

  Cazio felt his heart constrict as he looked at this man he did not know, had never known.

  “This is worse, knowing now,” Cazio said. “Now, when everything is all coming apart.”

  “What will you do?”

  “Now that Anne is dead? Kill Hespero. Find a cure for Austra. Go home. Why didn’t you tell me?” he shouted.

  “I can only apologize so much,” z’Acatto grunted.

  “You haven’t apologized,” Cazio said.

  “Cazio…”

  “Go away,” he said, suddenly very tired. “Just leave me alone, whoever you are.”

  Z’Acatto got up slowly and stood there, arms hanging at his sides, for a long moment. Then he walked off.

  Cazio continued drinking.

  He woke the next morning, still on the bench, with one of Elyoner’s pages tapping him apologetically. He groggily levered himself up to a sitting position.

  “What?” he said.

  “My lady would have you come to her chambers at third bell.”

  “What bell is it now?”

  “Second, sir,”

  “Fine,” Cazio said. “I’ll be there.”

  It was only as he found his room and was bathing as best he could from the basin that he began to worry about the place assigned for the meeting.

  When he arrived to find the duchess in bed and Austra on an adjacent bed, his worries intensified.

&nb
sp; “Don’t look like that,” Elyoner said with more than a hint of her old self. “Every man wants a go with two women.”

  “Duchess—”

  “Hush and sit on the foot of the bed,” she said, sitting up against enormous pillows. She was clad in a dressing gown of black-and-gold brocade.

  As Cazio sat gingerly on the bed, two serving girls came in bearing trays of food. One was placed in front of the duchess, another next to Cazio. A third servant, a slight girl with large eyes, entered with what looked like porridge and began to feed Austra.

  “Greyna is very good,” the duchess said, nodding at the girl. “Her brother was injured in the head at a joust and was unable to feed himself. He lived two years, so she’s had plenty of practice. She has a large soul.”

  “Thank you for all of your kindnesses, Duchess.”

  Elyoner glanced over at Austra. “That girl is as dear to me as Anne was,” she said. “She was as much my niece as Fastia or Elseny.” She shook her head. “I am hardly thirty, Cazio. I hope when you are my age you have not lost so many dear ones.”

  “Austra isn’t dead,” he said.

  “No,” the duchess replied. “She isn’t. Break your fast.”

  He looked down at the tray, thinking he wasn’t hungry, but the cream fritters, sausage, and dewberries invited him to try a few bites, anyway.

  “Unlike Greyna’s brother, Austra doesn’t seem to have an injury to her head or any wounds at all except those cuts on her legs. You said it was done by a churchman. Do you know what he was up to?”

  “No. She said he said something about the ‘blood telling’ but nothing about what that meant.”

  “Curious,” Elyoner said. “In any event, whatever has happened to the dear girl, I think we must suspect some eldritch cause—something I, unfortunately, know very little about.”

  “Do you know anyone who knows more?”

  “I assume you mean outside of the Church?”

  “That’s probably best.”

  “No, not really. But surely you do.”

  He nodded. “Yes, there’s an old Sefry woman in Eslen that Anne consulted.”

  “Eslen won’t be easy to get into,” Elyoner said. “The city is under siege, with Hespero’s army camped on the south and Hansa on the north. The fleets have met in Foambreaker Bay, but I haven’t heard much more than that.”