A Suitable Consort (For the King and His Husband)

by R. Cooper

  Arden’s small smile became wider and full of mischief. “Don’t worry, Mattin Arlylian, I had won Mil before then, anyway.” His smile abruptly disappeared and he sat up. “Were you here that day? Did you witness that?”

  “Oh, no,” Mattin assured him immediately, cold when a moment before he had been hot. “I was hiding. Many of us were, down in the cellars below the library. Only the Keepers and assistants and the odd scholar know those are even there.”

  They had heard much of the fighting, however. And when they had finally left the safety of the library, they had seen the aftermath.

  Arden relaxed, if only slightly. “Good.”

  “Good?”

  Arden nodded. “Hiding was sensible. And I don’t like to think of you in danger, or watching as I died.”

  Mattin wheezed at that word. “But you didn’t.” He thanked the fae again, as he would always. “Anyway, you wouldn’t have known me from anyone else.” Despite how members of the Outguard personally delivered the information they collected on their patrols to the Great Library, and how often they would flirt with assistants—and often tup them in the many secret aisles and passages—Mattin could not recall ever seeing Arden or Mil there.

  “But you were safe in the library.” Arden seemed to find satisfaction in the thought.

  “Oh, the library is not always safe,” Mattin said without thought, “just remember Master Keeper Lanth.” Only, Arden would not have been near the capital when that had happened, and had possibly never heard about it while out on his patrols. “During one of the more turbulent years—” for all that the beat-of-fours tossed around the word traitor at Arden, many of them had few qualms about taking what they felt was theirs through traitorous acts and then seeking to ignore this fact afterward “—Master Keeper Lanth was asked by the Queen Tye to remove any records that would have weakened her claim to the throne.” All Tye had to do was keep her seat, Mattin reflected shakily. None could have argued with that. “Lanth refused and was killed for it. I suppose that news did not travel to the countryside.”

  “No.” Arden was a grave and somber figure once more. “We knew things were not stable here, but my family had left the palace, and I’d sworn to myself to stay out of it, releasing all claims or interest in anything to do with the throne. It kept me alive, I think. All of us. For a while. Lanth?” He shook his head sadly. “I think I remember her. She would have been doddering about by then.”

  “Stubborn, though.” Mattin’s family had snatched him back from the capital for a while after that, no matter his love for the library. He made his voice soft, because Arden was pained, as though he was somehow to blame when at best only his parents had their share of that. “Many left then.”

  Arden looked up again. “You didn’t.”

  “I came back.” Mattin did not know what to do with Arden’s admiration and the feeling it stirred in his stomach. “I came back, and eventually… well, we still needed Keepers, didn’t we? And I was very young. No one noticed me. Any of us, really. Which is good, when you have no defense but research.”

  Arden ignored this fragile humor. “I still do not like to think of you here for that.”

  “Neither do I,” Mattin admitted, knowing he would have been useless had he seen Arden bleeding out at the foot of the palace wall. He glanced away, imagining the scene regardless of his wishes, and noticed the stack of papers and books always pushed to the side on his desk. “There are not many songs about the two of you when you were mere guards, none that mention your wooing then,” he offered, wanting a new topic, even this painful one.

  Arden allowed it. “Have you heard them all?”

  Mattin’s ears were going to burn to a crisp at this rate. “I am keeping a record of all the songs about you. Even the negative ones.”

  That got him a glimpse of real surprise. “Did Cael ask you to do that?”

  Mattin skirted the truth without lying. “I thought someone might wish to read them, one day.” He reminded himself of why the king was here. “Perhaps your intended.”

  All emotion disappeared from Arden’s face. It meant something that he would do that. Mattin knew that much, just not what it meant. “You will be there, at these arranged meetings?”

  “You want me to be there?” To watch? Mattin demanded silently, only to realize he was already nodding. “Can’t have an incident, can we?” he asked inanely. “I suppose I must be there—in the background. If it will help.” Arden’s relieved smile would have made him giddy another time. As it was, he was flushed. “You still do not have to accept one.”

  But whatever had made Arden momentarily withdraw was gone. He was regarding Mattin warmly once more. “It will do no harm to press on, I think. Or I hope it will not. Let the others see that I tried. Let The Tyrabalith see it. If he expected me to leap up in anger, he will learn that I try not to waste my anger on unimportant matters these days.” He got to his feet, so Mattin did as well, tipping his head back to keep eye contact. “It is not my duty to marry again, but it is my duty to try to make peace, and that I will. But I do not think he made the suggestion with peace in mind.”

  “It certainly wasn’t private, as it might have been,” Mattin remarked with a huff.

  “Yes.” Arden nodded. “Mil wonders if he didn’t expect a fight right then, from him or from me. We are not subtle about our feelings.”

  “No, not for each other.” Mattin smiled despite the pull in his chest. “But I have often found you hard to read.”

  Arden tilted his head down to level Mattin with a puzzled look. “I’ve spent most of my life in armor, but you’ve seen me without.”

  Mattin turned away enough to let him fuss with the papers on his desk without knocking over the teapot. “So Mil thinks The Tyrabalith may try to goad you into further conflict? Then we must be careful that all of your meetings are the same, and above reproach. Yes. I will definitely be there to help. I would be honored.”

  The sigh from Arden surprised him, but not nearly as much as the feel of his hand being gently picked up and held between both of Arden’s. Arden was hot and his palms were slightly rough. He did not wear gloves, but did not seem to need to. Mattin could feel Arden’s rings, almost as warm as Arden himself.

  He was not sure Arden had ever touched him before. He looked up instead of down, to Arden’s eyes. Arden held him still with just that.

  “I won’t take up more of your time,” Arden said, formal once again, courtly, something that should have made Mattin pause for longer than it did. “But I thank you.”

  Many foolish things rose up in Mattin’s throat and he barely kept them behind his teeth. “It’s my job.”

  “Your hands are still quite cold,” Arden observed as if Mattin had said nothing. “I do not think I have ever seen you with gloves. Not inside. Not outside. Not even in this weather.”

  “I forget them,” Mattin admitted, though it was no secret.

  “So I imagined.” Arden’s gaze was almost unbearably tender. “Your fire was not properly lit, either, despite the logs here for you.”

  Mattin blinked, although his hand was still being held, and his gaze was still caught in Arden’s. “It’s often late when it goes out. I’m not going to call someone in here at that hour to start a new one. Mil would say I am soft for that.” And for not being able to start one of his own, which Mattin had all but confessed to.

  “Hmm,” Arden agreed in a rumble Mattin felt in the air and in his hand before Arden finally released it. “And your list was quite thoroughly thought out, I am sure,” he added, with an expression that seemed odd, although Mattin was likely dreaming all of this. “I will see you in the morning? Or will you sleep at last?” He paused. “Have you been sleeping? Is that where you have been?”

  The comment was enough to prod Mattin from his staring. He jerked his head back. “Did you come here to scold me?”

  For the second time in what could not have been more than half an hour, Arden gave him a pleased, rakish flash of a grin that
made Mattin want to smile back, or do something wild. Whatever wild would mean for him, he had no idea. Probably something that would make him fall on his face.

  “I came to get your thoughts of courting,” Arden revealed, still grinning, “and those I have received. Anything else was for the pleasure of talking with you only.”

  “I…” Mattin could not tell if this was teasing because of his obvious foolishness or a reminder of their early conversation about flirtations, but he finally got his mouth shut after a few moments of gaping and then he wrinkled his nose. “Indeed,” he declared, like the fusspot he had been named, and shooed the king out with one wave of his hand. “Out, you.”

  “Oh, no,” Mattin went not even a heartbeat later, his eyes wide. “That is, I didn’t mean to order you about. I—”

  “I know what you meant, Master Arlylian,” Arden assured him gravely, despite his smile, and bowed his head graciously as he took his leave and went out the door.

  Mattin put his hands to his face the moment the door was closed.

  One was still warm.

  Mattin generally assumed Jola of the Canamorra associated the palace grounds with her unhappy childhood or her captivity here at the end of the reign of their last ruler. While her other sibling was content on what remained of their family lands from the capital, and Arden had fled to the Outguard, Jola had stayed in the capital, but in a house outside the palace wall, and had kept her visits here brief.

  That was, until gossip or paranoia had convinced King Piya that Jola was plotting against him. Piya had stepped to the throne while others had hesitated, but had made no other bold moves in his time sitting on it. His rule had been one of confusion and whispered plotting that even those in the depths of the Great Library had begun to overhear. Perhaps finally realizing this, Piya had at last decided to act to eliminate those with the strongest claims to the crown. That his eye had turned to the nearest Canamorra should have been expected, but somehow, it had not been.

  Mattin would never forget the stillness throughout the capital as the news had traveled that Jola of the Canamorra, pregnant, holding the hand of her young daughter, had been brought to the palace in the dark of night and confined to a small room to await the King’s judgment. Jola’s popularity, Piya’s typical hesitation, and the sudden ripple of awareness through the old families that Piya would come for them next, had granted Jola a stay of execution. Piya had focused on trying to subdue angry council members and made himself more enemies in the process. Others had begun to join Jola in her captivity by the time word must have reached Arden.

  Perhaps it was for Arden that Jola had now surprised everyone by temporarily returning to a home inside the palace wall. That very morning, she and her children had set up a small royal residence in a section of a building that had once housed the orphaned Canamorra children, and by afternoon, she had surprised Mattin again by sending him an invitation to a gathering in her new home that night.

  It was natural that she would take an interest in her brother’s attempts at finding a new spouse, especially as it was politically important. This party must be about that as well as being one of the more formal ways that old families greeted each other. What had stunned Mattin was that he was invited.

  Nonetheless, Mattin had left the library the moment he had read the note, and headed to his room to bathe and restyle his hair and consider what to wear. He saw many of these people every day, but not in a social setting. A Keeper and a minor Arlylian did not often move in the same circles as the Canamorra.

  The gathering was not overly formal, although even Arden and Mil had put on clothing more decorative than practical—with concealed armor, Mattin was sure. Mil was in a tunic of dark green, with another, long-sleeved tunic of white beneath that, and someone, Arden likely, had knotted some of his hair at the back of his head. Mattin thought wistfully of the beautiful green-enameled hairpin in the shape of a leaf that he had almost purchased with Mil in mind.

  Arden was in midnight blue with hints of gold at the trim, with a thin golden circlet at his brow that had to be Jola’s doing. It was no proper crown, but it was clearly intended to remind people of one, making Arden even more of a king than usual. Mattin was not the only person drawn to the sight of him, but at least Mattin had a cup of wine to drop his attention to whenever it seemed like Arden might look back.

  Avoiding his king was not wise, perhaps, but until Mattin spoke to Mil or Arden, he could pretend it was a simple party he had been invited to and not a first step in a campaign to bring a third to Arden and Mil’s bed.

  Mattin had been waved in by several guards, and since then, he had smiled at a Cael with silver stars in her hair, and chatted with a few of those he had seen a few nights ago, and seen no sign of Jola Canamorra herself. He had eventually settled onto a short, cushioned bench by a window to observe the many who approached Arden and his husband from safely behind his cup of wine.

  Some of the council members were here. Two or three had nodded in Mattin’s direction, showing surprise to see him. A few others had also nodded, showing no surprise, or pleasure, or displeasure. But though they stared, Mattin had kept his expression polite, and sipped his wine, and reflected that in the time it had taken him to plait two braids into a spiral and pin them up to leave his neck bare, he ought to have eaten.

  He also should have reconsidered his attire. He was still not sure what had made him order a robe or pants in a deep blue-purple, when blue was not his usual choice in color, and then wear the robe tonight. But he’d put silver cuffs along both ears, and a silver necklace wrapped close around his throat. He could not compete with wealthier or more powerful nobles and had not wanted to try. But he had not wanted to look foolish, either. He had even scrubbed the ink off his fingers.

  He might have as well have been one of the guards discreetly positioned around the room that everyone was ignoring. Mattin half-wondered if there had been more guards around recently, or if he was making himself nervous and imagining that. They acknowledged him whenever he passed; perhaps that was why he noticed them more now.

  Across the room, two nobles about Mattin’s age or slightly older were now standing before Arden. Arden had angled his head to indicate interest in their conversation, but either they were boring Mil or were not including him, because Mil was blank-faced. Mattin wondered if those two boring nobles knew yet why Jola had invited them. Probably not. The assembled guests were not all political or romantic candidates, just the families of candidates or possibly friends of Jola’s. But this was a preliminary round of some kind. Mattin had no doubt of that.

  Anyone with sense would talk to Mil, even if only seeking Arden’s goodwill and not his hand. But Mattin did not expect much sense from those two—they had not been on his list.

  “You appear to have finished your wine.” A voice quietly broke into Mattin’s thoughts and then the space next to him was claimed by Per Tyrabalith.

  He might have asked. But he did pluck Mattin’s empty cup from his hands and offer Mattin a full one, so Mattin decided not to comment. He did not take a sip, however.

  “Tyrabalith,” Mattin said formally.

  “Arlylian,” The Tyrabalith responded, as if amused. That he knew Mattin’s name was mildly surprising. Most Keepers were not nobles, but Master Keepers—usually of more advanced years—who sat in council meetings might be of interest to the council members. Despite that, Per Tyrabalith had never addressed Mattin in the time Mattin had attended the meetings. “Those are odd choices for him,” The Tyrabalith went on, leaning toward Mattin as if they were sharing a secret. He gestured loosely in the king’s direction. Mattin kept himself from glancing that way, but only just. “Your searches in the library have been of some interest,” he explained at Mattin’s rather stunned staring. “But old families know best, so I am certain you will separate out the chaff soon enough.”

  Mil and Arden had eyes-and-ears in the palace, and probably in the capital and the rest of the country. Of course, other nobles would as we
ll. Mattin had known that on some level, but never really considered it would apply to him. He doubted an assistant would maliciously share news of Mattin’s record requests, but careless talk was useful to many.

  He made a note to himself to do the rest of his searches personally and to consider his choice of assistants more carefully.

  Per Tyrabalith did not seem bothered by Mattin’s silence. “Still,” he said casually, now looking out to consider the rest of the party, “I was surprised to see you here. Despite your family, you are not usually to be found at these sorts of events. What a privilege for their matchmaker—if I am right in my guess?” He did not stop to see if he was. “Unless that is dear Jola, and you are merely here to offer reminders on rules and etiquette. You understand the necessity of this. I regret that it took such strong words for Arden to understand it.”

  A frown passed across Mattin’s face. He could feel it, like the sort of flicker of distaste or confusion that he had felt when a particularly out-of-touch Keeper would sing the praises of a ruler who had been cruel or inept.

  Per Tyrabalith turned to face Mattin again, tucking a chunk of his hair behind his ear to share a smile. The Tyrabalith was younger than Arden. Mattin had never really noticed that before. He didn’t suppose it mattered, except it should have given Per Tyrabalith and Arden something in common; being pushed to the head of their families at a young age by political scheming that had not been their doing. The past decades of in-fighting had taken their toll on the older generations. The survivors were cautious and guarded, or had abandoned the mess to their children, no doubt filling their heads with nonsense as they went.

  “This is no time for tender feeling, though it is, of course, admirable.” The Tyrabalith’s smile did not falter. “The workers, the people in the capital, they do not see the situation as it is, but we do, do we not, Arlylian?”