Highest Lord

by R. J. Price

  “Can the servant you attacked sleep well tonight?” Lerd asked.

  Aren smacked Lerd on the arm as if the two of them had a personal relationship. When Lerd turned to her, the two frowned at one another, then turned those frowns to Av.

  “She's mine,” Av snarled at Lerd.

  “Learn to share,” Lerd said. “Or... we could tussle each time you get upset over it, and I'll mash your face into the ground.”

  “Enough, the both of you,” Aren said loudly. “Av, you need to learn to share, whatever that means. Lerd, don’t say cryptic things around me unless you want me to start talking formally again.”

  “Of course, Aren,” Lerd said, bowing slightly before stepping away from her.

  “Now,” the queen said with a sigh and focused on Av. “You cannot do that again, whatever you did. I don’t like having to send you off for discipline. It doesn’t make me feel well.”

  Av frowned, glancing to Lerd. He wondered if this had anything to do with the conversation Aren had with the man. Instead he found the other warrior studying Aren as if she had just announced she was going to skin them all. Lerd wasn’t baffled by her announcement, he was on the defensive.

  Aren had never put her feelings into words before, which meant that Av hardly expected to hear her attempt such a thing. Yet there was a hesitance to Aren’s voice that seemed to imply the queen was confused by what she had felt. Everyone felt. Of course she had felt before. The whole of the palace had felt both her anger and her terror.

  And her giggles, which sent everyone running to find the source. Servants were daring one another to try something silly in order to make her laugh now.

  “I would hate to make you feel unwell?” Av half said, half asked, because he wasn’t exactly certain what was expected of him at that point. “How did it make you feel?”

  “As you said, it made me feel unwell,” Aren insisted. “My stomach feels funny, and my heart did a funny little flutter.”

  “That’s fear,” Lerd said.

  “Fear? Yes, I was afraid of what might become of you, Av.”

  How could she not understand that what she had felt was fear? He wondered if it had anything to do with Danya’s remarks in the healer hall. If he were to ask Aren about her childhood, what would she say? That she had lived? That her parents abused her?

  She never spoke of any of it, not even when Para and Cerlot had come to court. Aren hadn’t put words to why she didn’t want her own parents around. Possibly because she could no longer remember what had happened to her.

  Av glanced at Lerd again, who motioned to Aren with his head and a frown.

  “Does your confusion over your fear have anything to do with why Danya wanted me to ask what you recall of your childhood?” Av asked.

  He figured deflecting her confusion onto someone else would be the best thing. Between the two of them, he and Lerd could figure out how to calm Aren down, but he strongly suspected that Lerd knew something that he did not. The other warrior must have recognized something in Aren’s behaviour that reminded him of someone else.

  “Danya?” Aren asked, going a funny sort of colour. “Oh no, Danya!”

  She rushed off, leaving two very confused men in her wake. Av frowned at Lerd, who was glaring at him.

  “Who is Danya?”

  “Her companion from the winter. Aren hasn’t seen Danya since we returned, hasn’t even asked after her.”

  Lerd swore. The man paused, and then swore again, louder this time.

  “What’s going on?” Av dared to ask.

  “I don’t want to have to explain this twice. You go to your rooms. I’ll collect the barons. I will explain then. Go. I will find where you sleep from one of the others.”

  Confused, very, very confused, Av went to his rooms and waited. He was patient until Url and Er arrived. Both groaned at the sight of him. He was supposed to be in bed, not up and waiting for everyone to arrive because Lerd was gathering them all.

  “What’s this about?” Er asked, taking a seat beside Av.

  “Aren said that disciplining me made her feel unwell. She was behaving like she always does, except this time she didn’t rage. She just became confused, and when I mentioned something Danya said to me, she ran off.”

  “But when Aren gets confused, she gets angry,” Url said. “Or when she gets frustrated. Or when a lord questions her. She gets angry a lot, so I suppose calling us because she didn’t get angry is something.”

  Url spoke the words as Van walked into the room. The man pulled to a stop and looked over each of the warriors. He was silent as he walked towards, and then around, Url slightly.

  “What did you just say?”

  “That Aren didn’t get angry this time, so Lerd’s calling everyone together for some really important conversation,” Url said. “It’s a waste of our time.”

  “Aren… gets… angry…” Van said. “How often?”

  “All the time. A lord questions her, someone says something she doesn’t agree with. She’s just an angry woman.”

  “When someone says something you don’t agree with, you get upset,” Van said. “When someone questions you, you get upset.”

  “When she gets confused she gets angry, but this time she didn’t,” Av said.

  He watched as Van stiffened and turned to him ever so slowly. The baron looked upset one moment, then absolutely emotionless the next.

  “And Lerd saw this?” Van asked.

  Lerd walked into the room with Gamen and the Eastern high lord directly behind him. The warrior pulled to a stop, looked Van over and then moved to the other side of the group. He looked uncomfortable as he sat where no one could reach him, all the while watching Van.

  “I suppose they’ve been talking at you, which means you know,” Lerd said, never taking his eyes off of Van. “And for the rest of you, Van knows because he’s a queen.” He finally looked away, making eye contact with each person in the room besides Van. “Probably also because I dealt with his sister when she came to court.”

  “There was no saving her,” Van stressed.

  “No, there was no saving her and the throne certainly didn’t claim her,” Lerd said. “What the rest of you have viewed as a woman with an anger problem, isn’t a woman with an anger problem. When a queen is angry and she sits the throne, people get hurt, physical items burst into flames or simply fall apart despite how well constructed they are.”

  “That did happen,” Url said.

  “When Aren first ascended,” Av corrected. “Laeder told us that would settle after a few months, that the throne had to adjust to her and it obviously has, since she doesn’t rage like that anymore.”

  “Until you get to the part where, when Aren gets confused, she gets angry,” Van growled.

  “People get angry when they get confused because they don’t understand,” Er said. “Olea gets angry when she gets confused. I’ve had more than one mirror broken because of some puzzle my children have brought her.”

  “That’s frustration and confusion, which can lead to anger depending on temperament,” Van said.

  “Queens are quite familiar with emotions. By Aren’s age, she should know which emotions fuel her magic more,” Lerd said quietly.

  “She didn’t understand that what she felt was fear,” Av said, looking to Van. “What’s that mean?”

  “It means she doesn’t feel,” Van said through gritted teeth. “You’ve heard the stories of commoners who don’t feel. They kill their siblings for eating their sweets. That’s the extreme of it.”

  “Those are the same stories about how their father touched them while their mother watched and they got beat every day… oh…” Er trailed off into a squeak.

  “Aren’s never told me why she doesn’t want her parents around,” Av said. “She spoke about the one queen on the coast, but only after we asked her a direct question on how her parents viewed ranks.”

  “She must feel—everyone feels.”

  “That’s the good news,” Ler
d said. “Aren does feel, but she doesn’t understand what she’s feeling.”

  Van growled through gritted teeth. Av felt a danger in the room, and he assumed it was from Van. The man was still blocking much of his rank despite the fact that all the other ranks at court now knew.

  Lerd glanced nervously at Van, but continued. “It means she is capable of feeling but has either buried the emotions deep down or hasn’t had a reason yet to feel them. This may also explain her detachment from the court and from others. Does she have any friends here?”

  “Mar is her friend. Mar…” Av glanced at Van and saw the tremble run through the man. “Mar had a troubled childhood but seems to be adjusting well.”

  “Good, we have a stepping stone, then,” Lerd sighed out.

  “What would happen if we didn’t?” Av asked.

  “We’d have to do her a mercy,” Er said quietly.

  “Before she slaughtered us all,” Lerd said. “Queens like that go mad, and not the way Em did. If all she feels is rage, why would she view the world as anything else?”

  “She doesn’t view the world as filled with rage, just filled with stupid people who keep getting in her stupid way. And everyone just needs to learn to stay out of her way and let her do whatever she pleases with her life,” Av protested. “That doesn’t make her dangerous. Besides, the throne made her, chose her, waited until she was eighteen to take her. If she would be a danger to us, it would have taken her at a younger age to prevent whatever from happening. So why didn’t it do that? Or why not take Anue instead?”

  “Anue being Aren’s sister?” Lerd asked.

  “Yes, a bright, cheerful little thing who has a great deal more control and more magic than Aren does. Her temperament is even, as long as you don’t bring up warriors you want to bind to her.”

  “The reason queens like this need to be given a mercy is because they don’t fully feel, but the further into life they go, the more often they are presented with situations where they will feel. To never feel before is… is… is like a warrior never knowing what a trainer’s blow feels like, and then being struck.”

  “When she giggles, everything shivers in delight,” Gamen whispered. He turned to Van with a frown. “But how do you even drive a queen to that point?”

  Lerd was the one to answer, because Van was still struggling with himself. “It can vary, since different people react differently, but thankfully she doesn’t recall everything, if anything at all. To drive a queen to that emotional state is almost the same as driving any child to a submissive state. You starve them of attention and then give them conflicting orders. Tell them to eat, but then tell them they’re fat. Beat them if they are too slow to learn, but terrorize them against learning too much.”

  “A submissive state means—” Er started.

  Av growled at the prickling across his skin.

  “Her parents had to drive her halfway to breaking and then balance her on that point.”

  The whole room seemed to explode.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Aren walked into the remains of Av’s rooms and looked over the broken and burned plaster. The rug was nothing but ashes. While the furniture had survived, any fabric covering on said furniture had been destroyed. The frames were instilled with magic, but fabric was a funny sort of thing when it came to magic.

  She turned to those gathered in the room, the barons, Av, and the three high lords who were at court. She pointed at the one she didn’t recognize, knowing he must be the high lord of the East.

  “You are to come for a formal meeting tomorrow,” she said.

  “Yes, Lady Aren.”

  “You may leave.”

  “Yes, Lady Aren.” The man was only too happy to flee and leave this problem to the ranks.

  Her eyes roved over the barons, only to realize that Van was not in the room. She clasped her hands before her and studied the frightened faces that stared back at her.

  “Is this why male queens are feared?” she asked.

  “No,” Lerd said. “This is why queens are feared. Ella will be here any moment—”

  “Then she will submit, or her mate will be put out,” she said sternly. “This is my land, meaning my territory. You warriors claim land, yes? You mark off your land and call it your territory like a pack of wolves might, yes? Then you will understand me when I say this is my territory.” Aren heard a scuff behind her and turned as Ella strode into the room, fury rolling off the woman. “And when a queen destroys part of my territory, unprovoked, it is up to me to pass judgement on him or her. Do you question this?”

  She had said the last as she watched Ella. The woman’s fury turned slowly to fear. Ella didn’t attempt to relax, but did lower her eyes.

  “Van has done as much to others,” the warrior said to the floor, unable to look up once more.

  “I don’t plan on killing him, Ella, he will be returned to you. But in how many pieces will be determined by his behaviour.”

  “I understand,” the other woman said.

  Aren turned back to the men. “Now. What were you men talking about, that did this? And recall, I will know if you are lying and I now know that you all have a weakness and he’s right nearby.”

  “You,” Av said, stepping towards Aren. “We were talking about you, Aren. They believe, and I can’t help but see something of the sort, that you don’t feel the way a person is supposed to. Especially not how a queen is supposed to.”

  “I feel.”

  “You didn’t know what fear was,” he said. “Your giggles send a delighted shiver through everyone. Except me, and that’s not a bad thing. We like your giggles—the others for the delight and me because you are giggling, but it lasts a fleeting moment and then is gone.”

  “Why did this upset Van?” she asked.

  “In order to…” Av trailed off, struggling to find the word, “… make… a queen like you, you have to drive them halfway to breaking.”

  “You can’t break a queen.”

  “Breaking the spirit of a queen, just as one can do to anyone else,” Av said. “This will either leave you with a submissive subject whose magic is at your disposal, sometimes linked directly to you as if it were your own, or… with something a great deal worse than Em.”

  “Like how a tortured man will say anything to make the pain stop?” Aren asked.

  “Oh, not that again. I handled it my way. He meant to kill you and I think I made myself very clear. Though Jer did most of that, I think he needed the release. Anyhow, it’s in the past.”

  “But to break a queen would be the same.”

  “Yes,” Ella said. “Even at halfway, if your parents had known that you were a queen, you would have given over your magic to them in order to make them stop hurting you. For a time they might have, but then they would start again, slowly over time, to push you the rest of the way so that they could have access to everything.”

  “And how do you know that?” Aren asked, turning back to the woman.

  “Van’s father did it to his sister, tried to do it to Van,” Ella said. “I blooded him.”

  Aren glanced at Er. “Is blooded where nothing’s left but a head?” The man nodded gravely in response. “Where is Van’s sister now?”

  “Dead,” Lerd said. “I did her a mercy. Her body was there, but her spirit was long gone.”

  “And were you considering doing the same to me?”

  “We were simply discussing—”

  “Were you considering doing the same to me?” Aren demanded, louder this time.

  “It was an option early in the conversation,” Lerd said. “One that was dismissed when they mentioned the giggles.”

  “And now your plan?”

  “To make you feel the things you should have learned to feel growing up?” Lerd asked, sounding uncertain of himself. He glanced past Aren, to Ella.

  “You don’t have to make her feel anything. Once removed from the source it comes back fairly quickly,” Ella said.

  Ar
en wanted to rage at someone, but was afraid that it would only prove their damnable point. Hands still before her, she clenched them tighter together to remind herself to control her actions.

  “Where is Van?”

  “I believe he went to the sitting room down the hall,” Av said.

  She left the set of rooms and searched about. Her own emotions were conflicting with her searching because she and Van were feeling something very similar. Glancing down the hallway, she spotted a servant who stared back at her with wide eyes.

  “Where’s the other one?” she asked.

  The servant moved to Aren, then past her with a quick motion. Aren followed down the hallway and to a closed door. The servant motioned to the door and then stared at Aren with concern and a bit of fear. She motioned the servant off and received a stiff bow before the man fled.

  She stepped into the room and closed the door behind her quickly.

  Inside was unlike anything she had ever seen, or felt. The furniture seemed to vibrate as if it could not decide whether it should be solid or slivers of wood and shreds of fabric. Plaster from the walls had been lifted off in little flecks and were floating in the air.

  Deep down, somewhere in her body, she felt the desire to run, but she was too surprised and curious about what she saw. On some level she had known that a queen was capable of this, but she had never truly understood. Van wasn't altering the state of anything. His magic was simply ripping apart physical objects in an effort to expend the excess created by his rage.

  Aren's wrist throbbed. She reached for it absently and adjusted the black manacle as Van turned to her. There was fury and madness in the man's eyes as his magic redirected.

  How did she know his magic was changing direction? Because every flake of plaster, and even bits of the furniture, began drifting towards her.

  She lifted a hand in defence and watched as Van crumpled to the floor. The plaster collapsed a moment later. Aren lowered her hand and Van gasped out. She wondered if whatever she had done, she could do on purpose. As she wondered that, there was a creaking.