The Vacant Throne

by Joshua Palmatier

  “I was there, inside the White Fire I placed inside of him. I was watching through his eyes when the Chorl ships hit the wharf. I watched as he dragged you down behind the barricade when they struck. I watched as the Chorl spilled down from the ships and swarmed the docks. I watched as you led the charge into their ranks, and I watched when Borund turned and fled. I saw it all. I felt everything that Borund felt.”

  His eyes widened. “You did? But then, why didn’t he stay and fight? Why didn’t you make him stay and fight?”

  “Because . . .” I began, but then ground to a halt. Because I could have stayed and made Borund fight. I could have seized control of his body through the Fire, could have forced him into the Chorl’s ranks. I’d wanted to, the sense of betrayal as Borund fled sharp. But I couldn’t stay. I was needed in the palace, to fight the Ochean, to stop her, whatever the cost.

  But William didn’t want a rational reason. He wanted to know why Borund had betrayed him, had abandoned him.

  I sighed, heavily, pushed my own anger at Borund back.

  “He couldn’t stay, William. He couldn’t. His fear was too great. He tried. He honestly tried to stay and fight, but the fear overwhelmed him. I felt it overwhelm him.”

  William held my gaze a long moment, the hope that I’d give him a reason fading.

  When I reached for him, to touch his arm as Eryn had touched mine earlier, standing over Erick, he flinched away as I had done. I let my hand drop.

  He winced at the gesture. “I’m sorry, Varis, but . . .” He lowered his head, loosened the tenseness in his shoulder with visible effort, then caught my gaze. “How’s Erick?”

  I stilled, and he must have seen the answer in my eyes because he reached for me. And unlike before, with Eryn, I let him draw me in close, let him hold me. I breathed in the clean scent of his shirt, smelled the hint of fresh straw beneath on the river.

  “He’s not getting any better,” I said, and was surprised at how rough my voice sounded, how thick. “And neither Eryn nor I can do anything for him.”

  “What about Isaiah?”

  I shook my head, rested it against his shoulder for a moment, then drew back, even though his warmth was comforting. “Isaiah’s done what he can, but he can’t help with this. The Chorl did something to him using the river.”

  William’s brow creased. “And you can’t fix it?”

  I gave a short, barking laugh. “I can’t even sense it.”

  On the far side of the hall, a door opened and three other apprentices—two of Regin’s and one who had worked under the hoarder Yvan—stepped into the room, their voices carrying in the dusty silence. William took a step back from me, separating us. The moment of closeness broke.

  When the other apprentices moved on, William asked, “What are you going to do?”

  “I don’t know.” I thought of Ottul, hesitated as I wondered whether I should tell him about her. But I’d moved her to the upper palace. Word would be spreading soon enough. “We captured a few of the Chorl in the attack, including one of the Chorl Servants. I’m hoping we can find out how to heal Erick from her.”

  William’s eyes widened, but before he could begin questioning me about Ottul, I asked, “Where’s Borund?”

  William snorted, his anger returning in a heartbeat. “He hasn’t left the manse since the attack, hasn’t even left his study. He isn’t working, isn’t doing much of anything. All he does is drink. I’ve never seen him like this before.”

  I shuddered. Because I had. He’d done the same thing after William had been stabbed, when we weren’t certain that William would survive. Locked himself in his study, drunk himself into a stupor.

  Until I’d made the offer to kill Charls for him.

  I winced.

  “He needs something to do,” I said. “He needs something that will give him purpose again.”

  “Like what?”

  I shrugged, letting some of my own anger slip free again. “I don’t know. Something that will make him active again. In the guild, in the city. We can’t afford to have the guild brought to its knees simply because he’s feeling sorry for himself. I need him. Amenkor needs him. He’s one of the few remaining people of power left in the city. But if he’s going to be of any help, I need him to be visible to the people, and I need him to be stable.”

  William glanced toward his table, toward the stacks of parchment he’d been working on. “What about ships?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “We lost most of our trading ships to the Chorl, when they were attacking them in the trade routes and later when they struck the city. All Regin has been complaining about lately is the fact that the guild can’t operate effectively unless we have ships to trade with. We can’t rely on the roads. Shipping overland isn’t fast enough. Why not have Borund rebuild the ships we’ve lost? He can even help with the financing. I’ve seen his ledgers, I know how much he’s worth. He can probably underwrite at least five ships, perhaps more, depending on what size and scale you’re talking about. It will give him something to do other than drink. It will give him a chance to redeem himself.”

  I stared at William. Then, impulsively, I leaned forward and kissed him. A light kiss, startling me as much as him.

  Before either of us could react, I spun away. “Come on.”

  With a start, he followed me back toward Keven, the remaining guardsmen straightening as I approached. “Where are we going?”

  “To Borund’s manse.”

  I felt William halt, felt the coldness radiating from him as I turned.

  William shifted awkwardly under my gaze. “He ran, Varis. He left me there to die. I can’t forgive him. Not yet. Not that easily.”

  I felt my jaw clench, but nodded.

  Then I turned and left the merchants’ guild, Keven and my escort in tow.

  “Master Borund will see you now, Mistress.”

  Gerrold, Borund’s manservant, spoke the words formally, but his eyes were alight, completely ignoring Keven and the escort of guardsmen that surrounded me. He motioned us into the main corridor, leading us down a familiar hall toward Borund’s study.

  I breathed in the scents of Borund’s manse as I followed Gerrold—polished wood, the dust of parchment, the faint scent of bread baking. I didn’t see Lizbeth or Gart, the two other servants Borund kept around the manse, but the rooms we passed and the halls themselves brought enough of their own internal ache from memory. I hadn’t been physically in the manse for months, for what felt like a lifetime, but I had come here in spirit using the throne when searching for the stolen food. I’d had a purpose then, hadn’t allowed myself to let the memories affect me.

  But now they came unbidden. I wanted to be harsh, didn’t want the edge I felt over Borund’s cowardice to be blunted, didn’t want his betrayal of William to be lessened, but I was suddenly assailed with the taste of butter, with images of Lizbeth dunking me beneath the water in my first real bath, of William laughing at something Borund had said and Borund grinning, casting me a furtive look to see if I was laughing as well.

  And then Gerrold halted before Borund’s study. Before opening the door and allowing me in, he said, “Please, Mistress. Do something to help him.”

  He stepped aside and walked away, not allowing me to respond and without announcing my arrival.

  I stared through the open door, smelled the alcohol, the staleness of the room, and grimaced. It reminded me of the depths of the slums beyond the Dredge.

  Without turning to Keven, I said, “Wait here.” Then I entered, closing the door behind me.

  The windows were closed, the shutters drawn, faint sunlight visible at the edges. In the shadows, I could see the large desk, ledgers scattered haphazardly to one side, sheets of parchment sticking out from the edges. Various shelves and tables held more ledgers, a few plants, and other simple artifacts from locations all along the Frigean coast—an intricately carved pipe from the southern islands, fossilized leaves and shells embedded in stone, a feather-and-bea
d headdress from Kandish across the eastern mountains, a vial containing the blue waters of the far northern Taniecian lands. A large rug covered the floor before the fireplace; a great sword hung above the mantel.

  Among all the ledgers and artifacts were empty bottles of wine. A few were tipped to one side, others contained a few fingers’ worth of liquid, but by the smell of the stagnant room, they had clearly turned.

  Borund sat behind his desk, one hand clutching the stem of a glass. Another bottle sat close at hand, already half empty. He glared at me over the desk, brow furrowed, face flushed and angry. He hadn’t shaved recently, and his eyes were bloodshot and puffy.

  “What do you want?” The words were spoken in a gravelly, hoarse voice.

  I squinted into the dimness of the room, crossed my arms over my chest, feet a shoulder’s width apart. A soldier’s stance.

  “What do you want!” Borund barked, his free hand slapping down onto his desk with a hard crack as he surged to his feet, not quite stable.

  I didn’t flinch, didn’t move. I met his eyes, met the rage there with a steady gaze, and said simply, “You ran.”

  He jerked back, face contorted with shock as if I’d reached out and slapped him, the reaction magnified by his unsteadiness.

  I walked across the room, set my own hands down flat against his desk, felt the stickiness of spilled wine beneath my palms, and leaned forward, directly into Borund’s face. His eyes widened, the rage gone. The reek of stale, used-up liquor came thick on his breath, had been ground into his skin. He looked ten years older than he was, his flesh hanging on his bones, the wire glasses askew on his nose.

  “I was there,” I spat, letting all the rage I’d felt in that moment come through in my voice. “I watched through your eyes as the Chorl ships rammed the docks, watched as William took up the battle cry and led the Amenkor men over the barricade to meet them. I watched as you stood there, staring, unable to move, and I felt your heart falter.

  “And then I watched you run. I watched you abandon William to the Chorl.”

  Horror widened Borund’s eyes further. His mouth opened, then closed. Opened again. “I—” he began. I could see his pulse throbbing at his throat, in a blood vessel on his forehead. Sweat coated his skin in a thin sheen. His gaze darted away, searched the room in a panic, and then settled back onto me. “Oh, gods,” he whispered.

  And then he collapsed back into his chair. Tears streaked down his face, and his body shook with silent sobbing. “I couldn’t,” he heaved, voice strangled, barely there. “I couldn’t. I tried. I tried to turn back. But I just kept running. I didn’t even know where I was going.” His face contorted. “I’m sorry, Varis. So very sorry.”

  The emotion on his face was too raw, too visceral. I pushed back from the desk, an empty wine bottle on its side shifting position at the motion. I stared down at it a long moment, thought of William, of what Borund’s cowardice had done to him. I glanced around at the rest of the bottles throughout the room, and then I moved to one of the shaded windows.

  I stared at the material of the shade—deep red, suffused with sunlight from behind—and said, “Then do something about it.”

  Borund’s sobbing caught. “I can’t,” he said viciously, the anger aimed at himself, his voice thick with phlegm. “The attack is over. There’s nothing I can do to change it now.”

  “You can’t change what happened,” I said. I reached up and pulled the shade back, sunlight spilling into the room with a harsh glare. Borund sucked in a deep breath at the light, almost a hiss, but I ignored him, moved to the rest of the windows and jerked all of the shades aside, opening the windows, fresh air spilling in with the sunlight, sharp with spring and sea salt.

  I turned to face Borund, hands on my hips. “But you can attempt to redeem yourself. For me. For Amenkor, which needs you now more than before Alendor and his consortium, more even than before the Chorl arrived. But especially for William.”

  Guilt flashed across Borund’s face and he slumped even farther back in his seat. “William,” he whispered.

  I took a step forward, halted. I no longer felt the seething rage over his cowardice on the docks, but I was still angry. It would take more than a few words and some sobbing to change that. Like William, the forgiveness wouldn’t come easily.

  “You’ve lost him, Borund.”

  Borund stared at me from across the room, mouth open, one hand raised to shade his eyes against the sunlight, as the words sank in. “H-How?” he finally stammered. “How can I redeem myself? There’s nothing—”

  “You can build ships,” I said, cutting him off. “Lots of ships.”

  “Now that the wharf is repaired, we can begin working in earnest on the repairs to the surviving ships,” Regin said.

  We stood at the edge of the wharf, people streaming around us, mostly workers hauling rope and carting wood out to the ships tied up at the docks to either side of us. But there were some fishermen, crab traps slung across their backs, their skin tanned into a thick hide, their hair bleached by the sun. There were also shopkeepers from the upper city; peddlers and hawkers; the dark-skinned Zorelli that made up the majority of the ships’ crews; and one or two others from outside the main coastal regions. All these people had survived the winter in Amenkor and were trying to start anew. Sailors bellowed from the rigging, and crew called back and forth across the decks, the sounds accompanying the creak of the new planking beneath our feet and the slap of waves against the wharf’s supports. Birds wheeled in the air—gulls and terns, one or two pelicans—their shrieks blending into the general noise. The scent of fish and brine clung to the air, the breeze coming in occasional gusts from the ocean. At least seven ships had been brought in to the docks, most still with damage to be repaired.

  “When will the first ship be ready to send out?”

  Regin snorted. “We could send out a few trading ships immediately, but none of them are equipped to defend themselves against the Chorl. Their captains aren’t exactly leaping at the chance to leave the relative safety of the harbor.”

  “Not even to trade to the north?” So far, there had been no evidence that the Chorl were ranging farther north than Amenkor. All of the attacks on trading ships last summer had come to the south, between Amenkor and Venitte, along the main trading routes between the two sister cities.

  Regin shook his head. “Not even to go north to Merrell. They’re waiting for us to upgrade their ships, or to finish repairing the warships the Chorl left behind so that they have an escort ready to defend them.”

  I turned to look toward where three of the Chorl ships were also docked, their decks swarming with carpenters and engineers. Regin looked in the same direction.

  “Our carpenters are drooling over them,” he said. “I’ve already sent a few to check them out in detail. They seem to think they can adapt them somehow. Something to do with their construction.” When I gave him a questioning look, he shook his head. “Don’t ask. I’m a merchant, not a shipwright.”

  I wasn’t either. In fact, I’d never even been on a ship. Gutterscum from the Dredge typically never made it down to the wharf. Most never made it across the River that separated the slums from the lower city.

  That was changing though. There was less of a divide between the city and the slums now.

  “How long before we can provide the trading ships with an escort?” I asked.

  “By the end of the week. We should have three of the Chorl ships ready to go by then. If we send one with each trading ship, that should allow me to send two ships and Borund one.”

  At Borund’s name, I tensed, frowned. Even though I’d spoken to him two weeks before, had practically ordered him out of his stupor, I still felt anger boiling beneath the surface. I’d seen him on the docks, had seen him in the warehouse district taking stock of his supplies. But I hadn’t seen William and Borund together yet, had met with William repeatedly. I hadn’t mentioned Borund, and William had carefully sidestepped the issue whenever it came up.


  Borund hadn’t proved himself yet. And I hadn’t forgiven him.

  “He was raised to be a merchant, not a warrior.”

  I turned to meet Regin’s eyes, startled. He watched me with calculated intent. I suddenly wondered where Regin had been during the attack, wondered what he had done. He’d been assigned to one of the barricades in the lower city, but I’d lost track of him during the attack, too caught up in events to watch everyone.

  But Regin had changed. Before the attack, he’d hated me, hated how I’d seized control of the food and supplies, how I’d set up the kitchens and warehouses. He’d helped me only grudgingly as I tried to feed the city.

  “Borund should have stayed to fight on the docks,” I said, my voice level. “He should have stayed with William.”

  Regin didn’t waver. “Not everyone was made to fight. Not everyone was built for survival. Mistress.”

  Regin held my gaze a moment more, then looked away.

  “In any case, William has handled all of Borund’s affairs since the attack, while Borund was . . . otherwise occupied. And he’s done a splendid job of it. Since Borund and I are the only surviving members of the merchants’ guild of any consequence, I was thinking of making William a full merchant in his own right, perhaps a few of the other apprentices as well. The guild needs to begin recovering from Alendor and his consortium. What do you think?”

  I thought of William charging into the advancing Chorl, sword raised awkwardly before him. I thought of my first excursion to the middle ward at William’s side, saw his face as he gazed longingly at the merchant shops and manses that had lined the streets, and smiled. “I think he’d like that.”

  Regin grunted, a faint smile touching his own lips. “And I think he’d like you to come to the ceremony.” At my frown, he gave me a knowing look. “And I need to go see to my own estates, which are still in total disarray after the past winter. I assume that now that winter is over, and the city has survived, all of the merchants have free access to do their usual business? No more joint warehouses? No more communal kitchens?”