Ally of the Crown

by Melissa McShane

  She endured the fitting of the last two gowns in silence and increasing impatience. When Georgette helped her out of the final gown, Fiona breathed a sigh of relief and immediately donned her trousers and shirt. “I’m going for a walk,” she declared.

  “You should not go unescorted,” Georgette declared. “And walking is inappropriate for ladies of high status.”

  “I’ve walked all over Haizea in the last ten years,” Fiona said, “and I don’t think it’s inappropriate. Neither does my husband.”

  Georgette’s lips thinned, but she said nothing more, just gathered up the froth of green satin and tulle that was the final gown and left the dressing room. Fiona suppressed an uncomfortable feeling. For one thing, it had been five years since she’d been familiar with Haizea, and that had been with its less upscale neighborhoods. For another, she was pretending to be a high-class lady, and maybe that meant she shouldn’t go walking by herself. But she felt a sudden need to be alone, away from the trappings of her pretend life and away from all the scrutiny.

  She left the suite without a word to Sebastian, in case he might feel the need to invite himself along, and trotted down the stairs to the dimly-lit entrance hall. A couple of green and brown men in attachés’ uniforms crossed it, giving her curious glances but not addressing her.

  She had her hand on the door latch when she heard someone call her name—her false name, Lady North. Turning, she saw Charles Carris approaching in a hurry. “Lady North,” he repeated, “where are you going?”

  “Just for a walk,” Fiona said.

  “Please wait while I call for a carriage,” Carris said.

  “That won’t be necessary. I said I wanted to walk, not ride.”

  Carris looked confused for a moment, and then his face smoothed back into the affable, alertly helpful mask. “If you wish…I’ll summon an escort, then.”

  “I don’t need an escort. I’m familiar with Haizea and it’s perfectly safe.”

  “Lady North…” Carris looked as if he couldn’t decide what to say next. He settled on, “No member of the royal house should walk unescorted through a foreign city. There are dangers—if you were harmed—”

  “I won’t be harmed. And it’s not as if I’m recognizable as a North, if you’re worried about kidnapping or something.”

  Carris gave up his pretense at diplomacy. “Lady North, if something were to happen to you, this embassy would be to blame. I don’t know how you normally behave in Aurilien, but that’s simply not possible here. If you insist on going out, you will have an escort. Please wait here.”

  His tone of voice angered her. “You mean a minder,” she said. “Mr. Carris, I’m leaving now. If you want to send someone to make sure I don’t trip and stub my toe, that’s your affair. But he’d better stay far enough back that he doesn’t interfere with my business.” She threw open the door and left before he could do anything rash, like lay hands on her. Behind her, she heard him swear and then shout for someone whose name she didn’t catch. A minder. As if she weren’t a grown woman and capable of taking care of herself.

  On the street outside, she breathed in the cool air and relaxed for the first time in weeks. The smell of the Kepa, a rich, silty scent, tugged at her, and she walked at a leisurely pace toward the bridge.

  There weren’t many pedestrians in the embassy’s neighborhood, making Fiona wonder if Georgette’s comment about ladies not walking anywhere applied to more than just Tremontanan behavior. She kept walking, ignoring the stares of Veriboldans who rode past in high-sprung carriages with wheels nearly as tall as she was. Even with carriages taking the place of pedestrians, the road wasn’t very well trafficked, and silence nearly as complete as that of the Jaixante surrounded her.

  The roar of the Kepa grew in volume as she neared the bridge until it filled her ears, a welcome relief from the unaccustomed silence. Fiona walked along the bridge until she was near its center, then leaned on the ironwork railing and looked out at the island of the Jaixante. Her midnight run through its streets seemed forever in the past. By day, it looked so unreal, all those white and gold towers shading to pale blue and bronze where the shadows of early afternoon touched them. Again the feeling of being an alien touched her heart, and she shivered. Time to go somewhere familiar. Mostly familiar, anyway.

  The east side of the Kepa, thronged with pedestrians as the west side was not, was loud and chaotic and comforting. Fiona bought a bowl of meat and rice in the delightfully fishy sauce and felt better immediately. She strolled through the streets until she found the market they’d passed through and spent some minutes browsing its wares. She didn’t particularly feel like buying anything, but sometimes looking was enough.

  She saw no one in green and brown, no one who might be embassy staff, and began to feel uncomfortable at the scene she’d made. Carris’s point about the embassy being held to blame if anything happened to her in Haizea made more sense now that she wasn’t angry and, yes, embarrassed at being reprimanded. Lady North probably shouldn’t go walking alone even in Aurilien, let alone in a foreign capital, and she burned with greater embarrassment. Just one more reason she didn’t belong with Sebastian, because she didn’t want to live her life under such scrutiny. She liked being able to walk unescorted through a market and not buy anything. Or travel to a foreign continent. And if Sebastian weren’t a prince, she’d want to do those things with him.

  The thought made her heart hurt. If he weren’t a prince…but he was the man he was because of his upbringing, and royalty was part of that. She couldn’t wish him different with any seriousness, even as she immediately considered what it would be like if he married her and adopted into her family, leaving the Norths behind. But any man who was willing to do what he’d done for the sake of saving his family wasn’t likely to adopt out, and he loved his sister and great-uncle enough not to want to lose that family bond. Which put her back where she’d started—in love with a man she couldn’t have.

  She made her way back to the boulevard flanking this side of the river and once more leaned on the railing. She was near the gate they had entered back when they’d first come to the Jaixante. She could cross the bridge to the island and ask permission to go to the Irantzen Temple…which they would almost certainly deny. If she showed them the tokens…that would mean imprisonment and death, though if she could get past that, they’d probably gain her entrance to the temple. Fiona sighed and ran her fingers over the bag’s velvety surface. She’d have to find some other way to restore the tokens, and restore her honor.

  She returned across the bridge without stopping to admire the beautiful water and found her way back to the embassy without difficulty. Sebastian met her at the door. “Where the hell have you been?” he exclaimed, grabbing her upper arm tightly.

  “I went for a walk.”

  “You can’t just go for a walk in Haizea! Anything might have happened to you!”

  In time, Fiona realized he was afraid rather than angry, and controlled a sharp response. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you where I was going. You know Haizea is perfectly safe for someone dressed the way I am. I used to walk all over the east side, and so long as I stayed out of Dusktown, I was never in any danger.” She grimaced. “And Mr. Carris probably had me followed, so I wasn’t exactly unescorted.”

  A woman dressed in a green and brown uniform, a guard rather than an attaché, came through the door at that moment. She didn’t look at all uncomfortable or upset, just saluted Sebastian and Fiona with a neutral expression. “Your Highness. Lady North,” she said, and walked past them into the gloom.

  Sebastian loosened his grip on her arm. “Fiona, maybe this didn’t occur to you, but you’re a member of the royal family now. If you were attacked—yes, I know, that’s unlikely, but if you were attacked, it would cause an international incident. It might even disrupt the Election. You can’t go on behaving as if you’re nobody.”

  He was right. That hadn’t occurred to her. “I…I’m sorry, Sebastian. I didn’t think of
it that way. I just wanted to get out for a while.”

  “I didn’t realize you felt trapped.”

  “Not that. Just tired of the carriage after so many days on the road.”

  He grimaced. “And yet…”

  “And yet what?”

  “Nothing. Just…nothing.” He converted his grip on her arm to an outstretched hand. “Come inside. I want to discuss the opening ceremony tomorrow. Ambassador Emory has been telling me details, and it’s more complicated than I thought.”

  “That sounds dire.” She took his arm and was glad to see him smile with pleasure. “Let’s talk,” she said, “and maybe some solution to our problems may occur.”

  27

  Fiona wriggled into the gold silk gown without help and settled its skirts around her legs. The gown’s skirt was split up the front to reveal the embroidered satin underskirt, and the bodice fit perfectly, flattering her curves. The color made her hair glow like a corona of fire. Beautiful. She looked like a lady. If only it were as easy as putting on the right gown.

  “Hold still,” Georgette said. She slid one of the gown’s sleeves up Fiona’s arm and stitched it into place while Fiona did as instructed. The needle whipping past so close to her skin made her nervous. If this was how noble women had dressed in Willow North’s day, she couldn’t believe the formidable North Queen hadn’t put a stop to the fashion. Or maybe she had, and the Veriboldans had used the fact that it had once been the fashion to torment their guests, make them uncomfortable and thus throw them off balance.

  “Shoes,” Georgette said, extending a pair of white slippers that matched the pearls. Fiona slipped them onto her feet and took a few tentative steps. Her formerly injured foot flexed easily, painlessly. It still felt odd to her, even more than a week after being healed. She had never received magical healing before, and the palace healer had been gentle, if silent. The healing hadn’t been painful—hadn’t felt like anything at all, just the warmth of the healer’s hand on her cold foot. A faint white scar across her instep was all that remained of the wound. What would it be like to have a magic no one feared? No, it was better to have no magic at all, at least in Tremontane.

  “Thank you,” Fiona said. “Please don’t wait up for me.”

  “My thanks, milady, but I’ll finish hemming this gown first,” Georgette said, her arms full of shimmering North blue silk. “Enjoy your evening, if you can,” she added darkly.

  Sebastian waited in the sitting room, his arms slung across the low back of a Veriboldan sofa. He wore formal knee breeches and a gold satin coat too warm for this climate. He gave her an appreciative look that made her blush. “We make a very attractive couple. Holt must have spoken to Georgette, to coordinate our clothes so perfectly.”

  He stood with no effort—Fiona had struggled off the sofa when she’d sat there earlier that afternoon—and offered her his arm. “Shall we go?”

  “Is it all right if I’m nervous?” she said as they walked down the hall to the stairs.

  “I don’t think there’s any reason to be. We’re meant to be uncouth foreigners—it makes the Veriboldans feel superior, which makes them happy.”

  “That’s rather cynical.”

  “I don’t think it’s true of all Veriboldans, just the landholders. They have a high opinion of themselves. Not that I’m suggesting you slurp your soup, just that they expect us not to know all the rules.”

  “I’m never comfortable when I don’t know what to expect.”

  “Neither am I.” Sebastian put his hand over hers and squeezed lightly. “I haven’t forgiven Mother for putting us in this position.”

  The staircase was wide enough to let them walk side by side, and they descended in silence to the front door, which a brown and green servant held open for them. “For example,” Sebastian said when they’d left the woman behind and were safely in their carriage, “I don’t like that we don’t know which of the candidates Gizane is. We have to pretend she’s nothing to us, and suppose she’s introduced and catches us off-guard?”

  “I suppose we just have to…not react to everyone,” Fiona said. “What if she starts a fight?”

  “Unlikely. She won’t want to give away her crimes. She’ll have to behave as politely to us as we do to her.”

  Fiona shifted and slid on the carriage seat as the golden silk moved unexpectedly. “I know this gown is pretty,” she said, “but it’s not exactly comfortable.”

  “This is rather old-fashioned, actually. I think the idea is to dress the envoys from the different countries in their national garb, like dolls.”

  “That’s what Georgette said. That this was the fashion in Willow North’s time.” Fiona looked out the carriage window. They were traveling along the wide boulevard that flanked the river, and in the distance, the Jaixante drew nearer. Late afternoon sunlight warmed the white stone and made the buildings gleam painfully, blinding Fiona. She looked back at Sebastian, hoping to surprise a look of tenderness, but he was looking the other way, at the mansions facing the river.

  The carriage turned and rattled up to the gate of the bridge to the island, where it came to a stop. Of course. No horses or wheeled vehicles allowed in the Jaixante. A footman—no, it was Holt, garbed correctly in livery indicating his service to the North family—held the carriage door for Sebastian, who helped Fiona out, for which she was grateful; the skirt tried to tangle her legs, and she almost tripped over the hem. She emerged without falling on her face and took Sebastian’s arm, resting her hand loosely on it instead of taking it in a death grip the way she wanted to.

  A man dressed all in black waited for them, his hands clasped so his sleeves covered them completely, and nodded for them to follow him across the bridge. Holt was apparently included in that invitation, because he trailed along behind them.

  Fiona was too nervous to appreciate the sight of the Kepa at sunset, though the light hitting the water was almost as blinding as the white buildings. A few minutes more, and they were surrounded by the tall, windowless buildings Fiona remembered from their night flight. After seeing the blank walls of the Jaixante, she wondered whether any of its residents ever got lost. The Irantzen Temple was the only thing she’d seen with any individual character.

  She hesitated as they passed between the first buildings, not wanting to draw attention to herself because she superstitiously feared being recognized. It was an irrational fear, not only because no one was likely to have seen her closely enough to remember her face, but also because the Jaixante guards in their fluttering, ragged robes were nowhere to be seen. Nevertheless, she took Sebastian’s hand and gripped it tightly, hoping he would understand her fears.

  Their guide brought them to a wall so high it looked like a white cliff in which were set a couple of black-stained wooden doors tall enough to look normal-sized in that giant wall. Unlike the fairy spires of the Irantzen Temple, this looked like a fortress, or a gate guarding the treasures of a kingdom.

  As they approached the doors, they swung open silently, weightlessly, with no apparent hand to set them swinging. Fortunately for her peace of mind, Fiona noticed black-clad servitors holding the doors as they passed through. The servants in black had their heads bowed low so they were apparently looking at their feet. Fiona averted her gaze. It wasn’t that she felt embarrassed, or worried that looking was wrong; they were so still and so determined not to impose their presence on her she felt noticing them was rude.

  The doors opened on a long hall paved in white stones joined so closely the seams were invisible. Wide enough to admit two carriages side by side, the hall was lined with pedestals on which stood statues of black marble. The statues didn’t look like anything real, and gave Fiona a funny feeling when she looked at them, as if it said something about her intelligence that she couldn’t identify the subjects.

  Another set of identical doors stood open at the far end of the hall, and the sound of stringed instruments playing atonal chords emerged from them. Other figures made small by distance passed th
rough the doors, garbed in colors as bright as their own. Sebastian and Fiona followed them. Fiona realized her palm was sweating and wished she dared wipe it on her gown, but it would leave a mark. She waved it surreptitiously at her side, willing the air to dry it.

  The room beyond the doors was the largest Fiona had ever seen. She didn’t know how it compared to the grand ballroom at the palace in Aurilien, but it had to be more than a hundred feet long in both directions with a ceiling at least forty feet high. Terraces draped in filmy white left it open to the sky, which was orange and peach and gold with the sunset, and a cool breeze scented with a spicy cinnamon odor caressed Fiona’s cheeks and dried the sweat from her hand. It kept the room from being over-warm with so many bodies filling even that great space.

  “Your Highness, Lady North,” a Veriboldan man said, approaching them. He was dressed in a peacock-blue knee-length robe open over black linen trousers and a matching shirt with a deep V-neck that blended with his dark skin. The robe was embroidered with threads of what Fiona suspected were real gold, and tiny emeralds in an abstract pattern winked at her. The man’s feet were bare, his toenails lacquered bronze, and he wore his hair cut short to frame his face.

  “I am Mitxel,” the man said, bowing at the waist low enough that Fiona could see his black hair was thinning on top. “I am honored to be your guide throughout the Election.”

  “What does that mean?” Fiona said, her curiosity getting the better of her manners.

  “It means, milady, that I am to answer your questions, to show you to your place during the ceremonies, and to anticipate your needs. I will also introduce you to your counterparts, if you will follow me?” Mitxel bowed again, not quite as low this time. His Tremontanese was barely accented, like Hien’s had been, making him sound more like a northwestern Tremontanan than a Veriboldan.