Ally of the Crown

by Melissa McShane

  “What did he say?” Sebastian asked, rubbing his shoulder.

  “That next time, you’ll both speak Veriboldan,” Fiona said. “And that you’re a good man.”

  “If that’s how he shows approval, I’m glad he’s not my enemy,” Sebastian said.

  They walked with the other envoys to the outer doors, where they separated to return to their respective lodgings. Fiona had no idea where the others were staying. It made her wonder what Stannin, at home on the windy Eidestal and presumably unfamiliar with a permanent home, thought of Veribold’s hospitality. What a story he’d have to tell the kinship.

  Sebastian hadn’t taken her hand again after shaking Nikani’s, and Fiona’s hand felt unnaturally cold. It was a bad idea, anyway. She needed to disentangle herself from Sebastian if she wanted to build a new life.

  They rode through the streets in silence until they reached the embassy, where Sebastian helped her out of the carriage. “We don’t have to leave early,” he said. “There’s a lot of packing to do, and I was thinking we might go into the city while they’re doing that. We could find you lodgings then.”

  “All right,” Fiona said, wishing the ache in her chest hadn’t just become a stone in her stomach. “Thank you.”

  Sebastian nodded. He didn’t offer her his arm.

  The two of them walked side by side into the embassy, which was quiet and dark except for a few lights shining from beneath doors. It felt to Fiona as if they were miles apart instead of close enough to touch. She went over things she might say and came up blank. But there really wasn’t anything to say, was there?

  Sebastian held the door to their suite for her, standing close enough that her wide skirts brushed his legs, then closed the door and stood there with his hand on the knob. He didn’t turn the lights on. “Good night, then,” he said.

  “I have to call Georgette,” she said. “I can’t get out of this gown without help.”

  “That seems like a design flaw.”

  It was a joke, but she felt like crying instead. “I don’t know why Willow North ever put up with it.”

  “I don’t imagine she did for long.” Sebastian straightened and crossed the room to his bedroom door. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

  She heard the click of the latch. “Sebastian, wait,” she said, the words tumbling out of her before she could stop them.

  He turned. “Yes?”

  She could barely see him in the dimness, as if he were already gone, and the ache in her chest threatened to overwhelm her. “I don’t,” she said, and made herself stop. There was nothing she could do.

  Unless there was.

  “Don’t go,” she said. “Please.”

  Sebastian drew in a sharp breath. “Fiona. We can’t. Please don’t make this harder.”

  She shook her head. “I was married for ten years. For seven of those, I was miserable. I never thought—I love you, Sebastian. And now we’re going to leave each other, and I’ll never see you again, and it hurts so much it’s like being poisoned all over again, except it’s a poison I chose for myself. I don’t want you to go. I don’t care if it means I have to be mocked and ridiculed by every well-born man and woman in Tremontane. I want you. I always have.”

  Sebastian didn’t move, didn’t speak. Fiona drew in a ragged breath and wiped away her tears. Finally, Sebastian said, “It won’t work, Fiona. You said it—love isn’t enough to build a marriage on. You’d end up hating and resenting me, and I can’t bear that. I love you, and I can’t do that to you.”

  The tears fell more heavily now, choking her. “This is ridiculous,” she cried. “We love each other. Why can’t that be enough?”

  Sebastian took a few steps toward her and took her hand. “I don’t know,” he said, and pulled her into his embrace. She clung to him, crying as if her heart were broken even as his touch soothed her. A fragment of a memory surfaced, of him looking at her wide-eyed in that frigid barn, and it stunned her that she hadn’t known then what he would eventually mean to her. She loved him. She didn’t want to lose him. There had to be a way.

  “I wish you weren’t a prince,” she murmured into his shoulder. “Just the two of us, living in Veribold…we could have an import business, dealing in Devices…”

  “That’s appealing,” Sebastian said. He stroked her hair, and she snuggled in closer, not caring that it would only make the pain worse when he let her go. “No fancy balls, no awkward dinners with my family, no being snubbed by people with more money than sense…”

  His arms went rigid. Fiona lifted her head. She could see him clearly, and he was looking off toward the door. She turned awkwardly in his embrace, but saw nothing. “Is something wrong?” Other than the obvious.

  “Fiona,” Sebastian said, his voice distant. “Fiona, what if we didn’t have to be part of Tremontanan high society? That’s your objection, right?”

  Her heart lurched again. “But that…Sebastian, you’re a prince. You can’t avoid that.”

  “I can if we’re living in Veribold.”

  She buried her face in his shoulder again and wished he wouldn’t taunt her. “That was just an idle dream.”

  “It doesn’t have to be. Not if I’m the ambassador to Veribold.”

  That startled her into looking at him again. This time, his eyes were on her, and he was smiling. “You can’t,” she said faintly.

  “I’ve done enough to save my family that I think I can demand any reward I want from my mother. Think of it, Fiona. We’ll live here, away from the court—you already know as much as I do about Veriboldan culture, maybe more—”

  “But I still know nothing about high society. I’d make you look like a fool.”

  Sebastian shook his head. “Noble Veriboldans don’t give a damn about other countries’ customs or noble ranks. They’ll treat you exactly the same as they treat me, with a veneer of politeness over thinly veiled contempt. Fiona—”

  “Wait. Just…let me think.” The idea had already caught hold of her. Ambassador to Veribold, away from the court and Sebastian’s poisonous mother—except… “You don’t speak Veriboldan.”

  “Fiona, my love, no man in the history of the world has ever had so much incentive to learn to speak Veriboldan.” He gripped her shoulders. “It’s the perfect solution.”

  She stared at him, at his eyes alight with excitement, and ran over his words in her head, examining them for flaws. Hope threaded its way into her heart, sending out tendrils like a fast-growing vine until she once more felt light enough to fly. “Sebastian,” she said, but got no further because his lips were on hers and they were kissing like they’d never have the chance again.

  He put his hands low on her hips and pulled her closer as her arms went around his neck, doing the same. The touch of his hands, the feel of his body against hers, filled her with such joy it burned. He let go of her long enough to wrestle his satin coat off and fling it away into the darkness. “Forget about Georgette,” he said in a low voice. “Let me help you out of that dress.”

  She laughed. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had anything to laugh about. “We can’t,” she said. “We’re not married.”

  “Everyone in Veribold thinks we are,” Sebastian said. He buried his face in the crook of her neck, kissing his way along the curve of her cheek and back to her lips. “We shouldn’t disappoint them.”

  It was tempting, but after her experiences in the Irantzen temple, Fiona didn’t want to disregard her religious values so completely. “We can wait,” she said, withdrawing from him just a little.

  Sebastian scowled, but his eyes were alight with mirth, relieving Fiona’s heart. “We can wait until morning,” he said, “at which point we will take Ambassador Emory aside, tell her the truth about our non-marriage, and get her to witness our vows.”

  That solution hadn’t occurred to Fiona. “And tell her her tenure here will be up sooner than she thought. I don’t think she’ll be disappointed.”

  “I think I should recei
ve some reward for having the restraint to not pull the ambassador out of her bed right now,” Sebastian said with a smile.

  Fiona linked her fingers behind his neck and returned his smile. “Tomorrow,” she said. “This will have to do for now,” and she pulled him close for a kiss.

  40

  A week later, they rode into Aurilien to the sound of rain lashing the carriage window. Fiona chose to be grateful it was rain and not snow, but it was still cold, and she couldn’t help wishing this was all over and they were back in Veribold. She leaned against Sebastian’s shoulder and sighed. They’d been seven days on the road and every morning had felt like a miracle. Seven days traveling. Seven days married. She’d never been happier.

  Ambassador Emory had greeted their story with a raised eyebrow, but had asked no questions despite the sketchiness of their explanation. They couldn’t explain why they needed to protect Fiona from the Queen’s paranoia, so they’d stuck with saying there hadn’t been time to marry before leaving Tremontane, and Emory had agreed to help without saying anything about why they’d waited so long once they were in Veribold. Fiona, whose first marriage had been solemnized by Roderick’s father as patriarch of the Kent family, had thought the Queen would have to do the honors. She was pleasantly surprised to learn any Tremontanan with a family bond could witness the forming of a new one. And with only a few short sentences, she was Fiona North for real.

  She took Sebastian’s hand and twined her fingers with his. That first day had passed in a blur, between the marriage vows and packing and saying their goodbyes, that it had seemed like no time before they were rattling along in the carriage away from Haizea. She’d been painfully aware of her new husband all that day, when they sat opposite each other, not touching as if they both knew touching would lead to more, right there in the not-very-private carriage. By the time supper was over, and Sebastian escorted her to their room—one room, no more strange looks from the servants—she felt she might explode if he didn’t kiss her, touch her, take her to bed and make her cry out his name. And the night was a blur of a different kind.

  Now she cuddled close to his side and closed her eyes. Sebastian would report to his mother, convince her to make him the ambassador, and they could leave again…no, Fiona had sort of promised Sebastian’s sister Emily that she could host them a reception. The idea made Fiona cringe, but she liked Emily, and she could put up with one event. Knowing they had somewhere to retreat to, somewhere far from the capital, gave her even greater endurance.

  “Strange,” Sebastian said. “There are a lot of people in mourning.”

  Fiona opened her eyes and peered out the window. She’d thought he’d meant people dressed in mourning black, but it was the city that was in mourning. Black ribbons adorned most of the lampposts, many store windows were shrouded in black crape, and even the newspaper vendors’ cries were hushed, though they were still doing great business. “I wonder who died?”

  “Someone important, but—no, it wouldn’t be my mother, someone would have told us even if we were on the road.” Sebastian looked out the window past her. “It’s all over the city.”

  “And—there’s someone wearing a black band on her sleeve. And two more people. Sebastian, this is unsettling.”

  “There’s no sense worrying about it until we reach the palace. Someone there will know.” He squeezed her hand gently. “And then it will be nothing to do with us.”

  The carriage rattled past the gates leading to the great sweep of the palace drive, then up its curve to deposit them at the front doors. This time, Fiona didn’t feel intimidated by them or by the antechamber beyond. They were large, and impressive, but Fiona had seen even larger and more impressive buildings in Veribold.

  They stood inside the doors and shook themselves free of the few raindrops that had settled on them during the short few steps between carriage and palace. “Your Highness,” someone said, and Fiona looked up to see a stately gentleman in North blue livery approaching rapidly. “Prince Sebastian, Lady North, welcome home. May I give you my condolences on your loss?”

  “Ah…thank you,” Sebastian said, glancing at Fiona. She agreed silently that this was not the time to admit to ignorance. “Is my mother expecting me? I’d like to speak with her immediately.”

  “Her Majesty instructed me to ask you to wait upon her in her private drawing room,” the servant said. “I will be happy to escort you—”

  “That won’t be necessary,” a new voice said. Fiona remembered the woman who descended the stairs now toward them. Master Thornton. Her face was more careworn than before, her voice rougher, but she carried herself with the confidence of a Scholia Master. “I will escort Prince Sebastian and his lady wife.”

  The servant bowed. “Of course, Master Thornton.”

  Master Thornton reached the foot of the stairs and nodded politely to Sebastian. “This way,” she said, though Fiona was sure Sebastian knew the way to his own mother’s chambers.

  The halls of the palace were every bit as disorienting as they had been on her first visit, their architecture so varied it was like stepping backward and forward in time. It reminded her of the Jaixante, though the two couldn’t have been more different. Despite their differences, both felt like structures that had been built for the sake of an idea and not for anything so mundane as housing people. Fiona recognized, at one point, the hall leading to the east wing where the royal family lived, and was surprised at feeling relief. It was just a reaction to seeing something familiar in the midst of confusion, that was all.

  The queen’s private drawing room wasn’t in the east wing, as Fiona had expected; it was some distance from those quarters and up another two flights of stairs. Master Thornton opened a door carved to look like a beaded curtain and painted stark white and bowed them inside. Fiona hadn’t kept track of the stairs they’d climbed, as they’d gone up and down apparently at random, but it was clear this room was near the top of the palace, though still nowhere near as high as Willow North’s tower. The sound of the rain striking the glass, of the wind whistling across the windows, filled the room and made it feel even colder than it was.

  Windows of clear, thin glass, very modern, filled two of the walls, beneath which were backless couches strewn with cushions in the style of a hundred years previous. The contrast between the two eras struck Fiona as typically wealthy, because only the wealthy could afford furniture that didn’t wear out after five or ten years. To her surprise, it wasn’t a dismissive thought. Things were what they were, and how snobbish of her if she turned up her nose at a beautiful room—and it was beautiful—because she felt inferior.

  A pianoforte in a cherrywood case stood near the corner where the two windowed walls met and the light was brightest, or would be on a less overcast day. Fiona tried to imagine the Queen doing something so ordinary as playing the pianoforte and failed. Maybe it had belonged to some other ruler of Tremontane. Though she couldn’t imagine Willow North playing a musical instrument either. Her imagination must be faulty.

  Master Thornton stepped inside after them and shut the door. “You may not have heard the news,” she said in her gravelly voice. “Prince Douglas is dead.”

  Fiona gasped. Sebastian turned to look at Master Thornton. “Is he, now,” he said without a trace of emotion.

  “I realize it must be a shock,” Master Thornton said. She sounded as emotionless as Sebastian. “He was riding a green horse. He lost control and broke his neck in the fall. Most tragic.”

  “And a surprise,” Sebastian said. “Doug was an excellent rider.”

  Master Thornton shrugged. “Even excellent riders aren’t perfect. I understand the horse wasn’t saddle-ready, but Prince Douglas insisted he knew what he was doing.” She bowed, said, “The Queen will join you shortly,” and left the room.

  Fiona sank helplessly onto one of the couches. Sebastian crossed the room to join her. “Are you all right?”

  She nodded. “It’s just…”

  “I know,” Sebasti
an said grimly. “I hoped Mother would do something about Doug. I might have guessed it would be something permanent.”

  “What do we do?”

  “Nothing.” Sebastian sat beside her and took her hand. “It’s over. Gizane is powerless—may have been executed already—and Doug can’t hurt anyone anymore. The house of North is no longer in danger, and we’ve done everything Mother commanded. We’re free.”

  The door opened, and the Queen entered. Sebastian and Fiona rose, though Fiona didn’t feel much like the pinched, sour-looking woman in front of her deserved her respect. She didn’t understand how anyone could cold-bloodedly arrange for her own son to be killed. Though she had to admit, looking at Queen Genevieve, if she had to imagine what such a person might look like, the Queen certainly fit that picture.

  It was the first time Fiona had seen the Queen in anything but an elegant gown. Today she wore fitted trousers and a linen shirt with a deep yoke and full sleeves gathered to tight, wide cuffs. Both were dyed black, with some streakiness along the left sleeve that suggested it was a recent dye job. Her clothes, and her black hair pulled tightly back from her face, made her pale skin look almost white, as if the blood had been drained from her body. But her sharp blue eyes were every bit as bright as before. She closed the door behind her and regarded them. “Sit,” she said.

  Sebastian didn’t move, so neither did Fiona. Genevieve arched an eyebrow. “So we have reached the limit of your obedience, Sebastian,” she said.

  Sebastian said nothing. Fiona wished she could take his hand, but she knew the Queen would see that as weakness.

  Genevieve walked away from them, toward the windows, where she stood looking out over Aurilien. Wind blew the rain hard against the window. “I hear Bixhor of the Triminon is King in Veribold,” she said. “He is not one to be underestimated, but I believe we will deal well together.”