Allesandra ca’Vörl
“IT WAS NOT a
sign.”
Fynn slammed his
fisted hand hard on the arm of his chair. The servants standing
ready along the wall to serve dinner shivered at the sound. The
long scar down the right side of his face burned white against his
flushed face. “I don’t care what they’re saying. What happened was
a terrible accident. Nothing more. It was not a sign.”
“Of course you’re
right, Brother,” Allesandra told him soothingly. She paused—a
single breath—and gestured to the Magyarian servants: they were
taking supper in Allesandra’s rooms within the palais. The servants
moved forward, ladling soup into the bowls and pouring wine. Fynn
sat at the table’s head; Allesandra at the foot. Archigos Semini
and his wife were to Fynn’s right; her son Jan to the
left.
Allesandra had heard
some of the rumors herself. Hïrzg Jan is upset
that Fynn has taken the crown, not his daughter . . . The Hïrzg’s
soul cannot rest . . . I heard from one of the servants in the
palais that his ghost still walks the halls at night, moaning and
crying out as if angry. . . . There were dozens of the tales
surging through Brezno, twisted depending on the agenda of those
who spoke them, and growing larger and more outrageous each time
they were told. Cénzi sends a warning to the
Hïrzg that the Holdings and the Faith must become one again . . .
The souls of all those the Hïrzg killed—the Numetodo, the
Nessanticans, the Tennshah—pursue him and will not allow him to
rest . . . They say that when the sealing stone fell, those in the
chamber heard the old Hïrzg’s voice call out with a curse on
Firenzcia. . . .
The soup had been
served and the silence had stretched too long. Allesandra could
hear the breathing of the servants and the distant, muffled clatter
of the cook and the kitchen help a floor below them. “I understand
that the other lancer has died also,” Allesandra commented when it
was apparent that no one else was willing to start a
conversation.
Fynn glared at her
down the length of the table “That was Cénzi’s Blessing,” he said.
“The man would never have walked again. The healer said his spine
was broken; if I were him, I’d rather die than live the rest of my
life as a useless cripple.”
“I’m sure he felt the
same as you, Brother.” She kept her voice carefully neutral. “And
I’m sure that the Archigos did what he could to ease his passing.”
Another pause. “As far as the Divolonté would allow, of course,”
she added.
Francesca let her
spoon clatter back to the table at that. “You may have been soiled
by the beliefs of the false Archigos during your years with her,
A’Hïrzg,” she declaimed coldly, “but I assure you that my husband
has not. He would never—”
“Francesca!” Semini’s
rebuke caused Francesca to snap her mouth closed, like a carp
gulping on a riverbank. He glared at her, then clasped hands to
forehead as he turned to Allesandra. His gaze held hers. Allesandra
had always thought that the Archigos had exquisite eyes: powerful
and engaging. She had also noticed that when she was in the room,
Semini often paid close attention to her. That had never bothered
her; she enjoyed his attentions. She’d thought, back when her
vatarh had finally ransomed her, that he might have married her to
Semini, had he not already been tied to Francesca. That would have
been a powerful marriage, allying both the political and religious
powers within the state, and Semini might have been someone she
could have come to love, as well. Even now . . . She closed off
that thought, quickly. She had taken lovers during her marriage,
yes—as she had known Pauli had also done—but always carefully.
Always discreetly. An affair with the Archigos . . . that would be
difficult to conceal.
“I apologize,
A’Hïrzg,” Semini said. “Sometimes my wife’s, ahh, devotion to the
Faith causes her to speak too harshly. I did give the poor lancer
what comfort I could, at the Hïrzg’s request.” He addressed Fynn
then. “My Hïrzg, you shouldn’t be concerned with the gossip of the
rabble. In fact, I will make it clear in my next Admonition that
those who believe that there are portents in this horrible incident
are mistaken, and that these wild rumors are simply lies. I’ve
already had people begin to make inquiries as to who is spreading
all the vile gossip—I would say that if the Garde Hïrzg takes a few
of them into custody, especially a few of those of lower rank, and,
ahh, convinces them to recant publicly
before they’re executed for treason, that would certainly act as a
lesson to the others. I think we’d find that all the talk about
what happened at your vatarh’s burial would vanish as quickly as
snow in Daritria.”
Francesca was nodding
at her husband’s words. “We should treat these people no better
than we would the Numetodo,” she agreed. “Just as the Numetodo are
traitors to the Faith, these rumormongers are traitors to our
Hïrzg. A few bodies swaying in gibbets will adequately shut the
mouth of the populace.” She glanced at Allesandra. “Wouldn’t you
agree, A’Hïrzg?” she asked, her voice far too gentle and far too
eager. The woman actually leaned forward at the table, emphasizing
her humped back.
“I think it’s
dangerous to equate rumormongering with heresy, Vajica
ca’Cellibrecca,” she began carefully, but Jan interrupted
her.
“If you punish people
for gossiping, you’ll convince them instead that the rumors are
true,” her son said, the first words he’d spoken since they’d sat
at the table, then shrugged as the others looked at him. “Well,
that’s the truth,” he insisted. “If you give them the sermon you
suggest, Archigos, you’ll just be drawing more attention to what happened, which will make
people believe the rumors even more. It’s better to say and do
nothing at all; all this talk will fade away on its own when
nothing else happens. Every time one of us repeats the gossip, even
to deny or refute it, we make it seem more real and more important
than it is.”
She followed Jan’s
gaze from Semini to the others at the table. Semini was glowering,
his eyebrows lowered like thunderclouds over those captivating
eyes; Francesca’s mouth gaped open as if she were too stunned for
words at the boy’s impertinence; she gave a cough of derision and
waved a hand like a claw in Jan’s direction, as if warding off a
beggar’s curse. Fynn was staring down at the tablecloth in front of
him. “It’s better to say and do nothing,” Jan repeated into the
silence, his voice thinner and more uncertain now, “or what
happened will become a sign. You’ll all
have turned it into one.”
Allesandra touched
his arm: it was what she would have said, if less diplomatically
spoken. “Well said,” she whispered to him. He might have smiled
momentarily; it was difficult to tell.
“So if you were the Hïrzg, you’d do nothing?” Francesca said. “Then let’s thank Cénzi
that you’re not, child.”
That brought Jan’s
head up again. “If I were Hïrzg,” Jan answered her, “I’d be
thinking that these rumors aren’t worth my time. There are more
important events that I’d be considering, like the death of
Archigos Ana, or the war in the Hellins that’s sapping Nessantico’s
resources and their attention, and what all that means for
Firenzcia and the Coalition.”
Francesca snorted
again. She returned her attention to her soup, as if Jan’s comment
was beneath consideration. Semini was shaking his head and glaring
at Allesandra as if she were directly responsible for Jan’s
impertinence.
She thought Fynn was
angry beneath the scowl he wore, but her brother surprised her. “I
believe the young man’s right,” Fynn said, breaking the
uncomfortable silence. He gave Jan a smile twisted by the scar on
his face. “I hate the thought of having to hear the whispers for
even another breath, but . . . you’re right, Nephew. If we do
nothing, the gossip will fade in a week, maybe even a few days.
Perhaps I should make you my new councillor, eh?”
Jan beamed at Fynn’s
praise as Francesca sat back abruptly with a frown. Semini tried to
look unconcerned. “You’ve raised an intelligent young man, Sister,”
Fynn told Allesandra. “He’s as bold as I’d want my own son to be. I
should talk more with you, Jan, and I regret that I don’t know you
as well as an onczio should. We’ll start to rectify that
tomorrow—we’ll go hunting after my afternoon conferences, you and
I. Would you like that?”
“Oh, yes!” Jan burst
out, suddenly the child again, presented with an unexpected gift.
Then he seemed to realize how young he sounded, and he nodded
solemnly. “I’d enjoy that very much, Onczio Fynn,” he said, his
voice pitched low. “Matarh?”
“The Hïrzg is very
kind,” Allesandra told him, smiling even as suspicion hammered at
her. First Vatarh, now Fynn. What does the
bastard think he can gain with this? Is he just trying to get to me
by stealing Jan’s affection? I’m losing my son, and the tighter I
try to hold him, the faster he’ll slip away. . . . “It
sounds like a wonderful idea,” she told Jan.