Allesandra ca’Vörl
WITHIN A MOON . .
.
That’s the promise
the White Stone had made. Allesandra wondered if she could keep up
the pretense that long. It was more difficult than she’d thought.
Doubts plagued her—she had dreamed for the last three nights that
she had gone to the White Stone to try to end the contract. “Just
keep the money,” she’d told him. “Keep the money, but don’t kill
Fynn.” Each time he’d laughed at her and refused.
“That’s not what you
want,” the White Stone replied. In the dream, his voice was deeper.
“Not really. I will do what you desire, not what you say. He’ll be
dead within a moon. . . .”
She hoped Cénzi was
not rebuking her. Fynn probably contemplated
killing me as Vatarh was dying, thinking I would challenge him for
the crown. He would still do so if he suspected me of plotting
against him—he’s as much as said that. This is no less than he
deserves for what Vatarh and he did to me. This is what he deserves
for his continued arrogance toward me. This is what I must do for
me; this is what I must do for Jan. This is what I must do for
Vatarh’s dream. This is the only way. . . .
The words were
burning coals in her stomach, and they touched all aspects of her
life. She had suspected it would one day come to this, but she had
also hoped that day might never arrive.
Since the attempted
assassination, Fynn had enjoyed the adulation of the Firenzcian
populace and Jan—as the Hïrzg’s protector—had been taken up with it
as well. Everyone seemed to have forgotten entirely that Allesandra
had anything to do with the foiling of the assassination. Even Jan
seemed to have forgotten that—he certainly never mentioned, in all
his recounting of the story, that it had been her who pointed out
the assassin to him.
Crowds gathered to
cheer whenever the Hïrzg left his palais in Brezno, and there were
parties nearly every night, with the ca’-and-cu’ of the Coalition.
There were new people there every night, especially women wanting
to be close to the Hïrzg (still unmarried despite his age) and to
the new young protégé Jan.
Her husband, Pauli,
also enjoyed the influx of fresh young women into the palais life.
Allesandra was far less pleased with it, and even less pleased with
Pauli’s attitude toward Jan. “He’s your son,” she told him. Her
stomach roiled with the argument she knew was coming, and she
placed a hand on her abdomen to calm it, swallowing the fiery bile
that threatened to rise in her throat and hating the shrill sound
of her voice. “You need to caution him about these things. If one
of these eager ca’-and-cu’ swarming around him end up with child .
. .”
Pauli gave her an
expression that was near-smirk, making the bile slide higher inside
her. “Then we buy the girl and her family a vacation in Kishkoros
unless she’s a good match for him. If that’s the case, let him
marry her.” His casual shrug was infuriating. Allesandra wondered
how many Kishkoros vacations Pauli had bought during their years of
marriage.
They were standing on
the balcony above the palais’ main ballroom floor. Another party
was in progress below; Allesandra could see Fynn and the usual
cluster of bright tashtas, and that made her hands tremble.
Archigos Semini was close by as well, though Allesandra didn’t see
Francesca in the crowd. Jan was in the same group, talking to a
young woman with hair the color of new wheat. Allesandra didn’t
recognize her.
“Who is that?” she
asked. “I don’t know her.”
“Elissa ca’Karina, of
the Jablunkov ca’Karina line. She was sent to represent her family
for the Besteigung, but was delayed near Lake Firenz and just
arrived a few days ago.”
“You know her well,
then.”
“I’ve . . . talked to
her a few times since her arrival.”
The hesitation and
choice of words told Allesandra more than she wanted to know. She
closed her eyes for a breath, rubbing at her stomach. She wondered
if it had just been flirtations or more. “I’m sure Jan would
appreciate your familial interest, just as Fynn appreciates his
First Taster.”
“That was crude and
beneath you, my dear.”
She ignored that,
peering over the railing. “How old is she?”
“Older than our Jan
by a few years, I’d judge,” Pauli told her. “But an engaging and
interesting woman.”
“And a candidate for
a Kishkoros vacation?”
She heard Pauli
chuckle. “She might prefer a more northern location, but yes, if it
would come to that.” She felt him move close to her, staring down
at the crowd. “You can’t protect him forever, Allesandra. You can’t
live his life for him, and you can’t keep someone his age
captive—not without expecting him to resent you for
it.”
“I was kept captive,” she answered him, and pushed
away from the railing. “You can’t live his
life for him.”’ But I will shape his
future. I will . . . “We should go down.”
They were announced
into the party by the door heralds. She went directly to Fynn and
Jan, while Pauli bowed to her and went off on his own. Archigos
Semini’s eyes widened a bit with her approach—since the attempted
assassination and their one subsequent conversation, the Archigos
had engaged in little more than the required polite talk with her.
She wondered what he’d think if she told him what she’d
done.
The ca’-and’cu’ in
the group all bowed low as she approached. She bowed also—a mere
inclination of her head—to Fynn and gave Semini the sign of Cénzi.
She smiled toward Jan, but her gaze was more on the woman with him.
Elissa ca’Karina was one of those women who was incredibly striking
while not being beautiful in a classical sense, and the arms
emerging from the lace of the tashta were decidedly muscular—a
horsewoman, perhaps. Her eyes were her best feature: large, a pale
icy blue, and made prominent by judicious application of kohl.
Allesandra judged her to be in her early twenties—and if she was
unmarried at that age given her rank, then perhaps there was some
scandal attached to her: Allesandra decided that a judicious
inquiry was in order. The lines of the vajica’s face seemed oddly
familiar, but perhaps that was only because she was little
different than the others: young, eager, smiling, all eyes and
laughter and attention.
“A lovely party,
Brother,” she said to Fynn. His smile was nearly predatory as he
glanced around them.
“Yes, isn’t it?” he
responded, and his pleasure was obvious. “I’m absolutely surrounded
by loveliness.” Bright laughter answered him. Allesandra smiled in
return, but she watched her brother’s animated face. The image came
to her of him sprawled bloody on the tiles, with a pebble over the
left eye and the right staring blindly up at her. She shook away
the thought, swallowing heat again. “Don’t you think so,
Allesandra?”
“I do. I see here two
young bees and an old hornet surrounded by flowers, and the flowers
had best be careful.” More polite laughter, though she saw the
Archigos frown as if he were trying to decide if he’d been
affronted. Her gaze went back to Vajica ca’Karina. “Jan, you’ve
neglected to introduce your yellow rose.”
Jan straightened and
slid the barest fraction of an inch closer to the young woman.
Almost protective . . . Yes, he’s interested
in her. And look at the way she keeps glancing at him . . .
“Matarh, this is Vajica ca’Karina. She’s here from
Jablunkov.”
Elissa bowed her head
to Allesandra. “A’Hïrzg,” she said. “I’m so delighted to meet you.
Your son has told us many delightful things about you.” Her voice
held the accent of Sesemora, blurring the consonants ever so
slightly. The voice was husky and low for a woman. Something about
the young woman, though . . .
“Have we met, Vajica
ca’Karina?” Allesandra asked. “Perhaps at one of my vatarh’s
Solstice feasts? The shape of your face, the lines of it . .
.”
“Oh, no, A’Hirzg,”
the woman answered. The smile was disarming, the laugh enchanting.
“I would certainly remember having met
you, and especially your son.”
Allesandra was
certain of that last statement, at least. “Then perhaps it’s a
family resemblance? Would I know your parents?”
“I don’t know,
A’Hirzg. I know they once entertained Hïrzg Jan, many years ago,
but that was while you were still . . .” She stopped there,
blushing as she recognized what she was about to say, and hurrying
on. “I was named after my matarh, and my vatarh is Josef—he was a
ca’Evelii before he married my matarh. Our chateau is east of
Jablunkov, in the hills. A very pretty place, A’Hïrzg, though the
winters can be rather long there.”
Allesandra nodded to
all that, committing the names to memory for the message she would
send. Jan touched Elissa’s arm as the musicians on the ballroom’s
stage started to play. “Matarh, I promised Elissa a dance. . .
.”
Allesandra smiled as
graciously as she could. “Of course. Jan, we really must talk later
. . .” but he was already leading Elissa away. Fynn had moved out
into the open dancing space as well.
“He’s a fine young
man, your son, and very brave.” Semini’s emerald-hued robes shifted
as he gazed at her. He seemed uncertain as to whether to come
closer to her or to flee. The compliment was so bald that
Allesandra felt no compulsion to reply to it.
“Is your Francesca
well? I notice she’s not here tonight.”
“She is indisposed,
A’Hïrzg. These endless celebrations for the new Hïrzg are tiring,
especially for someone with so many ailments. But she sent her
regrets to the Hïrzg, and there is a meeting of the Council of Ca’
tomorrow and she takes her responsibilities as councillor very
seriously. There is no one who thinks more of Brezno than
Francesca. It is practically all she
thinks about.”
His tone was
blatantly scornful. Allesandra realized then that it had been
Francesca who had put the Archigos on his path. It was her ambition driving him, not his own. Semini, she
suspected, would still be a war-téni if it were not for Francesca.
She wondered if Francesca, too, harbored images of Fynn laying
dead, but with Francesca herself taking the throne. “And you,
A’Hïrzg?” Semini asked. “Forgive me, but you seem a bit pale this
evening.”
“I find that I’m a
little indisposed, Archigos.”
He nodded. Under
silver-flecked eyebrows, his dark gaze scanned the floor; she
followed it to find Pauli laughing in a knot of older women, his
hands gesturing finely as he spoke. “A family problem?” Semini
asked.
“Possibly.”
He nodded, as if
musing on that. “When we last spoke, A’Hïrzg, you said we were on
the same side.”
“Aren’t we,
Archigos?” she asked him. “Don’t we both want what’s best for
Firenzcia?”
He took a long
breath. “I believe we do. At least, I hope so. And the last time,
you asked me to dance. You said you wanted to know how well we
moved together. But you left without giving me an answer.” Another
pause. Another breath. His gaze came back to her, intense and
unblinking. “Did we? Did we move together well?”
She touched his arm.
She felt muscles lurch under his robes, but he didn’t move away. “I
seem to remember that we did,” she told him. “But perhaps a
reminder would be good. For both of us.”
She led him out onto
the dance floor.
She thought he moved
very well indeed.