The blessed couple sang promises to one another in the sight of gods and men, shafts of light from the dome above striking fire from the king’s burnished armor and the queen’s daunting jewels, and all applauded though Uthil’s singing voice was, in Yarvi’s opinion, not up to much and his mother’s little better. Then Brinyolf droned out the most elaborate blessing even that hallowed place had ever witnessed, while beside him Mother Gundring slumped ever more impatiently around her staff and every bell in the city sent up a merry clangour from below.
Oh, happy day!
How could Uthil not be pleased? He had the Black Chair and the best wife any man could ask for, coveted by the High King himself. How could Laithlin not be delighted? She had the jewelled key to the treasury of Gettland once again upon her chain and the priests of the One God dragged from her mint and whipped through Thorlby into the sea. How could the people of Gettland not rejoice? They had a king of iron and a queen of gold, rulers to trust in and be proud of. Rulers with poor singing voices, possibly, but two hands each.
In spite of all that happiness, though—or more likely because of it—Yarvi scarcely enjoyed the marriage of his mother more than he had the burning of his father. That event Yarvi had been unable to avoid. If anyone noticed him steal away from this one, no doubt they were not sad to see it.
The weather outside better suited his mood than the petal-scented warmth within. There was a seeking wind off the gray sea that day, and it moaned among the battlements of the citadel and cut at him with a salt rain as he wandered up the worn steps and along the empty walkways.
He saw her from far off, on the roof of the Godshall, clothes far too thin plastered to her with the rain, hair furiously whipping in the wind. He saw her in good time. He could have walked on and found another place to frown at the sky. But his feet led him towards her.
“Prince Yarvi,” she said as he came close, tearing a scrap from her bitten-down thumbnail with her teeth and spitting it into the wind. “What an honor.”
Yarvi sighed. There was a wearying pattern to the last few days. “I’m not a prince any more, Isriun.”
“No? Your mother is queen again, isn’t she? She has the key to the treasury of Gettland on her chain?” Her white hand strayed to her chest, where there was no key, no chain, nothing any more. “What’s a queen’s son, if not a prince?”
“A crippled fool?” he muttered.
“You were that when we met, and no doubt always will be. Not to mention the child of a traitor.”
“Then we have more in common than ever,” snapped Yarvi, and saw her pale face twitch, and instantly regretted it. Had things been only a little different, it might have been the two of them raised up in glory down below. He in the Black Chair, she upon the stool beside him, eyes shining as she gently held his withered hand, as they shared that better kiss she had asked for on his return …
But things were as they were. There would be no kisses today. Not today, not ever. He turned to look at the heaving sea, his fists bunched on the parapet. “I didn’t come to argue.”
“Why did you come?”
“I thought I should tell you, since …” He gritted his teeth, and looked down at his twisted hand, white on the wet stone. Since what? Since we were promised? Since we once meant something to each other? He could not bring himself to say the words. “I’m leaving for Skekenhouse. I’m taking the Minister’s Test. I’ll have no family, no birthright, and … no wife.”
She laughed into the wind. “And more in common yet. I’ve no friends, no dowry, and no father.” She turned to look at him then, and the hatred in her eyes made him feel sick. “They sank his body in the midden.”
Perhaps that should have made Yarvi glad. He had dreamed of it often enough, bent all his prayers and all his will towards it. Broken everything, and sacrificed his friend and his friendships for it. But looking into Isriun’s face, red eyes sunken in shadowed sockets, he felt no triumph.
“I’m sorry. Not for him, but for you.”
Her mouth twisted with contempt. “What do you think that’s worth to me?”
“Nothing. But I’m sorry still.” And he took his hands from the parapet, and turned his back on his betrothed, and walked towards the steps.
“I’ve sworn an oath!”
Yarvi paused. He wanted very much to leave that blasted roof and never return, but now the skin on his neck prickled, and he turned back despite himself. “Oh?”
“A sun-oath and a moon-oath.” Isriun’s eyes burned in her white face and her wet hair lashed at her. “I swore it before She Who Judges, and He Who Remembers, and She Who Makes Fast the Knot. My ancestors buried above the beach bore witness. He Who Watches and She Who Writes bore witness. Now you bear witness, Yarvi. It will be a chain upon me and a goad within me. I will be revenged upon the killers of my father. I have sworn it!”
She smiled a twisted smile, then. A mockery of the one she gave him when she left the Godshall on the day they were promised. “So you see, a woman can swear the same oath as a man.”
“If she’s fool enough,” said Yarvi, as he turned away.
40.
THE LESSER EVIL
Mother Sun smiled even as she sank beneath the world on the evening Brother Yarvi came home.
The first day of summer, the Gettlanders had declared it, with cats basking on the hot roofs of Thorlby, the seabirds calling lazy to one another, the slightest breeze carrying a salt tang up the steep lanes and through the open windows of the city.
Through the door to Mother Gundring’s chambers too, when Yarvi finally managed to wrestle the heavy latch open with his crippled hand.
“The wanderer returns,” said the old minister, putting aside her book in a puff of dust.
“Mother Gundring.” Yarvi bowed low, and presented her with the cup.
“And you have brought me tea.” She closed her eyes, and sniffed the steam, then sipped, and swallowed. Her lined face broke into the smile which Yarvi had always felt so proud to see. “Things have not been the same without you.”
“You need never want for tea again, at least.”
“Then you passed the test?”
“Did you ever doubt?”
“Not I, Brother Yarvi, not I. And yet you wear a sword.” She frowned towards Shadikshirram’s blade, sheathed at his waist. “A kind word parries most blows.”
“I carry this for the others. It reminds me where I’ve come from. A minister stands for Father Peace, but a good one is no stranger to Mother War.”
“Hah! True enough.” Mother Gundring held out her hand to the stool on the other side of the firepit. The one where Yarvi had so often sat, following the old minister’s stories with rapt attention, learning tongues, and history, and the lore of plants, and the proper way to speak to a king. Could it really be only a few months since he last sat there? It seemed he had done so in a different world. In a dream.
And now he had woken.
“I am glad you are back,” said Mother Gundring, “and not just because of your tea. We have much to do in Thorlby.”
“I don’t think people love me here.”
Mother Gundring shrugged it off. “Already they forget. Folk have short memories.”
“The minister’s task is to remember.”
“And to advise, to heal, to speak truth and know the secret ways, to find the lesser evil and weigh the greater good, to smooth the path for Father Peace in every tongue, to spin tales—”
“Shall I spin a tale for you?”
“What manner of tale, Brother Yarvi?”
“A tale of blood and deceit, of money and murder, of treachery and power.”
Mother Gundring laughed, and took another sip from her cup. “The only sort I enjoy. Has it elves in it? Dragons? Trolls?
Yarvi shook his head. “People can do all the evil we’ll need.”
“True again. Is it something you heard in Skekenhouse?”
“Partly. I’ve been working at this tale for a long time. Ever since that
night my father died. But I think I have it now from start to end.”
“Knowing your talents it must be a fine tale indeed.”
“You will thrill to it, Mother Gundring.”
“Then begin!”
Yarvi sat forward, looking into the flames, rubbing at his twisted palm with his thumb. He had been rehearsing it ever since he passed the test, gave up his birthright and was accepted into the Ministry. Ever since he kissed the cheek of Grandmother Wexen, looked into her eyes, found them brighter and hungrier than ever, and knew the truth. “I find I hardly know where to begin.”
“Set it up. Let’s have the background.”
“Good advice,” said Yarvi. “But yours always has been. So … a High King well past his youth, and a grandmother of the Ministry no closer to hers, most jealous of their power, as the powerful often are, looked to the north from Skekenhouse, and saw a threat to their majesty. Not a great man wielding iron and steel, but a great woman wielding gold and silver. A golden queen, with a plan to stamp coins all of one weight, so that every trade about the Shattered Sea would be made with her face.”
Mother Gundring sat back, the many lines on her forehead deepening as she considered. “This story has the smack of truth.”
“The best ones do. You taught me that.” Now that he was begun the words spilled out easily. “The High King and his minister saw the merchants leave their wharves for those of this northern queen, and their revenues shrivelling month upon month, and their power shrivelling with them. They had to act. But kill a woman who could spin gold from the air? No. Her husband was too proud and wrathful to be dealt with. Kill him, then, and topple the queen from her lofty perch and take her for their own, so she could spin gold for them. That was their plan.”
“Kill a king?” muttered Mother Gundring, staring hard at Yarvi over the rim of her cup.
He shrugged. “It’s how these stories often start.”
“But kings are cautious and well-guarded.”
“This one especially. They needed the help of someone he trusted.” Yarvi sat forward, the fire warm on his face. “And so they taught a bronze-feathered eagle a message. The king must die. And they sent it to his minister.”
Mother Gundring blinked, and very slowly swallowed another mouthful of tea. “A heavy task to give a minister, killing the man she was sworn to serve.”
“But was she not sworn to serve the High King and her grandmother too?”
“We all are,” whispered Mother Gundring. “You among us, Brother Yarvi.”
“Oh, I’m forever swearing oaths: I hardly know which ones to honor. This minister had the same trouble, but if a king sits between gods and men, the High King sits between gods and kings, and has been thinking himself higher yet, of late. She knew he would not be denied. So she fashioned a plan. Replace her king with a more reasonable brother. Trim away any troublesome heir. Blame some old enemy from the utmost north where even the thoughts of civilized men rarely stray. Say that a dove came from another minister with an offer of peace, and drew this rash king into an ambush …”
“Perhaps that was the lesser evil,” said Mother Gundring. “Perhaps it was that or see Mother War spread her bloody wings across the whole Shattered Sea.”
“The lesser evil and the greater good.” Yarvi took a long breath, and it seemed to hurt deep in his chest, and he thought of the black birds blinking in Sister Owd’s cage. “Only the minister given the blame never used doves. Only crows.”
Mother Gundring paused with the cup halfway to her mouth. “Crows?”
“It is so often the small things overlooked which leave our schemes in ruins.”
“Oh, troublesome detail.” Mother Gundring’s eye twitched as she looked down at her tea and took a longer swallow, and for a while they sat in silence, only the happy crackle of the fire and the odd floating spark between them. “I thought you might untangle it in time,” she said. “But not so soon.”
Yarvi snorted. “Not before I died at Amwend.”
“That was never my choice,” said the old minister. She who had always been like a mother to him. “You were to take the test, and give up your birthright, and in time take my place as we had always planned. But Odem did not trust me. He moved too soon. I could not stop your mother putting you in the Black Chair.” She gave a bitter sigh. “And Grandmother Wexen would by no means have been satisfied with that result.”
“So you let me flounder into Odem’s trap.”
“With the deepest regret. I judged it the lesser evil.” She set her empty cup down beside her. “How does this story end, Brother Yarvi?”
“It already has. With the deepest regret.” He looked up from the flames and into her eyes. “And it is Father Yarvi, now.”
The old minister frowned, first at him, then down at the cup he had brought her. “Black-tongue root?”
“I swore an oath, Mother Gundring, to be avenged on the killers of my father. I may be half a man, but I swore a whole oath.”
The flames in the firepit flickered then, their reflections dancing orange in the glass jars on the shelves.
“Your father and your brother,” croaked Mother Gundring. “Odem and his men. So many others. And now the Last Door opens for me. All … because of coins.”
She blinked then, and swayed towards the fire, and Yarvi started up and caught her gently with his left arm, and slipped the cushion behind her with his right, and eased her with great care back into her chair. “It seems coins can be most deadly.”
“I am sorry,” whispered Mother Gundring, her breath coming short.
“So am I. You will not find a sorrier man in all of Gettland.”
“I do not think so.” She gave the faintest smile. “You will make a fine minister, Father Yarvi.”
“I will try,” he said.
She did not answer.
Yarvi took a ragged breath, and brushed her eyelids closed, and crossed her withered hands in her lap, and slumped back sick and weary on his stool. He was still sitting there when the door banged wide and a figure blundered up the steps, setting the bunches of drying plants swinging like hanged men behind him.
One of the youngest warriors, newly past his tests. Younger even than Yarvi, firelight shifting on his beardless face as he loitered in the archway.
“King Uthil seeks an audience with his minister,” he said.
“Does he indeed?” Yarvi wrapped the fingers of his good hand about Mother Gundring’s staff. His staff, the elf-metal cold against his skin.
He stood. “Tell the king I am on my way.”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
To come
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JOE ABERCROMBIE is the New York Times bestselling author of Red Country and the First Law trilogy: The Blade Itself, Before They Are Hanged, and Last Argument of Kings. He is a full-time writer, and occasional freelance film editor, who lives in Bath, England, with his wife and daughters.
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