She smiled then, as if we’d just made a beginning: a new start for me, for her, for both of us. Only life doesn’t work that way. ‘You have to go now, Aline,’ I said.
She pulled away and stared at me for a long time. ‘Husband, when did you become so very full of useless principle?’ She waved a hand. ‘You might fool all these others but you and I both know you weren’t at all like this when I was alive. Or perhaps you were, but you were also a little selfish, a little too easily cowed, more than a little lazy.’ She smiled. ‘And now, here you are, this . . . hero. Is there nothing left of the foolish young man I married?’
‘Silly woman,’ I said. ‘I can be more than one thing.’
I expected her to laugh, but she didn’t. Instead her face grew deadly serious. ‘Ethalia doesn’t love you, Falcio. Whatever you had before, it left when she took the Sainthood.’
‘I know that. But it’s her life, and her choice.’
‘It was also her choice to give herself over to me – she knew the consequences, and she accepted them willingly, without reservation. Ethalia has given us this chance, to have the life together that was denied us.’
‘She has,’ I agreed. I took a deep breath and held it, hoping somehow it would strengthen my resolve. ‘And now you have to go.’
Aline sighed as she leaned in and whispered, ‘Very well.’ Then she smiled. ‘I will settle for one kiss, for old times’ sake. Let me feel my husband’s lips on mine this last time.’
I wanted the taste of that kiss more than all the wine in the world. I wanted that one moment, a tiny fragment of her love to carry with me for the rest of my days – hadn’t I earned it?
But . . . ‘They aren’t your lips,’ I said, before I could fall into that abyss from which I would never want to climb out. ‘Ethalia would not want this.’
Aline groaned. ‘Really? You think she would begrudge you this one tiny thing? Is she so selfish a woman as that?’
‘She isn’t selfish at all, and that’s why we can’t do this.’
Aline removed her hands from my cheeks and stood silently for a time, giving me a chance to change my mind, but when she finally said, ‘As you wish,’ the eyes staring back at me were Ethalia’s, and she turned and walked away without saying anything else.
*
I stayed there a long time, wallowing in my own loss, but eventually I had to move. I made my way into the ruins of the castle. There were still debts to be paid.
The steps below the wreck of the seventh tower were crumbled in places, but there was enough of the staircase left to reach the basement. The door to Aramor’s deathhouse was open.
‘I knew you would come,’ Jillard, Duke of Rijou said. He stood over the body of his son, his back to me.
‘This is a bad place to keep him,’ I said, looking around. ‘The ceiling may not hold.’
Jillard ignore the warning. ‘Did you come to pay the debt?’ he asked.
‘I did.’
The Duke of Rijou shook his head several times, like an old man suffering from a palsy. ‘Then come back tomorrow, or next week. Come and see me a year’s hence, in Rijou, where I will take you down to my dungeons and we can pay our debts to each other.’
I walked to the other side of the table and looked down at the boy who’d given his life, and in exchange, helped to make a God. I wanted to tell Jillard how I’d met Valour at the bridge, saving a drowning cat, but I didn’t think it would ease his pain, not yet.
‘I could have you killed,’ he said, conversationally, no ire in the words, only fact. ‘I imagine you must think you’re invulnerable to such things, with the luck you’ve had. But I promise you, I could have it done.’
‘You’ve tried on more than one occasion, your Grace,’ I pointed out.
He looked up and I saw the dark circles under his eyes. ‘On those occasions, I was not quite so invested.’
I understood his pain, and if anything, it made him more human. But even I have my limits when it comes to being threatened. ‘If there is some price you expect from me for Tommer’s death, speak it.’
He nodded, as if this had been the question all along. ‘I have to take his body to be buried, properly, in his home. That will take some time. There are arrangements to be made, political matters to be attended to. Of course, the country will be in jeopardy again by then and no doubt killing you would only make matters worse. So I will have to wait.’
‘If you’re waiting until the country is safe, you might be waiting a long time.’
‘I know,’ he said, ‘but I’m a patient man. It will be years, perhaps decades. The world needs us as we are, you and me, doing the things we do. By the time the country has met its future, you may not even be alive. But if you are, if, when all this is done, you still draw breath, I will send for you. Will you come?’
I looked down at Tommer’s face, at all that promise of youth and courage taken from the world. ‘I will,’ I said.
Jillard made no acknowledgement of my willingness to make myself his prisoner; it felt as if we were merely going over the items in a long-agreed contract. ‘You will come in secret, telling no one. I will choose the time and I will choose the place and you’ll come to me.’ He opened his mouth to continue, but then stopped, and I saw the pain twisting inside him. Then he went on, ‘You will give up whatever weapons you have with you. You will give up your coat. My men will bring you to a room and chain you there, and I will come.’
‘Torturing me won’t—’
He cut me off. ‘Then, Falcio val Mond, First Cantor of the Greatcoats, I will tell you about my boy, about my Tommer. I will tell you about the look of wonder on his face the first time he opened his eyes, smiling, not crying as other babes do. I will tell you about the way he stood up and walked, long before other boys. I will tell you about the silly things he said and the strange questions he asked. I will tell you all of this until your heart shatters in two, Falcio val Mond. I will tell you this so that you might know one tenth of the pain I will feel every day from now on. And when I am done . . .’
I waited for him to finish but he couldn’t seem to find the breath. This, I understood, was a torture for him greater than he had ever known.
‘Say it,’ I urged him.
He studied me, then said, ‘When I am done, you will tell me the stories of the Greatcoats you heard as a boy – the ones the minstrel, Bal Armidor, told Tommer. You will tell me the tales that made Tommer the way he was, that led him to the death he chose. You will tell me this so that in my final days I can try to become one tenth the man my boy deserved for a father.’
‘Marked.’
We shook hands then, though there was no need. Jillard was a monster, a master manipulator, everything I loathed about the Dukes. I, in turn, was everything he hated about the Greatcoats. But no man is all one thing; none of us are pure in our beliefs or our devotions. We are all bound by the frailties of our humanity, some of which feed our hatred, some of which, very occasionally, make us want to be something better.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-SIX
On The Eve Of Your Last Duel
You would think that after everything that had happened, after the weeks of duels and deceptions, after fighting an actual God, that I would have slept like a newborn babe that night. I didn’t.
In the wreckage of the castle I’d found the old Greatcoats’ wardroom was still standing, though somewhat dustier for the rubble. I stripped off my filthy clothes and righted one of the old couches to use as a bed, but no matter how much I tossed and turned, sleep eluded me. Eventually I conceded defeat and, having nothing better to do, dressed, righted the fallen weapons rack, picking out an old rapier, and set about practising the eight fundamental forms.
You can never get too much of the fundamentals, I thought, trying to pretend that this wasn’t a completely preposterous time to be training. I gave myself ten rounds to get the forms out of my system, hoping that would leave me exhausted enough to sleep, and when that didn’t work, I gave myself another ten, the
n another. After a while I could barely keep my sword arm up, and yet I couldn’t stop, either.
There is something very wrong with you, Falcio val Mond. You’re a sick, sick man. I was so wrapped up in my thoughts that it was some time before I noticed the knocking at the door. I listened more closely, as much to make sure I wasn’t imagining it as anything else; after all, no one had any reason to believe I wouldn’t be comatose by this point.
The knock repeated and now I knew who it was. I opened the door to Ethalia, who wore a simple grey dress, a little drab, I thought, then wondered whether that was for my benefit. She was holding a long wooden case in her hands. The black leather covering was wearing off at the edges where I’d forgotten to glue it back down.
‘You brought me my rapiers?’
She held out the case to me. ‘I thought you might be lonely without them.’ There was no discernible disdain in her words, so I decided none was intended. I took the case, walked back into the wardroom and placed it on the table. Ethalia took a step, then stopped, just inside the doorway.
‘I suppose it was as hard for you to sleep with them in your chamber as it was for me to sleep without them,’ I said. It had sounded cleverer in my head.
‘They’re pieces of metal, Falcio. They don’t make me sleep better, or worse. I just knew you’d want them.’
I couldn’t decide whether I was offended, or glad that she’d known how uncomfortable I would be without them. In the end I just said, ‘Thank you.’
She looked around the wardroom. ‘If you’re going to make your home here, you should really have someone put in a proper bed.’
‘Do you have a better . . .’ I was going to say a better suggestion, but I stopped myself. I had a terrible feeling in my gut. ‘Ethalia, what I did, sending Aline away . . . it doesn’t mean you should feel . . .’ I stopped. This wasn’t coming out right.
She leaned back against the doorway and crossed her arms, then raised an eyebrow and, tilting her head, said, ‘Go on, Falcio. What is it I shouldn’t be feeling?’
I was just about bright enough to know I was treading in dangerous waters, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on what I was doing wrong. ‘You shouldn’t feel as if you have some obligation to me,’ I said after a moment. Okay, that was definitely the wrong thing to say.
She laughed then, with more of a mocking tone than I liked. ‘Really, Falcio? You’re worried that I might feel obliged to – to what? To love you? Because you sent Aline away? Because you were so noble as to not allow her to use my body as her own?’
‘You let her in,’ I said, a little defensively. Now I was fairly sure I knew where I’d gone wrong, and just as sure that I couldn’t retrieve the situation.
‘To save your life, and this country.’ She shook her head. ‘I swear, Falcio, you are the strangest man I’ve ever met. On the one hand you are determined to save the life of every woman you stumble over; on the other, you imagine that just because you had the basic common decency to not let your dead wife take control of me permanently, that I would react by coming here and throwing myself at you.’
‘See, when you say it like that, I don’t sound very gallant.’
She stared at me for a long while, then said, ‘Put on a shirt and come with me.’
‘Where?’ I asked.
‘Brasti’s asked us to meet on what is left of the southern ramparts at midnight.’ She rolled her eyes. ‘Apparently he wants us to refer to him as “Brasti Goodbow, the Queen’s Godslayer” from now on.’
Saints save us from Brasti’s ego. ‘What did Aline say to that?’
‘I think she’s just relieved that he hasn’t asked for actual churches to be consecrated in his name. Right now, though, you and I need to take a walk to the town square. I haven’t had supper yet. I suspect you haven’t either.’
‘You want to have dinner with me?’
‘I do.’
‘Why?’
Ethalia let out a long breath. ‘Because I’m hungry. Because the stars are out and the air is warm.’ She came into the room and took my hand. ‘Because the truth is, you and I don’t know each other very well. We thought we did, and what was between us was real enough, but that’s passed now and maybe it’s a good thing. Perhaps we can get to know each other properly, as a woman and a man who both need to eat and who might like some of the same foods, as two people who might even have other things in common, too.’
I stood there for a while, enjoying the softness of her hand in mine, thinking about the need to put on a shirt but not wanting to let go, not yet. Then it felt awkward to be silent so I opened my damned mouth and said, ‘You know, you sounded a bit like Aline just then.’
Oh, Gods . . . why do you let me open my mouth at times like this?
Ethalia’s eyes narrowed. ‘You really aren’t very good at this, are you, Falcio val Mond?’
Somewhere beyond the veil of life, Saint Erastian who-plucks-the-rose was doubtless laughing his head off. ‘I’m fairly sure I’m absolute rubbish at it,’ I admitted.
‘Well, that’s something anyway. Shall we?’
I picked up my shirt and looked at it. For a moment I wished I had something clean with me, then I decided that Ethalia knew who I was, and more often than not whatever I was wearing would be covered in dirt and dust and more than a little blood. I looked down at the case of rapiers on the table. ‘Ethalia . . .’
She covered her eyes with her hands. ‘For the sake of the Gods old and new, you’re really not going to speak again, Falcio, are you?’
I knew there was a risk, but to hold my tongue just to keep her from leaving? That would have been no better than an outright lie, and she deserved better from me. ‘These swords . . . I know you think they’re tools of violence, and you’re right, of course.’ I leaned down and flipped open the lid. ‘But they’re also the means by which I saved the life of a young girl who turned out to be the King’s heir. They’ve helped defeat tyrants and assassins. I know there’s a line between valour and violence, but sometimes being a swordsman is the only thing that lets me protect the people I love. I’m not going to apologise for who I am any more.’
I waited for her to walk away, but instead she came to stand next to me and slid her fingers around the grip of one of the rapiers. ‘Good,’ she said. ‘Then don’t apologise. Be who you are and I’ll be who I am and let’s see if we can get through a whole meal without the world ending.’
She lifted the rapier from the box and handed it to me. I attached the scabbard to my belt. ‘I thought . . . I thought, what with you being a Saint now . . .’
‘I am the Saint of Mercy, Falcio, and I have to honour that, and Birgid’s faith in me.’
‘Then—’
‘But I’ve come to realise that I’m also a woman of this land, of this country, and it’s as much my duty to protect it as yours.’
‘That doesn’t sound very Saintly,’ I remarked, but she took my hand again and pulled me towards the door.
‘Silly man,’ she said. ‘I can be more than one thing.’
*
That night I ate a simple meal in a simple restaurant with a very complicated woman. For the first half-hour or so the two of us paid close attention to our food – venison stew, the contents of which spurred a good deal of comment and discussion on our part. Between courses we talked about the paintings of forlorn-looking farm animals on the walls, and argued over which of the cook’s relatives had likely been the artist. Other patrons, a mix of obviously wealthy merchants and less well-clad men and women of assorted trades, drew our scrutiny and speculation too. This was, so far as I could tell, the way normal people spent time in each other’s company.
Eventually we trod a wine-influenced, weaving path back to what little remained of the castle. Ethalia didn’t stopped to kiss me or confess to holding back a tide of love for me, but neither did she launch into a speech on the need for restraint in our relationship, or I the need for action. We didn’t particularly discuss the state of the country, but w
e didn’t shy away from the subject when some passing reference made it pertinent. We simply let the moments come and go as they chose. I wanted more, of course, but I didn’t want a return to the way things were. I was content to believe the future was a set of doors; though none were yet open, none were locked, either.
Just past midnight we walked up the long flights of steps to the southern ramparts. We heard the music long before we arrived, and I recognised Nehra and Rhyleis’ touch. We paused at the top of the stairs to hear Brasti emphasising the importance of no one mentioning how badly the two of us had botched our relationship. His hearing is rather extraordinary, so I was fairly sure he knew we’d already arrived.
‘Ah, there you are,’ he said, once we came through the arched doorway to the ramparts. ‘Making us wait for you as usual, I see.’
Ethalia shocked me when she responded, ‘In our defence, we were having rather a lot of sex.’
I realised that was oddly similar to something I’d said during my duel with Undriel – was it only a few weeks before? I really didn’t know her as well as I thought.
Brasti pursed his lips and puffed out his cheeks in a fair impression of a man about to vomit. ‘Please,’ he said, after a rather lengthy performance, ‘there are children about.’
‘I assume you’re referring to either yourself or Kest,’ Aline said tartly. ‘As I will soon be your Queen, it’s probably best you not antagonise me further than your unsavoury nature makes absolutely necessary.’
‘His unsavoury nature accounts for a great deal of annoyance to everyone, your Majesty,’ Darriana said.
Brasti ignored them both, picked up an impressively heavy jug of wine and proceeded to fill a collection of shabby pewter goblets. I took a seat on a low section of wall and Ethalia joined me there, not so close as to be intimate but enough to indicate she was there with me.
‘What shall we drink to?’ Valiana asked. Doctor Pasquine had done an impressive job of healing Valiana’s face, but there were new scars there to match the others she’d acquired over the past year.
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