The Pretender_s Crown ic-2

by C. E. Murphy

  Not until he was certain all of those thoughts were schooled out of his expression did Javier turn, smiling, toward Marius. “You look out of place here, Marius. Isidro's architecture swoops and soars, and you're so very solid.”

  “Grace has cast me amongst the stars, my lord. I should look out of place. I came only to bear news of your mother's death, and should have returned to Lutetia long since.” So, too, came the unspoken conclusion, should Javier have, and his lingering presence in Isidro was all that kept Marius there. Guilt twisted Javier's belly and he faced the city again, unwilling to meet Marius's eyes.

  “I'll go home soon.” The promise sounded sullen and childish. Javier heard Marius's footsteps, then felt the weight of his friend's hand on his shoulder. Unusual, that; Marius, of his three lifelong friends, had always been the most formal. Sacha was nearer in rank to Javier, so less concerned about niceties, and Eliza had never given a damn, not from the moment she'd tumbled from the palace garden's walls and broken both her fall and Javier's arm by landing on her prince.

  “You hear nagging in my words, my lord, but I mean none. Javier, so much has changed this past six-month, and not the least of it you.”

  “I've only been exposed, not changed.”

  “No, my lord,” Marius said with unexpected firmness. Javier, surprised enough to glance Marius's way after all, found resolution in his brown eyes. Resolution and worse, compassion. “Beatri-Belinda-changed us all, in ways for better and worse.”

  “Better?” Javier demanded. “What did she make better? We're scattered to the winds, the four of us, and my mother is dead, and Gallin's treaties with Khazar are laid bare. In what manner did she improve any of our lots?”

  “Eliza unbent far enough to accept a hand in turning her dressmaking skills to a profitable business,” Marius replied without hesitation.

  “Out of jealous rivalry.”

  Marius ignored him, admitting, “I can see no especial good she did Sacha, but no matter how it ended, she gave you joy for a little while, my prince. She gave you joy and she gave you a confidence that none of us had ever seen in you before. You've always been easy with power,” he said more swiftly, when Javier would have spoken. “It's a prince's right and his domain. But with Belinda at your side you shifted toward action. With all the years we've known each other I think it's safe to say you had not often shown an impulse to act. I hadn't understood why, but I do now. I can't imagine the weight of your witchpower burden, nor the relief you must have felt at finding you were no longer alone. It would have given me strength as well.”

  “And you, Marius? What good did she do you?”

  Marius gave a little sigh and let his hand slip from Javier's shoulder. “I suppose she stole some of my innocence. My belief in happy endings. Perhaps that's not a gift, but then again, it may well be. I've always been the young one amongst us,” he said without heat. “In experience if not in years. Sacha's more cynical and Eliza was born poor, and you've had the weight of a kingdom on your shoulders all your life. I've been the frivolous one, but all children must grow up one day.”

  “And what if I need that innocence at my side?”

  A beat or two passed, Marius catching his breath and holding silence, so clearly an indication of searching for words that Javier smiled. “Go on, Marius. We've been friends long enough that whatever you have to say won't break the bridges. You've been rude to me a time or two before.”

  “It's not rudeness that stays my tongue, my lord, but fear.”

  A cold blade sliced deep into Javier's chest, the contraction of his heart lurching and faltering around it. His breath cut short, knife slicing his lungs into pieces and leaving black spots dancing in his vision. He reached for power instinctively, wanting the soothing silver moonlight to make things right, wanting Marius to buckle under its weight and say only the things Javier wanted to hear.

  Shame gurgled in his belly as he recognised the impulse. A lifetime of trying so hard not to influence his friends, and yet when they spoke words that sparked alarm, he acted, without thought, to dominate.

  He ought not have scoffed at Belinda for her terrors.

  Only when he was certain the witchpower was controlled, no longer desiring Marius's acquiescence, did Javier dare speak. “Fear? Of me?”

  “Fear that you have found that necessary innocence in another.” Marius's voice was soft, so soft it could betray nothing of envy, of doubt; not even of fear: so soft it revealed all of those things in its attempts to keep them hidden.

  “Tomas,” Javier said, and in the saying knew he should have said “the priest.” A quirk ran over Marius's mouth, commentary enough, and Javier pressed his eyes shut, reveling for a moment in denying the world.

  But doing so brought Tomas's golden gaze to his mind's eye. Forthright, honest, faithful, full of challenge and confidence that only became murky when Javier exerted his will and bent the priest's thoughts away from the thing they both held to be true: that Javier was devilspawn, and his gifts a danger that ought to be turned away from, not embraced.

  “He's my confessor, Marius, nothing more.” Javier had no strength to put behind the assurance, his answer as soft as Marius's own voiced fears.

  “What he is,” Marius said unexpectedly, “is beautiful. And he bends beneath your power, Javier, but he doesn't break. I saw it in that first moment in your uncle's chambers. He doesn't have Beatr-Belinda's strength to stand before you and hold her own, but he has some of that, and it draws you. I suppose if I was certain everyone would bow to my whim I, too, would hunger for those few who didn't.”

  “He cannot replace what you are to me.”

  “Nor can I be what he is to you,” Marius murmured all too insightfully. “Will you take him with you when you go, Jav?”

  “Yes.” The answer came too easily, and with it came regrets for how his certainty would make Marius feel. “When I go, it will be to call an army. I'll need Cordula's support, and I can find little better assurance of that than Primo Abbate's son, a priest of the church, riding at my side. I'll still need you,” Javier added more quietly. “If Sacha has always tried to be my impetus, you, Marius, have always been my steady right hand.”

  “And Eliza your heart?” Marius wondered aloud. A note in his voice said he knew he treaded dangerous ground, and said as surely that he'd cast caution to the wind for these few moments of time stolen with his prince.

  “Eliza is Gallin, Marius. She is of the people, and if she is my heart, if I am hers, then I have the people behind me and we cannot fail in Aulun.” Sudden clarity rang in the words, making a path through torpor and reluctance. “I have to find her.”

  “My lord?”

  “I have to find Eliza.” Understanding came in bursts, clarion calls that brought the first vestiges of joy and enthusiasm back to his life. “With her at my side, Gallin will support me and we'll take Aulun before winter. It hinges on her, Marius. I'm a fool for not seeing it before.” Javier turned to his friend, seizing the merchant's broad shoulders. “I let Belinda turn me from pursuing Liz as fast and far as I needed. She'll be my angel, my icon. I cannot do this without her.”

  Something dark filled Marius's eyes, so rare as to be unrecogniseable. “Your angel and your icon, standing at your side. That's a queen's role, Javier, not a friend's. Will you marry her?”

  Javier swayed, regret taking the strength from his body. “I can't, Marius. I can't, even if I would. She's barren. A king must have heirs.”

  Darkness deepened in Marius's eyes, finally making a name for itself: bitterness-and that was not an emotion Javier's friend was given to. Incongruously, Tomas's golden gaze leapt to Javier's mind, washing over Marius's familiar features and wiping away disillusion. Repelled, Javier released Marius and stepped back, struggling to understand whether his revulsion was born from putting Tomas in Marius's place, or from the acid look in his friend's face. “Do not look at me so, Marius. I cannot help being what I am.”

  “A king, or cruel?” Discontent marked Marius'
s features a few more long seconds. “She deserves better, Jav If you'll make her an icon, make her a queen as well. Get a bastard child on some serving wench and give him the throne, if you must, but let Eliza have her due.”

  “You would make me Henry of Aulun?” Javier snapped.

  Exasperation flickered over Marius's face. “Yes, my lord. I would have you bed and wed half a dozen women, get girl children or sickly boys on all of them, and give up Cordula and Ecumenic faith for the Reformation. I would have your only strong heir be a woman as redheaded as yourself, and I would watch her rule Gallin and Essandia both for thirty years with her iron fist. Javier, forgive me. I love you, but I wonder if this witchpower isn't addling your mind. Henry had one strong son out of marriage, and would have made that son king had the lad not died a-hunting. Eliza would understand that decision. I don't know that she'd be willing to play the part of your angel of battle without a taste of something sweeter to carry her along. You know they already call her the prince's whore.”

  A fist flashed out and knocked Marius aside, so fast his cry was as much astonished as pained. He fell back with his hand against a bleeding lip and stared at Javier, who stared at his own betraying hand in turn. “Marius, I…”

  “It is of no matter, majesty. I spoke too boldly, and beg your pardon.” With grace powered by infinite hurt, Marius knelt.

  “Don't. Please, Mar, don't.” Javier reached out to draw Marius upward, but the merchant man offered no extended hand, no gesture of peace. Nor did Javier deserve one, but Marius's refusal sparked infantile pique. Grinding his teeth against doing further damage, he muttered, “I didn't know, and had never dreamt of hearing such vile words come from your lips, even in the form of reporting them. My hand flew quicker than my thoughts. It doesn't matter anyway,” he added desperately. “Liz has been gone for weeks, and no one knows where she is.”

  “I know.” Marius spoke to the flagstones, a wonderful precision in his words. Cutting precision, Javier thought: damning precision. That was the price, then, of Javier's thoughtless action: he would be mocked with knowledge he didn't share, mocked with the end of innocence, for once upon a time Marius knew nothing of keeping secrets.

  Anger flared again, this time with less physical intent, but far greater heat. “How can you know? Did she tell you where she was going? Why have you not said so?”

  Marius, still with exquisite precision, said, “No one asked me, my king.”

  “I shouldn't have had to ask!”

  Marius looked up, careful picture of mild surprise. “One friend's confidences ought not be broken at the unspoken whim of another's, my king.”

  Javier, through his teeth, said, “Stop calling me that.”

  “Yes, your majesty.”

  He had learned, Javier thought through a hazy tide of silver fury. Marius had, in the last weeks or months, learned to play a game of politics that had been beyond him. Had learned to use words as weapons, and not the blunt heavy ones that Javier might have expected, but subtle as a blade slipping between the ribs. And if his once-sweet Marius could make such a play on words now… suspicion snagged him, bursting forth in a demand: “Did you bed Belinda?”

  That same black bitterness slid over Marius's face. “Never.”

  “You're lying!”

  “There's no purpose in lying to a man with your talents, majesty. Any truths you want of me you'll have.” Resignation and regret were in Marius's voice, creating a weariness that alluded the death of something Javier didn't want to see die, and felt powerless to save. Marius should be kinder than that: Marius should be the rock he had always been, and make an allowance for Javier's loss, his fear, his unwelcome gifts.

  All of Javier's hurt and anger rolled together into the same question, demanded again: “Did you sleep with Belinda?” It was necessary that he know, more necessary than abiding by the rules of friendship he'd imposed on himself a lifetime ago. He let his silver-stained willpower roll toward Marius, certain that it, at least, could pull truth from his friend's lips, if all the years of friendship could not.

  And, as with everyone save two-three, including the priest's knack for brief resistance-he felt Marius's will sunder to his own. It was not a breaking, but a softening; an agreement, willing or not, to do Javier's bidding. He was unaccustomed to using his gifts to draw answers out; usually it was enough, more than enough, to have agreement from those around him, so his own path might be clear. But the one was merely an extension of the other, an expectation of verbal response rather than a simple shift of intentions.

  Marius met his gaze forthrightly “My lord king, I did not.” There was too little acquiescence in his voice for Javier's liking, too much awareness of what the king was doing, and no forgiveness for it. Until that moment Javier had imagined that Marius, more than Sacha or Eliza, understood the need for his friends to be truthful with him. But an understanding friend wouldn't be so resentful at sharing the truth, or so insulted that Javier sought it through whatever means he must.

  And though perhaps under duress, Marius had given his answer in bold flat words, no room for equivocation in them. Relieved, and with fresh hope for their friendship, Javier asked, “And what about Eliza, Marius? Where is she?” Witchpower still danced, expecting truth, though its significance faded in Javier's mind. Marius would tell him anyway; Eliza was too important to them both, and to Javier's cause, for Marius to keep such secrets. When they spoke of Eliza, the witchbreed magic spun between friends could be ignored.

  “I would look to Aria Magli, your majesty.”

  Delight sparked in Javier's breast. “I shall. I'll go myself, through Cordula, and there will ask the Pappas for his blessings in our crusade against Aulun. Thank you, Marius.” Javier offered his hands again, friendship re-sealed with the gesture.

  Marius, with more delicacy than Javier was accustomed to seeing, touched his palms against Javier's, putting no weight on them. He climbed to his feet wholly on his own, not accepting any help from Javier, even when Javier grasped his wrists and made as if to pull him to his feet. “My honour, your majesty.”

  Released from Javier's astonished grip, Marius took a step back, bowed more deeply than he had ever done before, then crossed the rooftop and trotted down the stairs, leaving Javier alone with his witchpower.

  “I am becoming what I've most feared.” Javier spoke from the shadow, the words his only herald. At the chapel's other end, Tomas straightened from prayer, crossed himself, and turned toward Javier. Setting sunlight broke through rich stained glass from the rose window above Javier's head, spilled down the simple chapel aisle, and by chance a swath of lemon light fell across Tomas's face, lighting his impossible eyes to golden fire. In that light he was everything a priest should be: holy, rapturous, serene. A sob rose up in Javier's chest, fighting to break free. Rather than give it voice he knelt, far too aware that as king he should kneel to no one save God, and then only if the Almighty seemed worthy.

  Moments later Tomas's fingertips touched Javier's forehead, a cooler touch than Javier expected, as though his enflamed colours took the very heat from him. The dead felt like that, though there was more give in the priest's hand than there would be in waxy cold death.

  Tomas moved away, footsteps quiet against the empty floor, and a door opened, then closed again. Javier got to his feet, following Tomas to the confessional still with the weight of sobs burdening his breath.

  Sheer creamy silk woven with gold thread in the mark of the cross hung between priest and confessor. There was no anonymity to it, but there was never meant to be. Rodrigo and his priests knew each other by name, by touch, by breath; so, too, did Javier and his own confessors. The pretence at privacy, though, made dark secrets and sins easier to whisper, and so the gauzy fabric did its duty. Tomas moved on its other side, crossing himself; Javier did the same, then gripped the window's edge.

  Tomas's cool fingers slipped over his, reassuring, confident, his touch everything Marius's should have been. Javier whispered, “I barely know the
name of my sin” to their entwined fingers. “Pride? Pride, yes, because I can't bring myself to apologise to a man when I've done him wrong.”

  “Royalty rarely needs to, though God looks kindly on the humble, even when they are kings. Perhaps especially when they're kings,” Tomas murmured. “You speak of Marius.”

  Javier flinched. Thin silk kept him from seeing any expression, but he felt his own must be stained with guilt so clear Tomas would feel it pushing through the barrier. “Yes.”

  “And you wish for me to relieve you of choice, and order you to make amends. If you are directed to do so by God, you are absolved of your own weaknesses. That would satisfy your ego, would it not?”

  Shame burned Javier's cheeks until the air around him felt chilled. He said nothing, answer enough, and Tomas's response was mild. “I will not do it. I will not for two reasons, one being that it is not our Lord's duty to make your days easier or your pride less puffed.”

  Javier locked his gaze on the window's edge again, hating the truth in the priest's calm voice more, even, than he had loathed watching Marius walk away a stranger. “And the other?”

  “If you fear what you're becoming, it tells me you're growing more reliant on your devil's power, Javier. Marius does not condemn your use of it, and I cannot in good conscience direct you to his side. I would keep you from those who encourage its use, that you might yet find your way back to the light.”

  “You would keep me from my uncle, then.”

  “If I must.” Implacable sorrow edged Tomas's voice.

  Javier choked on the sob that had taken up residence in his chest, twisting it into a raw miserable laugh. “What if I have no choice? What if this is the path I'm meant to walk?”