The Diminished

by Kaitlyn Sage Patterson

  Fortunately, the room stood empty; the ashes were cold in the hearth. I eased a window sash up and froze, hearing a carriage rattle to a stop in front of the house. Voices and laughter rang merrily out. I strained and thought I heard Birger’s distinctive cackle, but dismissed the idea. He and Thamina were half a day’s ride away, and I had to move fast if I wanted to catch Gerlene.

  I dropped the rucksack to the ground—a good five feet below the window—and swung myself over, as well. I nearly lost my footing as I landed. There was no time to struggle with getting the window closed, so I grabbed the rucksack and bolted down the narrow alley between my house and the next. I slowed to a walk when I reached the next block of houses and pulled the hat, which smelled rather strongly of sweat and unwashed hair, down low over my brow.

  Three hansom cabs passed me before one stopped, and I had nearly given up hope of making it to my meeting. The driver, a broad woman with thick braids to her waist, said, “Where to, sir?” in the thick, clipped accent of the lower-class city dwellers.

  “Do you know The Turnspit Dog? In Oak Grove?” I asked.

  “And what’s a gentleman like you going to a seedy place like that for, eh?” She twisted in her seat to get a good look at me.

  “I’ll give you a drott if you get me there before ten and don’t ask me any more questions,” I offered, showing her the coin.

  Her eyes widened, and she turned back to her horses. “Just as you say, sir,” she said cheerfully. I climbed inside, and she urged her team into a bone-rattling trot.

  * * *

  The Turnspit Dog occupied all three floors of a decrepit house that had likely been beautiful in its time. I tucked my cuff bracelet into my sleeve before entering. A symbol like that, and gold, too, would be noticed in a place like this.

  The air inside was thick with tobacco smoke and the sour stench of stale beer and unwashed bodies. The booths and tattered couches on the first floor were unoccupied but for one enormous, bearded man. He stood when I entered, then sat again with a sneer on seeing me. I’d never felt so small in all my life and was sorely tempted to race back outside, flag down another cab and disappear back into my safe, cushioned world. Instead, I glanced around the dingy room, steeling myself.

  A stout, smiling woman who was dwarfed by the mammoth wooden bar she stood behind asked, “Get you a drink, love?”

  “Err, I’m, ah...” I cleared my throat. “I’m meeting someone, but I don’t see her.”

  The bearded man snorted.

  “Most everyone’s upstairs,” the barkeep said.

  I nodded my thanks and headed for the stairs at the back of the dark room.

  “Not those, love,” she called after me. “Take the front stairs.”

  I did as I was told, feeling absurdly out of place. When I reached the second floor, I saw the reason for her suggestion. The other staircase led directly onto a dance floor, where several couples swayed to the sad whine of a lone fiola. There was a second bar on this floor, and several bedraggled characters hunched over their drinks, engaged in quiet conversation. It seemed clear to me that there had been some kind of mistake, some misunderstanding. For surely Gerlene—proper, business-minded, respectable Gerlene—wouldn’t in a thousand lifetimes bring me to an establishment so thoroughly caked in disreputability. Just to be sure, I decided to climb the next set of stairs and make a hasty pass through the third floor before heading back to Esser Park.

  I found Gerlene in a dim alcove beside the staircase. The third story of the building was essentially a balcony that looked down on the dance floor below. Mismatched tables snuggled up to the railing, and booths occupied the dim, stoop-ceilinged alcoves that ringed what must have originally been the building’s attic. Gerlene, having naturally chosen the only green table in the room, had a pile of papers and the dregs of something dark and thick in a mug in front of her.

  “Ah, good,” she said. “I didn’t think you were going to make it. Do sit down. Are you hungry? Thirsty?”

  I slid into the booth and stowed my rucksack beneath the table. Eyeing the overflowing ashtrays and smudged glasses that littered many of the tables, I shook my head. “No, thank you.”

  Gerlene chuckled as she rose. “Don’t look so worried. The kitchen’s clean enough, and Mistress Vick brews the stout herself. You’ll have a draft and a couple of pasties. A boy your age wants regular feeding. I’ll find Ed and let him know.”

  She disappeared down the stairs in a flutter of olive serge, and I looked around nervously, fiddling with the buttons on my coat. Most of the alcove booths were occupied by hard-looking men and women. They leaned their heads together and spoke in low voices. The majority of their garments appeared well-made, if worn, and every person I saw wore a knife or pistol on their belt. The sight of so many armed persons actively seeking dark corners only increased my anxiety, and the sidelong glances they directed my way had me shaking by the time Gerlene reappeared with another woman beside her. I nearly jumped when I realized it was Queen Runa, dressed in drab trousers and a veritable collection of sweaters, her hair sloppily braided and dark circles beneath her eyes. She set a pitcher of dark brew on the table, along with three smudged stout glasses, and slid into the booth beside Gerlene, smiling fondly at the solicitor.

  “What...?” I spluttered, but Gerlene interrupted me.

  “Did you find the file?” she asked.

  “File? Oh! Yes. Here. I, uh, I have it here.” I pulled the documents out of the bag and handed them across the table. Gerlene took them and pointedly looked from me to the pitcher and back again, but I couldn’t stop staring at the Queen. She stuck her hand across the table, offering it to me. I took it, my own hands shaking badly, and noticed that her fingernails were dirty. I’d never seen her anything less than perfectly put together. The sight was deeply unsettling.

  “Is it safe for you to be here?” I asked, my voice a whisper.

  “Try not to cause a scene,” Runa hissed. “I’ve three of my most loyal guards here, but if these folks get wind of something untoward, we’ll be in a bit of trouble.” She grinned at me. “It’s good to get out around the people every once in a while. Gives me a sense of what’s really going on in the empire.”

  Gerlene nodded to her. “We’ve business to attend to, youngling, and quick-like. Can’t afford to let all our hard work be bungled because you don’t know how to handle yourself.” She slid the papers to Runa, who leafed through them, nodding.

  “I made it here with no trouble, didn’t I?” My statement was made somewhat less convincing by my wavering voice. Belatedly, I realized that Gerlene still expected me to pour the stout. I hastily slopped the dark brew into one of the stout glasses, filling half of it with foam that oozed over the top. Gerlene put out a hand to stop me pouring again.

  “That’ll be yours.” She took the pitcher and deftly poured a glass for the Queen and one for herself. “I suppose it stands that a man in your position needn’t know how to pour for himself.” She took a sip and sighed in irritation. “You should’ve dressed more plainly.”

  I looked down. I’d worn my oldest trousers and a plain shirt with far less embellishment than fashion dictated. Granted, my burgundy waistcoat was rather loudly embroidered with turquoise toads, but the jacket I wore covered most of the bold colors and I hadn’t brought a fur, thinking all of mine would be too ostentatious. “Can we please get to the point? I don’t see what my clothes have to do with anything.”

  Runa shot me an exasperated look. “Aside from the fact that you’re quite young, quite pretty and dressed like the noble you are, you blush every time anyone so much as looks at you. You’re hard to miss, and you’ll be harder to forget. Have your tutors taught you nothing?”

  I started to ask what the hell kind of lessons she thought I’d been given, but Gerlene put her hand up to stop me as the scent of spiced meat wafted over my shoulder. A scruffy man in his middle years, long ha
ir pulled into a tail, set a plate of steaming pasties on the table.

  “That be all for you, Miz Gee?” he asked in a thick city accent.

  “Yes, thank you, Ed,” Gerlene said, and added as an afterthought, “Ed, this is our great-nephew, Tiffin. He’s a footman for one of the noble families down by the parks. He’s been kind enough to spend his precious night off with his old aunties while his brother tends to their employer’s needs. Tiffin, say hello to Ed.”

  The man cracked a gap-toothed smile at me and wiped his hand on the pristine apron tied around his scrawny hips before offering it to me. “Pleased to meet you, son,” he said. “Your aunties are some of our favorite customers. Been coming in together as long as I’ve worked here, these two lovebirds.”

  I forced my jaw to stay closed as I wondered why, in the names of all the gods, the Queen of the Alskad Empire was known in a place as seedy as this—and why Ed implied she was Gerlene’s lover—but now was not the time for such questions. I shook his hand, trying not to grimace at the clammy sweat clinging to his palms. “The pleasure’s mine, sir.”

  “Ooh, look at the fancy manners on this one.” He winked at Runa. “If y’all will excuse me, I best be getting back to the kitchen afore sissy skins me alive.”

  Ed nodded to us and ambled back toward the stairs. Gerlene pushed the plate to me, took the papers I’d brought from Runa and riffled through them, reading quickly in the low light and muttering to herself.

  “It’s all in order. These papers back the woman’s story.”

  “What’s her story?” I asked. “You’re my family’s solicitor. Shouldn’t you know everything about my estates?”

  Runa gave me a sharp look over the rim of her stout glass. “Manners, child.”

  I blushed, but neither of them seemed to notice.

  Gerlene gestured at the papers. “This was all done in my mother’s time. She died ten years ago now. Before that, I had my own practice. She wouldn’t have kept notes about something like this.”

  “Like what?” I asked. I didn’t want to believe what I’d read. What I’d told Claes. I was desperately hoping for another explanation.

  “First, let me ask you two things. Do you have any birth marks?”

  I nodded hesitantly. “A port wine stain on my thigh. Why?”

  Gerlene ignored my question. “Did you ever hear your parents talking about someone called Ina?”

  I racked my brain, but I couldn’t remember hearing that name. All I could see was the woman who’d run from Gerlene’s house, her gray eyes so like mine.

  Bile rose in my throat. I didn’t want it to be true. I’d prayed to all the gods, not just Gadrian, that it wasn’t true. “Who was that woman, Gerlene?”

  “Best have another drink, child. We asked you to come here rather than meeting you somewhere more respectable, because what we have to tell you shouldn’t be overheard.”

  I did as she suggested, taking a hurried sip of my stout.

  The Queen leaned in close and whispered, “She’s your mother.”

  I swallowed hard and stared at Gerlene and Runa, horrified. “My mother is dead.”

  Gerlene looked at Runa, and at her nod, said, “I had an assistant posted at the corner in case she ran. He tracked her to a slum house in the End. When I went to see her, she told me a wild story that I had a deal of trouble believing, but your birthmark and Ru—erhm—these contracts confirm the claims the woman made.

  “She said Myrella, your father’s wife, had trouble falling pregnant, and when she did, she often lost the babes. The woman, her name is Xandrina—Ina—was a servant in your family’s household. She and your father had an affair, and she learned she was carrying around the same time as Myrella. Ina was bundled off to Penby to avoid a scandal. It would have all been over then, but this time, Myrella carried the babe to term. He was singleborn, a boy they called Ambrose.”

  “Me,” I said. My heart rose in my throat, and suddenly I realized the meaning of the acronym in the records I’d found—G.O.A.T. Those were my initials, scrambled. Ambrose had been my mother’s choice. Oswin for my father, and my family names, Trousillion and Gyllen. Trousillion had been my father’s last name before he’d married my mother and taken hers.

  The pieces began to fall into a startling, horrifyingly clear picture.

  Runa touched my cheek. “No, dear, not you. The birth was hard on Myrella, and she was very sick for a long time afterward. The doctor said she’d never have another child, so when her babe took ill, she was inconsolable. I suppose it occurred to Oswin that Ina’s babes were the same age, and he came to the city asking after them. One was a girl, Obedience, and the other was a boy, Prudence. Oswin offered Ina a great deal of money and a yearly stipend to switch her healthy babe for Myrella’s sickly one.” Seeing the shocked look on my face, she added, “She was young and had few skills. It’s a pitiful story, but she said she saw a better life for one of her babes.”

  “So...that woman. She’s my real mother?” Cold spread from my gut to the tips of my fingers and toes. My father had loved nothing in the world so much as he’d loved my mother—except perhaps me. To know that he had been unfaithful, like so many other members of the court, shattered my memory of him. I’d always wanted to be like him, above the immoral indulgences of the nobles. I’d always imagined he was better than the rest of them.

  “Ina gave birth to you,” Runa said grudgingly. “But Myrella raised you. By my reckoning, Myrella’s as much your mother as Ina, if not more.”

  Her words, their meaning, slammed home. “And I’m not singleborn?” I twisted the gold cuff at my wrist. I’d always known I didn’t deserve its weight. I shouldn’t have taken those vows. My chin trembled, and I fought back tears.

  Gerlene poured more stout into my glass, refusing to meet my eyes. Runa, however, met my gaze, her warm brown eyes steady and unconcerned.

  “No. You aren’t. Though these documents are ironclad—we made sure of it. Gerlene’s mother knew what she was about.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked.

  “One is a secrecy agreement,” Gerlene explained. “Ina is bound to tell no one about the circumstances of your birth, other than yourself or your legal representative—me. The other names you sole heir to your parents’ estates. But the third is the most brilliant—a contract, signed by Runa and your parents, that names you Runa’s chosen heir. It is irrevocable. You’re the first twin in the history of the Alskad Empire to be the heir to the Trousillion throne.” She paused, her eyes gleaming. “This could change everything.”

  The reality of what Runa and my parents had done bloomed like deadly jellyfish up from the treacherous depths of the ocean. “I have a twin?” I asked tentatively, wanting more confirmation. Gerlene and Runa nodded. “I’m heir to the Alskad throne and I have a twin? Hamil’s watery damnation. A sister? Where is she? Who is she?” I stared at Runa, aghast. If she was my father’s mother—if she was my grandmother, as I was nearly positive she was—then this cruelty was far, far worse. She’d taken away my other half. My balance. My conscience. “How could you?”

  Runa’s weariness disappeared, and she fixed me with a glare that held all the power and might of her years on the throne. “You do have a sister. Her name is Obedience, though she goes by Vi. When Myrella’s babe died, we asked Ina to give her to be raised by the temple. It seemed to me that it would be a bit easier for Ina to let go if she lost both of you, and I have some friends among the anchorites who have kept me apprised of Vi’s progress. We thought that if Ina could start over, could live without the burden of raising one of the diminished, her life would be more or less normal. It isn’t easy to live with one of the diminished, much less raise one.”

  My heart thudded. It was as though everything in my life had been explained by one simple fact. I had a sister, a twin. No wonder I had always felt so alone. I ached with the knowledge that she must have spent her w
hole life knowing that she didn’t belong and waiting for the grief to take her. My feelings of not belonging and estrangement were at least couched in wealth and love and a lie that would put me on the throne. Her childhood couldn’t have been so easy.

  I closed my eyes and imagined what my sister’s life must have been to this point. Horror and disgust sweeping over me in turns. “But Ina knew she wasn’t one of the diminished.”

  Gerlene took up the thread of the conversation. “She appeared to be, and with the stigma that entails, it was more than Ina could’ve handled on her own. I hate to say this, but Ina isn’t a good woman. She’s greedy, mean, a drunk. You’re both better off without her.”

  “But, Ru...” I stopped myself. “But I can’t be King if I’m a twin. It isn’t right. I’m not fit to rule.”

  Runa rolled her neck and sighed deeply. “I’ve been the Queen of this empire for more than thirty years, and I can tell you with a great deal of certainty that my not having a twin does not make me any better than you are. It has broken my heart every day to keep you and Vi apart, and I’d never planned to keep up the ruse forever. So when your mother died, I thought it best you knew now rather than later. You needed to know all the ways you were vulnerable, so that you can protect yourself as we continue grooming you for the throne.”

  I couldn’t fathom it. Everyone around me had spent every day of my life preparing me for a position that our religion—that simple common sense—dictated I should not hold. “Why not Patrise? Why not Lisette? Why not one of the actual singleborn?” I demanded.

  In a dangerous voice, too low for anyone but Gerlene and me to hear, Runa said, “You are the most direct heir to the throne. Trousillion blood runs in your veins, and I will not sit by and watch one of those pompous, lazy nitwits ruin my empire. I know better than anyone what it takes to lead this nation, and I chose you. You will sit on the Alskad throne.”