by David Weber
“And agreeing to formalize the betrothal here in Tellesberg means he doesn’t have to,” Cayleb agreed, resting one hand lightly on Daivyn’s shoulder. “He and Nahrmahn Garyet can both pay their respects to your future bride right here, and then they can stay home while the rest of us sail to Manchyr for the actual wedding.”
“Nahrmahn Garyet’s staying home, too?” Daivyn raised an eyebrow.
“Zhanayt’s having a harder time with this pregnancy.” Cayleb shrugged. “She insists she’d be just fine aboard Ahlfryd Hyndryk, and she’s probably right. Nahrmahn Garyet really doesn’t want to take any chances, though, and if he stays home from the wedding it could make Gorjah’s absence seem a bit less pointed to the more hypersensitive. I think he’s planning on explaining that to you in person when he and Zhanayt get here tomorrow. He doesn’t want you to think it’s because he doesn’t care.”
“This is probably going to be the most crowded wedding in Corisandian history,” Daivyn said with the air of the man who’d tried his best to avoid that distinction. “We’ll be just fine without him, and Zhanayt and the baby are way more important.”
Cayleb squeezed his shoulder and nodded, then looked down to where the insect-repelling flambeaus had just been lit in the gathering dusk as swarms of servants descended upon the long tables arranged along the terrace. They came armed with table cloths, flatware, and serving utensils, and strands of music drifted up to the balcony as the musicians began tuning their instruments.
“Looks like they’re getting ready,” Cayleb said philosophically. “It’s going to be crazy, you know. We kept the guest list as lean as we could, but that wasn’t all that lean, I’m afraid. Last time I checked, it was up to over a hundred and fifty. And that was last five-day.”
“I know,” Daivyn sighed. “Going to be a lot worse in Manchyr, though. I have to say it does seem sort of silly to be ‘presenting’ Frahncheska to people who already know her, though. I mean, she’s been in and out of Tellesberg for her entire life. For that matter, she was just here for five years!”
“Court etiquette knows no sanity.” Cayleb shook his head. “God knows it isn’t because I haven’t tried, but this is one task which is clearly beyond the reach of any mere emperor or empress. Sharleyan and I’ve been scandalizing the protocol experts for over twenty years, and not one of them’s dropped dead of apoplexy.” He shook his head, sadly this time. “You’d think we could’ve gotten at least one of them by now.”
“You may not have killed any of them off, but I’m sure you’ve made their lives a living hell,” Daivyn said in an encouraging sort of tone.
“There is that.” Cayleb brightened visibly. “Come on. Let’s go scandalize them some more!”
MAY YEAR OF GOD 915
.I.
Manchyr Cathedral and Royal Palace, City of Manchyr, Princedom of Corisande, Empire of Charis.
“Daivyn was right,” Cayleb murmured glumly in Sharleyan’s ear as they gazed out across Manchyr Cathedral from the royal box.
Their four older children—and Lywys Whytmyn—had joined them there, although eight-year-old Domynyk Maikel had been spared. Hektor, Irys, and all five of the Aplyn-Ahrmahk children filled in for him, however, which filled the box pretty close to capacity. Earl and Lady Anvil Rock, Koryn, Nimue, and their brood filled the Gahrvai family pew to the left of the sanctuary, and Nynian and Stefyny Athrawes had joined them.
Merlin, of course, stood post outside the royal box.
“About what?” she murmured back under cover of the organ music which filled the packed cathedral as the massed worshipers awaited the wedding party.
“About how damned crowded this shindig would be.” Cayleb shook his head. “Talk about your dog-and-dragon shows!”
He had a point, Sharleyan thought. Although the components of the Charisian Empire clearly dominated among the celebrants, every major realm of Safehold outside the empires of Harchong and Desnair and the Kingdom of Delferahk was represented, despite the vast distances involved. Silkiah had sent a member of the grand duke’s family, and the Dohlaran ambassador was also a cousin of King Rahnyld, so the House of Bahrns was directly represented. Most of the others had sent ambassadors, and a special place had been reserved for Vicar Zherohmy Awstyn, who’d made the enormous trip—over eighteen thousand miles—by rail, canal, and steamer to attend as Vicar Tymythy Rhobair’s personal representative.
That was a gesture she and Cayleb deeply appreciated, and the fact that Awstyn retained so many reservations about the Church of Charis only made his manifest willingness to undertake that gargantuan journey even more important to them both. Among other things, it reminded them both yet again of how many good and compassionate men and women there were within the Church of God Awaiting’s ranks. There were times when they needed that reminder, which made them treasure men like Awstyn even more deeply.
He was, however, only one of the diplomats and visiting clerics who packed the pews like picklefish. She hadn’t seen so many of them in one place since the Siddar City Peace Conference at the end of the Jihad.
“I haven’t actually counted,” she said now. “Are there actually more of them than there were for Nahrmahn Garyet and Zhanayt?”
“I think so,” Cayleb replied.
That was an interesting thought, Sharleyan reflected. And Merlin was probably right. At the moment, Irys’ children remained Daivyn’s legal heirs, since Corisandian law still barred female inheritance, and the Corisandian peerage’s more conservative elements were dug in deeply in defense of that principle. Daivyn fully intended to ram through an amendment to change that in the crown’s case, but Irys and Hektor had convinced him to defer that until he’d produced at least one heir of his own body. Irys had no desire to assume his crown, and the last thing they’d wanted to do was to draw attention to the fact that if anything happened to Daivyn, one of the House of Ahrmahk’s collateral branches would inherit the throne of Corisande. Or to provide the paranoid with further “proof” Sharleyan and Cayleb had pressured their youthful prince into bending to their will to insure that happened. Theoretically, that throne was already Cayleb and Sharleyan’s to dispose as they willed, but despite the general acceptance of Irys and Hektor’s marriage, the thought of a “Charisian interloper” on the throne had remained a thorny one.
Daivyn’s marriage to Frahncheska—and the production of one or two heirs, an effort to which she was confident they would devote their enthusiastic efforts in the very near future—would lay that issue to rest once and for all. Probably. There were still a handful of Corisandian revanchists who would never accept their princedom’s inclusion in the empire, but they were few, far between, and dying out steadily. Daivyn and Frahncheska were about to give that process a hefty kick, in addition to taking a long stride towards reconciliation between Corisande and Zebediah, and that made today an even more significant political event than most royal weddings.
“He’s got a point,” Cayleb said in her ear. He’d clearly been following the same train of thought. “And to be honest, Nahrmahn Gareyt and Zhanayt weren’t in the same league, as far as political impacts go. The House of Ahrmahk and the House of Baytz were already firmly allied thanks to Zhan and Mahrya, and—”
The organ music paused for a moment, in which the enormous cathedral seemed unnaturally silent. Then it surged back to life, joined by the trained voices of two hundred choristers as the cathedral doors opened to admit Prince Daivyn Dahnyld Mahrak Zoshya Daikyn with Lady Frahncheska Ahdylaid Chermyn on his arm.
Cayleb and Sharleyan came to their feet, along with every other person in that enormous cathedral, as Daivyn and Frahncheska paced regally down the a
isle through the swirling music and the soaring voices. Despite the protocolists’ stern admonitions about the solemnity of the moment, both of them wore enormous smiles, and Sharleyan felt her hand stealing into Cayleb’s as she remembered another day in another cathedral. She turned her head to smile up at him and discovered he was already smiling at her.
His hand tightened on hers, and then they turned back as Daivyn and Frahncheska reached the sanctuary rail and paused before Archbishop Klairmant Gairlyng and Archbishop Maikel.
The hymn ended, the music died, and someone coughed in the sudden, singing silence. Then Gairlyng raised his hands in benediction.
“My children,” he said, “you have been bidden here this day to witness the marriage of our Prince, Daivyn Daikyn, to his chosen bride, Lady Frahncheska Chermyn. This is the marriage of two young people who have known one another literally since childhood. They know one another’s strengths and they know one another’s weaknesses, and more importantly still, they know one another’s hearts.”
He smiled at the couple before him, then raised his eyes to the crowded pews behind them.
“Daivyn and Frahncheska have completed their pre-marriage counseling with me as prescribed by the Holy Bédard, and I am confident this is a marriage of hearts. Yet it is, of course, also one of state. One which all of us hope and pray may further the healing between Corisande and Zebediah. And so we have many reasons to join in this joyous celebration, but the most important one of all comes from the Book of Bédard. ‘Join with your friends, your brothers and sisters, the whole and the healthy of heart. Share the joy you find in one another with those most dear to you, and seek out those with whom you would share this most holy and intimate of moments. For this is the day in which two become one, and that one becomes stronger than the sum of its parts. Build in your hearts a fortress against all the world may bring against you, and choose carefully those with whom you would share the laying of the cornerstone of the rest of your life together.’ Come now, and join with us as we lay the cornerstone of this young couple and with it all of the joys and triumphs which will proceed from it all the rest of the days of their lives.
“And now, my children,” he said, signing the scepter of Langhorne, “it’s time the two of you expressed to this company assembled what you have already expressed so eloquently to one another. Are you prepared?”
“We are,” they replied in unison. Their voices were less superbly trained than his, but they carried clearly in the stillness, and he smiled at them once more, then raised his own voice in the ancient, familiar words.
“Dearly beloved, we are gathered here—”
* * *
“For something with so much hoopla tied up in it, it went really, really well,” Cayleb said, much later that evening, as he and Sharleyan settled at last into their chamber in the suite which was always set aside for their use here in Manchyr. It was the same one in which Merlin Athrawes had carried Sharleyan to the bed after an all too nearly successful assassination attempt, but it had been completely redecorated since and she seldom thought about that anymore.
“Yes,” she agreed. “Yes it did.”
She toed off her court shoes with a sigh of relief. Eventually, they’d have to go ahead and summon Gahlvyn Daikyn and Sairaih Hahlmyn, but for now it could be just the two of them, with no valets and no maids.
“My feet are swollen,” she said plaintively, settling onto the side of the enormous bed in an airy billow of skirts. She’d deferred to Corisandian custom and style for the wedding itself, but she’d opted for a lightweight, simply cut—and far cooler—Old Charisian style gown for the reception.
“Not surprising if your feet are barking at you, given how much time you’ve spent on them,” Cayleb told her. He crossed to her and hooked a footstool closer with one toe, then settled onto it in front of her. “Give me,” he said, and she smiled as she laid one foot in his lap.
“Has it really been twenty-two years since that was us?” she asked as his strong, skilled fingers went to work.
“Doesn’t seem possible, does it?” He shook his head, kneading the sole of her foot with his thumbs. “Or that both of us were actually younger than they are! God, if you’d really known what I was asking you, would you still have been crazy enough to say yes?”
He paused in the foot massage, looking up at her, and she looked back down. She saw the strands of silver which had crept into his dark hair and close-trimmed beard, and she remembered the intensity of that far younger man. Remembered the glow in those eyes, the way he’d reached out to a woman he hadn’t even known, trusting her to reach back. So many years since then, so many miles. So many truths revealed. So many challenges and triumphs … and failures. So many joys and so many griefs. Alahnah, Gwylym and Braiahn, Nynian Zhorzhet and Domynyk Maikel. So many people to mourn, so many to embrace.
She leaned forward, ran her fingers through that hair, wondered if he saw that younger Sharleyan when he looked at her. She was still slim, but no longer as slender as she’d been then, for childbearing and time had exacted their price, and she disdained the dyes other women in her position might have used. The strands of white in her gloriously black hair were broader than his, stood out more strongly, and she knew twenty-two years of laughter, life, and tears had put lines into her face, too.
“In a heartbeat,” she told him softly. “In a single heartbeat.” The hand stroking his hair touched his cheek, instead. “I won’t say you’ve never pissed me off, because we both know better. But I wouldn’t have missed you, or a single second of our lives together, for any imaginable price. And if, at the end of it all, the ‘Archangels’ come back and the ‘Nahrmahn Plan’ fails, not even that could make me change my mind. You gave me the chance to do something about all the lies, all the deceit. You and I, Cayleb—we changed the world, and it was worth every single thing it cost. But, even more than that, we have always, every instant of our lives together, been there for each other. And I know that whatever happens in the next year or so, you and I will always be together. Nothing can ever change that, no matter what lies beyond this moment. Nothing will ever separate us. Zhaspahr Clyntahn couldn’t do it, the ‘Archangels’ can’t do it, and neither can Heaven or Hell.” She smiled at him through a sudden sheen of tears. “Here we stand, my love. Right here … inside each other’s hearts.”
He came off the stool, kneeling beside the bed, and his arms were around her. Those familiar, strong, beloved arms. And hers were about him, holding him tight while their cheeks pressed together.
“Whatever price God asks in the end, I’ll pay it,” he whispered in her ear, “because he gave me you. He gave me a ‘marriage of state’ beyond anything I could have imagined—could’ve dreamed of!—when I sent you that letter. And if Daivyn and Frahncheska are blessed with a quarter of the joy we’ve had, then they’ll be the second most fortunate pair of people on the face of Safehold.”
They never knew how long they stayed there in each other’s arms, but eventually Cayleb drew a deep breath, kissed her cheek, and settled back on the stool. He recaptured her foot and began massaging it once more.
“If I’d known what good foot massages you gave,” she said in a deliberately light voice, “it would’ve made the decision to accept your proposal a lot easier. Have I told you before that you’re very good at this?”
“A time or two,” he acknowledged with a smile. “Always good for a man to know he has a second profession to fall back on if his current line of work falls through.”
“Maybe we could open a pedicure shop down off the waterfront in Tellesberg,” she said. “Or even a full-service beauty salon. You could trim toenails and massage feet, and I could do fingernails!”
“It has possibilities,” he replied. “Don’t know how Merlin would feel about it, though. The security aspects could be a little challenging.”
“We wouldn’t open it under our own names, doofus!” She gurgled a laugh. “I’m sure we could come up with aliases that worked.”
&n
bsp; “And nobody in Tellesberg would recognize us, right?”
“Well, maybe two or three people.”
“Only two or three?”
“All right, I’ll give you a dozen. Even two dozen. But if you shaved your beard and I dyed my hair—?”
She arched her eyebrows at him, and it was his turn to laugh. But before he could respond, a soft, musical tone chimed in their com earplugs.
He paused, looking at her. Then his lips firmed as he recognized the identifying ring … and its priority.
“Accept,” he told the com’s small computer after a moment, then paused for a second while the circuit was opened.
“Yes, Nahrmahn?” he said then.
“I hate to disturb you,” Nahrmahn said, “especially on today of all days. But Owl and I have just been looking at some new data from Siddar City, and we think we have a problem.”
JUNE YEAR OF GOD 915
.I.
Silkiah Canal Consortium Building and Protector’s Palace, Siddar City, Republic of Siddarmark.
“Shan-wei–damned bastards!”
“Fucking thieves!”
“Burn ’em out!”
The line of city guardsmen around the magnificent marble-faced building locked their riot shields, leaned their shoulders into them, and braced themselves as the mob surged once more. Cobblestones pried out of the streets, some of them the size of an infant’s head, sailed viciously through the air. Most of them struck the hard-held shields and staggered the guardsmen ducked down behind them but bounced away harmlessly, in the end.
A few struck more fragile prey.
The guardsmen had been issued breastplates and helmets when they mustered for duty today, but three or four of them went down anyway as the whistling stones hit their helmets. Two of them were next to each other, and a gap opened in the shield wall as they were battered off their feet.