by Shannon Page
“On the one hand, if the Factor’s only heir should die, the other Houses — Orlon, Suba, perhaps even Phaero — would almost certainly not wait for Viktor to die too before swooping to displace him, and the chaos I’ve described would ignite immediately.
“But bringing you openly into the Factorate House to keep the Factor’s heir from dying, thereby defying and humiliating the Mishrah-Khote at this already delicate moment in their relations, would be tantamount to declaring war between Factorate and temple, which might also tip the balance far enough to give the other families their excuse to lunge.
“Compounding this is the apparent fact that, willingly or not, your new power seems to be derived from the Butchered God’s fanatic cult leader. Any appearance of alignment between the Factorate and that madman, however insubstantial, might well get the Factor and his foreign consort immediately beheaded, for all I know — political process be damned.” He leaned back into his chair and smiled at her. “Such a quandary, eh, dear cousin? Damned if he doesn’t let you heal his heir, and damned if he does. Can you see now why I couldn’t even risk that someone in the shadows last night might have overheard Our Lady of the Islands being invited to take refuge with the Census Taker? Even if we are related. The Mishrah-Khote has eyes and ears in every shrub and pillar, as you must understand all too well by now, my dear.”
She nodded, though her head still swirled with the complexity of it. “So what can be done? Am I to heal the Factor’s son or not?”
“Oh, it is crucial that you heal him, of course. But first, some way must be devised to do it so that the Mishrah-Khote, which has more eyes and ears inside the Factorate House than anywhere in Alizar but their own temple, can never find a shred of evidence that you were ever there, or in any way involved.” He leaned forward again. “I fear you must be prepared to absorb yet another indignity, my dear. However all this is arranged, your success in healing young Konrad will almost certainly be credited to the temple priests who have attended him so ineffectually so far. Can you bear it, do you think?”
She snorted, and looked back out at the garden. “Such nonsense is of no concern to me.”
“That’s the spirit, cousin!” He got up and went to set his glass back on the breakfast cart. The monkey looked down longingly, but stayed put. “All of this will take time to arrange, of course. Bringing you safely back into our possession was but the first of many steps. I fear you may have to be content to stay here for a while, and tolerate more of my hospitality. Can you bear that as well?” He gave her an amused look.
“I am sorry I was so cross with you before,” she said. “I hope you can understand how difficult and strange all this —”
“Please! Dear cousin! Do you imagine me able to comprehend the politics of Alizar, but not your own entirely legitimate distress? Really, dear. I do wonder sometimes if we’ve ever really met at all!” He tittered at his little joke, and came to kiss her on both cheeks, in the continental style; Sian closed her eyes so as not to stare into Gigi’s dark gaze. “I shall look forward to your company at dinner. Until then, I shall make sure that you have things to entertain you. Do you like to read?”
“Why … yes. I used to anyway. It’s been so long since I’ve had time to read anything but paperwork and reports …”
Escotte made a face, waving at the air between them as if dispelling some bad odor. “No more reports for you, my dear Sian. You’re on holiday now. For a little while at least. Try to enjoy it!” He headed for the door. “I’ll send Cleone straight up again. Ta for now, cousin!”
… That this new healer possesses a gift unprecedented in recent temple history seems no longer in question, my lady. I have little doubt that he will be able to heal your son. Unfortunately, his gift is accompanied by an extraordinary cathexis to the spiritual realm, so far beyond our normal experience that its impacts are difficult to anticipate or manage. Hence the current difficulty. I assume the trance state I have described will abate soon, as his current immersion is so profound that he has taken neither food nor water in several days, and must certainly need to soon. Still, as these waters are so uncharted for us all, I can be completely sure of nothing.
I deeply regret this latest delay, My Lady Consort, and understand how much frustration these impediments must cause you. I appreciate your patience immensely, and feel sure that we will be ready to receive you and your son very shortly now. I will, of course, keep you apprised of any and all further developments as they occur.
Respectfully your servant,
Duon, Father Superior, Temple Mishrah-Khote
Arian set the letter down, trembling with anger, and looked up at Viktor. “I am finished putting up with these maneuvers.”
“Arian,” her husband said warily, “we cannot afford to further antagonize —”
“It’s been more than a week, Viktor! Every morning, we are informed again of this extraordinary new healer who is still unavailable until tomorrow — or perhaps the day after that — while our son draws nearer death each day. Now the man is in a trance — and cannot be disturbed? Do you think Duon truly believes I am so stupid, or are these insults intentional?”
Viktor made a helpless gesture. “What do we know of such matters? If he says the fellow might be harmed by —”
“This has nothing to do with some medium’s delicacy!” she snapped. “This is a blatant power play, pure and simple. Can’t you see that? He is waiting for us to beg. To offer the temple whatever concessions he requests, if only he will condescend to save our child.” She rose to pace around the table still laden with remains of their breakfast. “I know I was a fool to launch this battle in the first place, but if he thinks to win our argument this way, then we must end it now — with sufficient force that there can be no further question about who rules Alizar.”
Viktor looked alarmed. “Are you deranged? I cannot use force against the temple! I would be deposed by my own government just for suggesting it. You know that as well as —”
“I do not mean physical force, Viktor,” she cut him off in exasperation. “Give me some credit, please. I am talking only about the projection of power.” She stopped before one of the windows to gaze out over the surrounding jungle canopy at the shore of Apricot across the channel. “The question, of course, is how.”
“Arian, listen to me. I am in no way equipped for such a confrontation at this moment. I am fighting just to keep my seat.”
“If you allow that pompous temple toad to dangle the life of our son on his leash with impunity, you have lost your seat already. The Mishrah-Khote will own us. This is a necessary fight.”
“It doesn’t matter,” he said bleakly. “One cannot fight with both hands chained behind his back.” He shook his head and looked away from her. “I am a cripple in the water, and the sharks are circling very closely now. I have failed. Not only Alizar, but you and Konrad, terribly. I’m sorry. Truly. If our son is spared what’s coming, that may be a mercy.”
“Meaning what?” she asked in outraged disbelief. “That you also wish him dead now?”
“Arian, don’t —”
“Do not speak to me!” she shrieked. “I cannot endure another word of your spineless pessimism. If your hands are chained, then fight with your feet!”
“Spare me the impassioned metaphors, wife!” he shouted, finding sufficient spine to stand and thump the table with both hands. “Is there some obvious solution to this nation’s downward spiral that you have not thought to recommend to me? I have tried everything I can. To no avail.” He stared down at all the half-empty platters spread around him. “This is why nations appoint leaders: so they’ll have someone else to blame when everything goes wrong. A demon close at hand to exorcise at last resort.”
“So … We are just to sit here waiting for our dismissal, then? Hoping Konrad dies in time to save our pride?”
“It may not just be our pride that needs saving when all this collapses, love. People can get very angry when their lives fall apart. When it happen
s to a lot of people all at once, that anger can be very violently expressed.” He gave her a pointed look. “How much that violence costs you and me personally may well hang on whom we have offended, and how badly.”
She held his gaze, wondering what had happened to the modest, good-hearted, yet confident and optimistic man she had agreed to leave her own home and country to marry. “Well, my dear,” she said, already heading for the door, “if you’re so convinced that we’re already doomed, you can have no reason to object to whatever I may choose to do about it in the meantime.”
He offered no reply as Arian left the breakfast room and stormed toward her chambers, sorting through her options. By the time she got there, her decision had been made. It was the best she could do quickly enough to matter, given Konrad’s rapidly deteriorating condition. If it worked, point and game to her. If not … At worst she would appear deranged with grief, as her own husband had just suggested. He could disavow the act and divorce her afterward, if that was what it took to shelter himself from blame. Should his dire predictions turn out to have any merit, it would hardly matter, would it?
“Maronne! Lucia!” she called as she burst into her chambers. “I need you!”
Maronne came rushing from her room, wide-eyed with alarm. “What is wrong, my lady?”
“Where is Lucia?”
“With Konrad, as you requested.”
“Of course.” She brought a hand up to massage her forehead. Poise would be essential now, and poise required calm. “Run and get her, would you?” she asked more gently. “And find Kafahl as well, please.”
Maronne dropped a hurried curtsy and rushed off.
Arian went quickly to the windows and looked down at the great sundial in the courtyard, set within its ring of dazzling plumeria. If she lit sufficient fire underneath the chief of staff, there should be time to do this. Just.
Unwilling to waste precious moments waiting for Maronne’s return, Arian walked through her rooms into her wardrobe. Well back to where the most seldom-used items were stored. There, behind dozens of beautiful dresses simply too outdated — or too narrow at the waist and hips — to be worn any longer, she paused before a rack on which just three dresses hung.
The first was a great bell-shaped gown composed entirely of wired jade beads and russet fan-shells, which she had worn to Escotte Alkattha’s instillation as Census Taker. It had cost a fortune, and she had given it not another thought since then. The second item was a black and red silk ball gown, edged and accented with hundreds of cut rubies and garnets, as spectacular as it was completely inappropriate for this occasion. The third dress there was sewn from cloth-of-gold, with a high, rigid collar and shoulder ruffles of beaten copper. Hanging with it was a train of the same fabric at least as wide, and twice as long as the dress, covered in mosaic patterns of dangling bronze and copper beads. Arian had worn this dress when she had wedded Viktor — a gift from her father in Copper Downs, worth almost as much as the ship which had brought it and her to Alizar. She had expected never to wear it again until the day of her son’s instillation ceremony as Factor.
She tried not to wonder whether that day would ever arrive now, as she stood back to consider the jade and fan-shell gown. Of the two dresses, it would lend her the larger, more imposing profile. But it was as heavy as a suit of armor. She had been required to do little more than sit in it at Escotte’s instillation, and still she had been exhausted by the time the ceremony was concluded and she’d been freed to exchange it for a blessedly airy silk reception gown. It was fairly dark as well — which might make her seem formidable from close by, but would likely just render her a shadow at any significant distance. And distance would matter here — briefly.
The cloth-of-gold was not much lighter in weight, but far easier to move in. More important, possibly, it would likely burn like fire in the afternoon light — even from half a league away. Its symbolic value as a reminder of her father’s wealth and continental influence — however irksome to Alizari national pride — might lend some pointed perspective to the occasion too. If the tiresome priest happened to recall where he had seen it before, at any rate.
Her decision made, Arian began to take things from shelves and hangers, tossing them in piles for Maronne and Lucia to carry out when they arrived. She was still at it when she heard them calling from the parlor.
“My lady?” called Lucia. “Are you here?”
“In the wardrobe!” Arian called back. “Come help me!”
“Domni Kafahl is here as well,” Maronne warned.
“Good. Bring him too. I’m not undressed.”
The two women and the Factorate chief of staff arrived a moment later, entering the wardrobe with uncertain glances at each other and at Arian.
When Maronne and Lucia saw the cloth-of-gold and its accouterments lying piled at Arian’s feet, they gasped.
“My lady! What has happened here?” Lucia asked, as if fearing the clothing had just fallen there by accident.
“Please carry these things out and lay them on my bed,” said Arian. “I will need at least two of my hairpieces as well. The largest ones. And the amber jewelry. All of it, I think.”
The women’s eyes grew round with astonishment — as did Kafahl’s.
“May I ask what occasion is being prepared for, my lady?” asked the chief of staff, clearly puzzled, if not panicked. “Have we some …” He surveyed the clothing being gathered up and carried out by Maronne and Lucia. “… perhaps unexpected visitor?”
“No, Kafahl. I will be the unexpected visitor. I need the royal barge equipped immediately in full ceremonial regalia suitable to a state occasion. Full crew, formal entourage, and honor guard in dress attire.” Kafahl’s mouth fell open as Arian went on. “I wish the barge accompanied by a large flotilla as well, outfitted in the same manner, and fitted with as many cannon as may be available. Full ceremonial dress guard aboard every craft.”
“My lady,” the man sputtered, “may I ask how many craft you wish, exactly?”
“How many of my husband’s ships are currently at harbor?”
He blinked at her, clearly stunned. “Many more than we can outfit as described, I fear.”
“As many as you can, then,” she said pleasantly, brushing past him to go join her maids.
“But … my — my lady …” Kafahl stammered, seeming to progress from ‘stunned’ to ‘appalled’ as he followed her out of the wardrobe, “to where is this flotilla bound?”
She turned back to face him, realizing instantly that she dared not answer. The temple had too many ears inside her house. That was a long-accepted fact of life. Tell the chief of staff where they were going, and the temple would almost certainly have been informed before they even departed. Surprise was half the substance of this exercise. Without any warning. That was a crucial suffix to the message that she wished to send Duon.
“I will tell you when it’s time to leave,” she said, offering him an apologetic smile.
His eyes grew even rounder, and he began to shake his head — clearly without meaning to. “But, my lady, if am I to provision such an … an elaborate embassy, I must at least know how long it will be gone, and toward what sort of climate, not to mention —”
“It will require no provisions at all,” she said, aware that she was torturing the man, and starting to feel somewhat bad about it. “We will all be back here before dinner time.”
“Dinner time!” he blurted, forgetting appropriate conversational protocol entirely.
“We will not even be leaving the islands, Kafahl.”
“But it will take at least that long just to equip and launch such a flotilla! … My lady,” he rushed to add, ducking his head in embarrassment.
“You have two hours,” she told him. “We must be gone before midday.”
He stared at her, blanching visibly. Like a man who’d just been told he would be hanged.
“Commandeer whatever staff you need, from anywhere,” she said, not wanting him to have a hear
t attack before anything at all was seen to. “Use the entire grounds and kitchen staff to get this done, if it will help. Just do the best you can, but we must depart on time.”
“My lady,” Kafahl said with a nervous but respectful nod, and turned to dash out past the wide-eyed maids, who watched him go before turning back to stare at Arian with twin expressions of bewilderment.
“When you two have got me into this dress,” she told them, “I will need hair and cosmetics suited to a goddess. A very fierce one. I have some ideas about my headdress. Maronne, we will need the wire, please.”
“Perhaps my lady would enjoy a trip to the garden this morning?” Cleone asked as Sian finished yet another sumptuous breakfast.
Though as flawlessly deferential as ever, the inquiry grated on Sian a bit. Must Cleone always be guessing what Sian’s next want might be before she’d had time to think of it herself? It was the girl’s job, she supposed, to anticipate the wishes of others, but after more than a week of being so well managed … Sian was tempted to refuse, or to propose something else, just to assert herself, but knew that would be peevish. She did enjoy the little courtyard garden — or anything else that got her out of this lovely room.
“That sounds quite refreshing. Thank you, dear.” Sian grimaced mentally. She was even sounding like the woman now.
They left her fancy room high in the Census Hall’s east tower, and made their way down the carpeted back staircase toward the courtyard. Cleone led the way, as always. Sian was allowed to go nowhere unaccompanied, it seemed, even inside the house. For her own protection and convenience, of course. This had been made clear. Repeatedly. But it did leave her feeling five years old again at times.
As they descended, Sian eyed the adorable little leather-bound case clutched in Cleone’s slender hand, wondering what the girl would be offering up for their amusement today. She sighed quietly, reminding herself that Cleone had been charged with keeping her entertained, and doubtless felt obliged to fulfill Escotte’s expectations. But, oh, this sudden, enforced idleness was awfully challenging after so many years of fruitful, unmanaged productivity. She almost wished at times for the freedom and privacy of her overturned boat back on Pembo’s Beach.