State of Sorrow

by Melinda Salisbury

  She dropped the curtain into place and took two steps back. Her foot nudged the lantern and she looked down to find it hadn’t shattered. She returned it to the bedside table, sitting on the bed and turning the dial enough to give a reassuring glow. Go and wake Luvian, she told herself. And Irris. Tell them about the intruder. Tell the guards at the entrance to the wing.

  But she was so tired, the sleeping potion still thick in her veins, slowing her heart, tricking her into believing the danger had passed.

  I’ll rest for five minutes, she decided, leaning back against the pillows. Just five minutes…

  The next thing Sorrow knew, golden light was streaming in through the windows, and she was lying on the bed, a sheet tangled around her. She sat up slowly, trying to understand why she felt strange. A kind of tugging in her stomach told her there was something she was supposed to have done, and she racked her brains for it. Snatches of dreams came to her, sounds and sensations, and she found herself staring at the window. There had been someone there, hadn’t there? Or was it a dream?

  She was saved from thinking too deeply about it by Irris knocking at her door. Irris kept up a stream of chatter as she poured them both cups of strong coffee, the mere smell making Sorrow feel alert. As the drink took effect, the memories of the night before became even hazier, like smoke drifting away from her, and when Irris began to reassure her briskly that she couldn’t be any more prepared for the debate, the knots that formed in her stomach made her forget about the night completely.

  Later that day, Sorrow sat backstage, in what Luvian told her had once been a music hall, hastily whitewashed and swept in the days leading up to the presentation. There was a brown patch of damp on the ceiling, and Sorrow found her attention drawn to it, her mind making shapes in it: a rose, a turtle. A face.

  The venue was in Prekara, a district Sorrow had never visited. Prekara was an archipelago, jutting out into the sea, divided by service canals that neatly carved up the territory.

  It was a county of ruffians, smugglers and thieves. More people lived on boats than in houses, easy to move around if need be. And there was often a need – almost a third of all those imprisoned in Rhannish jails hailed from Prekara. The watery, labyrinthine streets bred criminals, and it was the seat of felonious dynasties like the Finches, the Monks and the Rathbones. It was hardly an obvious or illustrious choice for Sorrow to present her plans for Rhannon.

  The Jedenvat had chosen the district, and the venue, and Sorrow didn’t know if it was a good thing or bad. Senator Kaspira held the district of Prekara, and she’d never warmed to Sorrow, or her grandmother either, and Irris had told her it was because Kaspira didn’t think a woman should be chancellor, which Sorrow found somewhat ironic, given Kaspira was one of the most powerful women in Rhannon. So while this was a chance to win over a crowd that might mostly mistrust her, thanks to Kaspira’s influence, she also felt vulnerable. For the third time since they’d arrived, Sorrow crossed the room to peer at her reflection in an old, half-silvered mirror still mounted on the wall, nodded, and returned to her seat beside Irris.

  She was dressed in a deep-red tunic over dark blue trousers, and every time she looked down she was surprised by the colour, despite Luvian’s insistence she wear something bright every day so she’d get used to it. She wished she’d never told him what had happened when she’d put on the green dress; the man remembered everything.

  Irris had swept Sorrow’s hair into a sleek knot at the base of her skull and lined her eyes with kohl, gifted to them by Ines, who’d got it through her contacts. Finally she’d added a coat of dusky red to Sorrow’s lips. The idea, she’d told her, was to make sure she’d be seen all the way at the back of the hall.

  Sorrow, who barely recognized herself in the mirror, didn’t think anyone would miss her.

  Luvian’s eyebrows had risen the tiniest fraction when she’d met him in the hallway before the journey. His poker face was legendary; squeezing any kind of uncontrolled expression from him felt like a victory, and she was glad she’d caught it, had almost missed it as she’d been concentrating on navigating the stairs in her new heeled boots. He’d quickly mastered his face, casting a cooler eye over her when she reached the bottom, before nodding. Now he and Irris were sitting either side of her, Irris stroking her hand, while Luvian sat going through a pile of papers, pausing occasionally to add a marking to them.

  “How are you feeling?” Irris asked.

  Whether it was the hours of preparation she’d put in, the mask the make-up offered, or simply that it was too late to be afraid, Sorrow was surprised to find she was calm. “All right,” she said truthfully.

  On her other side, Luvian put down his papers and leant over, placing a hand on her arm. “Sorrow, you’re going to be fine.”

  “I said I felt all right.” Sorrow frowned at him. “I honestly feel fine. I’m ready for this.”

  “Now don’t be cocky,” he urged.

  Sorrow couldn’t believe her ears. It was unnerving to hear Luvian – wry, droll Luvian – be cautious, and she realized then she might not be nervous, but he was.

  She pulled her other hand from Irris, and patted him. “Luvian, when am I ever cocky? I’m saying I feel OK. We worked really hard and because of it I’m ready. And it’s very rich for you to warn me about being cocky.”

  He smiled. “I’m not cocky, I’m rightly confident,” he said.

  “So am I.”

  Sorrow stood, making her way to the door, barely stepping back in time as it opened and a middle-aged woman in a floor-length tunic, entered.

  “Miss Ventaxis, a pleasure to meet you. I’m Ellyra Bird, and I’ll be introducing you and your brother today.”

  “What?” Sorrow, Luvian and Irris all spoke at the same time.

  Luvian rose smoothly to his feet. “What do you mean, Sorrow ‘and her brother’?”

  “Mr Ventaxis is here too…” She looked between them, frowning. “To deliver his plans…”

  Sorrow stared at the woman. She was mistaken. She had to be. No one had said anything about her and Mael presenting on the same night. It was one thing to run against him the election, but to be pitted against him onstage… Her hands rose to her mouth and covered it.

  “No,” Luvian said. “We knew nothing about this. We weren’t told he’d be presenting today too. This is unacceptable.”

  “I’m afraid it’s out of my hands, Mr Fen.” Ellyra Bird took a step back. “I’m sorry. I’ll give you a moment to decide if you want to proceed.” She left swiftly, closing the door behind her.

  Luvian crouched in front of Sorrow. “What do you want to do?”

  Sorrow’s sense of calm vanished, leaving a high-pitched buzzing in her ears as fear swelled inside her, making it impossible to breathe.

  Luvian placed his hands either side of her face and gently turned her to look at him.

  “You can do this,” he said. “It doesn’t matter that he’s here. It changes nothing. In fact, this is a chance to show them all that you’re better than him. To show him you’re better than him. These are your people, and you love them. Remember that. Hey –” he shook her slightly as her eyes slid away from his “– nothing has changed. You’re still as prepared. OK?”

  Sorrow nodded obediently.

  It wasn’t enough for Luvian, who leant in until his forehead was touching hers. “Say: ‘I did not put on this excellent outfit and get my hair done nicely to hide backstage from that upstart.’ Say: ‘I lied earlier, I am cocky, because I’m going to blow them all away out there.’ Say: ‘My name is Sorrow Ventaxis and I am going to be the next chancellor, deal with it.’ Come on, Sorrow. Say it.”

  She didn’t know how he’d done it, but some of her fear had seeped away, enough for her to say, “I’m ready.”

  “Close enough,” Luvian smiled, leaning back. “But, yes, you are.”

  “I’m going first,” Sorrow said. “Tell them. I want to go first.”

  Luvian’s smile widened. “Atta girl.”
r />   The Sons of Rhannon

  Ten minutes later, they filed along a passageway, through a heavy door, and instantly the sound of a crowd assaulted Sorrow’s ears.

  “How many people are out there?” she whispered.

  “Around a thousand,” Irris replied.

  “A thousand?” Sorrow choked on the words, her mouth dry as dust as her nerves returned.

  “They took out the seats – it’s standing room only. This is history in the making,” Luvian replied, sounding far too chipper for Sorrow’s liking.

  She whipped around to face him, but he shook his head and pushed her towards a set of steps, up and into the wings, and her entire body was instantly bathed in a cold sweat, her stomach churning.

  She peeped through a gap in the curtain, taking in the crowd. Despite the relaxing of the laws, they still wore the same old, dark colours, though they looked a little more animated than the people who’d been at the bridge the day Mael returned. They turned to their neighbours and spoke softly to them, exchanging quicksilver smiles and embraces, as though still frightened to do so. It seemed Rhannon was finally returning to life, albeit fearfully.

  Behind the crowd the Decorum Ward stood watch, Meeren Vine and fifty of his men and women lining the walls. Luvian had insisted on it after the package, and for once Sorrow hadn’t felt like arguing. It didn’t mean she disliked Vine, or what the Ward stood for, any less, but until they found out who had sent a dead animal to her, she would feel a little easier knowing there was some security nearby.

  Even so, it turned her stomach to watch Vine caressing the leather baton at his waist as he spoke to one of his men.

  “Ready?” Irris whispered in her ear.

  Sorrow nodded, too afraid to open her mouth in case she threw up.

  “You’ve got this,” Luvian murmured on her other side. “Show them who Sorrow Ventaxis is.”

  Before Sorrow could reply, Ellyra called her name, then Mael’s, and Luvian was shoving her out on to the stage to the sound of polite applause.

  Mael walked out with a hand raised, waving to the crowd, and Sorrow remembered she was supposed to do the same. He was wearing dark blue trousers, and a long fitted blue coat – he looked like Luvian, she realized, the same precise tailoring and fitted, almost militaristic cut. As he neared the front of the stage, the row of gas lamps along the front lit his face, and she saw that he looked thinner, shadows under his eyes, his smile a little strained. He wasn’t finding it easy, she thought. He was probably up half of the night learning the intricacies of governing a country he was a stranger to.

  At that moment, Mael turned to her, and his smile widened. He looked genuinely happy to see her, despite the fact they were competing against each other. He mouthed, “How are you?” and she replied, “Fine,” in kind, aware they were being watched. Most of the time, she thought his niceness was an act. But sometimes… She shook the thought away.

  She focused on Luvian and Irris moving through the crowd, gently pushing past people, until they were in her sight line, both of them nodding at her, silently telling her she could do this.

  Ellyra Bird stepped forward.

  “Welcome, all of you. Tonight, history will be made in Rhannon. For the very first time, we have two eligible candidates for the chancellorship: Mael Ventaxis, son of the late chancellor, returned to us from the dead…” She paused to allow the audience to clap, before continuing.

  “… and his younger sister –” Sorrow tried to keep her face neutral “– Sorrow Ventaxis. Tonight gives both candidates the chance to address the people, and present their vision for Rhannon. So without further ado, let us begin. Sorrow Ventaxis will speak first.”

  The room fell silent as all eyes turned to Sorrow.

  She cleared her throat.

  “Thank you for coming today. My name is Sorrow Ventaxis, and I believe I am the right choice to lead Rhannon forward as your next chancellor. The past eighteen years, and before, have been some of the most challenging in Rhannish history. I’ve been here with the people, living alongside them, under the same rules and laws. In fact, they’re all I’ve known. But not all I believe. My beloved grandmother, the Dowager First Lady, told me how it was when Rhannon prospered. When we were at the forefront of science and medicine on Laethea. When we celebrated the Greening, and the Gathering festivals, when we came together for midsummer and midwinter. But you, the people, have taught me that the Rhannish are some of the strongest – if not the strongest – in the world. I have seen you weather the many, many storms that have battered you over the past eighteen years, and not break. We are a resilient and adaptable people; there is no trial we cannot overcome, there is no burden we cannot bear. I am one of you.” Sorrow turned to the crowd. “I am bound to you, by history, and by blood. Now, I ask you to allow me to lead you into something better. Something more than the darkness of the past. A new Rhannon. For everyone.”

  “Lies,” a male voice called from somewhere in the back.

  Sorrow peered out into the crowd as they all turned, some murmuring, towards the speaker. At first Sorrow couldn’t see who it was; then the crowd began to move, parting, until there, in the centre of the hall, three people stood isolated. They were hooded, crude leather masks covering their faces, leaving only their mouths free. One stood to the fore, a huge mountain of a man, the other two only slightly smaller, flanking him like sentinals. Not that it looked as though he needed them.

  “Lies,” the apparent leader of the trio said again.

  The hair on the back of her neck rose, and Sorrow’s gaze flicked to Luvian, who was craning to see what was happening. When he met her eyes he looked almost frightened, which worried Sorrow more than the men did. Luvian wasn’t the type to scare easily.

  The hooded men stepped forward, the crowd backing away from them as they did. They stopped six feet from the front of the stage.

  “Can we help you?” Mael moved to Sorrow’s side.

  “Yeah. You can piss off back to Rhylla, and take your sister with you,” the man said.

  “Excuse me?” Sorrow’s mouth fell open with shock.

  “You heard.” The man’s attention returned to her. “We’re done with the Ventaxis family. All of you.” His voice rang through the hall.

  Luvian waved at her, eyes blazing a warning, but Sorrow shook her head and focused on the ringleader.

  “Who’s ‘we’? Who are you?”

  “The Sons of Rhannon,” the man replied, his chin rising with pride. “Your reckoning.”

  So these were the vigilantes who’d targeted the Decorum Ward? Sorrow looked at Vine, and watched him whisper to the man beside him. Then that man turned to his neighbour, mouth to ear as he passed on Vine’s message. Though she hadn’t thought it possible, in that moment Sorrow was grateful for him, grateful for the Ward. But she didn’t understand why the Sons of Rhannon were shouting at her and Mael. They’d done nothing wrong.

  Sorrow decided to try to reason with them. “I know you suffered under my father, but I’m not—”

  “You know nothing,” he shouted. “You hid in your palace while our children starved. For eighteen years you’ve stayed locked away, coming out once a year to throw a doll that costs more than some of us earn in a year into the river. No new jobs. No chances to better ourselves. Nothing to hope for or live for. Your dogs beating our kids when they smile. Look at you –” he thrust an accusing finger up at her “– in your red, standing up there, deigning to meet us. Telling us things will be better. Well, maybe they will. But not while a Ventaxis is in power.”

  “My father—”

  “It’s not about your father,” the man bellowed over her again. “It’s your grandfather, and his father, and his father before him. All of you Ventaxises. Sending us off to fight a war we didn’t want. You make decisions and we suffer for them. And now you have the gall to stand here and tell us things will be different? How will they? Because the only change we see is there’s two of you this time. What a choice.”

  T
here were more murmurs from the crowd, still standing watching the scene, but this time the shock was absent. Sorrow could see people nodding, and her stomach dropped.

  They agreed with the Sons of Rhannon, she realized.

  And she couldn’t think of a single argument against them. So far, she’d done nothing to prove them wrong.

  But Mael still had things to say. “The law of the land states that only a Ventaxis can govern…”

  “Laws the Ventaxis family made,” the man shouted. “Crooked, like all of your laws. You come in telling us you’re better than kings, and then you behave just like them. We’re tired of it. We’re tired of you. We want a new Rhannon.”

  The atmosphere thickened as rumbles of support came from the crowd, who’d drifted back towards the hooded men, surrounding them, all of them watching her, just like at the bridge. Though this time, there was fire in their eyes. Burning low but steady as they waited to see what she’d do next.

  Sensing this was her last chance to disarm the hooded men, unwind the coiled spring the room had become, she took a deep breath. “And you will have a new Rhannon,” she said, pushing her voice out into the far corners of the room, continuing the speech she’d so carefully worked on. “One with colours, and light, and music. One with art, and growth. One with—”

  “One without you,” the man roared, and then, in a swift, synchronized movement, all three men reached beneath their cloaks and withdrew something, hauling their arms back, as the crowd recoiled from them.

  Sorrow saw a flash of something clear and bright arching towards her, and then the stage before her burst into flame.

  Both she and Mael staggered back, falling, as the hall erupted into screams of panic, the crowd suddenly realizing they might be hurt too.

  Scrambling to her feet, she peered through the wall of fire to see that the three men had remained in the centre of the room, even as the rest of the people ran for the exits.