The Pretender's Crown

by C. E. Murphy

  The Pappas nods thoughtfully and gestures for Tomas to continue. The remaining story pours from his lips, his decision to trust Javier until that terrible burst of silver dominated the room; his fear that weaker minds, never implying that the Pappas himself might be so affected, for such an idea is anathema, but weaker minds may have been led to believe a thing that was not true. He ends with the night before, with his free will saved only through the grace of God, and when he falls silent, so, too, does the Pappas for a long while.

  “I am glad that you have told me of this,” the Pappas finally says, heavily. “It seems the road I thought lit by sunshine has darker shadows hanging on it. You say that the symbol of the Madonna broke his will, though?” He nods when Tomas does and goes on, more thoughtful now than weighty. “And it seems that he trusts you. I am loathe to put you in the devil's sight, my son, but I think Cordula needs you at Javier's side.”

  “He has asked for me to accompany him,” Tomas whispers. He cannot, it seems, speak above a whisper: these are matters too large for his slender shoulders, too important for a youth of his years. “I have agreed already, if I have your leave.”

  “My leave and my blessing. Do not worry, my son.” The Pappas leans forward and puts his fingertips against Tomas's forehead, soothing for all that his hands tremble with age. “God has shown us a path to reclaim our lost brothers and sisters in Aulun, and we must trust Him. Javier's power, if it is as extraordinary as you say, will stand us well in the war to come.”

  Then, casually, as if intending to reassure, the Pappas smiles and adds, “We can always burn him later.”

  JAVIER, KING OF GALLIN

  1 April 1588 † Aria Magli, in Parna

  Javier, king of all Gallin, heir to the Essandian throne, child of the last Lanyarchan queen, and pretender to the Aulunian crown, leaned across a gondola seat, arms crossed to support himself, and, in utmost confidence, murmured, “I am looking for a woman,” to the gondola boy.

  The boy, who was perhaps twelve and more probably ten, leaned on his pole, edging the boat along its busy canal, and offered a heartfelt sigh of sympathy “Sì, signor, so are we all. A beautiful woman, no? A woman with eyes like diamonds and hair like spun gold, with skin softer than silk and arms warm as the fire. Her touch may burn,” he said mournfully, “but for such a woman the pain is worth everything.”

  Javier blinked, first at the boy, then over his shoulder at Tomas and Marius, neither of whom made even an attempt to control their laughter. Javier cleared his throat and turned back to the boy whose expression had been wiped entirely clear of theatrics in the moment Javier'd looked away, and who now looked cheerful and expectant. “This is the woman you seek, no? I will bring you to her. I know many fine ladies, and you are a man of wealth, I can see that in your clothes. You will be pleased with me, and I shall bring home a fat chicken to my father and my brothers and sisters with the payment you give me.”

  “Ah,” Javier said, still half outwitted. “I'm looking for a specific woman, I'm afraid.”

  “And you start by asking me because I am the finest gondola boy on the canals,” the boy said without hesitation, “which is wise, for I know many people, but there are many more people I do not know. But perhaps my people will know people who know your lady. She is a courtesan, sì?” he added in a tone that suggested they were the only women worth seeking out.

  “Sì,” Marius said from behind them, though Javier'd shaken his head in disagreement. He looked back a second time to find the laughter gone from Marius's face. “A courtesan, a foreign woman, from Gallin, with black hair and brown eyes, and she wears an alabaster ring on this finger.” He lifted his left hand, touched his middle finger. “She would wear dresses of her own fashion, not the usual that you would see.”

  “A courtesan, Marius?” Javier asked through his teeth, and in Gallic.

  The look Marius turned on him was almost pitying. “That or a widow, Jav She's got some money, but she'll need more, and in Aria Magli the easiest way to be a woman of means is to be one of them.” He jerked his head toward a high window, where a woman much like the one the gondola boy had described leaned out, breasts on display as she waved and blew kisses at the passersby “Eliza has the beauty, the wit, and, thanks to you, the education for it. Why not?”

  “I thought you thought her better than the prince's whore.”

  “Here, she would be her own whore, and I would mark that higher, aye, my lord.”

  “What kind of dresses does she wear, signor?” The gondola boy's voice broke over their argument in a clarion call, pure and utterly without awareness of growing tension. Javier, irritated, looked back at the child and found determination in his eyes, much older than his years. He wasn't unaware after all, but deliberately pulling them away from feuds, no doubt in concern over his payment. Anger faded beneath an appreciation for the boy's business sense, and Javier traced the shape of one of Eliza's flowing, high-waisted gowns in the air.

  “Like this, with a band beneath the breasts that makes a false high waist, and the necks are scooped low.”

  “Like her,” the boy said with a nod up the canal. Javier twisted to see a woman in just such a gown, who wore extravagantly coiffed black curls tumbling around her shoulders, accept a gypsy man's hand in helping her into a gondola, and leapt to his feet.

  “Eliza! Eliza!”

  The gondola boy squawked “Signor!” in alarm, while Tomas and Marius both grabbed for Javier's hips, trying to pull him back to sitting. Men and women—women, particularly—passing on bridges and looking out windows paused to look first at Javier, then for the woman he called for, titters of romance and teasing floating over the brackish waters. The woman herself didn't look back, and Marius, tilting to examine her once Javier was seated again, said, “Not unless she's put on two stone since we saw her last. You're not going to endear yourself to her if she hears you're mistaking a barge for a sailing ship.”

  “Catch up to them,” Javier snapped. “I need to know where she got the gown.”

  “Oh, but it is dangerous, signor, to push and shove on the canals. If my boat capsizes my father will beat me—” His complaints stopped as he snatched the coin Javier threw to him. There was almost no break in his poling as he secreted the money away, and then his voice rang out in a song of emergency, unrequited love, and thwarted passion. That the details clashed and muddled, making no sense at all, bothered no one, and laughing gondoliers made way for the boy and his boatful of hopeful young men.

  “You,” the child said to Javier as they approached the woman's gondola, “you hold your tongue, signor. I will talk.”

  “He's got no faith in your romancing talents, Jav.” Marius, grinning, reached out to thump Javier's shoulder. “Perhaps he knows you better than we think.”

  Javier scowled and the boy aimed a kick at him, unknowing and uncaring of his passenger's rank. “Look winsome, signor, or the lady will not care about your tale of woe.”

  “My tale of what?” It was too late: the boy had leapt from his own boat to the neighbouring, causing a shriek of dismay and then of laughter as he knelt beseechingly at the woman's feet. Javier, hoping to look lovelorn, unwisely thought of Beatrice, and felt his expression turn to rage. He dropped his face into his hands, and listened to the story of how he was a cloth merchant's son, wealthy enough to dress well but beggared when his father's silk shipment had been drowned in the Primorismare. Now all his hopes of love and happiness rested on wooing a beautiful girl who did not yet know of his misfortunes.

  He had, according to the boy, promised her a gown of extraordinary beauty, of rare and subtle cut, and his heart was inspired by this woman's dress, though in truth even his beloved could never fill it so generously or well as this woman herself did. It was his fate to be unable to look so high as to this woman herself, but perhaps she might share the name of her dressmaker, and where to find her, so that the poor cloth merchant's son might take the last bolt of good fabric he had to his name and have a wedding gown made t
o change his destiny.

  Through all of this Marius and Tomas held fast to the other boat's side, so the boy could return, and through all of it they kept straight faces while Javier's flush of anger faded into amazement. The woman gave a name and an address, and the boy leapt back with an air of unmistakable triumph. “You will pay me very well,” he told Javier, and then, thoughtfully, said, “and perhaps introduce me to your lady friend, for I am a better talker than you, and you might need help.”

  Too astounded to be offended, Javier asked, “How can you tell? You haven't given me a chance to say anything.”

  The boy sniffed and leaned his weight into poling. “A man who talks as good as me would have put his words in.”

  ELIZA BEAULIEU

  There has been a rumour that the prince—the king—of Gallin is come to Aria Magli. The courtesans have talked about it with great interest, gathered in Eliza's receiving quarters to examine material and finery and to stand for fittings and argue over trimmings. They've asked her, because she is Gallic, if she knows the king, and have laughed merrily when she has said yes, she does. They have asked for stories of him, and she's told them, from the story of the pauper girl who fell on him and broke his arm while trying to steal pears from the royal gardens to the story of a minor Lanyarchan noble who wore Eliza's fashions to court and caught the prince's eye. She does not speak of her rage at Javier's engagement, nor of the knuckle she broke in bruising Beatrice Irvine's jaw. The others are stories everyone knows a little of, and that she is Lutetian-born, and speaks with quiet confidence, delights the courtesans and sets them to laughing and teasing, which is enough.

  They are her best customers, these beautiful and intelligent women. Well, mostly beautiful: there are those whose wit outstrips their looks, but Eliza, who is beautiful herself, is coming to learn that beauty can be made up of imperfect parts, if there is enough cleverness and kindness in their making. There's one woman, a true blonde of icy perfection, who is possibly the most flawless woman Eliza has ever seen, and who is so haughty it steals her beauty. There are moments when Eliza wonders if her own pride has turned her into that kind of woman, and in those moments she thinks of Javier's oft-made offer to take her away from her cheapside beginnings. It may be that the courtesans of Aria Magli have taught her something about both pride and regret that may do her good in later years.

  She has surprised all of her customers with her language skills: a woman from Gallin is not expected to have the Parnan tongue so thoroughly in her mouth. The courtesans love it, and laugh uproariously when she tells them that the prince taught her the languages she knows. Eliza's not accustomed to having fun, and it's taken her several weeks to realise that she's enjoying the small life she's built here. She's stolen enough from Javier over the years to have started her business, but because she is young and lovely and has coin, she's widely assumed to be a courtesan herself.

  This, to her surprise, bothers her not at all. There's a certain amusement in letting the men wonder which of them she's bedding and for what price, and when they all protest that it's not they who are lucky enough to find pleasure in her arms, they all believe each other to be lying in order to maintain discretion and keep competition at bay.

  There are even one or two she might consider taking into her bed, when she feels ready to become that committed to this vibrant community. It is not at all like Lutetia, this city: it seems to grab and give more, both at once, with a madcap fascination for other people's business that is familiar, but more heightened here. Perhaps it's that she's never been quite so included; in Lutetia she was always aware that she was the pauper, and the wealthy folk around her were even more aware than she was. Here, she is merely who she says she is: Eliza Beaulieu, a Gallic woman with a talent for dressmaking.

  She is not a woman who expects a king to turn up on her doorstep, staggering from a gondola to the stairs with a leap as clumsy as anything she's ever seen from him. It's only because the gondola boy, a handsome lad with a broad bright grin, is bellowing her name, that she comes to the window at all, another dark-headed flower amid a bouquet of curious courtesans.

  The women around her call out cheers and raspberries at Javier's awkwardness, while Eliza simply gapes. A girl at her side elbows her and offers a wicked grin. “No wonder you've stayed away from Parnan men, if it's gingers you like. Do his cuffs match his collar, lovey?”

  “They do,” Eliza says absently, though she knows this from young adulthood, when they were all still free enough with their bodies to dive into the Sacaruna bare as babes, and not from any more intimate experience.

  She cannot actually believe he's here; it's a little as though one of Parna's ancient sun gods has come down from the sky to alight in her courtyard. She knows of Sandalia's death, of course, and knows that Beatrice Irvine proved a spy and an assassin and worse, because neither winter nor Echon's breadth keeps stories from spreading, but regardless, it's quite impossible that Javier should have travelled all this distance, most particularly to find her.

  Which is clearly his intent, because while the boy has stopped bellowing her name, Javier has lifted his eyes to the window, and for the first time in their lives, his gaze is only for her. There's a smile in his grey eyes, and relief, and joy, and love, though not the depth of that last that she might wish. At least, that's what her head tells her, while her heart bumps and crashes and makes sick places of wild excitement inside her.

  It's impetuosity that makes her call, “Have you a pear, my lord?” though at ten she'd had nothing like the wit to have asked such a question.

  Javier, though, responds perfectly, patting his pockets with increasing alarm in the gestures and brightening laughter in his eyes. When he comes up empty, the boy in the gondola sighs with terrible exasperation and jumps to the steps with all the grace Javier lacked. He, somehow, has strawberries, if not pears, and he presses them into Javier's hand, then gives Eliza a look that suggests she'd be better off with his young self. Amused and full of roguish hope, Javier lifts the berries toward the window. Half a dozen women squeal and reach for them, but Eliza is not among them. She watches, not quite letting herself smile, and says, “If I fall I'll break your head, and there was trouble enough when I broke your arm. And you were a lesser man, then.”

  “I was the same man I've always been,” Javier says, and lowers the berries. The women all coo disappointment, but their giggling and delight fade into the background until Eliza is barely more aware of them than she is of the light breeze that cools her. Something must cool her, at least, because the warmth within her seems to be growing, and if there's no breeze she may well light into fire, burning up the skies out of not-so-secret hope and joy.

  “I was the same man I've always been,” Javier repeats, more softly, “only younger and more foolish. Much more foolish, Liz. I didn't know until you were gone how badly I needed you.”

  There's murmuring in the background, and Eliza takes her eyes from the young king of Gallin to look at the gondola, where Marius appears to be translating Javier's words for the benefit of the gondola boy. The boy's mouth is pushed out, ducklike, and he wobbles his head dubiously, then finally turns his palms up in reluctant approval. Marius grins and ruffles the boy's hair, then turns his attention back to Javier and Eliza, offering a bow from the waist when he sees she's looking at him. Javier twists, offended, to see what's taken her attention from him, then turns a plaintive look back toward her window.

  “The boy thinks I'm poor with words, and shouldn't be allowed to speak for myself. He may be right, as I've had a lifetime to say the things I should, without realising how badly I wanted to. We've been so careful of our balance, the four of us,” he whispers. “I should have seen long ago that you were worth upsetting it for. I have been rescued from my own folly and have brought these,” he says wryly, and offers up the berries. “Hardly a fitting gift for wooing, but pears are not yet in season, and I find myself on the edge of desperation. Will you have me, Liz? I go to war, and need you at my side.�
�

  The women all around her are silent now, clutching one another, clutching her, holding their breath to hear her young lover's words more clearly, turning to her with wide eyes to see how she might respond. Oh, whores all of them, perhaps, but born to a culture that admires the ideal of romantic love and plays to it, even if they don't believe in it themselves.

  And there is the grain of truth at the centre of it, the few rare moments when love does conquer, and makes glad fools of all. There's a stillness in those moments, a greatness waiting to happen, and not even the most jaded courtesan wishes to let those grains escape when hands might clasp to catch them.

  “Damn you, Javier de Castille,” Eliza finally whispers, and her throat is tight with the curse, and her eyes bright with tears. “Damn you, for there's nothing I can deny you, least of all my heart.”

  JAVIER, KING OF GALLIN

  The courtesans, not one of them believing Javier was in truth the king of Gallin, left in a drove, scattering to the canals to tell tales of how the king of Gallin had come to make love to an impoverished but beautiful woman under their watch. Truth hardly mattered; it was the delight of the story they wanted to share.

  When they were gone Eliza came into her courtyard and caught first Javier, then Marius, and then both men together, into a hug with strength enough to belie the softness of her gown and long shining hair. None of them spoke for long minutes, until Eliza finally took back a few steps and pulled her wig off to rake her fingers through short matted locks.

  Her hair had grown out in the months since he'd seen her last; had grown out considerably since she'd begun her business under Beatrice's tutelage, but it was still too short to be anything but a man's cut. Even that couldn't take away from the delicacy of her face and the largeness of her eyes. Given a crown, she could stir men's hearts to wonders, and it was a wonder to Javier that he had never seen it. Unaware of Javier's thoughts, though, she gestured to her gown, muttered, “I feel ridiculous in this,” and fled upstairs to change.