His lips moved against my fingers. “Are you saying we can never—”
“Never is a long time.” I forced a smile, but something broke through like sunlight inside me, and suddenly it wasn’t forced after all. “We’re both alive. That’s a good place to start. And as you say, we’ve overcome a lot together. Perhaps you’ll turn out to be a secret prince of lost Celantis. Or perhaps my mother will disinherit me.”
He returned a faint echo of my smile. “I’ve learned not to doubt your capabilities, my lady. I have faith you can find a less dramatic solution.”
Footsteps approached, more forceful than Ciardha’s noiseless tread. The door burst open. Marcello leveled his flintlock at the intruder.
“Oh, put your pistol back in your trousers,” Zaira said, smirking. “If I wanted her dead, she’d be dead.”
Marcello settled back into his chair with a sigh of relief.
“Thank you,” I said. “For saving my life.”
“Don’t let it go to your head.” Zaira’s smile faded, and she dropped into a chair by my bed. “Too bad about Ignazio.”
Something twisted in my gut. After all he’d done, he was still family. “Is he dead?”
“Not yet, that I know of. No, I meant too bad he turned out to be a conniving ass.”
“That’s hardly your fault.”
“He’s being held at the garrison for now,” Marcello said. “They’re going to bring him back to Raverra for trial by the Council of Nine.”
I wondered if that would be hard for my mother. Or if she’d seen the flaws that drove him to betray Raverra sooner than anyone, and had removed him from his position as envoy to give him a chance to avoid the pitfalls of his own character.
“He was right,” I said quietly. “It was too late for him long ago.”
Marcello squeezed my shoulder.
“How about Ardence?” Zaira sprawled in her chair as if she didn’t care, but the tautness of her voice betrayed her. “Is it too late for the city, too? I’m going to need a big dinner if you want me to have the energy to set everything on fire tonight.”
“That appears, unfortunately, to be up to me.” I gritted my teeth. “So if you two might be so kind as to help me out of bed, I should take a bath. It’s going to be a long day.”
I started with Domenic, because I knew he would forgive me if I made mistakes.
Ciardha helped me arrange myself in a chair in the opulent yet intimate Blue Room such that I would be able to rest without looking insultingly at ease to my guests. Still, all I wanted to do was sleep, and I had a pounding headache from the aftereffects of the poison. Ignazio probably could have mixed me something to help with the pain.
I tried not to think about how he had no motivation to mix me anything helpful ever again. Except perhaps to keep my mother from ordering his death.
Domenic arrived with the distracted air of a man who has been pulled away from struggling to put out a fire. But he listened as I told him everything I knew about Lady Savony and Ignazio’s conspiracy, grimacing or exclaiming at points. At the end, he jumped up and started pacing, despite his obvious exhaustion.
“Damn them to the Hell of Corruption. They were using our pain and anger, all that time. This never had anything to do with justice. They were laughing at us.”
“We need the Council of Lords and the Ardentine court to see the truth.” I rubbed my temple, attempting to smooth out my headache. “So long as some of them still believe Savony’s lies, making peace between Ardence and Raverra will prove difficult.”
Domenic shook his head. “Lady Savony. I would never have guessed she, of all people, would betray Ardence.”
“In her own mind,” I said, “I don’t think she did.”
Domenic’s brows climbed his forehead. “I don’t see how it’s not a betrayal to murder your duke and push your city to the brink of a war that would destroy it utterly.”
“But she never intended to let that war actually happen. And in her eyes, Duke Astor was the true threat to Ardence. He and the other decadent nobles of the court.” She might even have been right that he would have plunged the city into ruin, but I wasn’t going to say that to his cousin. “If he’d had a promising heir, she might simply have done away with him. But without a strong Ardentine leader to replace him, she had to create a crisis so extreme the Empire would have to step in and appoint an imperial governor. And Ignazio, the natural choice, was more than willing to assume that role.”
“Hells. I know I didn’t have much respect for the city’s leadership either, but that’s going too far.” Domenic fell silent, lost in thought.
I wished I could give him time to come to terms with what had happened to his city, but I had only hours left before he would cease to have a city at all.
“Domenic.” I caught his eyes. Trouble weighed down his normally lively expression. “Tell me. Do you believe Ardence’s future lies with the Serene Empire?”
“I do.” Domenic sighed. “How I feel about the Empire doesn’t matter. It’s here, and we’re in it. The days when Ardence and Raverra were both independent city-states are long gone.” He settled back into his chair. “It’s why I never liked Gabril’s talk of rebellion. It doesn’t make sense. We can reform the Empire, and make it better. Sometimes we need to stand up to it. But we’re a part of it, for good or ill. That’s the truth we have to work with.”
Good enough. “I have to ask you to do something, Domenic.”
He swept his arm in a courtly flourish. “Ask, and it is yours.”
“You won’t like it.”
He lifted a brow. “Hmm. Well then, ask, and I’ll think about it.”
“I need you to become the new duke of Ardence.”
The stunned expression on his face was inordinately satisfying. After a long moment, he swallowed. “There are others with a claim on the ducal throne who want it more than I do.”
“I know. I’m sorry.” I grimaced. “I’ll make it up to you. You can even have my Muscati.”
His eyes lit up. “Truly?”
“Well, when I’m done with it.”
Domenic leaned back in his chair, taking a long breath. “I’m not sure a Muscati is enough. I’m a scholar, Amalia. A traveler, a joker, and a dabbler. Not a duke. And you know how I despise politics.”
“I know.” I poured a full goblet of wine from the bottle Ciardha had left with me. “Believe me, I know. But a duke who hates politics may be what Ardence needs right now. I’m counting on you to make this sacrifice, for the sake of peace.”
“That’s a low blow.” He took the goblet, and drained it by a third with a few long swallows.
“Yes.” I smiled sadly. “I learned from my mother.”
“If I do this,” he said, “you realize I won’t jump whenever Raverra snaps its fingers. If I think the Empire is doing its people harm, I’m going to speak up. And I won’t be silent about the injustice of forcing children into the Falcons.”
I nodded. “I know that, too.”
“I can’t imagine the doge will like that.”
“Keep it civil and abide by the Serene Accords, and he’ll manage somehow.” I lifted my glass to him. “And as for me, I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
The parents of the abducted heirs proved a more complex series of conversations, full of changing emotions and painful subjects, but one simple fact remained: their children knew who had saved them. With each of them in turn, once we worked past the prickly fence of anger and denial, we made it through into the sunny pasture of gratitude. They were mine, forever, for bringing their sons and daughters back alive. Each promised me their support, some with greater reluctance than others.
Gabril was a more difficult matter. This was the interview I’d been dreading the most. I’d thought about asking Domenic for help with his brother, but decided in the end he was best left out of that discussion.
Gabril settled into his chair with great suspicion, and refused the wine I offered him.
“I’ll tak
e nothing from Raverra.” He crossed his arms, glaring at me over them. “I thought you were a friend to Ardence. I trusted you, because of your family connections. But you murdered my cousin the duke, and Lady Savony besides. I’ll hear what you have to say, but do not mistake this visit for a friendly one.”
Well. That made this easier. I’d rather face an honest enemy than have an unpleasant conversation with someone who thought me a friend.
“Gabril Bergandon, it’s thanks to Raverra the children your Shadow Gentry claimed to want to protect are now safely back with their families. It was Lady Savony who orchestrated their abduction and murdered the late duke. Why still hold this bitter grudge against the Serene Empire?”
Gabril huffed. “I’ll believe Colanthe Savony killed the duke when his ghost tells me so. My brother may swallow your lies, but I’m not so gullible. If you’re here to try to cajole me into being a good little imperial bootlicker, you’re wasting your time.”
I sighed. “Gabril. Let me tell you my problem.”
He crossed his arms and regarded me in wary silence.
“Domenic is a good friend. I don’t want to hurt him.” I poured myself a glass of wine. “That means keeping you from being executed for treason if I can. But you’re making it dreadfully difficult.”
Gabril swallowed. “Executed for treason?”
“Consider how it looks to the doge.” I held up my wineglass, examining it as if the vintage were Gabril’s soul. “You’re known to be close with Prince Ruven, who fled Ardence after stealing rare books and plotting to use devastating magic against the Empire.”
“Ruven wouldn’t do that,” Gabril protested.
“Forgive me, Gabril, but you are a terrible judge of character.” I sipped my wine. “To make matters far worse, the Shadow Gentry have been implicated, thanks to Lady Savony’s efforts, both in abducting the Ardentine children and in the unprovoked attack on a Falconer and the theft of the jess.”
Alarm grew on Gabril’s face. “We didn’t do any of that!”
“I know.” I eased back in my chair, trying not to show my exhaustion. “But it will be much harder for me to convince the doge of your innocence if you’re still acting like Ignazio and Savony’s accomplice, repeating every lie they told you. Right now, on the surface, it looks very much like you conspired with them and Vaskandar to sow chaos and war in Ardence. If I were you, I would be careful—very careful—not to give the Council of Nine further reason to believe you’re plotting against the serenity of the Empire.”
Gabril’s shoulders sagged, and his eyes went glassy. He reached, at last, for the wine.
I smiled. “Think on it, Gabril Bergandon, and I will see you this evening.”
As the shadows lengthened toward a sunset that could prove Ardence’s last, the air held an autumn chill. I was glad Ciardha didn’t object to my request for a jacket and breeches, and instead helped me select a Raverran royal-blue coat with rich enough embroidery and fabric to impress the Ardentine court, but a severe enough cut to remind them I meant business. I was too drained and achy to spend the rest of the day fighting shivers in a low-cut gown.
When I set out for the River Palace, I didn’t go alone. Zaira came with me, since the law required it. Marcello, as lieutenant, came to see to the safety of his Falcon and Falconer. And Ciardha fell in behind us without a word. Whatever she expected she might have to do in the palace, I was sure it would be executed with elegant precision, which both comforted and unnerved me.
Palace guards met us at the door, the Bergandon crest glittering on their doublets. Two of them escorted us, more closely than I suspected Marcello and Ciardha would have preferred, through the baroque splendor of the Hall of Beauty to the Hall of Majesty, where the nobles of the Council of Lords waited for us.
Perhaps forty men and women in jewels and brocade gathered in a space of charged, dim echoes, around a vast, shining oak table. They had the rumpled, restless look of people who had been there a long time. A thronelike chair waited vacant at the head of the table. Domenic stood at the foot, leaning on the table with his fists as if he’d been shouting someone down a moment ago. Gabril sat a few chairs away from him, arms crossed, glaring down at his lap.
As we entered, every eye in the room turned to us. Some of the nobles gave me nods of recognition; others drew back in apparent fear or disgust. A few lips curled in anger.
“Lady Amalia Cornaro,” Domenic greeted me. “Please, sit. You must be exhausted.” His gaze strayed to Zaira at my side before he even finished welcoming me; I had trouble suppressing a smile.
Before I could return his greeting, the scraping of a chair on the marble floor jarred the quiet of the room. Lord Ulmric, the bearded gentleman who’d accosted Zaira at Ignazio’s party, rose to his feet. “If Astor Bergandon’s murderer sits at this table, I will not.”
A murmur ran around the table. A few more nobles rose as well.
“Then you can sit back down.” I let my voice ring out calm and clear. After everything that had happened in the past couple of days, I wasn’t afraid of a roomful of old people. “Lady Savony took the life of the late duke. I saw it with my own eyes.”
“Colanthe Savony was the duke’s right hand,” a portly woman objected. “She loved Ardence more than her own life. Why should we believe some Raverran girl over the honorable lady who helped govern Ardence for so many years?”
I hadn’t expected to get accused of murder quite so soon, but perhaps I should have. I supposed it was only the chaos within the Council of Lords that had prevented me from being arrested the moment I passed through the River Palace gates.
Thank the Grace of Wisdom I didn’t have to return fire from an empty quiver. I nodded to a mustached lord sitting at the table, who in turn nodded to a servant behind him, who left the room.
“I understand why you don’t want to trust me,” I said. “Ardence has had its trust violated more than once in these difficult days. But perhaps you will believe me if I’m vouched for by someone all too familiar with Lady Savony’s treachery.” I looked toward the door.
Footsteps approached the Hall of Majesty, a light patter providing a counterpoint to the sedate and measured tread of an adult. A gangly, bespectacled woman entered the chamber, holding the hand of a little girl.
I almost didn’t recognize her, cleaned up and wearing a yellow silk dress. But then her eyes met mine, and I did.
The girl from the drain. Jaslyn.
She must have recognized me too, because she broke out into a smile as if a shaft of sunlight pierced the painted clouds on the ceiling fresco and shone straight down in a holy beam to strike her face.
“It’s you!” she cried. She dropped her mother’s hand and ran to me, wrapping her skinny arms tight around my waist.
I hugged her back, my eyes stinging. “I’m so glad you’re safe.”
“You know this woman, Jaslyn?” the portly woman asked, surprised.
“Yes, Auntie!” Jaslyn turned excitedly to her. “This is the lady who saved us.”
Most of the standing nobles sank into their seats, stunned. But Lord Ulmric’s glare remained unabated. “So you set them free. You’re still a liar. Colanthe Savony would never betray Ardence.”
“No. She wouldn’t.” I gripped an empty chair in front of me for support as I stared around the table. “But for Ardence, she would betray her duke. For Ardence, she would betray you, and your children. It was the city itself she wanted to save, even at the expense of its individual people.”
Agitated whispers filled the room, like the rustle of wings. They still weren’t convinced, yet.
The mustached lord, Jaslyn’s father, called her over to him and put a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Jaslyn.” His voice was soft, but it carried. “Tell them about the woman who held you prisoner.”
“She wore a gray mask,” Jaslyn said.
Gabril winced.
“Do you remember anything else about her?” Jaslyn’s father asked.
Jaslyn scrunched her ey
es shut. “She was very thin, with long, bony arms.” That ruled me out. Some of the lords exchanged glances. “She wore her hair up—it was dark, with gray in it.” Jaslyn gestured vaguely around her head.
“That’s good, Jaslyn,” her father praised her.
Jaslyn’s eyes popped open. “Oh! One more thing. She had little golden spectacles on a chain around her neck.”
Murmurs ran around the table like spreading balefire.
Domenic slapped his palm on the table. “You all know who that describes as well as I do. Colanthe Savony. We’ve been betrayed, ladies and gentlemen.”
This time, no one contradicted him. A grim silence fell on the room. Gabril put his face in his hands.
“Lady Amalia is innocent.” Domenic threw the statement on the table like a drawn knife. “Duke Astor Bergandon and his murderer are both dead. We stand with a blank page before us, Lords and ladies of Ardence, and the Serene Empire watches us write. We must choose our words carefully.”
“The Serene Empire can go—” Lord Ulmric began. But Gabril, who sat next to him, grabbed his arm. He leaned up out of his chair, whispered into Ulmric’s ear, and then slumped back down, not meeting anyone’s eyes.
Lord Ulmric swallowed. He looked at Gabril, and licked his lips. “Can, ah, go too far. Yes. The Empire can go overly far to make a point sometimes. That’s all.” He sat back down, face red with anger or humiliation.
The bespectacled lord cleared his throat, putting his arm around Jaslyn’s shoulders. “I owe the Lady Amalia my daughter’s life. It grieves me that one of our own betrayed us, but I must accept it is true.”
A rumble of assent ran around the room, and some of the tension eased out of the air. Jaslyn’s mother ushered her out; she waved to her father, her aunt, and then to me. My throat tightened as I waved back.
“Now, please, Lady Amalia, take a seat.” Domenic gestured me to an empty chair.
“My thanks. But the place I must take for this meeting is that of the Serene Envoy.” I crossed to stand behind the seat to the left of the empty ducal throne, giving them a moment to absorb what I’d said. “I am filling in for Lady Terringer while she recovers.”
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