Protector of Thristas: A Lisen of Solsta Novel

by D. Hart St. Martin

  “Elor appears to be doing well,” Korin said, leaning in to whisper in Lisen’s left ear. In preparation for the Zanlot heir’s investiture in August, Lisen had loosened the reins on the boy and allowed him to live a bit more independently.

  “I’m hoping he’ll learn that freedom from imposed structure doesn’t mean he requires no personal boundaries.”

  Korin laughed softly. “I’ve never known any sort of boundaries to stop a Zanlot from doing what they want.”

  “No, but maybe he’ll reflect before acting.”

  The dinner proceeded as these dinners always had—various meats with great chunks of bread to soak up the juices, followed by some sort of sweet dish, and, finally, fruit to cleanse the palate—all of it accompanied by the soft sounds of the rillion and the purkatta—providing a moment of peace before the arguments began, which often happened as soon as the tables were cleared and before Lisen and family had managed to exit the room. She prayed that they could make it out cleanly tonight. Nalin had scheduled a brief privy council meeting to begin as soon as all its members could extricate themselves from the after-dinner discussions. Tired from all her attempts at convincing Rinli to accept her aid and then worrying about the girl in the light of her refusal, Lisen wanted this meeting to start without delay so she could get to bed—if not to sleep—at a reasonable time. And for good reason. This Council session, not yet begun, already gave off the stench of impending misery.

  She, Korin and their children escaped down the steps back to the portico unnoticed. After making it to the hallway, she and Korin sent the three young ones up the stairs to bed and headed through the clerk’s office and into Lisen’s. They found Jazel there, waiting at the conference table, copies of the agenda carefully laid out in front of each chair. The woman rose at their entrance, but Lisen gestured her down. The three of them waited, Korin and Jazel in their places at the table, Lisen pacing slowly from her desk to the table and back again.

  It didn’t take long. Tanres and Under-commander Kopol, fresh from Pass Garrison, arrived and, after saluting, took their seats. Nalin and Bala followed, with Holders Melanda Cabell and Malaki Mira and Councilor Sirin Tor right behind. Lisen allowed everyone a few moments to acquaint themselves with the session’s agenda, and only then did she join them at the table.

  “All right,” she said, “you’ll note that the Ba case is going to be our first test of the new rules of trial by Council. Lots will be drawn for the judges on the third day of Council. Evidence in this case will be made available in the library right after Opening tomorrow, and statements and testimony will be heard immediately after the judges have been chosen.”

  “We expect all of that to take at least two days, probably more,” Nalin added, “with closing arguments presented directly after.”

  “Once we’re done with that, there are some road repairs between holdings that need funds,” Lisen continued.

  And so the meeting went on, longer than Lisen had hoped but not too late into the evening. Eventually, everyone agreed that, save for a couple of minor changes, the agenda could stand as written. Jazel took her usual meticulous notes, and as Lisen and Nalin bid the others good night, Jazel headed into her office to hand the amended document off to her two assistants who would spend the night preparing enough copies for every member of the Council—by Lisen’s count, thirty-six in all.

  Tanres and Kopol had stood back while the others in the council had departed, and Lisen headed straight over to them. She hadn’t seen the under-commander in charge of Pass Garrison since she’d sent her there a year ago. The two officers saluted Lisen at her approach, and Lisen, who never saluted, smiled at her former captain.

  “How’s the Pass treating you?”

  “The Pass is as it has always been, my Liege,” Kopol replied. “It’s the guards there who make my life interesting.”

  “Problems?” Lisen asked, looking quizzically from Kopol to Tanres and back again.

  “Nothing of note, my Liege,” Kopol replied. “Just the usual adjustments to a new commander.”

  “Well, I have to admit I feel better knowing you’re there.”

  “Thank you, my Liege.” Kopol nodded, and Lisen caught a hint of a smile from Tanres.

  “Now, if you’ll excuse me…”

  Both commanders straightened to attention and saluted, fist to chest. Lisen acknowledged their salute with a minimal nod and then left to head upstairs.

  Hearing Nalin coming up beside her in the hall, she paused to let him catch up.

  “Well,” she said, “here we go again.”

  “Isn’t it always so?”

  Lisen shook her head. “Something’s always different.”

  Nalin shrugged and left her there. She jogged slowly to the stairs and joined Korin halfway up.

  “You were quiet,” she said.

  “I find that saying nothing when one has nothing to say is always wisest.”

  She smiled and would have kissed him, but they were, of course, still out in public ascending the stairs. Time enough for folly, she thought. Later.

  The next morning, Rinli did her best to slip unobtrusively and unnoticed between Council members as they all made their way up the short stairs that led to the visitors’ gallery and from there down into the Council chamber. But just as she was about to set herself down on a bench in the back, she felt a tap on her shoulder.

  “My lord?”

  She whirled, thinking they must have mistaken her for someone else, but the face smiling back startled her.

  “Under-commander Kopol,” she said, feeling stupid the second the words left her mouth.

  “Your mother has requested your presence with her in the office,” Kopol explained and took Rinli’s hand. Weaving through the opposing flow of nobles entering the Council chamber, she pulled Rinli up the steps behind her. Rinli, entranced by the woman’s skill at navigating her way through the crowds, failed to try to veil herself from these people and could hear whispers as she moved past them. “It’s the young Heir.” “She’s a handsome young woman.” “Shame about the father.”

  It took all of Rinli’s limited self-discipline to keep from turning on that one and shouting, “What about my father? He’s half-Garlan, too, you know.” But the under-commander urged her down the stairs to the chamber’s entry and then out. There, space opened up in the hall, and Kopol let go of her hand.

  “This way,” the woman said.

  “I know the way,” Rinli snapped. She was not in the mood to be treated like an ignorant child. She elbowed past the guard and headed straight to the door to her mother’s office. The guard there opened the door, and Rinli entered, once again feeling like her mother was ordering her around. She heard the under-commander’s footsteps behind her and then the sound of the door latch.

  “Good. Rinli,” her mother said. She, Rinli’s father and Holder Corday stood by the conference table looking like they had eaten something bad, but as soon as her mother had acknowledged her arrival, both her father and the holder left the room via the door she’d come in. She turned around as the door closed and discovered the under-commander had departed as well. She was alone with her mother.

  “I’m going to introduce you to the Council,” her mother continued.

  “They know me.”

  “A formal introduction of the soon-to-be Protector of Thristas. Then you’ll take your seat in the empty place next to your father in the front row.”

  “Why now? Why not when I return after my investiture?”

  “This is to be your first official attendance at Council.”

  Rinli shrugged. “I suppose.”

  “I remember my first entrance.” Rinli watched as her mother got that misty look in her eyes signaling a memory rising up to possess her. “I was barely eighteen and had spent all of twelve hours or so in Avaret. Your father had run off, leaving me feeling abandoned and alone. When all those people rose as I stepped into the room…well, it was quite an experience.”

  “I can imag
ine.” Rinli sensed the sheer power of that moment, and she also sensed that for her mother something bittersweet had accompanied the triumph.

  “All right then. I will enter as I always do. Once the door has closed behind me, I want you to take your place right in front of it. Your introduction will be my first order of business.” Rinli watched her mother step over to the door, then turn back. “Oh, and if you want to listen, put your ear right here up against the door.” Rinli nodded in acknowledgment.

  At a light tap on the door, her mother straightened to her full height, and once the door opened, she stepped out into the Council chamber. The door closed swiftly behind her, and Rinli walked over, thinking that she probably should have chosen a more respectable tunic, maybe in the dark tan she’d as yet told no one she’d decided on as the color of a proper Protector of Thristas. And why hadn’t she allowed Sen to braid her hair for her? Her sister had offered, and now Rinli knew why. How was it that everyone but she herself had understood an “honor” was about to be dropped upon her?

  She remembered she could listen, and she pressed her ear against the spot her mother had pointed out.

  “My lords, welcome to the thirty-third semiannual Council session of my reign. As you can no doubt see by the agenda you received this morning, it’s going to be a very busy two weeks. But before we bury ourselves too deep in Council matters, let me begin by noting that the formal transition of Thristas from dependent territory to independent entity will begin with the investiture in September of its new protector. It is with pride, I welcome the Heir of Thristas to this Council. Rinli?”

  Rinli’s neck straightened involuntarily at her mother’s words and the solemn significance in her tone as she spoke them, and a new sense of purpose touched her. A light tap on the door signaled Rinli to action. She pulled at her tunic to straighten out any wrinkles and prepared for the most important entrance of her life. The door opened, and every person in the room rose and applauded as Rinli took tentative steps out on the dais. At the table right in front of her, her mother’s Will smiled with encouragement, and as promised, in the middle of the first-row, center bench, sat her father, nodding with a subtlety only he could manage, an empty seat beside him. Mine.

  She walked towards her mother who stood waiting for her, arms extended. Rinli thought a hug was in the offing and wondered why her mother would be so public about her affection when she never hugged Rinli, nor anyone else for that matter, even in private. But a hug was not to be. When Rinli reached her mother, the offered hands grasped Rinli’s, and the Empir of Garla smiled warmly at her daughter.

  “Go sit with your father,” she said softly, and as the applause waned, Rinli stepped away and down the steps to the vacant space in the front bench.

  Her father whispered, “Sit,” into her ear, and when Rinli did, everyone else followed her lead. She looked at her father, then back up at her mother, and for the first time she thought she understood the weight of the power her mother wielded. She’d sat in on Council meetings before, but always in the gallery at the back. At that distance and somewhat sheltered by the overhanging ceiling there that cloistered one in, Rinli had seen only people responding to a woman—a woman who happened to be her mother—seemingly preoccupied with ordering others around and making grandiose pronouncements. Not today. Today her mother was both her mother and the Empir of Garla, not some personage in the distance. It nearly stole the air from Rinli’s lungs.

  “Now, as you have, no doubt, noted, we have a question of inheritance to decide starting the day after tomorrow. We’ve blocked out three days for presentation of statements, testimony and arguments as well as deliberation by the judges, though we are hoping it will take less. Please notify Jazel if you do not want to be included in the group of potential judges. We will need to know that by the end of tomorrow. Evidence is now available for viewing and study in the library, and you are welcome there any time, day or night. I’m excited that this will be our first opportunity to test out the changes in trial law regarding cases brought before the throne, and it is my hope that any problems that may arise can be quickly resolved and worked into the law for the future.”

  The Empir took a deep breath, then continued. “All right, then, as I said before, the agenda is full already, so I’ll call for adjournment now so my clerk and I can devote the rest of the day to requests for additions, deletions and amendments to it. Tomorrow we shall begin in earnest. Unless there are objections?” She paused. Not a whimper. “Then I declare this meeting adjourned.”

  Again, the room rose as one, Rinli standing in awe as her mother returned to her office. Barely eighteen when she took the throne, Rinli thought, and she knew nothing. And yet, from everything she’d heard, her mother had stepped into her role as Empir almost seamlessly. With feelings roiling through her essence, Rinli could only imagine what it had been like for her mother. And her father wasn’t even here during all those months—nearly all of her mother’s first year as Empir—not until the One-Day War.

  “Rin?”

  She jumped at her father’s voice beside her. She’d been somewhere entirely not here.

  “Are you still with us?”

  She nodded furiously, her thoughts blurring before she could catch them. Her mother. Yes, that’s who she’d been thinking about, but…

  “Yes, I’m here.” And indeed she was. Any compassion for her mother elicited by watching her run the Council meeting had slipped away; Rinli couldn’t really remember what she’d been thinking.

  “Good,” her father said as he led her out behind the rest of the crowd.

  Rinli paused at the gallery and turned back to look down on the room. The center of the world. How would it look when the Protector of Thristas laid claim fully to her birthright and drew a boundary at the Rim forever separating the desert from the green lands? It was a question Rinli couldn’t answer. Not today. Maybe someday, but of a certainty, not today.

  CHAPTER SIX

  DELICATE HANDLING

  In the afternoon after Opening, Nalin sat back in his chair at the conference table in Lisen’s office, his left leg crossed over his right, and listened without interruption as Akdor Ba, golden-brown hair neatly coifed, golden-brown eyes filled with angry light, implored his Empir sitting behind her desk to listen to him. Encouraged to observe, Rinli had taken what was normally Lisen’s seat at the table, and Nalin watched her reactions to her mother’s handling of this complicated situation.

  “My Liege, you have to understand—”

  “No, Akdor, you have to understand,” Lisen said, holding a hand up to stop him from speaking further. “I serve as the final judge in this. My vote breaks a tie, if there is one. I cannot be listening to you now. I do promise you, though, that I will give you plenty of time to make your case the day after tomorrow.”

  “But, my Liege—”

  “No. Must I call my guards? You’re making a fool of yourself, and we’re not alone.” Lisen nodded in the direction of Nalin and her daughter, and Nalin offered him a gentle smile with a shake of his head when Akdor’s eyes implored him.

  “No,” Akdor said, rose from his chair, turned abruptly and left the room at a brisk walk.

  Nalin leaned in and whispered in Rinli’s ear, “And that’s how an experienced leader deals with a fool.” The girl nodded, then turned to look at her mother. Nalin couldn’t see her face, but Lisen’s response—a solemn single nod—told him that Rinli had somehow expressed appropriate respect. Now, if the girl could only sustain that for more than a couple of minutes.

  “So, does that give his brother an edge?” Rinli asked.

  Nalin turned all the way in his chair so he could watch his Liege take on this child of hers.

  “I’m only one of five judges,” Lisen replied, “and unless Akdor chooses to mention it, none of the other four will know he came to me.”

  “Why wouldn’t you tell them? Doesn’t the fact he came to you and begged indicate a weakness in character?”

  Lisen got up to join t
hem, leaned back against the conference table, facing them, arms crossed, and responded. “Very perceptive. But I never let him get past his initial request to speak. It’s not up to me to point out the flaws in his character; he’ll probably do a fairly good job of that himself.”

  “But,” Rinli said, “what if it’s two to two and you have to decide? Will it become relevant then?”

  “Relevant?” Lisen shook her head. “No. Because it is my job, as it is the job of the other four judges, to set aside any prejudice and endeavor to decide the case on the merits of the evidence.”

  “But he would have been better off staying away and saying nothing.”

  “Rinli,” Nalin said, breaking in, “one thing a good leader knows is that each petitioner is an individual who requires delicate handling. Tell me, what did you learn from your mother’s handling of the potential Heir Ba?”

  “That Akdor Ba doesn’t want to be thought of as a fool,” the girl replied.

  “And why would you say that?” Nalin asked.

  “Because he left when my mother told him he was making a fool of himself.”

  Nalin looked up to Lisen. “She’s got it, you know.”

  “She’s got what?” Lisen asked.

  “Whatever it was that made you a good Empir so quickly.” And Nalin watched as Lisen looked to her daughter. She smiled and lightly brushed two fingers across the left side of the girl’s chest over her heart, then pulled them away again.