Authors: Unknown
Krystállina signaled the cardinal again and he droned through the rest of the contract. When he was finished, both parties rose to sign, beginning with the cardinal. As she waited, Krystállina smiled to see that some cunning secretary had affixed Conrad’s inky footprint to the contract in advance.
“Can she sign for herself?” the cardinal asked when it was Chárí’s turn.
“I know my letters!” she responded in her babyish German. Chárí stepped forward and took the quill in hand. Her parents’ smiles quickly turned to looks of horror, however, when she signed not Caroline Marian Bestwick, but
:
Chár
í ţis Vronţís
Palace of the Dark Moon
Wài
Mid-May 1228
“You’ve been holding something back from me!” Yolanda did not bother to make the proper reverences as she entered the throne room. “When I told You about the Duke and Duchess of H
artford, You blew them off as simple gatecrashers; but I
know
You’ve been intrigued. I
know
I can’t be the only spy that’s been reporting in. You’ve done Your research. Probably sent out search parties, if You thought my information was something of value.”
“What I do and do not do is m
y prerogative,” Léi Shēng replied in an irritatingly calm tone. “You will never know whether I believe your information is important, because I—like every other god—am inscrutable. Have you not heard the Christians say, ‘God works in mysterious ways’?”
“Oh
, I already
know
my information is valuable.” The Hungarian Queen smirked. “If it was mere
words
, You wouldn’t suffer my presence for one second. I wouldn’t even see Telfer—Your guards would turn me away at the door.
“And what I have to say next? Well…that may be the most valuable of all.”
“Stop babbling about your worth and get on with it!”
“As I’m sure You noticed, I convinced Frederick to let me stand as proxy for Isabella. Cozened him. Told him it was what his beloved Empress would have wanted.”
“You couldn’t bear to miss out on all the action,” Telfer muttered.
“Shut up!” Yolanda snapped. “I won’t bore You with the details of Lady Bestwick’s consecration as Grand Duchess of Berlin or Conrad’s coronation as King of Jerusalem; but I
will
tell You that as proxy, I read and signed the betrothal contract.”
“The details?” Léi Shēng prompted.
“Savoy goes to Catherine and Andrew equally upon consummation of the marriage. If a son is born first, the Marquise de Queensberry becomes the Duchess of Tuscano; if a daughter, she takes Lorraine. That was the Grand Duch
ess’s terms, along with the agreement that she will take whatever title Lady Grace does not take—whenever the appropriate child is born, of course.
“In return, we demanded half a million
thaler
and a number of domestic goods, to be agreed upon by the Grand Duchess and I.”
“That sounds relatively standard.”
“I thought so, too,” Yolanda agreed. “Until it came to signing the contract.
“I had a secretary imprint the contract with Conrad’s foot in advance, so that he would not interrupt the ceremony with a fuss. Being the higher-ranking party, Frederick and I signed first, followed by the Bestwicks. When it came time for Lady Berlin to sign, the cardinal asked Catherine if the girl was capable of doing so.”
“And was she?”
“Oh yes. Lady Berlin spoke up—rather articulately for a girl of a single year—and said she could. Except she did not sign her name as ‘Caroline Bestwick’.”
“There was another name?” interrupted Telfer.
The Queen of Hungary produced a scrap of parchment and passed it to the Elder God of Wind. He c
ontemplated the words for a moment, added some accents and raised an eyebrow.
“I
knew
it was valuable information!” Yolanda nearly jumped out of her seat. “Now You will
have
to tell me what You’ve been hiding!”
Léi Shēng glanced at his servant, who shrugge
d.
“Like everything else spoke of here, this remains a secret,” Léi Shēng warned. When the Queen nodded, he said, “I am no great shakes at Hungarian, but I will try to translate it for you.”
He turned the parchment over, accepted a quill from Telfer and sc
ribbled out a few words before passing it
back to Yolanda.
Kegyelem a Mennydörgés
“‘Grace of Thunder’?” the Queen whispered.
“The future Queen of Jerusalem’s true name,” the Elder God replied. “As you might have guessed, gods do not generally have surnames—especially the Elders and their families. A Goddess—or, in this case, a demigoddess—might sign her name in a way to indicate her lineage. Thus, in your tongue, my eldest son might call himself, ‘Mennydörgés a Szél’.”
“‘Thunder of Wind’,” she repeated, s
inking back into her chair. “So that must mean that the Duchess of Hartford’s name isn’t Caroline?”
“Very likely not,” Léi Shēng agreed. “Of course, I do not think Amihan and…whomever he is with…intended for their daughter’s names to be translated from language to language. Therefore, Caroline Bestwick’s name is exactly what you brought me: Galíní ţis Vronţís.”
“I can’t believe that’s their secret!” Yolanda replied. “No wonder they gave themselves false names and titles!”
“With good reason. I am surprised y
ou did not question me when I said ‘demigoddess’.”
“I didn’t think about it,” she admitted.
“Based on the information I have been receiving—primarily yours—I have reason to believe my son has copulated with a mortal. And—I will not tell you this twice—” the Elder God leaned forward in his chair. “I
hate
demigoddesses.”
The Queen blanched. “You’re not going to kill Your granddaughters, are You?”
There was a knock at the door.
“Tell them to go away!” Léi
Shēng snarled.
Telfer scurried off to do his master’s bidding, but he was back in mere moments, offering the highest of obeisances.
“Many pardons, O Highest of the High, O Lord of Lords.” The servant fell to his knees and bowed so low that they could barel
y hear him from the floor. “Prince Beniru and Princess Masama are pleased to announce the birth of Your first
legitimate
grandchild, Princess Kejahatan.”
The Elder God glowered at the pale Queen. “Actually, I just might.”
Vienna
Holy Roman Empire
January 1229
Krystállina felt blessed to finally get some time to ride out with her husband. Although winter caused fewer problems among the tenants and clients, they were constantly apart. Since Amihan was only the titular Grand Duke of Berlin, any convention of the nobles of the Empire required Krystállina’s attendance—something the men frequently resented. When she was home, Amihan was off on business somewhere in their holdings, forcing Krystállina to spend time with her few ladies-in-waiting and the throng of maids-in-waiting that came to her in hopes of some polish before marriage or—perhaps someday—joining the court of the next Empress. It seemed like she only found real joy in her daughters anymore—and even they were becoming articulate and intelligent at an alarming rate; long having moved beyond “precocious”.
“How is life at court?”
“I don’t want to talk about it,” the Grand Duchess replied. “Any more than you want to tell me about a tenant’s leaky roof or the status of trade in Berlin.”
“I
usually
share information about the tenants and clients,” Amihan pointed out. “And when you want to know what is going on in and around Berlin, you pick up the letters yourself.”
She had no answer to this. Not only did Krystállina not want to get anywhere
near
the talk of business, but she was in no mood for an argument, either.
“Has the spark gone out of our marriage?” her husband asked at length.
“You’re the God of Thunder,” she replied as she slowed her horse to navigate a tricky part of the path. “You tell me.”
“That is not what I meant.” Amihan reached over and put his hand on her reins. “Can you honestly tell me that you love me as much now as you did three and a half years ago?”
“That and more. But this is not the life I expected,” she replied. “I knew that I would never want for anything, that with a big estate, we’d have tenants, and if we were going to play at Duke and Duchess, we’d have clients. But I expected to be ‘the foreign couple’, the novelty at court. I didn’t expect to become the most important woman in the Empire because the Emperor found out my husband’s secret and barred him from his courtly duties. And being the mother of twin demigoddesses…” She sighed. “They can have their nurse for a while longer, but we need to find a governess right away. I cannot keep up with them anymore, and within a few years, they’ll know more than I ever have.”
Krystállina jerked her reins away and rode on ahead, but their separation didn’t last long. Amihan caught up with her shortly after she rounded a corner. Her dagger was already out.
“Do you have your sword with you? I left my bow back at the house.”
The Thunder God raised an eyebrow as he saw the Siberian tiger cross the path, growling; but he dismounted after a moment.
“Put your dagger away. That is my mother.”
“Your muh—!” she sputtered.
“I recognize the markings.”
The tiger rubbed up against him with a throaty purr and he threw his reins to his wife.
“Go back to the estate and bolt the doors. No one goes in or out without my say so.”
Krystállina eyed her husband warily, but soon clucked to the horses and set off down the path. When he turned back, Amihan found his mother standing there, wearing a white pelisse and matching boots.
“You are brave, riding out without guards,” Sundara said as she led the way out of the clearing. “Either that, or you are very stupid.”
“No mortal will accost me on my own land.”
“Mortals are not who I mean,” the Dowager Queen replied in a tone that ended the conversation.
A few minutes’ walk brought them to a bower, the withes tightly lashed against the winter wind. As soon as Sundara approached, a thin spiral of smoke began threading its way through the roof. Without so much as a glance over her shoulder, the Goddess melted through the wall. Clearly, she expected her son to do the same.
“Was that my daughter-in-law?” Sundara slid out of the pelisse and revealed a flowing gown of white silk. Amihan was enamored with the sight of his mother and didn’t answer right away.
“How long have you known?”
“I was present at the handfasting,” she said, folding the pelisse onto one of the two rough-hewn benches that spanner the bower. “You took excellent precautions, though…I could only see a fuzzy outline of her and barely hear a few of the words.”
The Thunder God settled onto the oppos
ite bench. “You have not reported me, then?”
“To whom?
Léi Shēng?” Sundara held her toes out to the fire as her doeskin boots melted into rabbit fur slippers. “You can be sure he already knows.”
Amihan felt his heart sink.
“Has no one told you the purpose
of humans?”
“You left that out in the few years you deigned to teach me.”
The Dowager Queen laughed. “The first gods created humans so that they could spy on each other. As the number of gods grew, so did the number of humans. Eventually, the Elders decided to allow the human race to keep reproducing by itself. At that point, the gods were using the humans to spy on their fellow gods
and
other humans. The consensus also came to be that humans were
highly
amusing and worth having around.”
“Are you saying my father secretly
likes
humans?”
“Goodness, no!” Sundara smiled and stoked the fire. “He likes the adoration he receives as the High King of the Gods—and the services he receives from the one he calls Telfer. He certainly does not mind that some humans have no compunction about spying on his behalf. But that is all.”