Kushiel's Mercy (16 page)

My mother was in Paphos on the isle of Cythera, mistress to the Governor. I had the information I needed. Now all I needed to do was figure out how to act on it without tipping my hand. Ysandre had promised assistance, and I meant to hold her to it.

I was a little concerned about Gillimas, but not overly. He was a Guildsman and a magistrate of considerable standing, and he’d been careless. I doubt my bluff would have worked if I hadn’t caught him unaware, sotted, sated, and sleeping, but I had and it did. He could admit to it, or he could keep his mouth shut and let the Unseen Guild believe I’d assembled the cryptic pieces of their puzzle myself. If I was lucky, mayhap Ti-Philippe’s inquiries would turn up somewhat that would lend credence to the notion.

Either way, I knew.

I couldn’t bear to wait. With dawn breaking over the Palace, I woke Sidonie and told her, watching her sleepy eyes widen in shock.

“You did
what
?”

“It was worth it,” I said. “I got the idea in Bryony House when I realized that for once I was surrounded by supporters and loyal guards. It was the perfect time to bluff.”

She shook her tousled head. “What if Gillimas had called it?”

I grinned. “Well, it would have put him in the position of having to explain why I was trying to smother him in a D’Angeline pleasure-house without exposing the Guild. I daresay
that
thought flashed through his mind, too.”

“Still,” Sidonie murmured. “It was a big risk.”

“I know,” I said. “But now we know. And as soon as these damned Carthaginians stage their damned horologists’ celestial mirror-show and leave, we’ll all sit down, pool our knowledge of Cythera, and make a plan.”

Sidonie frowned. “What about the eunuch? What was his name? Sunjata?”

I flopped down on the bed beside her and closed my eyes, feeling weariness from the long night settling into my bones. “To hell with the eunuch. If he has a message for me, let him deliver it. I’m not chasing him.”

“Well, he is rather fetching,” she said with unexpected humor.

I cracked one eye open. “Not half as fetching as you, Princess. By the way, the Dowayne of Bryony House expressed the hope that you and I will partake in certain adventures in the future.”

“Mmm.” Sidonie leaned down and kissed me. “Let’s get our future in order first.”

The horologists’ spectacle was to take place on the morrow. The mood in the City was festive, and the City itself was ungodly crowded. An unwarranted number of peers had chosen to stay to witness the spectacle. Scientists and engineers poured into the City, many from Siovale, skeptical but curious. Ghislain nó Trevalion had the entire Royal Army billeted within the walls of the City. Quintilius Rousse had a dozen war-ships anchored in the Aviline River, and his lads thronged the taverns.

It seemed like the only preeminent figure
not
in the City was Barquiel L’Envers, who had withdrawn in disgust to his estate in Namarre, having never abandoned his opposition to the Carthaginian delegation. Even the other members of Parliament who’d opposed it had lingered, drawn by curiosity. Not L’Envers. In truth, I didn’t blame him, but I welcomed his absence nonetheless.

The day before the spectacle, Sidonie and I rode out to observe the preparations, accompanied by her guard.

I must own, I was at least a little curious. The event itself was to take place in Elua’s Square, the exact center of the City. The horologist Bodeshmun was there, overseeing the placement of the great mirror, directly in front of the ancient oak tree said to have been planted by Blessed Elua himself.

“No,” he said absently, making a measurement with a piece of string on which a bead was strung. “No, no, no! It must be
perfectly
level.”

Slaves groaned, lifting the mirror from its tripodal base. One crawled beneath it, adjusting the tripod, and the mirror was lowered again.

“That is one damnably big mirror,” Claude de Monluc observed.

It was. I gauged its diameter as at least five armspans’ length; a vast pool of silver, reflecting sky and oak leaves. There were symbols worked around the silver rim, representing the twelve Houses of the Cosmos.

Bodeshmun measured again and grunted. “Better.” He glanced down at one of the symbols, then strode a few paces, an unlikely figure in his black beard and a long robe. He raised his thumb, sighting along an unseen line. Half a league away, atop the white walls of the City, an answering mirror flashed. Bodeshmun squinted at his thumb. “Two degrees west,” he said curtly. “Send a runner.”

One of the slaves departed at a run. We lingered, watching, while the process was repeated, then began anew with the next symbol.

“It seems a complicated business, my lord,” Sidonie said at length, still seated astride her white palfrey.

“Yes, your highness.” Bodeshmun glanced up at her from beneath heavy brows, then gave a short, perfunctory bow. A multifaceted green gem that hung on a chain around his neck swung briefly into view, catching the sunlight. “The secrets of the heavens do not reveal themselves easily,” he said in his deep voice. “One must be diligent and exacting. But I promise, you will find the results well worthwhile.”

She inclined her head. “I’m sure I shall.”

He smiled in a way that made my flesh prickle. “You will.”

For the first time since we’d become lovers, Sidonie and I argued that day. All the way back to the Palace, we quarrelled.

“I don’t like it,” I said. “Can’t you talk Ysandre into calling it off?”

“On what grounds?” Sidonie asked reasonably.

“I don’t
know
!” My voice rose in frustration. “It smells bad, Sidonie. I don’t know why. I just know it does.”

“It’s not enough.” Her back was very straight in the saddle. “Half the realm is here to observe this. We need some evidence of bad faith on the part of Carthage to deny them.”

“Astegal’s intentions—” I muttered.

“Were spoken plainly.” Sidonie scowled at me. “Imriel, I don’t like it either. But we’ve accepted their gifts. We’ve heard their suit, and they accepted our refusal with seeming good will. If Carthage
does
move against Aragonia, yes, everything changes. But they haven’t, not yet.”

“They will,” I said darkly.

She sighed. “And we will deal with it when they do. What are you afraid of, Imriel? The City is bursting at the seams, filled with our soldiers and sailors. What can Carthage possibly do?”

“I don’t know,” I whispered. “That’s what scares me.”

“Well, stop scaring
me
!” she retorted.

We were irritable enough with one another that when Sidonie answered a summons from her mother on returning to the Palace, I went to the Hall of Games to distract myself. I found Mavros playing piquet with Julien Trente and a young Siovalese baron, and joined them. I played badly and lost rather more money than I’d intended by the time the game broke up many hours later.

“So what’s your problem?” Mavros inquired after Julien and young Baron d’Albert had departed for the Night Court, purses fat with my coin.

“Nothing.” I shrugged. “This business with Carthage has me on edge. I just want it to be over.” We were drinking wine, and I swirled my cup, scowling into it. “I asked Sidonie to have her mother call off the spectacle. She refused. We argued.”

“So?” Mavros asked.

“We never argue,” I said.

“That’s a bit odd in and of itself, don’t you think?” he asked.

I shrugged again. “We did enough of it growing up. Not now. It feels wrong.”

Mavros sighed. “Look around you, Imri. The City’s full to bursting with folk eager to see the spectacle. Our new Siovalese friend was fair twitching with excitement. Carthage has been generous. What do you expect?” His voice softened. “Go tell Sidonie you’re sorry and make it up with her. You’re lousy company when you’re brooding.”

I stood. “You’re right.”

He grinned. “Good man.”

Halfway to Sidonie’s quarters, I was met by Alfonse, who had been sent to fetch me.

“Sidonie,” I said when I entered the salon. “I came to say—”

“Imriel, I’m sorry,” she said at the same moment.

“—came to say I’m sorry,” I finished. Both of us laughed. I reached out my hand. “Come here.”

“You’re right.” Sidonie twined her fingers in mine. “Somewhat about this sits wrong, and Mother agrees. She wouldn’t have Ghislain and the entire army here if she didn’t. But I asked, and there’s simply no cause to cancel without reason.”

“I know,” I said. “Mavros said the same thing. He also thinks it’s odd that we never quarrel.”

She smiled wryly. “I’m sure we will when we can afford the luxury. Right now, we’ve got the entire realm doing our quarrelling for us.”

I slid my hands around her waist, drawing her against me. “What shall we quarrel about when that blessed day arrives?”

“Oh, I don’t know.” Sidonie looped her arms around my neck, gazing up at me. “I’m sure we’ll find something. Everyone does.”

I kissed her, long and deep. “We’re not everyone.”

“No,” she murmured. “We’re not.” Her arms tightened around my neck. “Imriel, will you take me to bed? No games tonight, just us.”

I scooped her into my arms. “Love, I will do anything you wish.”

We made love for a long time that night, until the almost-full moon stood high above the balcony outside her bedchamber, silver light spilling through the open doors and drenching our bed. Afterward, we lay for a time watching it, both of us wondering. Wondering what lay in the spaces between the stars. Wondering what the morrow would bring, and wondering what would follow.

At length, Sidonie rolled over to face me. “I love you,” she said. Her shadowed eyes were wide and grave, and the moonlight behind her pinned a silvery halo on her love-tangled hair. “Very, very much.”

Elua, she made my heart ache.

I wound a lock of her hair around my fingers, feeling it catch on my knotted gold ring; a living echo of the gilded cord that bound us together. “Always,” I said. “Always and always.”

Despite my misgivings, I slept soundly that night.

I woke with a vague memory of my dreams, of beseeching Hyacinthe to fill the night sky with clouds that they might blot out the moon and ruin the Carthaginian horologists’ spectacle. For the space of a few heartbeats, between sleeping and waking, I thought it was true, and my heart grew lighter. But then I opened my eyes to find the bedchamber filled with sunlight, and Sidonie, fully dressed, standing at the end of the bed and regarding me with amusement.

“Lazy boy,” she said with affection.

I smiled at her and patted the bed. “Come back and join me?”

“I can’t,” Sidonie said ruefully, shaking her head. Gold shivered and glinted. Her hair was coiled in a coronet and she was wearing the earrings I’d given her for—Elua!—her seventeenth birthday, it had been. Golden suns, miniatures of the pendant she’d worn on the Longest Night the time I’d first kissed her. “I’m to attend a meeting between General Astegal and the Euskerri delegation.”

I yawned and stretched. “Are the Euskerri intriguing with Carthage now?”

“Trying.” She eyed me. “You needn’t look so tempting.”

“This scarred thing?” I asked flippantly, gesturing at my body.

“Mm-hmm.” Sidonie’s lips curved. “That very one.” She stooped to kiss me, her lips lingering on mine. “I’ll see you later.”

It was a strange day and it passed slowly. I felt caught between warring moods, my apprehension at odds with last night’s tenderness, and all of it overshadowed by the vast change looming on the horizon.

I dined that afternoon at Phèdre’s townhouse. I didn’t tell the whole story of how I’d coerced Gillimas, but I reported what I’d learned from him. In turn, I learned from Phèdre that the Governor of Cythera was one Ptolemy Solon, a kinsman of the Pharaoh of Menekhet, although he ruled under the auspices of Khebbel-im-Akkad.

And I learned from Ti-Philippe, when he joined us a bit later, that there were rumors among the sailors about the Governor’s mistress.

“The same story?” I asked. “The Bella Donna?”

Ti-Philippe pursed his lips thoughtfully. “Not exactly. But the isle of Cythera was once sacred to the Hellenes as the home of their goddess of love and desire. It is rumored that her likeness has returned in mortal flesh.”

“That would be your mother,” Phèdre said calmly.

I groaned. “Isn’t she a bit old for it?”

Phèdre raised her brows at me.

“I’ll not say much in Melisande’s favor,” Joscelin intervened with rare diplomacy. “But I will say one thing. Among a folk renowned for beauty and aging with grace, she does stand out.”

“What do you reckon is our best course?” I asked, steering the conversation onto safer shoals.

We talked for a while about plausible tales we could concoct to send a fleet of ships to Cythera to apprehend my mother without alerting her in advance, while at the same time maintaining the goodwill of Khebbel-im-Akkad. By the time I departed for the Palace, afternoon was finally wearing on toward evening.

There was a small formal meal that night with the Carthaginians, which I attended as a member of House Courcel. I was in no mood for small talk, and it seemed to drag on forever. All I wanted was for this night to be over, so I could lay aside my fears and at last address head-on the shadow that had been hanging over Sidonie and me for the past year.

It wasn’t until we were lingering over glasses of cordial that the Court horologist came, quivering with excitement, to report that the hour was nigh. Even at that, Astegal assured us that we had well over an hour’s time before the moon would be completely obscured. Not until that moment would the effects be visible.

“How long will it last?” Drustan inquired.

“At least an hour.” Astegal smiled. “The heavens move slowly in their stately dance. There will be ample time for you to bask.”

“Or ample time for many to glimpse the marvels you promise,” noted Ysandre, who had dispatched a contingent of the Royal Army to ensure that matters proceeded in an orderly fashion, and as many folk as possible were able to share the spectacle.

Astegal accorded her a brief bow. “Her majesty is a generous ruler.”