The Queen's Gambit (39 page)

“Does the council advise war?”

“Aye, they want it. The old fools. They won't be riding against these barbarians, but I'll be expected to lead our forces in the thick of it.”

She nibbled at his shoulder. “Your majesty will look splendid in armor.”

“Well, I don't like the thought of it. I've seen these savages in action, my dear, and they're damned terrifying. Besides, there's the queen threatening civil war from the north. I can't fight her and the barbarians at the same time, you know.”

“I am sure your majesty will think of the solution. You're so brave and clever.”

“I don't feel brave and clever,” he said wearily. “I feel underfinanced and cornered. There simply isn't enough money to do
everything.
If only Pheresa would die. She's ill, you know.”

“I heard,” Hedrina said quietly. “She did something foolish and caused your son to die.”

He shrugged. “So 'tis rumored. But even if Thod takes her, that will not solve all the problem.”

“What do you need?” Hedrina asked.

“More men. And more money. But, morde, I might as well ask for the Chalice of Eternal Life as get either.”

“You can have exactly what you desire, my love,” she murmured, nuzzling his ear.

“Nay,” he said, shifting his head away from her caresses. “ 'Tis not that simple. Even your magic kisses, my sweet, cannot comfort me tonight.”

“Listen,” she said, pressing her hand over his heart. “Why not form a new alliance?”

“If you think I'm going to appeal to Nether for help, nay! Theloi has warned me the Netherans can't be trusted, treaty or no treaty. They're lying in wait, ready to take advantage of our troubles. Turning to them would be like letting a cat into the birdcage.”

Hedrina had begun to trace a complex pattern over his heart with her fingernail. “What about a treaty with Gant?” she whispered.

He flinched, but she was still tracing the pattern over his heart, repeating it endlessly. Frowning, he found himself saying, “What mean you by this?”

“Gant has wealth. Gant has an army.”

He laughed softly. “Nay. Nether squashed Gant into the dust, and they haven't recovered yet.”

“Gant can supply the men you need. Hear me, Lervan,” she said persuasively, her nail tracing the pattern faster. He found his heartbeat thudding in time with it, and he felt
breathless and strange. “Gant has special powers,” she said, “which you need in this time of crisis. Why not use them?”

I have,
he nearly said aloud, and clamped his lips shut in dismay. He would never confess aloud his part in Verence's untimely death. “You're dreaming,” he managed to say, but his tongue felt thick and unruly.
How much wine have I drunk tonight?
he wondered. “The people,” he said, struggling to speak, “would never accept such an alliance.”

“Why need the people know? You don't really fear the Gantese, do you? What harm have they ever done to you?”

“They—they—” He stopped, unable to go on. His mind was spinning. He thought of another beauty long ago, with flashing eyes and unbound hair and their meeting in the woods. She, too, had clouded his mind and made his senses reel with forbidden thoughts. He could not recall her name, only that he'd killed her, and she'd laid a curse on him.

But the curse hadn't come true. He was king now, due to be crowned in a few months. Everything that he'd always desired was coming to him. He had only to be patient, had only to find his way through this difficulty, and then true power would lie in his hands.

Hedrina was still whispering, her voice like honey, fragrance, and smoke in his mind. He felt drugged by the persuasion in her voice. “Why fear Gant? Has their magic ever harmed you? Extend your hand in friendship, Lervan, granting trade routes between Mandria and Gant, and the Chief Believer will see that your enemies trouble you no more.”

Acceptance filled his throat. He lay defenseless in her hands. For her, he would do anything. And yet, some lingering sense of caution came to him. “The queen,” he said thickly.

Hedrina's caresses stopped abruptly, and he felt as though he'd been thrown over a cliff, plummeting headlong down into an abyss far from her. “Yes?” she said coldly.

“Let the Chief Believer prove his good intentions. Eliminate her, and I will agree to his terms.”

Hedrina began to laugh. It was a cold, merciless sound. “Is
that all?” she asked. “My dearest, is that your only condition?”

He tried to think, telling himself to take care, but prudence had no chance. He was drunk or mad or bewitched, and if her little spells were an example of Gantese magic, he wanted more of them. Hedrina had become as necessary to him as the blood in his veins. He needed her too much to question what she said or did. After all, why should he care what befell Mandria if it allied itself to Gant? All he wanted was ease, luxury, and Hedrina's arms. The consequences could take care of themselves.

“ 'Tis rumored she's protected by the Chalice, but, Lervan, is the queen's death all you require to seal this bargain?”

“That's all I want,” he replied.

Her mouth was warm and soft, her skin like silk as she slid her body across his. “Then you shall have it,” she murmured.

And Lervan lost himself in her fire once more.

At Thirst, Aelintide came, the celebrations lasting for two days of feasting and merriment. After that, the snows fell, blanketing the hold and the land beyond it in a soft cloud of white. A bitter wind blew around the eaves, whistling through arrow slits in the defense turrets, rattling the shutters over the windows.

Pheresa lay in her bed, watching the shadows of a snowy dawn lighten to gray around her. That's what she felt, cold and gray and empty. So very empty. She had carried life, but it was gone now, extinguished and taken from her. Her son had never cried. His blue fists had been so tiny, so miraculously perfect. She glimpsed him once, wrapped in a cloth and rubbed by Oola before the fire, but then Oola's efforts had stilled and all was silent as the servant carried him away.

The door clicked open, and someone came inside, skirts rustling. A tray was set down beside her, and a lamp lit.

The light hurt Pheresa's eyes, and she turned her face away.

“Your majesty?” Oola said in concern. “I've brought you some good, hearty broth and bread. Have a little, won't you?”

Pheresa ignored her, and after a while Oola sniveled in her apron and left. Then the physician came. He asked questions in his calm, deep voice. Pheresa ignored him, too. What she wanted was gone, taken from her forever. She had never held her son, and she ached for him desperately, so desperately she wanted to scream aloud for Thod to give him back.

But her child could not come back, and she wanted nothing else. She could not cry out for him, and so she said nothing at all. She lay in this empty place, listening to her own breathing, and she did not want even that.

The physician's hand slid across her brow and rested there. “The fever is gone,” he announced with satisfaction. “Your majesty will get better now. You will regain your strength, but only if you eat something. Will you not try?”

She frowned, staring at the wall. “Withdraw,” she said coldly, and, finally, they went away.

Of course they came back. They always did, every few hours, to try to cajole her again. After a while she began to feel hungry, as though her body meant to betray her, too. She tried to ignore it, but the hunger only grew, and the next time Oola came with a tray, Pheresa nibbled a little of the pastries.

After that, she consented to sit up for a short time each afternoon, staring at the snow falling outside her window while the countess read aloud and Carolie embroidered. She did not want to grow stronger, but the physician's prediction proved correct. Her body, it seemed, wanted to live, even if her spirit was broken. This puzzled her, for she had read in her philosophy scrolls that a broken heart broke all else within the body, causing it to pine and wither. Yet in her case, this did not happen. She felt that her improving health was a betrayal of that small, sweet creature who had once lived inside her womb. They should have died together, and yet she'd been left behind.

Then it occurred to her that living with this empty ache in her heart and soul was Thod's punishment for having failed her child.

“Sir Thum is at the door this morning,” Lady Carolie said to her one day. A wintry sun was trying to melt the icicles
hanging outside the window. “He has come three times before. Will your majesty not consent to receive a visitor?”

“The queen sees no one,” Pheresa replied.

With a curtsy, Carolie went to the door, and murmured to Sir Thum, “Nay, sir, she will not see you. I'm sorry.”

“Is she ailing again?”

“She's much stronger, but she grieves as fiercely as ever.”

“Have you told her about Talmor?”

“Nay, sir. She's not asked about him, and on the physician's orders we dare not mention his name.”

“Pity. Well, thank you, my lady. I'll come again at a later time. There's much she should know.”

Pheresa listened to this brief, soft-voiced exchange with a deepening frown. What did they mean about Sir Talmor? He was dead, surely. She had not wanted to think about it, had not wanted to face her part in bringing about his horrible fate. That was why she had not asked about him.

A feeling of restlessness seized her. Throwing back the bedcovers, she got weakly to her feet.

Lady Carolie jumped up to steady her balance. “Your majesty—”

“I will visit my baby's grave,” Pheresa announced.

It caused a commotion, but the physician gave his approval. Pheresa was gowned and wrapped in numerous layers, with a heavy fur cloak pulled tightly about her. Then, carried in the arms of the gruff, taciturn Thirst knight who had been assigned as her protector, she was taken to the chapel. Inside the dim quiet place, she was set down, and she walked unsteadily past the altar and crypt and outside into a small graveyard, where a rowan tree spread gnarled branches above the headstones.

She gazed down at the stark inscription:
unnamed son of Queen Pheresa and Duc Lervan of Mandria.
The icy wind blew gusts that made her shiver. What a bleak, unhappy place, she thought. Her son should not be here, and yet what happiness had he known?

“He should have been named,” she said.

Lady Carolie wept quietly into a handkerchief. The
countess looked cold and tired, her face haunted by memories of her own.

The priest, unkempt as usual, shuffled forward with his hands tucked deep in his wide sleeves. “ 'Tis impossible to name him, your majesty. The church recognizes no premature birth unless the baby lives. If—”

“Hush, Father,” Sir Thum said, coming up. “She needs no lecture on Writ at this time.”

With the priest firmly dismissed, Thum joined Pheresa. His hazel eyes were somber and kind. She was afraid he would speak, but he did not, and after a few moments she relaxed and took comfort in his presence.

She wished she could cry. There would have been solace and relief in tears. But her arrogance and stupidity had cost the lives of her child and Talmor, and in her guilt she could not weep for them.

Instead, her gaze swept across the other graves, searching the names without finding Talmor's. At last she turned to Sir Thum with puzzlement.

“Aye, majesty,” he said quietly, watching her. “He lives still.”

She stared at him, unable to believe it, and found her eyes suddenly awash with burning tears. Something that had lain dead in her heart unfurled and began to lift.

“What say you?” she whispered, her voice thick and unsteady. “How can this be?”

“He's a strong man, stronger than most.”

“But I saw him go down. I saw the hurlhound bite—” Her voice failed her, and she could not say it. The images assailed her mind, still too bright and nightmarish to endure. She shuddered and with great effort met Thum's gaze. “He cannot live from such grievous wounds.”