Joe Abercrombie - Half a King

In spite of all that happiness, though-or more likely because of it-Yarvi scarcely enjoyed the marriage of his mother more than he had the burning of his father. That event Yarvi had been unable to avoid. If anyone noticed him steal away from this one, no doubt they were not sad to see it.

The weather outside better suited his mood than the petal-scented warmth within. There was a seeking wind off the gray sea that day, and it moaned among the battlements of the citadel and cut at him with a salt rain as he wandered up the worn steps and along the empty walkways.

He saw her from far off, on the roof of the Godshall, clothes far too thin plastered to her with the rain, hair furiously whipping in the wind. He saw her in good time. He could have walked on and found another place to frown at the sky. But his feet led him towards her.

“Prince Yarvi,” she said as he came close, tearing a scrap from her bitten-down thumbnail with her teeth and spitting it into the wind. “What an honor.”

Yarvi sighed. There was a wearying pattern to the last few days. “I’m not a prince any more, Isriun.”

“No? Your mother is queen again, isn’t she? She has the key to the treasury of Gettland on her chain?” Her white hand strayed to her chest, where there was no key, no chain, nothing any more. “What’s a queen’s son, if not a prince?”

“A crippled fool?” he muttered.

“You were that when we met, and no doubt always will be. Not to mention the child of a traitor.”

“Then we have more in common than ever,” snapped Yarvi, and saw her pale face twitch, and instantly regretted it. Had things been only a little different, it might have been the two of them raised up in glory down below. He in the Black Chair, she upon the stool beside him, eyes shining as she gently held his withered hand, as they shared that better kiss she had asked for on his return …

But things were as they were. There would be no kisses today. Not today, not ever. He turned to look at the heaving sea, his fists bunched on the parapet. “I didn’t come to argue.”

“Why did you come?”

“I thought I should tell you, since …” He gritted his teeth, and looked down at his twisted hand, white on the wet stone. Since what? Since we were promised? Since we once meant something to each other? He could not bring himself to say the words. “I’m leaving for Skekenhouse. I’m taking the Minister’s Test. I’ll have no family, no birthright, and … no wife.”

She laughed into the wind. “And more in common yet. I’ve no friends, no dowry, and no father.” She turned to look at him then, and the hatred in her eyes made him feel sick. “They sank his body in the midden.”

Perhaps that should have made Yarvi glad. He had dreamed of it often enough, bent all his prayers and all his will towards it. Broken everything, and sacrificed his friend and his friendships for it. But looking into Isriun’s face, red eyes sunken in shadowed sockets, he felt no triumph.

“I’m sorry. Not for him, but for you.”

Her mouth twisted with contempt. “What do you think that’s worth to me?”

“Nothing. But I’m sorry still.” And he took his hands from the parapet, and turned his back on his betrothed, and walked towards the steps.

“I’ve sworn an oath!”

Yarvi paused. He wanted very much to leave that blasted roof and never return, but now the skin on his neck prickled, and he turned back despite himself. “Oh?”

“A sun-oath and a moon-oath.” Isriun’s eyes burned in her white face and her wet hair lashed at her. “I swore it before She Who Judges, and He Who Remembers, and She Who Makes Fast the Knot. My ancestors buried above the beach bore witness. He Who Watches and She Who Writes bore witness. Now you bear witness, Yarvi. It will be a chain upon me and a goad within me. I will be revenged upon the killers of my father. I have sworn it!”

She smiled a twisted smile, then. A mockery of the one she gave him when she left the Godshall on the day they were promised. “So you see, a woman can swear the same oath as a man.”

“If she’s fool enough,” said Yarvi, as he turned away.

Mother Sun smiled even as she sank beneath the world on the evening Brother Yarvi came home.

The first day of summer, the Gettlanders had declared it, with cats basking on the hot roofs of Thorlby, the seabirds calling lazy to one another, the slightest breeze carrying a salt tang up the steep lanes and through the open windows of the city.

Through the door to Mother Gundring’s chambers too, when Yarvi finally managed to wrestle the heavy latch open with his crippled hand.

“The wanderer returns,” said the old minister, putting aside her book in a puff of dust.

“Mother Gundring.” Yarvi bowed low, and presented her with the cup.

“And you have brought me tea.” She closed her eyes, and sniffed the steam, then sipped, and swallowed. Her lined face broke into the smile which Yarvi had always felt so proud to see. “Things have not been the same without you.”

“You need never want for tea again, at least.”

“Then you passed the test?”

“Did you ever doubt?”

“Not I, Brother Yarvi, not I. And yet you wear a sword.” She frowned towards Shadikshirram’s blade, sheathed at his waist. “A kind word parries most blows.”

“I carry this for the others. It reminds me where I’ve come from. A minister stands for Father Peace, but a good one is no stranger to Mother War.”

“Hah! True enough.” Mother Gundring held out her hand to the stool on the other side of the firepit. The one where Yarvi had so often sat, following the old minister’s stories with rapt attention, learning tongues, and history, and the lore of plants, and the proper way to speak to a king. Could it really be only a few months since he last sat there? It seemed he had done so in a different world. In a dream.

And now he had woken.

“I am glad you are back,” said Mother Gundring, “and not just because of your tea. We have much to do in Thorlby.”

“I don’t think people love me here.”

Mother Gundring shrugged it off. “Already they forget. Folk have short memories.”

“The minister’s task is to remember.”

“And to advise, to heal, to speak truth and know the secret ways, to find the lesser evil and weigh the greater good, to smooth the path for Father Peace in every tongue, to spin tales-”

“Shall I spin a tale for you?”

“What manner of tale, Brother Yarvi?”

“A tale of blood and deceit, of money and murder, of treachery and power.”

Mother Gundring laughed, and took another sip from her cup. “The only sort I enjoy. Has it elves in it? Dragons? Trolls?

Yarvi shook his head. “People can do all the evil we’ll need.”

“True again. Is it something you heard in Skekenhouse?”

“Partly. I’ve been working at this tale for a long time. Ever since that night my father died. But I think I have it now from start to end.”

“Knowing your talents it must be a fine tale indeed.”

“You will thrill to it, Mother Gundring.”

“Then begin!”

Yarvi sat forward, looking into the flames, rubbing at his twisted palm with his thumb. He had been rehearsing it ever since he passed the test, gave up his birthright and was accepted into the Ministry. Ever since he kissed the cheek of Grandmother Wexen, looked into her eyes, found them brighter and hungrier than ever, and knew the truth. “I find I hardly know where to begin.”

“Set it up. Let’s have the background.”

“Good advice,” said Yarvi. “But yours always has been. So … a High King well past his youth, and a grandmother of the Ministry no closer to hers, most jealous of their power, as the powerful often are, looked to the north from Skekenhouse, and saw a threat to their majesty. Not a great man wielding iron and steel, but a great woman wielding gold and silver. A golden queen, with a plan to stamp coins all of one weight, so that every trade about the Shattered Sea would be made with her face.”