Django Wexler - The Shadow Throne

“Then what? Just give up?”

Marcus shrugged. “It’s a possibility. Speaking as someone who’d probably lose his head, I’m against it.”

Winter glanced at Jane, and her lips tightened. Speaking of people who would lose their heads. .

“I’m open to suggestions,” she said.

“Look. We both know that even if you’d managed to put me in charge, I wouldn’t be able to stop Orlanko.” He paused. “And we both know that if you did want to try, there’s only one person I’d put money on.”

Winter bit her lip. “Janus.”

“Janus,” Marcus said.

“Janus, as in Count Mieran?” Jane said. “The Minister of Justice?”

“He beat thirty thousand Khandarai with one regiment of infantry,” Marcus said. “If you’re looking for someone to put in charge, he’s your man.”

“I don’t doubt that he’s a genius,” Jane said, in a tone that implied she doubted it very much. “But can we trust him? He’s a noble, after all, and obviously he was close to the old king.”

Winter and Marcus exchanged a look. Winter could tell the captain was thinking along the same lines she was, about the temple in the desert and the Thousand Names.

Can we trust him?

“I can’t speak for the long run,” Winter said, slowly. “But I know for certain that he hates Orlanko and the Borels.”

Marcus nodded. “His head is on the block, too, if Orlanko returns.”

“But I don’t think the deputies would agree,” Winter went on. “Janus is too popular with the mob.”

“Even after he ordered Danton’s arrest?” Marcus asked.

“In the streets they’re blaming that on the Last Duke,” Jane said. “Janus is still ‘the conqueror of Khandar.’ That counts for a lot right now.”

“All right, he’s a hero. So much the better, I would think,” Marcus said.

“It means the deputies won’t trust him,” Jane said.

Winter nodded. “They were terrified of handing over leadership, even to someone like Peddoc, for fear that he would turn the Guard against them. As far as they’re concerned, someone with Janus’ reputation might try to set himself up as king.”

“We need him,” Marcus said. “Even if you could convince the deputies to put me in command, I wouldn’t take it. Better to surrender than to fight and give Orlanko an excuse for brutality. If we had Janus. .” He shrugged. “I would fight, if he thought it could be done.”

“Maybe if we had him address the deputies?” Winter said. “He’s not Danton, but he can speak when he needs to.” She was thinking of the mutiny in the desert, and by his wince Marcus was, too. “But-”

“You’re going at it backward,” Jane said.

Winter and Marcus both turned to her.

“You’re thinking of the deputies like a kind of collective king,” she said. “But it’s different. They have only as much power as the people are willing to give them. We don’t have to argue them into it. We just have to convince them.”

–

The commotion had calmed down by the time Winter and Jane left the Vendre. Those Guards who were going to join Peddoc had gone, leaving mostly Reds with a scattering of unconvinced Greens. A few of these had regained enough alertness to give odd looks to the two young women strolling out of the prison, and Winter smiled at them serenely.

As they passed out through the main gate, Jane said suddenly, “Do you really think this will work?”

Winter blinked. “It was your idea, wasn’t it?”

“Not that part. Once Janus is in command, do you really think he can stop Orlanko?”

“If he can’t, no one can.”

Jane shook her head. “That’s not good enough. Captain d’Ivoire was right. We could surrender.”

“Assuming Peddoc loses. .”

Jane snorted.

“If we surrender, Orlanko will certainly round up any traitors he can catch. That means you and me.”

“We could get away.” Jane grinned wickedly. “You escaped from Mrs. Wilmore. How much harder could it be to get away from the Last Duke?”

“And leave everyone behind? The Leatherbacks, your girls?” Winter hesitated only slightly. “Abby?”

“If we don’t surrender, they’ll fight, and maybe die. And if we lose, you know what Orlanko would do to the city.”

It was all too easy to picture. Blue-uniformed soldiers in the streets, and black-coats smashing down doors, dragging people into the night. .

“I don’t want to pull everyone into that,” Jane said, “just to save our skins. Not if you don’t think we can win.”

Winter thought about this for a long moment. “I’ll give Janus this much. If he thinks we can win, then it’s possible. And if he doesn’t think so, he’d say it. I think the best we can do is put him in charge, one way or another.”

“All right.” Jane stretched and cracked her knuckles over her head, the old wicked smile creeping across her face. “Let’s see what we can do.”

RAESINIA

The setting sun painted a pale crimson line through the gun slit in Raesinia’s chamber on the top floor of the Vendre. It was a spacious room, and some effort had been made in the way of hangings and furniture to make it into a fit habitation for a queen. No amount of carpets or tapestries could conceal the thickness of the stone walls, though, or the fact that the door was locked from the outside and watched by the Patriot Guard day and night. The gun slit was not large enough to squeeze through, even for a prisoner like Raesinia who was willing to chance the four-story fall.

It was from just above here, after all, that she’d fallen with Faro.

She wondered if she could have avoided that, somehow. Was there some point on the twisting path where she could have taken a different turn, so that Ben wouldn’t have been killed, Faro wouldn’t have turned traitor? So that it wouldn’t have come to this , waiting in a cell barely a week after her father’s death. Some history the reign of Queen Raesinia will make.

Still. Better the Deputies-General than Orlanko. Better the mob than the Church and its demons. It was a small comfort, but it was all she had. If that wasn’t true, if the people weren’t better off, then everything she’d done was both monumentally selfish and ultimately pointless, given how it had ended up. She wasn’t sure she could live with that.

Not that I have a choice in the matter.

There was a knock at the door. Raesinia sat up in bed. Servants came and went all the time, but they didn’t knock. She’d had no other visitors.

“Yes?”

“I wonder if you have a moment to see me, Your Majesty,” came a voice from outside. It took Raesinia a moment to recognize it as Maurisk’s. He sounded hoarse.

“Of course,” she said. “Come in.”

She stood up and crossed to the table as he entered. There was a crystal pitcher of water there, and a bowl of fruit.

“I’m afraid I can’t offer much in the way of hospitality,” she said. “But help yourself.”

Maurisk didn’t smile. His thin face didn’t seem made for smiles, and since she’d last seen him it had grown even less cheerful. His eyes were sunken and dark, almost bruised, and his cheekbones stood out sharply through his thin, pale flesh.

He was dressed more respectably than in their Blue Mask days, complete with the black sash of a deputy, trimmed with a band of cloth-of-gold. One hand tugged at the sash constantly, adjusting it this way and that. His lips were tight and cold.

He said nothing while the guard shut the door behind him, only stared hard at Raesinia’s face. She felt herself flush under the scrutiny, and put on her haughtiest expression.