S Farrell - A Magic of Nightfall

The volatile tone was the reaction he’d expected, and Sergei grinned quickly to make it seem that the words were only a jest. “Hardly,” Sergei told him. “Just pointing out how Allesandra might respond. Certainly Sigourney or Donatien would be good choices, as you suggest, though perhaps we need Donatien to remain as commandant in the Hellins. However, Audric’s not dead, and I’d prefer that he stay that way. But if the worst would happen… You’re right; we should be considering the succession. The Holdings are already broken, thanks to Justi’s incompetence, and we can’t afford to have what is left shatter further.” He paused. He deliberately narrowed his eyes and stroked his chin, as if the thought had just now occurred to him. “But

… Perhaps a compromise could be worked between the Holdings and the Coalition if the worst happened, Kenne. A ca’Vorl to take the Sun Throne, but the Concenzia Faith ruled by you, not Semini ca’Cellibrecca.” There. See what he makes of the offer.

“You’d have Ana’s murderers seated on the Sun Throne?” The horror in the man’s voice was palpable.

Sergei sniffed-a loud sound, whistling through the metal nostrils of his false nose. “You’re making the same accusation as Ambassador ca’Vliomani. As of the moment, it’s unfounded.”

“Who else would have done this to Ana, Sergei? We know it wasn’t the Numetodo-she was their ally.”

Sergei didn’t push the point any further. He already knew what he needed to know. “That’s something my people are trying to determine. And we will.” The sunset fire no longer burned in the western sky. The stars were competing against the colder flames of the teni-lamps, and the evening chill was settling around the city. Sergei shivered and rose from his chair. His knee joints cracked and protested at the movement; he grunted with the effort. Sergei could still feel the ache in his muscles and the lingering bruises from when he’d flung himself over Audric in the temple.

Old men, indeed…

Petros must have been watching (and undoubtedly listening, as well) through the cracks of the temple doors; as soon as Sergei stood the doors opened and an e’teni attendant hurried to him with his overcloak. He could see Petros standing in the gloom of the corridor beyond. “I should be checking on Audric, Archigos,” Sergei said as he shrugged on the woolen folds. “If you find someone with the skills we were discussing, please bring him or her to the palais immediately.”

“I’ll stop by myself in a turn of the glass or so,” Kenne said. “Petros will have my supper ready now, but I’ll come afterward. To see what I can do.”

“Thank you, Archigos,” Sergei told him. “I will see you then, perhaps.”

As he walked away from the temple, he wondered whether his message had reached Brezno yet, and what reception it might have found.

“ Your boy’s shot was as good as any I could make,” Fynn declared.

Allesandra doubted that. Jan might not have the bulk and power of Fynn’s muscular frame. He might not be able to wield the heavy weight of water-hardened steel someone like Fynn could manage with ease, but the boy could ride like no one else and he had an eye with an arrow that very few could match. Allesandra was certain that neither Fynn nor anyone else there could have hit, much less brought down, the stag from the back of a galloping horse.

But it seemed best to simply nod, give Fynn a false smile, and agree. It was safest, but conceding the falsehood still hurt when her pride in her son made her want to object. She stored it with the other hurts and insults Fynn and her vatarh had given her over the years. The pile in her mind was already mountainous. “Indeed, Brother. He’s been taught well in Magyaria. Pauli was famous for his horseback archery when he was young; it would seem that Jan has acquired that ability from his vatarh.”

“It was lucky I was there to take the final shot, though, or the stag would have escaped.”

Allesandra smiled again, though she knew it was neither luck nor fortune, only Jan demonstrating that he knew better than to entirely eclipse the presence of the Hirzg. A political move, as adroit as any she might have made.

The two of them were walking along the eastern balcony of the Stag Fall Palais-as private as one could be within the estate. Gardai stood at stiff attention where the balcony turned to the north and south, their stoic avoidance of the Hirzg and A’Hirzg obvious as they stared outward; from the windows left open to catch the evening breeze, they could hear the murmuring of the guests at the table they’d just left. Allesandra could pick out Jan’s voice as he laughed at something Semini said.

She looked eastward, toward the evening mist rising in its soft, slow tide from the valleys toward the steep slopes in which the palais was nestled. The tops of the evergreens below them were wrapped in strands of white cloud, though the wind-scoured and treeless peaks above remained swaddled in sun that sparked from the granite cliffs and the clinging snowbanks. Somewhere hidden in the mist below, a waterfall burbled and sang.

“It’s truly beautiful here,” Allesandra said. “I never realized that when I was here as a girl. Great-Vatarh Karin picked a perfect location: gorgeous, and perfectly defensible. No army could ever take Stag Fall if it were well-defended.”

Fynn nodded, though he didn’t seem to be looking at the landscape. Instead, he was fiddling with the brocaded cuff of his sleeve. “I asked you to walk with me so we could speak alone, Sister,” he said.

“I thought as much. We ca’Vorls rarely do anything without ulterior motives, do we?” she said. A quick smile played with her lips. “What did you want to say to me, little brother?”

He grinned-briefly-at that, the thick scar on his cheek twitching with the motion. “You never knew me when I was little.”

“There was good reason for that.” Yes, that hurt was at the very heart of the mountain inside, the seed from which it had all grown.. ..

“Or a bad one. I didn’t understand then, Allesandra, why Vatarh left you in Nessantico for so long. After he finally told me about you, I always wondered why Vatarh let my sister languish in another country, one he so obviously hated.”

“Do you understand now?” she asked, then continued before he could respond. “Because I still don’t. I always waited for him to apologize to me, or to explain. But he never would. And now…”

“I don’t want to be your enemy, Allesandra.”

“Are we enemies, Fynn?”

“That’s what I’m asking you. I would like to know.”

Allesandra waited before answering. The marble railing of the balcony was damp under her hand, the swirls of pale blue in the milky stone varnished by dew. “Are you thinking that if our positions were reversed, that if I’d been named Hirzgin by Vatarh, then you would consider me your enemy?” she asked carefully.

He made a face, his hand sweeping through the cool air as if he were swiping at an annoying insect. “So many words…” He sighed loudly and she could hear his irritation in it. “You make speeches that slip in my ears and make my own words twist their meanings, Allesandra. I’ve never been someone able to fence with words and speeches-it’s not one of my skills. It wasn’t one of Vatarh’s either. Vatarh always said exactly what he thought: no more, no less, and what he didn’t want someone to know, he didn’t say at all. I asked you a simple enough question, Allesandra: are you my enemy? Please do me the courtesy of giving me a plain, unadorned answer.”

“No,” she answered firmly, and then shook her head. “Fynn, only an idiot would answer you with anything other than ‘No, we’re not enemies.’ You know that, too, despite your protestations. You may be many things, but you’re not that simple, and I’m not that foolish to fall into so obvious a trap. What’s the real question you’re asking?”