S Farrell - A Magic of Dawn

Brie continued to stare at her as Rhianna’s voice faded and went silent. “You should leave the staff gossip and speculations at the door, Rhianna,” she said to her. “It’s been a stressful day, but that doesn’t excuse spreading rumors.”

Rhianna flushed furiously, curtsying at the rebuke. “I apologize, Hirzgin. I’m sorry.”

Brie waved her silent. “Don’t let it happen again,” she said.

“I won’t, Hirzgin. Ma’am, Paulus also told me to have your domestiques de chambre and those of the Hirzg start packing for Stag Fall. With your leave, Hirzgin, I should go find them and tell them.”

“Yes, certainly,” Brie said. “Go on with you, then.”

Rhianna curtsied again. She turned and hurried away. Brie stared at the door for several breaths after it closed behind her. Then she sighed. “Come, children. Your vatarh has sent up some fruit. Let’s eat, and then perhaps we can have a game of chevaritt…”

Erik rolled away from her, leaving her body momentarily chilled. Allesandra reached down and pulled the blanket up over herself. She glanced over at Erik, panting next to her. “Satisfied?” she asked. His body, in the candlelight, was heavy and dark, the light glimmering from the polished flesh of his skull and glinting from the white hairs snagged in his midnight beard.

From above the fireplace at the foot of the bed, Kraljica Marguerite stared down at the lovers from her painting, her expression severe.

Erik groaned and nodded. “By Cenzi, woman, you’re a tigress. A danger to all men. You’ve destroyed me entirely.” His voice was a purr, a low growl, and his eyes regarded her possessively.

She smiled at that. But he didn’t ask her the same question she’d asked him; he never did. She wondered if that would begin to do more than annoy her one day. She wondered if he looked at her, saw her age and the way her breasts sagged and her stomach rounded, and whether he wished he were with someone younger, someone who could give him children. She would never give him that, even if she wanted it; her monthly flow had ended a few years ago. The seed that filled her belly now could do nothing.

But she could offer him things that no younger woman could, that no other woman in the world could. She wondered again if she would make that offer to him.

“Perhaps.”

“Hmm?”

Allesandra laughed, not realizing she’d said the word aloud. “Perhaps you would like some refreshment, my love? I could ring for the servants…”

“No, not unless you want something for yourself.” There was silence for a moment; she wondered whether he was falling asleep. “Allesandra?”

“Yes, love?”

“This offer to the Hirzg. If he accepts it. What then happens with me?”

He was staring at her; she could feel his gaze. She held it in the darkness. “I’ve already told you that when the Holdings are one again, I will make certain that a true Gyula sits on West Magyaria’s throne. You shouldn’t worry yourself.”

“Yet I do. When the Holdings are one again, the Kraljica might not want to cause yet more dissent.”

“You talk of this Kraljica as if she were some other woman.”

His hand stroked her side. “My family has been involved in the politics of the Holdings all my life, by necessity. Forgive me for saying this, but one thing my vatarh always told me was that the promise of a Kralji could not buy a beer in the tavern: even a barkeep knows that the Kralji might decide that the folia is better spent somewhere else, and leave you with the tab.”

“You believe I’m that cold?” she asked, and she knew he could hear the warning in her voice. “You think you mean that little to me?” His hand stroked her arm and found her hand, but she didn’t return the pressure of his fingers. He hurried to answer.

“No, of course not.” A breath. A sigh. “I would be lost without you. Truly. Being with you, well, I’ve never felt this way with anyone, not even the matarh of my children. I just hate to think.. .”

“Then don’t think,” she told him. Her voice snapped more sharply than she intended, and she softened her tone. “Just feel what I tell you, and accept it.”

He laughed then, and his hands roamed the slope of her side, falling into the hollow of her hips. His hands tightened there, and he pulled her toward him. His mouth sought hers, his beard brushing her skin. His hands cupped her as he brought her on top of him. She looked down at him, and he seemed vulnerable and almost boyish.

She smiled at that thought. She brought her head down and kissed him deeply, her mouth opening, her hands on either side of his face. When she finally pulled away, gasping, she leaned on her elbows, a cloud hovering above his landscape. Firelight rippled across his face and she saw the eager expression there. “No more thinking, and no more worrying,” she told him. “At least not for a bit…”

Sergei sat in his chair like a wizened toad, one hand clutching the end of his staff, his silver nose reflecting the morning light from the window overlooking the palais gardens. Erik was seated near him, and his face was dark and red with a flush. Allesandra had left her own chair behind her desk, pacing near the balcony entrance.

“I wonder, sometimes, if you aren’t conspiring with my son, Ambassador,” she said. “I thought that you believed you could convince him to accept the offer we tendered.”

“I told you, Kraljica, that I thought he would listen to it sympathetically. And he did exactly that.”

“Yet he requires that I abdicate the throne in seven years in favor of him.”

Sergei gave a nod that sent motes of light scattering along the wall like bright cockroaches. “Yes,” he answered simply. “If you agree to that and state so publicly, the Hirzg will dissolve the Coalition, freeing the member countries to make whatever choice they wish: to rejoin the Holdings or remain independent.” Sergei smiled slightly. “Like you, Kraljica, he doesn’t expect any of them to choose the latter course. And he will bring the army of Firenzcia here to help defend Nessantico against the Tehuantin.”

“What of West Magyaria and the false Gyula he set on its throne?” Erik interjected before Allesandra could respond. “What does the Hirzg say of that?”

Sergei glanced over at Erik. He seemed to look the man up and down with a smirk of disdain. “Of that he said nothing at all,” he said. “He didn’t seem to consider the throne of the Gyula important enough for comment or negotiation.”

“Then he’s a fool,” Erik spat. “With West Magyaria at the Kraljica’s side, the Holdings wouldn’t need Firenzcia at all.”

“The Hirzg, I believe, would disagree with you, Vajiki ca’Vikej. For that matter, so would I. And I note that the Kraljica didn’t send an Ambassador to West Magyaria asking for their help.”

Erik sucked in a breath through clenched teeth, and Allesandra whirled to face them. “Be quiet, both of you,” she snapped. “Your bickering makes my head ache so that I can’t think.” She kneaded her forehead with a hand. She felt confined, trapped, as if the palais walls were constricting around her. You have no choice in this. The thought hammered at her skull in time with her pulse. You really have no choice. The Holdings can’t stand alone against the Westlanders, and the Holdings can’t survive another long recovery.

She stared out the window, to the walls where she could still see the marks of the repairs that had been done after the Tehuantin bombardment. She remembered how the city had looked in the days and weeks and months after the Firenzcian army had finally smashed the Westlander forces and sent them reeling back across the Strettosei. She remembered the misery and the pain of those times. She remembered how desolate she had been herself then, abandoned by her own son.