DAVID COE - Seeds of Betrayal

Dusaan had to grit his teeth. “It’s a great loss for Aneira,” he managed to say. “And for all of us who considered the king an ally.”

“I always liked Carden,” the emperor said, chewing his lip, and staring off toward the harper. “He was a wise leader and a reliable friend.”

Actually he was a fool and as poor a leader as ever ruled a kingdom of the Forelands, but Dusaan kept that to himself, nodding solemnly. He knew as well as Harel that the emperor’s concerns lay elsewhere.

“We’ll need to start again, you know, building an alliance with the new king, whoever that may be.” Harel looked up at him. “Have you any idea who’s next in line for the Aneiran throne?”

“No, Your Eminence, I don’t. There was a daughter, but I can’t imagine she’d be accepted as Carden’s heir. Which leaves his brothers.”

Harel frowned. “I don’t like what I’ve heard about them. Particularly the eldest. What is his name?”

“Grigor, Your Eminence. And his reputation does leave much to be desired.”

“I’ve no tolerance for brutes, High Chancellor, and I certainly don’t wish to find myself allied with one. I spent a good deal of time and gold winning Carden’s allegiance. Do you know how many ships I sent him? I believe it was fourteen. Fourteen ships at more than seven thousand imperial rounds each. None of that will matter to the new king. He’ll just think of it as his navy, as if we’d done nothing at all to make it the strongest among the six. He’ll know nothing of the weaponry we sent either, or the mercenaries. This man, this…” He shook his head, frowning once more.

“Grigor, Your Eminence.”

“Yes, yes. This Grigor. Where is my mind today?” He looked past Dusaan to the harper. “You there!” he called. “That’s enough music for today. Leave us.” Then, looking at the ladies, he added, “All of you as well. Leave my chambers. I wish to speak with the chancellor in private.”

The musician curtsied and stepped out of the chamber, leaving her instrument in the corner against the wall. The ladies followed close behind her, looking back at the emperor with frightened faces.

“This will delay the attack on Eibithar, won’t it?” Harel asked, once they were alone.

“I’m afraid it must,” the chancellor said, feeling his ire rise once more, and moving swiftly to quash it. “A new king, whoever it might be, will need time to consolidate his power. Even a man like Grigor won’t rush into a war so soon. It will be several turns before we can act, at the very least.”

“Several turns?” the emperor asked, looking relieved. “That’s not so bad.”

“At the very least,” the Qirsi said again, pointedly this time. Sometimes the emperor seemed to him more child than man. Harel had held the scepter for more than half his life, taking the throne after his father died, just a year past his Fating. It often seemed to Dusaan that twenty-two years later he remained a frightened boy, out of his depth, foolish, and weak, even for an Eandi. “If Grigor does assume the crown, and if he can move quickly and decisively, then it will only be half a year,” he explained, his patience strained. “But if he meets with resistance from the other houses it could take far longer. And if by some chance, Carden’s death leads to war among Aneira’s more powerful families, it could be years.”

“Which means,” Harel said, “that as soon as the king takes the throne, we must act quickly to back him, to make it clear to others in Aneira that the emperor of Braedon recognizes him as the legitimate successor to Carden.”

“Yes, Your Eminence,” the chancellor said, taken aback by the clarity of Harel’s reasoning. “That’s just what we must do.”

“And in the meantime?”

Dusaan thought for a moment. “In the meantime, I believe we should continue with our plans as if nothing has happened. The training of the men should go on uninterrupted, and the bulk of the fleet should be divided between Ayvencalde and Bishenhurst. The longer the ships remain there, posing no threat to Eibithar, the greater the surprise when they finally cross the Scabbard. The delay is unavoidable, but perhaps in this small way we can use it to our advantage.”

The emperor fairly beamed. “Excellent, High Chancellor! See to it, will you?”

“Of course, Your Eminence.” He stood before the emperor another moment, neither of them speaking. “Is there more?”

“No,” Harel said, looking troubled again. “No, nothing more.”

“Very good, Your Eminence.” Dusaan knelt again, then rose and started quickly toward the door.

“What makes a man take his own life?” the emperor asked, just as the Qirsi reached the door. “What could cause a king, with all his wealth and power, to take a dagger to his own heart?”

Dusaan stood unmoving, his back to the throne, biting down on his tongue until he tasted blood.

“Send the harper back in, would you?” Harel said after a moment. “And tell the kitchenmaster that I require my supper a bit early today.”

“Yes, Your Eminence,” Dusaan said, his voice thick. He faced the emperor again, sketching a quick bow. Then he left, fearing that the man would keep him there longer if given the chance.

After seeing to the harper and the emperor’s meal, Dusaan returned to his chambers and summoned the other chancellors so that he could inform them of the tidings from Solkara and his conversation with the emperor. It was a waste of his time and theirs, but Harel expected it of him. Like all Eandi rulers, the emperor had a great number of Qirsi in his palace. Ostensibly they were here as advisors-most bore the title of chancellor, a few were ministers. But Harel rarely met with any of them, relying almost entirely on Dusaan. He collected Qirsi, just as he did swords from Sanbira and Uulrann, and horses from Caerisse. The more Qirsi he possessed, the wiser he appeared to both his people and his rivals in other kingdoms. Braedon was the most powerful of the seven realms-few would have argued the point, even in Eibithar. People here spoke of Braedon and the six, as if the other kingdoms were mere dukedoms standing in the vast shadow of the empire. Of all the realms, only Braedon dared call itself an empire, and in fairness to Harel and his predecessors on the throne, Braedon did have territorial holdings as far away as Enwyl Island, in the Gulf of Kreanna. So it was only natural that Harel should surround himself with Qirsi advisors.

From all that Dusaan could tell, Harel assumed, as did the other Qirsi, that the advice Dusaan gave the emperor was not just his own, but rather a compendium of the counsel offered by all the chancellors and ministers in their daily discussions. Dusaan, of course, did nothing to dispel this notion.

Most of the other advisors were typical of court Qirsi throughout the Forelands: blindly loyal to Braedon and House Curtell, almost pitiable in their desire to please the emperor and rise in his esteem, and disturbingly eager to try to surpass each other in this regard. With each day that passed, it became harder for Dusaan to meet with them without revealing the contempt in which he held them. A few showed signs of being more, of being capable of rising above their current station, with his help, of course, but the time for that had not yet come.

This day’s discussion proved to be a somber affair, with the older chancellors and ministers falling over each other in their attempts to exalt the dead king. Dusaan had told them as little as possible about the emperor’s plans to attack Eibithar, and now he said merely that the attack would be put off indefinitely.

Speaking of it served only to enrage Dusaan once again. He ended the meeting abruptly, dismissing the other Qirsi and locking the door to his chamber once they were gone. Stepping to his window, he pushed open the wooden shutters and gazed out over the ramparts of the palace and the swift waters of the River of Swords, which lay beyond. The windows in this part of the palace were not glazed, and a brisk wind stirred his hair and chilled his quarters. The sun had set, but the western sky still glowed orange and pink with the last glimmers of daylight. It would still be some time before he could do anything more than brood on his anger, and given the night that lay in store for him, Dusaan decided that he was best off using this time to sleep.