Daniel Abraham - The Tyrant's Law

“I’ve been … speaking with Minister Basrahip,” Daskellin said at last.

“Yes,” Geder said. “Did he tell you I’ve decided to move his temple into the Kingspire? There are all of those levels at the very top that no one ever seems to use, and since the old one was damaged last summer … along with everything else, I suppose. But that way, he’ll have a place that’s protected.”

“He’d mentioned it, yes,” Daskellin said, tapping his fingertips idly against the spine of a book on taxation precedent. “It wasn’t the meat of our meal, though. It’s the Lord Marshal.”

“Ternigan?”

“Not Ternigan, no. Not precisely,” Daskellin said. “More the role of the Lord Marshal in the larger sense. As an extension of the power of the throne.”

Geder tilted his head. Daskellin licked his lips, his gaze on the farther wall.

“The king, or in your case the man taking the king’s role, isn’t a leader in the field,” Daskellin said. “His place is to coordinate among his subjects, see to it that the nobility are unified and direct his will through them. Through us.”

“Of course,” Geder said.

“But,” Daskellin said, sitting forward, “the minister had a point about the present situation. About Nus, in particular. You’ve read Ternigan’s reports, I assume?”

“Of course.”

“Minister Basrahip suggested that if you were to join the Lord Marshal in the field—if you were to be physically present—it might rally the troops and end the siege sooner. And the sooner Nus falls, the more likely we are to recover food and supplies that … Well, we’re going to need them to make it through next winter, aren’t we?”

“You mean,” Geder said, his heart suddenly leaping within his chest, “you think I should go to the war? To Nus?”

Daskellin shook his head ruefully.

“I didn’t,” he said. “Not at first, but the minister kept repeating his arguments, and by the fourth or fifth time he’d said it all, it seemed to have some heft to it. It is critical that things go well in Sarakal, and Ternigan is a fine strategist. Only he isn’t … he isn’t a man who inspires the men around him. He isn’t a hero.”

“A hero?” Geder echoed, and he felt the smile not as an expression, but only a pressure at the back of his jaw. A bud that was growing into a bloom.

Thank you , Basrahip, he thought. This is what I wanted.

Clara

Disruption was, in its way, a constant. No season passed without its share of scandal. In a court the size and complexity of the one that attended the Severed Throne, someone was certainly being sexually unfaithful on a near-daily basis. Someone’s health was failing. Someone had delivered a deathly insult to someone. Really, if nothing else, someone would wear a jacket with an unfortunate cut or rouge their cheeks too much or else too little. Falling from grace, like anything else, had its protocol and its expectations. And, provided one didn’t fall too far, so did returning to court.

Allies would announce themselves by their invitations. The staunchest might invite the unfortunate soul in need of rescue to a dinner party or hold a luncheon in their name, but that was boldness that bordered on the rash. The more cautious might include the recently fallen into a sewing circle or private tea casual enough that the guests sat wherever they pleased. Even a nod or a smile in the street could be noticed by others and commented upon.

Clara’s misfortune, she knew, would be difficult to parse. Her husband, whom all in court knew she’d loved deeply and sincerely, had led the rebellion against the Lord Regent and been slaughtered. Attempted regicide should have been too dark a stain to recover from, but there were Jorey and Vicarian. Even, in her grudging way, Elisia. Each of them had kept some distance from the tragedy, and Geder Palliako had even kept Jorey in the court. Clara’s position, then, became something of a cipher. She was without precedent, and even the most experienced etiquette master might be permitted to confess puzzlement at how best to approach her.

The common sentiment appeared to be that sending a servant to her boarding house was a bit too sordid, and so slowly, as the groaning mechanisms of social play took their positions, notes began to arrive at Lord Skestinin’s small manor. Not invitations, because that would be almost a statement of allegiance, but mentions of small gatherings. Most were ostensibly for Sabiha with the understanding that she might choose to bring a guest. But there were a few addressed to Clara herself.

Lady Tilliaken’s gardens spilled out from her family’s manor house in an artful display of carelessness. To an untrained eye, the ivies and spoke-roses that curled around the stone walkways might have looked wild, but it was a tended wildness. The bright green runners never found their way into any inconvenient place. The buds of the flowers all came, as if by chance, into positions that would show their petals to the best effect. The finches and butterflies that found their way there hadn’t been drawn by any obvious caches of seed or sweet water. The style was called Hallskari, though Clara’s understanding was that real gardens in Hallskar were much more spare and put greater importance on the bitter herbs that Haaverkin seemed to prefer. The servant girl, a young Cinnae with hair as pale as daylight and eyes the color of ice, led Clara directly to the garden tables without bringing her through the house. The other women were already there, and it took Clara less than five long breaths together to assess the situation.

Lady Enga Tilliaken, at the head of the table, rose to greet Clara with kisses on both cheeks, which taken with the invitation put her as Clara’s ally. Merian Caot, second daughter of the Baron of Dannick, looked pleased and amused in equal measure much the way Clara’s own daughter might have done when she was young and going to inappropriate garden parties in order to play at rebellion. Lady Nikayla Essian, seeing Clara, gave a little coo of concern and rose to her feet, her eyes the perfect image of sympathy. She had come to gloat.

“Don’t get up on my account,” Clara said with a smile. “I don’t intend to stand for long. I’m too old for it.”

“You will take some tea, though, won’t you?” Lady Tilliaken said. “I’ve discovered this fascinating blend from that merchant from the Free Cities. What was his name?”

“Not the Timzinae!” Essian said.

“Of course not. The Jasuru woman.”

“Nufuz, you mean?” Clara said, and Tilliaken clapped her hands together.

“Yes, her.”

“If she recommended it, I can hardly refuse,” Clara said, taking a seat at the little stone table. A wasp hissed by her ear, gold and green as a gem in the sunlight. “I haven’t seen her in an age.”

“Of course, you wouldn’t have,” Essian said, touching Clara’s wrist. It promised to be a long and unpleasant afternoon.

It was necessary, of course. And more than that, it was expected. Dawson had thrown everything about her into question. The role she had played at court her whole life had been made uncertain, and now those who were willing to accept her company would be watching, testing, to see who and what she was. Did she show remorse, and if she did was it for her husband’s death or his actions? Did she speak harshly, or was she kind? In a hundred small ways, the Clara Kalliam they had all known was dead, and this new woman with her face and voice had stepped in. If she were ever to be reintegrated at court, they would need to know who this new woman was.

And, for that matter, so would she.

The tea was lovely—smoky and rich with a brightness that came from adding rose hips—and the cakes seemed to be made entirely of butter and honey with only enough flour to give them shape. The smell of turned earth from where Tilliaken’s servants were preparing the beds floated through the air like perfume, and the soft warmth of the spring sun slowly undid the stays at the necks of their dresses. Clara listened and spoke, doing the best imitation she could of the woman she had been only a year before, except she didn’t smoke. She’d run out of money for tobacco, and she would not allow herself to ask for it.