Chapter Eleven
That night, Gwydion began visiting my chamber. It was more enjoyable than I would have expected, given the river of animosity that ran between us—perhaps it was more pleasurable for it. But I had more important business than his nocturnal calls.
For one thing, my search for Auralia’s love was proving fruitless. I could not have strange men pawing at my sister, but nor could I find any indication of a love amongst Auralia’s things. If she had love letters or tokens they were hidden somewhere I could not find. What’s more, bandits had begun raiding Aquia’s border, about seven great marauding bands, who were roping up the wandering livestock. As Winter settled into Aquia, our mercenaries from Avarain, the northernmost country of the known world, managed to subdue most of the bandits, who were largely loosely organized troops of thieves. The rest had fled, but not without torching abandoned farms along the way.
What I had not expected, but certainly should have, were the marauding bands of cousins: those emirs and emiras of neighboring principalities, who, seeing Aquia struck low by the Pari’s blow, decided to press their own claim. Viziéra and Darsepol, emirdoms situated upon our border, were steadily pressing inward. I had arranged a meaning for today with the Emira Quenela of Viziéra, and the Emir Hadil of Darsepol.
My new maid, one of the gallons of imports of the past few months, had lain out a simple gown of the sort I had grown to favor over the past years. Today however, I would not give Quenela and Hadil the opportunity to see me as anything less than regal and I pulled on a silk gown of a deep wine red. Without the maid, I struggled to match the ruby buttons marching down the back. Clipping an emerald barrette into my tousled raven waves, I slipped gold bangles studded with large beryls onto my wrists.
In the front room of my apartment, I found Gwydion reclining on a couch. I had left my parents in the official bedroom reserved for the Emira and Emir. I hoped that my reign would only be a brief placeholder. A fire crackled warmly—it was already deep into the ice of winter.
“Finally,” he exclaimed, leaping out of his seat.
“I was having a touch of difficulty with my gown.” It was uncomfortably tight—we had finally found a proper cook and he feasted us nightly. I turned around. “So, if you will milord?”
Gwydion examined my back. I could not help but twitch uncomfortably at his scrutiny.
“Selene, you are still having a touch of difficulty with your gown,” he said, amused. “Has your maid gone blind? I have never seen so many mismatched buttons.”
“Shut up. Fix it quickly otherwise Hadil and Quenela will invade Aquia from sheer boredom after their tea grows cold. You did arrange for tea and wine, did you not?” I asked as he buttoned my gown. His fingers worked nimbly, no doubt from the practice that he had received over the course of his voyeuristic career. My back twitched away reflexively at his touch.
“Yes of course,” he replied coolly, his teasing tone suddenly frostbitten. “You know I do not bungle matters of state, although serving the tea and such niceties should be the woman’s job.”
“Shut up,” I repeated tiredly. “Nearly finished?”
He patted my back. “Do not forget what I have told you to say.”
I stiffened. Since I was the one recognized as Emira-Regent, Gwydion could not speak at a meeting, while I remained silent. That did not stop him from instructing me, however.
Leaving the apartments, we traversed down the great flight of marble stairs to the audience hall where we met with delegations of import. As we entered the room, both Hadil and Quenela rose to greet us with hugs and murmurs of “Cousin.”
Their own attire was simpler than mine, indicative of the fact that they had been on the war trail. Quenela looked very pretty though, despite the simplicity of her neatly pressed grey linen gown. I had seen her many years ago when I was a child and she newly instated as the very young Emira of Viziéra. The years had only matured her beauty. With her wide-set blue almond eyes, sharp against her deep copper complexion, we did not appear related at all, although our lines linked extensively through marriage. The distinctive slanted blue eyes of the Viziéri Emiratis are courtesy of a period of frequent intermarriage between their line and the imperial family of Xanjo, a country that lies west of Ghalain, across the Green Sea.
Hadil, on the other hand, bore a definite familial resemblance with his tanned skin and large eyes, which was not flattered by his cherry-brown wool tunic.
Cousins though Quenela and Hadil might have been, they were not to be trusted. That much would have been clear to an infant with hay for brains.
I gestured for a servant to pour wine into the goblets and drank deeply. I needed to steady my nerves.
“Milord,” I reached out to Hadil. “My deepest condolences for your son. You and I have a shared grief.” His son, Kisam, was my sister Evra’s husband and he now lay beside her in repose in Evra’s childhood bedchamber. Hadil had lost his only child and grandchildren to the curse.
Hadil swallowed and for a moment, I felt sympathy. I would have hoped that family ties would encourage him to stay his hand. “If you would be so kind, I would like to take my son and his grandchildren back to Darsepol.”
Gwydion shook his head slightly.
“You may take Kisam, of course, but I know that my sister would not wish to be parted from her children, even in sleep. Less than she would wish to be parted from her husband, I should think. Nonetheless, Evra is Aquian and will remain here as will her children, but I will have Kisam sent to you immediately.” I indicated for a servant to take care of the matter.
“Very well,” he acceded, graying head bowed. “My thanks.”
Gwydion glowered. I too was afraid I had misstepped.
“It is I who should thank you—and Quenela as well. Thank you so much for bringing your army to help us in our time of need. The gesture has been ever-so-appreciated, especially for keeping order around the borders, preventing some of our less scrupulous cousins from raiding. We truly are family. Your actions have once more reminded me of the depth of our blood bonds.” I raised my chalice to toast them.
Their smiles froze.
I smirked coldly. “Your armies certainly have been helpful in keeping bandits at bay, but we could not allow you to do us this favor without feeling as if we had caused you to abandon your own emirdoms. I insist that you return to tend your own lands and let us manage ours.”
The two sat uncomfortably in silence. Although they were not yet in alliance against me they both sought the same thing.
“Congratulations on your nuptials,” offered Hadil weakly.
“Thank you,” said Gwydion. “You are both invited to the formal ceremony, of course.”
Again the silence. I had given Quenela and Hadil an opportunity to honorably slip away, to scatter like the carrion-eating crows they were. I willed them to take it.
“Once your men have returned home, you are welcome to stay at the Mehal until the wedding. Anything to help those who have come to us so valiantly in our time of need.” I was not completely able to suppress my sarcasm.
Quenela spoke for the first time. “Thank you, no. Let us speak frankly. With this curse, Aquia has been weakened. You are too green to be a real threat,” she sneered, “I have come so that you may be peaceably offer surrender, Cousin. I stand ready to Aquia.”
Hadil harrumphed loudly. “Indeed, we do.”
“You will take your armies and you will leave if I have to take a stick and prod you along the whole damn way,” I growled. The wine danced in my head.
Gwydion crunched my hand in a hard grasp.
Hadil started at my pronouncement and Quenela stood up, shaking her skirts angrily. “If you think—”
“If I think what, Cousin?” I said sharply. “If I think that you are violating a dozen treaties and accords and refuse to surrender to your bullying? I have already apprised the Queen in Nyneveh of your actions. Rest assured, if your army makes any further move in Aquia, I w
ill send Gwydion and our mercenaries to settle you. I offer you this chance to withdraw peaceably. I suggest you take it.”
Quenela sniffed. “I see the impetuosity of youth is not to be reasoned with. You will find, child, that in this world, if you make threats, you need to be able to make good on them.”
As Quenela glided from the room, Hadil followed her. “Adieu, Emira Selene, Lord Gwydion,” he said, always the amiable courtier.
I eyed him poisonously. “Your son awaits you in your carriage, milord.”
Quenela and Hadil had come under the Flag of Arbitration. Therefore, as much as I wanted, I could not throw the pair of them into prison—although it would have saved me a great deal trouble later.
After Hadil had left, Gwydion’s mouth twisted. “Seasons! What possessed you to give Hadil his son without securing something else in return? I doubt you could have bought off Quenela, but you had the man’s son in your hand! This is why I must direct you. Without me, you would bungle everything in sight. Without me, you would give Aquia away. Look at all I must do for you.” He kicked the chair; it clattered to the floor. “We should have met with them separately, or, at the very least, if you had played them better, they would have turned on each other.”
I flinched. As soon as I had said it, I knew I had erred. “I had hoped that he would see the good-will in my gesture and reach the decision of his own accord.” Even to my own ears, it sounded weak, the move of a naïve child, not an emira. No wonder Quenela had been so dismissive.
He laughed scornfully. “That may have worked very well for a governess in Clemen, but the stakes are higher now than an arithmetic book.”
He was right, but little did I know that the stakes had only begun to rise.
Chapter Twelve