Power & The Price

Lady Azeline had been quiet all the way from the port Bourrac inland to Souchon. Freyza had heard that the little woman with grey hair and olive skin had been the Queen’s marshal once, even though her black eyes and calm ways were unassuming enough. What brought her to the embassy, Freyza did not know, and was too uncomfortable to ask. In their shared carriage, both of them had been reading since they entered.

When they had passed through Souchon proper, Freyza finally could not resist the urge to open one of the closed curtains. He was almost instantly disappointed to see Souchon Palace.

A hillside covered in deep green grass, with straight paths and meticulously arranged flowers, flanked by a moat on all sides, showcased in its middle the large white castle with its red-and-grey banners flapping in the wind. Freyza recognized that it appeared to be rather oversized compared to the chateaus he had seen on his way there, and yet felt nothing at all that could come close to admiration for the dynasty that built it. The gathered crowd outside, however, made him grin.

‘They’re throwing a party,’ he said, smiling as to signal to Azeline a personable nature both knew he did not have.

‘Yes,’ she said simply, having shot her gaze quickly out, before continuing to read.

Freyza felt his heart sink with embarrassment. Had he spoiled a great surprise and now had to pay the price with Azeline’s demeanour?

‘Did I do something?’ he asked. ‘I’ve read up as much as I could, and yet I still feel as a fish out of water. I’m sure you understand…’

‘No,’ she said simply, flicking a page. ‘When we’re there, ask for Lord Theo de Sainte-Vallac. He’ll show you around much better than I ever could.’

Freyza huffed indignantly. ‘Am I wrong to say that we got off on the wrong foot, Lady Azeline?’

Azeline snorted and looked up. ‘Yes,’ she said with the first grin of hers that he had ever seen, despite being cooped up with her for days.

The rest of the carriage ride, albeit gracefully short, was enjoyed in silence. They got off at the coach house and before Freyza could thank her, Azeline was on her way, leaving him and the horseman in the stables. From there, he could hear loud music playing, and there was a roaring crowd.

‘Are all ambassadors received so warmly?’ he asked the horseman as the next few carriages rolled in containing his belongings and assistants.

The horseman looked up from his work. ‘Aye,’ he said. ‘Real warm Chavanet kings and queens in this place. If only you knew how warmly they treat their servants…’

Though his Massouric was far from fluent, he detected the sardonic tone in his voice and said: ‘Well, I come from a land where no wages are dished out at all, for most servants are enslaved, so I’m afraid you cannot expect much sympathy.’

The horseman threw him a disapproving glance. ‘One cannot expect much sympathy from anyone wearing silk.’

Starting to feel himself slip into frustration, Freyza separated himself and headed out into the yard, where he thought he spotted a wine fountain. The crowd was even larger than he imagined from the distance, and even though he was wearing his Sunday best — more importantly, in Massouric fashion as instructed to him by his correspondents — he felt frankly underdressed for the occasion.

He was hoping that one of the uniformed men would come to greet him, but each time he caught their eye, they relented and continued their conversations some feet away from him. It was exasperating to him. He had asked half a dozen of them for Theo, but each time had been given an answer either from ignorance or malice.

As he stumbled through the fashionable crowd, having been given a glass of sangria by one of the servants, a sudden burst of trumpeting stopped him in his tracks. The road he could see just behind the first row of trees after the moat was now lit up by several blue-torched purple carriages. Blue torches were something entirely unknown to Sbaians, though they were to Freyza a recognizable symbol: a blue-torched carriage may not legally be stopped by any authority but by the crown itself. Purple fabric was controlled under sumptuary laws all over the west for use by the royal houses exclusively.

The sudden lull in the crowd seemed to bother him. Was some great guest impeding on his party, which nobody seemed to recognise him being at in the first place? It started to dawn on him that maybe he had been the one to impede on another’s party. Did he have to leave?

Before he knew it, a number of carriages had stopped in the yard, and servants were rushing to open the doors and help out those within. Freyza sipped from his sweetened wine, with the faint taste of alcohol reminding him that indeed he was far from home, when someone bumped into him to pass him.

At the same time, the large double doors of the castle opened, and out came six people he finally did recognise: the King and Queen and their four children. Louise and Silouane, the royal pair, were each wearing their ermine cloaks, and the former had her crown on. Prince Henry, their eldest, was wearing cloth of gold. From his tiptoes, Freyza could just see how one of the half-cloaked courtiers held the door open and bowed before the woman that slipped out of the first carriage.

The royal couple caught up with her and largely obscured her. Freyza considered who could have arrived, but the answer was rather unequivocal: it only could be the new Queen of Ilworth.

Freyza tried to catch a glimpse of her as she bowed before the King and Queen of Massouron, curtsied before their eldest son, and waved at several of the attendees that were in her line of sight. Slowly the band music which had halted for the trumpeting returned, and conversations began again, but now the most important guests were pointed out to him, he could not help but be drawn into the whirlpool that was powerful company.

As he wedged himself through the crowd, he kept his eyes on the ermine cloaks and Queen Katherine’s blue-and-gold gown — a gown that looked suspiciously like the one she had been described as wearing during her coronation.

He nearly stumbled over a small step, and when he used the railing to break his near-fall, noticed a raised platform that the steps led up to, from where he thought he might have a better view of the happenings. Moreover, it seemed many of the red-and-grey uniforms gathered up there. Freyza made his way halfway up, casting the occasional glance up and down to make sure he was not entering any place where he was not allowed, when a clearing in the crowd finally offered him a decent view of the mingling of the royal families.

Prince Henry was facing Freyza with his back and shoulder, the shoulder upon which his red cloak rested, billowing in the wind, flapping to reveal occasionally its cloth of gold interior and the golden scabbard that must hold a ceremonial sword. He was speaking to Katherine, who he could finally see clearly.

Freyza took a step down just for a better view.

There was an unimaginable goodness that he saw in her face, as if her particular type of beauty spoke of greatness. He had to admit she had no particularly attractive features: her eyes were much duller and framed with much lighter lashes than he thought to know from the portrait, and she was so lithe that it detracted from the youthfulness of her form, but she immediately entranced him. To him, a man who considered himself a connoisseur of beauty, she was strangely perfect.

Her hair was loose and lay on her back, undoubtedly a reference to her coronation again, as it was considered unseemly for a woman in these parts to wear her hair loose, and even though it was hardly even red like the chroniclers made it out to be, the intersection of red and blonde lit up the porcelain blush of her complexion and the brilliant blue of her gown and jewellery. A kind of charm danced through her every moment and every expression so potently that it only could have been innate.

Freyza took a few steps down, imagining it only appropriate to congratulate her in the name of the Sultan. There was disappointment in that thought. The Sultan. He was unsure whether he was still willing to put in a good word for him. Imagining the angelic Ilworthian creature, whose eyes were as liquid and glass as a bottle of arak and whose little chin was made to be tilted up by some noble prince or knight in an act of innocent love, in the hands of the old emperor, made his stomach turn.

He was meaning to inch in, but there seemed to be guards around that did not entertain the notion of his introduction. In an act of desperation, he held up his hand and waved, and felt himself tense up when that caught her eye.

‘Your Majesty,’ he hollered through the line of defence that kept him from her presence, ‘Congratulations!’

There was no use in introducing himself, and in fact he thought it more fruitful for her impression of him if he appeared as if he was just passing by. A smile crept up from her little rosebud mouth, and she waved back. Thank you, she mouthed. Then, she turned to the prince again.

Freyza swaggered along in his little performance as to not look so pathetic in his inability to speak to the Queen, and suddenly he felt a hand on the arm he had outstretched to her and had not fully put down since.

‘Freyza of Tougaf?’ asked a young man with warm-white hair the way northern seafarers had been described as having.

Freyza nodded. ‘The very same.’

He jovially outstretched a hand. ‘Sorry about the strange welcome,’ he said, then scraped his throat, ‘I’ll show you to your office and rooms once you feel as though you’ve seen sufficient festivity.’

‘Then, I imagine you must be Theo de Sainte-Vallac,’ Freyza said, in his mind referencing a painting he had seen of Queen Louise’s secretary of state.

He grinned. ‘My apologies if you have been fruitlessly looking for me. I’ve been accompanying the queen for her encounter with the new Queen of Ilworth. How exciting that the crisis is over. At this rate of speed, we will surely be trading as usual by the end of the week.’

Freyza pasted a calm smile on his face. ‘Wouldn’t that be grand?’

‘My apologies…’ Theo murmured as he came into Queen Louise’s cabinet, where opposite the Queen herself sat the two Ilworthian advisors — one of whom he had met before, the secretary of state Cuthbert Harcourt, and the other who had recently been appointed, the royal administrator William Lennard. ‘I was held up with the new Sbaian ambassador.’

He scanned the space for Queen Katherine and frowned. ‘Was I supposed to pick up Her Majesty?’

Harcourt shook his head. ‘There is a fair amount I wish to say of Queen Katherine, Lord Theo, that I found unfitting to mention in her presence. Nothing grave, it is only uncomfortable to characterise one in one’s presence. Moreover, I wish to be free to say what needs to be said in full.’

A grin danced on the Massouric queen’s face: ‘There is little reason to speak so politely. We are all acutely aware that Katherine was not your first champion, or your second.’

The statesman grimaced. ‘So I have brought my more patriotic counterpart, the newly minted Lord Astwick, William Lennard. He never worked for the late King Richard so he has no comparison — but he hails from my lady wife Lettice’s court in Gartham.’

William nodded with an uncomfortable smile. He must have been the same age as Harcourt, perhaps a few years younger, but unlike Harcourt, whose blond hair had greyed, Will had a full head of dark hair coiffed elegantly beneath his smart hat. His face was broad and angular, with a pair of dark eyes that looked knowingly beneath his bushy brows.

‘I am simply acutely aware of my luck, Lord Overleigh,’ he said finally, ‘We have yet to see what this new reign has in store for us.’

The Queen was a middle-aged woman whose presence was imposing due to her impressive height and broad shoulders which she accented through the use of large, boned sleeves. She had changed since the arrival of Queen Katherine, where she had been wearing a deep red gown, and now wore a simple kirtle with a loose gown over top.

‘Pleasantries,’ she said, smiling. The word tasted grim in her mouth. ‘There is a reason we do not often entertain those in my court. Overleigh… what exactly are we to deal with?’

Harcourt scraped his throat before he said, ‘Well, for one, Lady Louise, she seems both intent on doing everything herself, as well as completely uninterested in the occupation. And I am sure you have heard her tale…’

Louise’s brows raised. ‘You are going to have to be less vague. Katherine’s mother is my sister-in-law. I’ve heard a million tales of her.’

His eyes darted to and fro the two other councillors. ‘Her Majesty was meant to be removed from the line of succession due to her admission to the Our Lady of the Angels convent in Dolcotshire, where she served as prioress for three years after an aborted attempt at arranging a marriage with the De Serra son.’

‘Oh,’ Louise said and clicked her tongue. ‘The bastard child. Overleigh, all I see is benefits. Let her and Henry roll about as much as they wish while we discuss the terms. With a bit of luck she will conceive by the fall and they will have no choice but to wed. At least, I will leave Henry no choice, and Katherine will be grateful to be considered. William. What is your impression of your new queen?’

William shot up from lazily hanging over the table as he listened. ‘It has not been long,’ he began, and though he opened his mouth to speak again, Louise interrupted him.

‘No, that is true… is she capable in audiences, charismatic, diplomatic, pure of heart? Your secretary of state is biased against her, so I’d like a fresher point of view,’ she said.

‘What my colleague has stated of her are facts,’ Will began. ‘She is a rowdy young lady who had been sent into a convent against her will. Of course the top priority now will not be pure of heart stewardship, queen or not.’

A sly grin crept onto Louise’s face. ‘Theo,’ she then said, languidly turning to her adviser, ‘Characterise my son for these noble Ilworthian councillors.’

Theo’s arms were crossed and his eyes were fixed listlessly on a painting behind the two Ilworthians. ‘Rakish for one,’ he began, wiggling his brows once. ‘Does not respect authority. Does not entertain anything against his will. Marriage prospects find him unbearable to deal with.’

‘And I’ve decided I would rather have him inherit with a warm hand,’ Louise said. ‘So I can supervise.’

Harcourt felt his chest tense up. ‘You are meaning to abdicate?’ he asked.

Louise nodded. ‘Imagine if I passed and Henry was in charge without my mentorship,’ she said. ‘Especially with his new bride. I am trying to make sure the palace doesn’t turn into a drunken brothel.’

There was a profound silence that was so all-encompassing that they could nearly hear each other’s thoughts. Harcourt, for one, was beginning to lose hope: he had been too quick to assume that a marriage match with the crown prince of Massouron would bring peace to the realms, and instead, came to the conclusion that the tumultuous young dynasty members seemed too much for either court to control. Louise saw her plan come to fruition with less enthusiasm than she had planned for, which in turn affected Theo. And then there was William, whose thoughts were the most opaque of any of them.

‘Must we proceed with this course of action, given the risks?’ Harcourt eventually asked. ‘Is a mending of Courtenay-Chavanet ties worth all these lives, potentially?’

Louise looked at the secretary of state sheepishly. ‘My dear Lord Overleigh… I have a son who must inherit my kingdom unless I do unspeakable things — you have a queen with an heir who will not be taken seriously until there is a young man by her side. Both are equally marred by reputation, impossible to marry off to anyone but one another, unless we are considering shamefully lopsided matches. Do we have much of a choice?’

‘Your Majesty, with all due respect…’ Harcourt began hesitantly. ‘There will be war on the continent when you abdicate. In Ilworth, uprisings are burgeoning. The Baradrans are upside down. If we go, Neuhausen will go next.’

Louise held up her hands and shrugged. ‘It is not my job to keep the country out of despair, Lord Overleigh.’ She pointed at him, and then to Theo. ‘It’s your job. I decide, you do. Council dismissed.’