in the shadows of the coach. “Let me give you the rest of it. The worst danger, as I’ve also said to the Kraljiki, is that in looking west, we are ignoring the East and the Coalition. I take it Audric didn’t mention that to you.”
She stayed in shadow, her response masked. “You don’t advise sending more troops to the Hellins? Do you advise abandoning what we’ve gained there?”
Sergei glanced back at the dragon; it seemed to be leering toothily at him. “Why is it that I believe you already know my answers to those questions, Councillor?”
“I would still like to hear them. From your lips.”
“Then: no, and yes,” he told her flatly. “If we send more troops, we are sending more of our gardai to die across the Strettosei when I am convinced we will need them here, and perhaps sooner than we might like. As for the Hellins: my experience tells me that another commandant will fare no better than your esteemed brother has. Commandant ca’Helfier, his predecessor, is ultimately responsible for the terrible situation there; it was his bungling and poor judgment that caused the Tehuantin army to become involved in the conflict, and that tipped the balance.” Sergei was pleased to see her draw back at that and look away from him, as if the sight of the Pontica ahead of the carriage was suddenly far more interesting. “Our difficulties are the distance, and communication, and a vast enemy who is fighting on their home ground.” He tapped the open window of the carriage with his hand. “And an enemy who is now stronger than most of us want to believe. When we took the Hellins, the Tehuantin stayed in their own lands beyond the mountains, but ca’Helfier’s actions caused the natives of the Hellins to call on their cousins for help. We can call the Westlanders savages and infidels who worship only the Moitidi and set them up as false gods, but that doesn’t alter the truth that their war-teni-through whatever deities they call upon-are at least as effective as our own. Perhaps even more so.”
“Some might say you skirt dangerously close to heresy yourself with that statement, Regent,” ca’Ludovici told him, making the sign of Cenzi.
“I see my duty as Regent to look the truth in the face, no matter what that truth is, and to speak it,” he told her. That was a lie, of course, but it sounded good; as he saw it, his duty as Regent was to see that the Nessantico he handed to the next Kralji was in a stronger position than he’d originally found it: no matter what that entailed him doing or saying, legal or illegal. “That has always been my function within Nessantico. I serve Nessantico herself, not anyone within it. That’s why Kraljica Marguerite named me Commandant of the Garde Kralji, and why your cousin Kraljiki Justi placed me first as Commandant of the Garde Civile and then named me Regent, even when we often disagreed.” His mouth twitched at the memories of the arguments he’d had with the great fool Justi. May the soul shredders tear at him for eternity for what he did to the Holdings.
“I, too, serve Nessantico first,” Sigourney said. “In that, we’re alike, Regent. I want only what is best for her, and for the Holdings. Beyond that…” She shrugged in shadow.
“Then we agree, Councillor,” Sergei answered. “Nessantico needs truth and open eyes, not blind arrogance. The Council of Ca’ certainly recognizes that, doesn’t it?”
“Truth is more malleable than you seem to think, Regent. What is the saying? ‘A ca’s vinegar may be the ce’s wine.’ Too much of what is termed ‘truth’ is actually only opinion.”
“That may be the case, indeed, Councillor, but it’s also what people say when they wish to ignore a truth that makes them uncomfortable,” Sergei answered, and was rewarded with a moue of irritation, a glistening of moistened lips in the dimly-lit face. “But we can speak of that later, with all of the Council present, if you wish. There should be a new report coming from the Hellins soon, and perhaps that will tell us what is true and what is only opinion.”
He heard her sniff more than he saw it, and a white hand lifted in the shadowed interior, rapping on the roof of the carriage. “We shall talk further on this, Regent,” she told Sergei in a cold, distant voice, then called to the driver in his seat: “Move on.”
He watched her drive away, the iron-rimmed wheels of the carriage rumbling against the cobblestones of the Avi. The sound was as cold and harsh as Sigourney’s attitude had been. Sergei turned again to the Bastida and looked up at the dragon’s skull above the gates. The ferocious mouth grinned.
“Yes,” he told the skull. “The truth is that one day we’ll all look just like you. But not yet for me. Not yet. I don’t care what Audric has said to the Council. Not yet.”
Jan ca’Vorl
Jan found his Matarh standing on the balcony of their apartments in Brezno Palais. She was staring down at the activity on the main square. The Archigos’ Temple loomed against the skyline directly opposite them, nearly half a mile away, and nearly every foot of that distance was covered with people. The square was illuminated with teni- lights in yellow and green and gold, dancing in the globes of the lampposts, and the markets and shops around the vast open area were thronged with shoppers. Music drifted thin and fragile toward them from street performers, wafting above the hum of a thousand conversations.
“It’s a scene worth painting, isn’t it?” he asked her, then before she could answer. “What’s the matter, Matarh? You’ve been keeping to yourself ever since the party. Is it Vatarh?”
She turned at that. Her gaze slid from his face to the chevaritt’s star that he wore, and he thought that her tentative smile wavered momentarily. “It’s just been an overwhelming few weeks,” she told him. Her hand brushed imaginary lint from his shoulders. “That’s all.”
“I think Vatarh’s behavior has been abysmal since he came here,” Jan said. “I swear, sometimes I think I could kill the man. But I’m sure you’ve been far more tempted than me.” He laughed to take the edge from his words, but she didn’t join him. She half-turned, looking back down toward the square.
“You’re a chevaritt,” she said. “Someday you’ll go to war, and someday you’ll have to actually kill someone else-or be killed yourself. You’ll be forced to make that decision and it’s irrevocable. I know…”
“You know? ” Jan frowned. “Matarh, when did you-?”
She interrupted him before he could finish the half-mocking question. “I was eleven, nearly twelve. I killed the Westlander spellcaster Mahri, or I helped Ana kill him.”
“Mahri? The man responsible for Kraljica Marguerite’s death?” Is this a joke? he wanted to add, but the look on her face stopped him.
“I stabbed him with the knife Vatarh had given me, stabbed him as he was trying to kill Ana. I never told anyone afterward, and neither did Ana. She was always careful to protect me.” She was looking at her hands on the railing; Jan wondered if she expected to see blood there. He wasn’t sure what to say or how to respond. He imagined his matarh, the knife in her hand.
“That must have been hard.”
She shook her head. “No. It was easy. That’s the strange part. I didn’t even think about it; I just attacked him. It was only afterward
…” She took a long breath. “Did you ever think about how it might be if someone you knew were dead-that it might be better for everyone involved if that were the case?”
“Now there’s a morbid subject.”
“Someone killed Ana because they thought that their world would be better if she were out of the way. Or maybe they did it because someone they believed in told them to do it and they were just following orders. Or maybe just because they thought it might change things. Sometimes that’s all the reason someone needs-you don’t think about the people who might care for the victim, or what the repercussions might be. You do it because… well, I guess sometimes you aren’t certain why.”
“You’re making me worry more, Matarh.”
She did laugh at that, though Jan thought there was still a sadness to the sound. “Don’t,” she said. “I’m just in a strange mood.”
“Everyone thinks that way sometimes.” Jan shrugged. “I’ll wager that every child has at some time wished his parents dead-especially after they’ve done something stupid and been caught and punished. Why, there was that time that I stole the knife from your…” He stopped, his eyes widening. “Was that the same one? You said Great-Vatarh had given it to you.”
Another laugh. “It was. I remember that; I found you using the knife to cut up some apples in the kitchen and I snatched it back from you and spanked you so hard, and you were refusing to cry or apologize, and so I hit you
