forward after she and Jan had paid their own respects.
The children… The thought came to her that this could have been her matarh and her, if only things had been different, but then she shook her head. No, she told herself firmly. Their relationship could never have survived the falsehoods and Matarh’s madness. It would never have been. This was never meant for you. Don’t lie to yourself. You can only be his bastarda, never his true daughter.
She wondered what her future held, and she had no answer for that. Her hand went to the jeweled hilt of the knife she’d taken from her vatarh, the knife with which she’d hoped to kill the Kraljica. The smooth wood of the pommel seemed to throb against her fingers.
The family stepped back from the bier. She saw them settle into their pews, heard the doors open as the wind-horns began their throbbing, mournful call once again, and the ca’-and-cu’ entered the temple. The choir, startling her, began to sing one of Darkmavis’ ethereal, mournful pieces. The rising tones and the close harmonies echoed, loud and insistent, near here to the dome of the temple that they enveloped her like a cloak.
It seemed to take forever for the mourners to enter between the lines of white-robed teni and settle in their pews. From her hiding place, Rochelle watched the front pews, gazing at her vatarh and her half siblings, as well as the woman who had taken her own matarh’s place: Brie, whom they were calling the Victor of the South Bank and who the crowds cheered as loudly as they did Jan. She could see Sergei in the row behind them, sitting next to the Numetodo woman, who had a child in her arms.
And beside her was Nico, fidgeting like a bored child. The A’Morce kept turning to him and speaking softly to him, and Rochelle noticed that Sergei was watching the young man closely. Nico-she wondered if it was true, what they said of him, that his wits were gone and that he was no more than a child. Seeing him this way hurt most of all, she thought.
A’Teni ca’Beranger finally emerged from behind the quire and began the service, attended by a covey of high-ranking teni who fluttered around her with censers and goblets, with the staff of the broken globe, with the scrolls of the Toustour and Divolonte. Rochelle half-dozed through most of it, stirring only when Jan arose to give the Admonition. She watched him move to the High Lectern-walking like an old man, leaning on a cane with one arm clutched tight to his body. Talbot moved to assist him, and she saw Jan shake his head at the man. Slowly, he ascended the steps of the High Lectern, refusing to allow his injuries to stop him. She saw him gaze out over the crowd, then stare at the body of his matarh for several breaths before speaking.
“It’s customary to say how kind and wonderful one’s matarh was in life,” he said finally, his baritone voice swelling with the fine acoustics of the temple. “I won’t tell you that lie. She was not, perhaps, the best matarh I could have had. I was her only child, but I was still not the child she cared most about.
“That child, her only true child, was Nessantico. The Holdings. To Nessantico, she was an excellent matarh: a strong and forceful one, who accomplished what few others could have. She restored Nessantico when the city was in ruins. She kept the Holdings from falling apart when in lesser hands it would have crumbled and dissolved. She protected Nessantico when, for the second time, it came under the attack of foreign invaders. She gave all her love and all her energy and all her attention to this city and this empire, and when the sacrifice was demanded, she was willing to give Nessantico her life as a final payment.”
He paused, taking several breaths as if speaking had exhausted him. Rochelle leaned forward. I was willing to take her life. I would have, Matarh, but I was too late. Her hand was still on the knife hilt. Her vatarh glanced upward, as if he’d glimpsed her movement or could somehow feel the pull of the knife she’d stolen from him. She slid back into shadow. His eyes, far below, seemed to hold her despite the great distance.
“Celebrate Allesandra ca’Vorl,” Jan continued, his gaze returning to the audience. “Celebrate her stewardship of the Holdings, because in a time when the Holdings teetered on the brink, she kept the empire from the edge. That was masterful. That was genius. That was passion. Those were the qualities that Matarh possessed in abundance. They were exactly the qualities that Nessantico needed, and she arrived at exactly the time Nessantico required her presence. Nessantico was fortunate to have her-with her abilities and in this moment. Even if I didn’t exactly appreciate that most of the time.”
A faint chuckle ran through the crowd at that comment, sounding out of place in the temple. “We have emerged victorious from a terrible war,” Jan said, “in no small part because of Kraljica Allesandra’s actions. I can only hope, in going forward, that I am able to emulate her, that I can be her son and build upon her legacy. The Holdings are one again, the Faith is one again, but there are challenges ahead that will test us-all of us. I know that she will be watching from the arms of Cenzi. I hope that we can make her proud of what we accomplish.”
Jan bowed his head. Rochelle thought that he might say more, but he gave the sign of Cenzi to the crowd and left the High Lectern-slowly, again, the sound of his cane loud in the silence. He returned to his seat as the A’Teni and her attendants moved back to the altar. As they began to circle the bier, chanting and waving censers, Rochelle sank back into her niche, putting her spine to the cold stone.
What do I do, Vatarh? What do I do to make you proud of me?
She could feel the hilt of the knife pressing into her side as she crouched against the temple’s buttress. If Nessantico was to be her vatarh’s passion, as it had been Allesandra’s, if-as he had said was true of Allesandra-the Holdings were to be his one true child, then she would share that passion with him. Rochelle’s matarh had given her a singular skill; she would use it, then.
I won’t be the White Stone, no, but I can become the Blade of Nessantico.
She nodded. She would stay in the shadows. She would truly be Jan’s daughter. She would serve the Holdings in her own way.
Yes.
The choir began to sing once more, and she closed her eyes, letting herself sink into the ethereal sound, as insubstantial and mysterious as she would be.
The procession around the ring boulevard of the Avi a’Parete was long and slow and-Jan could see by the throngs that lined the Avi waiting for the Kraljica to pass by-necessary. The populace stood several hands deep on both sides of the Avi for the entire length of the boulevard, as far he could see. Their faces were solemn; many were weeping openly. Jan realized then that as Allesandra had loved the city, it had come to love and appreciate her in return.
He could only hope they would do the same for him in the coming years.
He grimaced as the carriage in which he rode found a jagged hole in the pavement, the impact pushing his cracked ribs together, the pain radiating all the way to his shoulders. The cuts the healers had sewn closed days ago pulled as he tried to make himself comfortable in the seat. He struggled to show as little of his discomfort as possible to the crowds. He smiled; he waved. And on his hand, the signet ring of the Kralji glistened.
The funeral procession for Allesandra echoed that for the great and beloved Kraljica Marguerite. None of the Kralji between Marguerite and Allesandra had been given such a formal display. Kraljiki Justi, Marguerite’s son, had been mocked and loathed; the people of the city had actually rejoiced at his death, and his bier had gone directly from the Archigos’ Temple to the palais. His son Audric’s reign had been worse, though Sergei’s short regency had kept the city stable. But once the regency ended prematurely, Audric’s madness and erratic behavior had damaged the Holdings even further, and his assassination had-many thought-been a blessing. Kraljica Sigourney, Audric’s successor, had committed suicide as the Tehuantin sacked and burned the city, and her body had been desecrated by the Westlanders: Jan remembered that all too vividly.
With Sigourney’s death, with the city a smoking ruin around him, Jan could have taken the title of Kraljiki himself; he’d chosen to give Nessantico and the Holdings to his matarh instead: a gesture of mockery.
She had turned his mockery into a true gift, he had to admit. That was evident now.
Jan’s carriage, drawn by three white horses in a four-horse harness, followed immediately behind the bier. He could hear the chanting of the teni who walked alongside the bier, which appeared to float in a white cloud. Above the body, huge images of the Kraljica appeared and vanished again: there she was as she appeared in her official portrait; there she dedicated the rebuilt dome of the Old Temple, there she smiled as she descended from the balcony during the Gschnas.
The smell of trumpet-flowers accompanied her, and the sound of the musicians in the open carriage ahead of the bier, playing Darkmavis and ce’Miella: a fusing of ancient and modern.
The old giving way to the new. Jan found it compelling.
“Look-they’re cheering for you, Vatarh,” Elissa said happily, pointing and waving herself. And it was true, as the bier passed, as their open carriage followed, the mourning morphed into applause and smiles. “They like you.”
