Shadowplay

was Kupilas, son of Zmeos, because the Artificer proclaimed his allegiance to his uncles and promised he could bring many useful things to the three godly brothers and their heavenly city. And thus it proved to be. He taught them healing and other crafts, and even the making of wine, so that mortals could make offerings of drink to the gods as well as meat and blood.

—from The Beginnings of Things, The Book of the Trigon

Utta stared at her reflection. Even looking in a mirror was an unusual experience, since Zorian sisters were generally given neither opportunity nor encouragement to contemplate their own reflections. “I cannot help it,” she said. “I look like something in a mummer’s play.”

“You do not,” said Merolanna, invisible for a moment in a cloud of powder as her little maid Eilis vigorously applied the brush to Utta’s face. “You look extremely handsome— like a highborn gentleman.”

“I am not supposed to be a gentleman, even in this ridiculous imposture, but an ordinary servant. In fact, though, I am neither of those. I am an old woman, Your Grace. What am I doing got up in such a semblance?”

“You must trust me,” the duchess replied, waving away the last of the powder. The maid began to cough, so Merolanna sent the girl out of the room. “I simply cannot do what must be done,” she said when they were alone in the bedchamber, “since I am bound to be at the blessing ceremony, especially with Duke Caradon coming to Southmarch. The Tollys are swarming, so we Eddons must make a show. I have to go. That is why you must do your part, my dear.”

But I’m not an Eddon. Utta looked at the duchess with what she hoped was a certain sternness. She thought Merolanna had grown a bit careless about this matter of her lost son, her plans getting stranger and more wild, as though the steps they were contemplating now really were nothing more dangerous than a mum-show. She also clearly felt that Utta had become some kind of foot soldier in the cause, bound to obey all orders.

“I can understand how you feel about the child...” she began.

“No, you can’t, Sister,” said the duchess with unconvincing good cheer. “Only a mother can. So let’s just get on with this, shall we?”

Utta sighed.

When she was finished, with all the unfamiliar ties and buckles done up, Utta took one last look at the dour creature in the glass—an aged, effeminate servant dressed in dun-colored robes and a shapeless hat. It seemed scandalous to be showing so much hose-covered leg, but that was what men did every day. She squinted.

“You know, all the men’s clothes in the world cannot make a woman truly look like one. A man, I mean. Our faces just are not the right shape.” She traced the line of her own toodelicate jaw with her finger.

“That is why we will wrap this close around you,” Merolanna said briskly, winding the tails of the hat around Utta’s chin and neck like a scarf. “It is a cold day—no one will take much notice. Especially not today.”

“But is it wise, this plan?” She felt fairly certain it was not, but was torn between her good sense and her loyalty to Merolanna.

“To be honest with you, Utta, I don’t care.” The duchess clapped her hands together, which brought the little maid back into the chamber. “Help me with my jewels, Eilis, will you?” Merolanna turned toward back toward Utta. “Now you had best be on your way. We have only a few hours left—it is still winter, and dark so early.”

Utta wasn’t certain that hurrying off because the danger would be worse in a few hours made sense, especially when she hadn’t agreed that the plan was warranted in the first place, but she had long since learned that Merolanna could not be opposed with anything less than a wholehearted and extremely patient effort.

“Very well,” she said. “I will meet you afterward as we arranged, then.”

“Thank you, dear,” said Merolanna, remaining statue-still as her maid struggled to close the hasp on a necklace that looked as heavy as a silver harbor chain. “You’re very kind.”

Each time he looked at her Matt Tinwright had to look away after only a few moments. He felt certain that his guilt as well as his longing must shine from his face like the light of the brazier burning on the altar.

Only once had Elan M’Cory looked up to meet his gaze across the vastness of the Trigon Temple, but even from half a hundred paces away he felt the touch of her eyes with so great a force he nearly gasped aloud. Even in the midst of this nominally festive occasion she wore black clothes and a half-veil, as though she were the only person in Southmarch castle who still mourned the death of Gailon Tolly—as she might very well be. Tinwright had never been able to learn what Gailon had been to Elan, whether a secret lover, her hope for a good marriage, or something even harder to understand, but it confirmed him in his belief that nothing was less knowable than a woman’s heart.

Hendon, the dead duke’s youngest brother, stood beside Elan dressed in an elegant outfit of dove gray with black accents, his sleeves so deeply slashed that his arms seemed thicker than his legs. Elan M’Cory might be the most important person in the room for Matt Tinwright, but it was the woman on the other side who was clearly of the most interest to Hendon Tolly: Southmarch’s guardian did not even look at Elan, let alone talk to her, but spent much of the blessing ceremony whispering to Queen Anissa. It was the queen’s first day out in public since the baby had been born. She looked pale but happy, and quite willing to receive the attentions of the current guardian of Southmarch.

The nurse beside her held the infant prince; as Tinwright looked at the tiny, pink face he could not help marveling at what a strange life this child had been born into. Just a few months ago little Olin Alessandros would have been the youngest in a good-sized family, the happy child of a healthy, reigning monarch in time of peace, with nothing ahead to trouble his horizons except the business of being part of the most powerful family in the March Kingdoms. Now he was almost alone in the world, two brothers and a sister gone, his father imprisoned. If Matt Tinwright could have felt sorry for something as unformed as a baby (and Tinwright was beginning to feel he actually could)—well, then young Prince Olin was a good candidate for pity, despite having been born with everything the poet would most have liked to have himself.

Well, almost everything. There was one thing that even having been born royal would not have given him, and at this moment the lack of it burned in Tinwright’s heart so that he could barely stand still. And tonight...the awful thing he must do tonight...!

He looked at Elan’s pale face again but her eyes were cast down. If she could only understand! But she couldn’t, as had been made all too clear. She had invited Death into her heart. She wanted no other suitor.

Hierarch Sisel finished the invocation of Madi Surazem, thanking the goddess for protecting the child and his mother during the birth. Tinwright thought the hierarch looked drawn and unsettled—but then, who did not? The shadow of the Twilight People hung over the castle like a shroud, chilling the hearts of even those who pretended not to feel it. It was having its effect in other ways, too, with fewer ships coming into the harbor and, because of all the refugees from the mainland city and villages, many more mouths to feed even as many of the kingdom’s farms lay deserted and untended. Little as he knew about such things, even Matt Tinwright realized that when spring came and no crops were planted it could mark the beginning of the end for Southmarch.

Hierarch Sisel stood behind a small altar that had been erected just for this ceremony so that the ceremonial fire could be placed atop the large stone altar. The flames billowed behind him as cold air swirled in the high places of the temple. “Who brings this child before the gods?” he asked.

“I do,” said Anissa in a small voice.

Sisel nodded. “Then bring him forward.”

To Tinwright’s surprise, the queen didn’t carry the child to the altar herself, but nodded for the nurse holding the baby to follow her. When they stood before the altar, Sisel threw back the child’s blanket.

“With the living earth of Kernios,” he proclaimed, rubbing the bottoms of the child’s feet with dark dust. “With the strong arm of Perin,”—he lifted the tau cross called the Hammer and held it over the child’s head for a brief moment before setting it down—“and with the singing waters of Erivor, patron of your forefathers, guardian of your family’s house...” He dipped his fingers into a bowl and spattered the child on the top of the head. The baby began to cry. Sisel grimaced ever so slightly, then made the sign of the Three. “In the sight of the Trigon and all the gods of Heaven, and soliciting the wise protection of all their oracles on this, the prophets’ own day, I grant you the name Olin Alessandros Benediktos Eddon. May the blessings of heaven sustain you.” The hierarch looked up. “Who stands for the father?”

“I will, Eminence,” said Hendon Tolly. Anissa gazed at him with grateful pleasure, just as if he had really been the child’s father, and in that moment Tinwright felt he saw it all plain: of course Tolly did not want Elan—he had bigger plans. If Olin did not come back his wife and son would need another man in