“When you build your life around only one thing, love only one person, dream only one dream, you risk losing everything at a stroke. You built your life around your brother. I built mine around a crown.” He gave a heavy sigh, pursed his lips, then tossed the circle of gold aside and watched it rattle round and round on the map of Styria. “Now look at us. Both equally wretched.”
“Not equally.” She lifted the scuffed, notched, hard-used blade of the Calvez. The blade she’d had made for Benna. “I still have you.”
“And when you have killed me, what will you live for then?” His eyes moved from the sword to hers. “Monza, Monza… what will you do without me?”
“I’ll think of something.”
The point punctured his jacket with a faint pop, slid effortlessly through his chest and out of his back. He gave a gentle grunt, eyes widening, and she slid the blade free. They stood there, opposite each other, for a moment.
“Oh.” He touched one finger to dark cloth and it came away red. “Is that all?” He looked up at her, puzzled. “I was expecting… more.”
He crumpled all at once, knees dropping against the polished floor, then he toppled forwards and the side of his face thumped damply against the marble beside her boot. The one eye she could see rolled slowly towards her, and the corner of his mouth twitched into a smile. Then he was still.
Seven out of seven. It was done.
Seeds
It was a winter’s morning, cold and clear, and Monza’s breath smoked on the air.
She stood outside the chamber where they killed her brother. On the terrace they threw her from. Her hands resting on the parapet they’d rolled her off. Above the mountainside that had broken her apart. She felt that nagging ache still up the bones of her legs, across the back of her gloved hand, down the side of her skull. She felt that prickling need for the husk-pipe that she knew would never quite fade. It was far from comfortable, staring down that long drop towards the tiny trees that had snatched at her as she fell. That was why she came here every morning.
A good leader should never be comfortable, Stolicus wrote.
The sun was climbing, now, and the bright world was full of colour. The blood had drained from the sky and left it a vivid blue, white clouds crawling high above. To the east, the forest crumbled away into a patchwork of fields-squares of fallow green, rich black earth, golden-brown stubble. Her fields. Further still and the river met the grey sea, branching out in a wide delta, choked with islands. Monza could just make out the suggestion of tiny towers there, buildings, bridges, walls. Great Talins, no bigger than her thumbnail. Her city.
That idea still seemed a madman’s ranting.
“Your Excellency.” Monza’s chamberlain lurked in one of the high doorways, bowing so low he almost tongued the stone. The same man who’d served Orso for fifteen years, had somehow come through the sack of Fontezarmo unscathed, and now had made the transition from master to mistress with admirable smoothness. Monza had stolen Orso’s city, after all, his palace, some of his clothes, even, with a few adjustments. Why not his retainers too? Who knew their jobs better?
“What is it?”
“Your ministers are here. Lord Rubine, Chancellor Grulo, Chancellor Scavier, Colonel Volfier and… Mistress Vitari.” He cleared his throat, looking somewhat pained. “Might I enquire whether Mistress Vitari has a specific title yet?”
“She handles those things no one with a specific title can.”
“Of course, your Excellency.”
“Bring them in.”
The heavy doors were swung open, faced with beaten copper engraved with twisting serpents. Not the works of art Orso’s lion-face veneers had been, perhaps, but a great deal stronger. Monza had made sure of that. Her five visitors strutted, strode, bustled and shuffled through, their footsteps echoing around the chill marble of Orso’s private audience hall. Two months in, and still she couldn’t think of it as hers.
Vitari came first, with much the same dark clothes and smirk she’d worn when Monza first met her in Sipani. Volfier was next, walking stiffly in his braided uniform. Scavier and Grulo competed with each other to follow him. Old Rubine laboured along at the rear, bent under his chain of office, taking his time getting to the point, as always.
“So you still haven’t got rid of it.” Vitari frowned at the vast portrait of Orso gazing down from the far wall.
“Why would I? Reminds me of my victories, and my defeats. Reminds me where I came from. And that I have no intention of going back.”
“And it is a fine painting,” observed Rubine, looking sadly about. “Precious few remain.”
“The Thousand Swords are nothing if not thorough.” The room had lost almost everything not nailed down or carved into the mountainside. Orso’s vast desk still crouched grimly at the far end, if somewhat wounded by an axe as someone had searched in vain for hidden compartments. The towering fireplace, held up by monstrous marble figures of Juvens and Kanedias, had proved impossible to remove and now contained a few flaming logs, failing utterly to warm the cavernous interior. The great round table too was still in place, the same map unrolled across it. As it had been the last day that Benna lived, but stained now in one corner with a few brown spots of Orso’s blood.
Monza walked to it, wincing at a niggle through her hip, and her ministers gathered around the table in a ring just as Orso’s ministers had. They say history moves in circles. “The news?”
“Good,” said Vitari, “if you love bad news. I hear the Baolish have crossed the river ten thousand strong and invaded Osprian territory. Muris has declared independence and gone to war with Sipani, again, while Sotorius’ sons fight each other in the streets of the city.” Her finger waved over the map, carelessly spreading chaos across the continent. “Visserine remains leaderless, a plundered shadow of her former glory. There are rumours of plague in Affoia, of a great fire in Nicante. Puranti is in uproar. Musselia is in turmoil.”
Rubine tugged unhappily at his beard. “Woe is Styria! They say Rogont was right. The Years of Blood are at an end. The Years of Fire are just beginning. In Westport, the holy men are proclaiming the end of the world.”
Monza snorted. “Those bastards proclaim the end of the world whenever a bird shits. Anywhere without calamities?”
“Talins?” Vitari glanced around the room. “Though I hear the palace at Fontezarmo did suffer some light looting recently. And Borletta.”
“Borletta?” It wasn’t much more than a year since Monza had told Orso, in this very hall, how she’d thoroughly looted that very city. Not to mention spiked its ruler’s head above the gates.
“Duke Cantain’s young niece foiled a plot by the nobles of the city to depose her. Apparently, she made such a fine speech they all threw aside their swords, fell to their knees and swore undying fealty to her on the spot. Or that’s the story they’re telling, at any rate.”
“Making armed men fall to their knees is a neat trick, however she managed it.” Monza remembered how Rogont won his great victory. Blades can kill men, but only words can move them, and good neighbours are the surest shelter in a storm. “Do we have such a thing as an ambassador?”
Rubine looked around the table. “I daresay one could be produced.”
“Produce one and send him to Borletta, with a suitable gift for the persuasive duchess and… offers of our sisterly affection.”
“Sisterly… affection?” Vitari looked like she’d found a turd in her bed. “I didn’t think that was your style.”
“My style is whatever works. I hear good neighbours are the surest shelter in a storm.”
“Them and good swords.”
“Good swords go without saying.”
Rubine was looking deeply apologetic. “Your Excellency, your reputation is not… all it might be.”
