AUGUST, YEAR OF GOD 895
Royal Palace, City of Talkyra, Kingdom of Delferahk
“I could wish they’d just go ahead and get all of this settled,” King Zhames II grumbled across the dinner table.
The king’s kingdom, despite its respectable size, was not one of the great realms of Safehold. In fact, it was on the penurious side, which was one reason his own father had arranged his marriage to one of Hektor of Corisande’s cousins. King Styvyn had had hopes that the relatively wealthy island princedom would see its way to making investments in his longed-for project to turn the port city of Ferayd into the kernel for a Delferahkan merchant marine which, in alliance with that of Corisande, might actually have been capable of challenging Charis’ maritime dominance. Alas, it had never been any more than a hope-a dream, really-although Prince Fronz and, later, Hektor had been relatively generous in loans over the years. Not that Zhames had entertained any illusions that it had been out of the goodness of Hektor’s heart, whatever might have motivated his father. Hektor of Corisande had always invested his marks wisely, and it had been Zhames Olyvyr Rayno’s distant kinship to an up- and-coming bishop of the Order of Schueler which had been the true reason for Hektor’s generosity.
Not that Wyllym Rayno had ever done a damned thing for Delferahk, Zhames reflected grumpily. He’d been willing enough to use Zhames as a go-between to Hektor once or twice, and he’d helped arrange the remittance of the interest on a couple of the king’s more pressing loans from the Temple, but that was about it. And now there was this mess.
“Sooner or later it will all blow over, I’m sure, dear,” Queen Consort Hailyn said serenely from her own side of the table. The two of them dined alone together more often than not, less for any deep romantic reasons than because state dinners were expensive. At the moment, their three grown sons were elsewhere, no doubt entertaining themselves in some fashion of which a dutiful mother would not have approved. The queen consort had grown increasingly accustomed to that over the years. In fact, she’d grown accustomed to a great many things and taken most of them placidly in stride.
“Ha!” Zhames shook his head. Then, for added emphasis, he shook his finger across the table, as well. “Ha! You mark my words, Hailyn, this is going to get still worse before it gets better! And we’re already stuck in the middle of it, no thanks to dear, distant Cousin Wyllym!”
“Hush.”
Few things could disturb Queen Hailyn’s even-tempered world, but her husband’s occasional criticisms of Mother Church-and especially of the Inquisition-were among them. She looked around the dining room, then relaxed as she realized there’d been no servants to hear the injudicious remark.
“Saying things like that isn’t going to help, dear,” she said much more severely than she normally spoke to her royal spouse. “And I really wish you’d be a little more sparing with them. Especially”-she looked straight across the table-“these days.”
Zhames grimaced, but he didn’t protest, which was itself a sign of the times. Despite the distant nature of his relationship to the Archbishop of Chiang-wu, he’d never cherished many illusions about the inner workings of the vicarate. There’d been times when he’d been hard put to visualize exactly how those workings could serve the interests of God, but he’d been wise enough to keep his nose out of matters that were none of his affair.
Until, of course, his wife’s cousin dumped his two surviving children into Zhames’ lap and simultaneously dumped the king into the Temple’s business right up to his royal neck.
It had seemed like a situation with no downside when Hektor first requested asylum for his daughter and younger son. The request had come with promises of a very attractive subsidy in return for the king’s hospitality. And given the fact that Hektor had become the Temple’s anointed paladin in its struggle against the Charisian heretics, it had offered Zhames an opportunity to cement his relations with that dratted distant kinsman of his, as well. It wasn’t likely to make his relationship with Charis any worse, either, given that business in Ferayd. And in a worst-case situation (from Hektor’s perspective, that was) it would give Zhames physical control of the rightful ruler of Corisande. Best of all, he’d had absolutely no responsibility for getting the royal refugees to Talkyra; all he’d had to do was offer them reasonable quarters (or as close to it as the old-fashioned fortress of his “palace” permitted) if they succeeded in getting there.
Then Hektor managed to lose his war against Charis. And to get himself assassinated.
Suddenly Zhames found himself in the middle of what looked like turning into a nasty situation. On the one hand, he was forced to recognize-or at least deal with-Prince Daivyn’s Regency Council in Corisande despite the fact that it had signed a peace treaty with Cayleb and Sharleyan of Charis and sworn to abide by its terms. Vicar Zahmsyn, speaking as Chancellor Trynair, had made Mother Church’s position on the legitimacy of that council abundantly clear, but at least he’d recognized certain pragmatic constraints on Zhames’ position and stopped short of threatening the king for his “dealings” with the proscribed council. On the other hand, Vicar Zhaspahr, speaking as Grand Inquisitor Clyntahn, had made it equally abundantly clear Zhames dared not give any formal recognition to the Regency Council, which forced him to squirm through all sorts of convoluted hoops just figuring out how to phrase his correspondence with it. Yet, simultaneously, both Vicar Zahmsyn and Vicar Zhaspahr had informed him, speaking as Knights of the Temple Lands, that they very much desired for him to retain physical custody of young Daivyn for the foreseeable future.
Zhames often found himself wondering exactly why that was. Surely the boy would be safer in the Temple’s direct custody in Zion, where no Charisian assassin could get at him! And if the Temple intended someday to restore him to his father’s throne, then wouldn’t it have made more sense to see to it that he was trained up from childhood in a spirit of proper respect for (and obedience to) Mother Church in Mother Church’s own imperial city?
The contemplation of those questions had led him to certain unhappy conclusions. Indeed, to conclusions unhappy enough that he hadn’t shared them even with his wife.
“I’m just saying,” he said now, “that we’re in a sticky situation and this squabbling and bloodshed isn’t going to make it any better. Langhorne only knows how the Charisians are going to react when those prisoners Rahnyld captured get to Zion, but it’s not going to be pretty. We’ve had our own demonstration of that, haven’t we?”
His wife frowned the way she always did whenever someone alluded to the “Ferayd Massacre.” She’d never been happy about the part Delferahkan troops had played in the original incident, and despite what she’d said a moment ago, she’d had some tart words of her own for the Inquisition following the murders. The Empire of Charis’ reprisal against the city hadn’t made her one bit happier, although she recognized that the Charisians had actually been rather restrained in their response, however it had been reported by the Inquisition.
“We’re lucky they’ve been too busy elsewhere to go on raiding our coasts,” Zhames continued, “but that can always change, especially now that they’ve settled things with Tarot. Everything they had committed to blockading Gorjah is available for other enterprises now, you know. And leaving that completely aside, the more settled things get in Corisande, the more… awkward they’re likely to get for us here in Talkyra.”
It was the closest he’d yet come to broaching his suspicions about who’d really murdered Prince Hektor and his older son. From the flicker in Hailyn’s eyes she might have been entertaining a few of those same suspicions herself.
“This ‘Regency Council’ of young Daivyn’s is starting to sound far too conciliatory where Charis is concerned for my peace of mind,” he continued, deliberately steering the conversation to one side. “I’m not sure how much longer Vicar Zahmsyn’s going to go on allowing me to correspond with them, and what do we do about Daivyn then?” He shook his head. “The most likely outcome I can see is for the Temple to take him into its direct custody.”
Hailyn’s eyes widened and one hand rose to the base of her throat.
“Whatever else Daivyn and Irys may be, they’re my cousins,” she said, “and prince or not, Daivyn’s only a little boy, Zhames! He only turns eleven next five-day, and Irys isn’t even nineteen yet! They need family, especially after all they’ve already been through!”
“I know,” Zhames said more gently, “and I’m fond of them myself. But if the vicarate”-he saw her grimace slightly, proof both of them knew he was actually speaking about the Group of Four-“decide we’ve gotten too cozy with the Regency Council, and if they decide the Regency Council’s gotten too cozy with Charis, that’s exactly what they’re likely to do. And in the meantime, they’re more or less ordering me to go on corresponding with the Regency Council! And they’re insisting on receiving true copies of every document from the Regency Council to me or to
