about other things, like the audience with Ashford. What are your thoughts?”
“That you should have it,” Dawson said. “As I said before—”
“I know what you said before. You know more now than you did then. I can’t take the audience if I’m going to piss myself in the middle of it. Right now, they’re frightened of me. Of what I might do. And they’re backing away. If Ashford takes back a report that I’m half mad and dying, that song changes. The last time you brought me advice, I turned you away and came within days of handing my child to a man with plans to kill him. So far as I know you’re still in control of your own bladder. It makes you more competent than your king. So tell me. What do I do?”
Dawson stood and tried to gather his windswept mind. He felt like he’d just fought a duel. His body had the sense of expended effort and exhaustion, even though he’d done nothing more than walk across a room and call for a servant. He had the sudden, visceral memory of pelting down a street, Prince Simeon at his side. He didn’t remember when or where it had happened, but he knew the street had smelled of rain, that Simeon had worn green and he’d worn brown. He swallowed and wiped the back of his hand across his eyes.
“If the fits can be controlled, have the audience immediately,” he said. “Prepare beforehand, and keep it brief. No feasts, no private meals, no second audience. Something formal.”
“And say?”
“That you’ll give Asterilhold the time to clean its own court, but that you expect a full accounting and the heads of those who supported Maas. It’s the only option you have. We can’t fight a war. Not with you in this condition.”
Simeon nodded slowly. His spine seemed more bent now than when Dawson had first arrived, but it might only have been that he saw now what habit had hidden before.
“And if they can’t be controlled?”
“Appoint someone else. An ambassador or warden. If you want someone particular, name him Warden of the White Tower. There hasn’t been one since Odderd Faskellin died. Or else… Ah, God.”
Dawson sat again.
“Or else?” the king prompted.
“If you’re failing fast enough, postpone it and let the regent address it once you’re dead.”
Simeon’s breath was sharp as a man struck.
“That’s where we are, aren’t we?” Dawson said.
“We may be,” Simeon said. “Thank you, old friend. That was what I needed to hear, and I don’t believe anyone else would have said the words aloud. Even if everyone were thinking them. Don’t take it amiss if I ask you to retire now. I think I need to rest.”
“Of course, Your Majesty,” Dawson said.
He paused in the archway and looked back. King Simeon had turned away, and Dawson could not see his face.
At the gates of the Kingspire, he waved his carriage away. He didn’t want to be carried now. He wanted to walk. The path between the Kingspire and his mansion was miles, but he didn’t care. He adjusted his sword on his belt and started off. He’d spent nights walking and running through the dark streets of Camnipol, racing horses through the empty market squares, drinking until he was too tipsy to walk a straight line and then hanging over the side of a bridge until the vertigo made his head spin. On a night like that, he’d have walked eight miles. Ten. From his dying king to his own drawing rooms weren’t half that.
Despite its name, the Silver Bridge spanned the Division with stone and wood. Its supports dug into the walls of the great canyon, falling away as far below the city as the great tower was high. Dawson paused at the center of the span, looking south. A flock of pigeons wheeled through the shadows below him, whirling above the midden heap hidden by darkness and mist at the bottom. He stood for a long time, his mind scoured and raw. Behind him, the traffic of the city passed over the void, men and women, horses and oxen, nobles and peasants. He wept briefly.
When he walked into the courtyard outside his mansion, an unfamiliar carriage stood by the door. The crest on its side and the colors of its cloth announced House Skestinin. The old Tralgu door servant rose and bowed, his chain rattling as he did.
“My lord,” he said. “It is very good to see you again. The lady was concerned when your carriage returned empty. She is with Sabiha Skestinin in her private rooms. My Lord Jorey asked to have a word at your convenience. He is in your study.” Dawson nodded and the door slave bowed. Dawson’s hunting dogs greeted him just inside the hall, their wide tails flogging the air and sincere canine grins plucking at their mouths. Dawson couldn’t help smiling as he scratched their ears. There was no love so pure as a dog’s for its master.
He thought of going to Clara before he saw his son, but her rooms were at the farthest end of the mansion and his hips ached from walking. He knew, anyway, what Jorey wanted to talk about. He’d been expecting the conversation since Clara had told him to. Dawson commanded his dogs with a gesture, and they sat as he went into his study and closed the door behind him.
Jorey stood at the window, the afternoon light spilling across his face. It occurred to Dawson again how much the boy could look like his mother. Not in the shape of the jaw so much as the eyes and the color of his hair. It seemed so recent that Jorey had been a thin-limbed boy climbing trees and playing swords with fallen branches. He was broad across the shoulders now, his face serious. And the swords he wielded cut.
“Father,” Jorey said.
“Son,” Dawson replied, feeling the just-conquered tears struggling behind his eyes. “You’re looking well.”
“I’m feeling… I need to ask your permission for something. And it may not be something you like hearing.”
Dawson sat with a grunt and then immediately wished he’d thought to call for a drink before he had. Not wine. Not today. But a cup of water would have been welcome.
“You want to marry the Skestinin girl,” Dawson said.
“I do.”
“Even though she brings no honor to the family.”
“She does, though. The world may not see it, but it’s there. She did something stupid once, and she carries it with her now. But she is a good woman. She won’t embarrass you.”
Dawson licked his lips. There were a dozen objections and concerns he’d had when Clara first explained who Sabiha Skestinin was, and more that had grown up and been trimmed back only to grow again since they’d come to Camnipol. Who was the father of the offending child, and was Jorey willing to have that man, whoever he was, hold that bit of scandal over him in court for the rest of his life? Wouldn’t Barriath, who served under Skestinin in the fleet, be the better match? How could he trust the girl to keep her sex in harness when she’d already shown she couldn’t control it unwed?
“Do you still dream about Vanai? The fire?”
“I do,” Jorey said, his expression grim.
“Is that guilt the reason you want a fallen woman for your wife? She’s something you can save?”
Jorey didn’t answer. He didn’t have to.
“It would be wiser if you didn’t make this alliance,” Dawson said. “The girl’s history shows what she is. We already have connections to Skestinin, so the family gains very little by it. Your brothers aren’t married yet, and it seems odd to have the youngest marry first. When my father came to me and told me who I’d be wed to, I was grateful to him for his guidance and wisdom. I didn’t bring some stray home and beg him to keep it.”
“I see,” Jorey said.
“Do you?”
“Yes, Father.”
“If I tell you now to go to the girl and break things off, will you do it? Out of loyalty to me and to this family?”
“Is that what you’re saying, sir?”
Dawson smiled, and then laughed.
“You wouldn’t,” he said. “You’d go to your mother and arrange some way to force my hand or elope to Borja or some other idiocy. I know you, boy. I’ve changed your diapers. Don’t think you can fool me.”
Something shy and tentative plucked at the corners of Jorey’s mouth. He stepped forward.
“Go,” Dawson said. “Take my permission, and do what you’d have done without it. And take my blessing too.
