“No,” the Werist said. “But I have heard from the bloodlord. He was displeased. He clawed my messenger, almost tore the man’s eye out. He talked of sending a Witness here to find out what happened and who was responsible.”
Considering her son’s disappearance an affair of state, Oliva had sent for Speaker Quarina right away. She, in turn, had summoned a Witness to investigate. Purque himself had heard the woman testify that two Werists had kidnapped Chies, lowering him from the balcony. Purque had set Werists to track the kidnappers. They had followed the scent across the city, then lost it just outside the wall, where the fugitives had boarded a boat. Stralg must have been told all this, so whom did he disbelieve? He reputedly never let his Vigaelian Witnesses out of his presence, so if he wanted one of them to investigate, he would have to come in person. That might explain the huntleader’s worried look.
But there was worse. “He also talked of reprisals.”
“What sort of reprisals? Against whom?”
Purque sighed. He was basically a decent man, the only Vigaelian she had ever met she could imagine growing to like. No longer a combatant, he had allowed his hair and beard to grow in, and their original flaxen had turned to a deader sort of white. Years of Florengian sun had crinkled his pale Vigaelian skin into a red, wrinkled brick. A man missing half a leg could neither fight nor cross the Edge, and his chances of finding some bucolic haven to coddle him in his old age here on the Florengian Face seemed poorer by the day. The best future he could hope for now was a quick death. He did keep his Hero rabble under some sort of control, unlike the callow louts who had preceded him.
“Against anyone. My lady, the boy is the Fist’s son also, and has been abducted or… or worse. Stralg is not the sort of man to accept that.”
“He has never cared two grapes for Chies!”
“But he values his reputation. I don’t know what he has in mind. He may have just spoken in the heat of anger.”
“Or not?”
“Or not. He has been known to order random killings. This time he hasn’t, so far.” As his regent, Purque would have to see such an order carried out. He studied her face. “Any change?”
“No, but the Mercies are confident that it will be very soon. They can no longer get him to swallow.” The sooner the better! Why did the Bright Ones not take pity on Piero and end his suffering? How long would they let the Evil One torture him?
“Tonight, you mean?”
“Probably.” And she should be sitting with him at the end, not wasting time with this Vigaelian hoodlum.
“You will send word here?”
“The trumpets will sound.”
“Before that! I’ll pull my patrols off the streets. I don’t want trouble.”
“Neither do I. Thank you. And in turn you will warn me if you have any important visitors? I don’t want him bursting in on me unexpectedly.”
Purque smiled wanly. “I will warn you if I can. If he does come, he will burst in on me unexpectedly, too.”
She went away. As she was passing through the vestibule, the thugs sitting there threw bones down ahead of her, so she was almost bowled over by the dog pack. She waited until the winners had bolted out the door with the losers in hot pursuit. She followed the losers.
Head covered again, she hurried back along the darkling alley to the private door. As she fished the heavy key from her pocket, she realized that she might be doing so for the last time. The moment Piero died, the last trace of her shadowy authority vanished. She would not even have the right to live in the palace. For generations, Piero’s ancestors had succeeded one another on the throne, so the problem had never arisen before, but now his line was ended. Even Chies, whose claim had been a polite fiction, was no longer available to serve as a puppet for the elders, had they ever managed to accept that solution. A dynasty was falling.
She had just reached the stairs when she heard someone calling for her to hurry.
It was not quite over. For a short while she sat holding his hand. His death throes were barely visible, just a few bubbling gasps, but at least she was there when the royal physician proclaimed that they had ended. Her eyes stubbornly refused to shed tears. The Piero she had known and loved had passed through the veil a long time ago. She shooed away the remaining Mercies, declining their offers of comfort. Yes, she would allow a couple of them to remain in the palace and would call on them if she needed them, and yes they could give solace to any of the servants who wanted it.
When she was alone with him, she knelt by the bed and repeated the prayer for the dead as a personal farewell. Its ancient sonorities comforted her. Then she stepped outside to where the senior palace officials had gathered. She told them to begin doing all the innumerable things that must be done, everything they had been planning for so long. Piero’s body must be washed and taken to lie in state in the Hall of Pillars. Notifying Huntleader Purque was already on the list. But the first and most important message must be advance warning to the justiciar. Only when Speaker Quarina had formally declared the reign of Piero VI ended could the real wheels began to turn.
It was a relief. His sufferings were over; Oliva’s burdens were lifted. She had no one left to worry about except herself. Even Chies had gone, and what happened to the city did not concern her now. She would almost welcome Bloodlord Stralg roaring in on her. Then she could ask him what he had done with her other children, and he could claw her eyes out for impudence.
She bathed and dressed in the black of mourning. She prayed briefly in the palace chapel before going to inspect the Hall of Pillars. The catafalque stood in the center, a lonely block of carved and gilded wood. The throne was draped in black silk and everything else had been removed. Beyond the giant columns the gods wept, rain pattering on leaves and puddles. Tomorrow the citizens could come and pay their respects, filing in at one end of the long hall and out at the other. How many would come? For years Piero had been despised as a loser who had given away his birthright, but lately she had sensed the mood changing as the war growled ever closer, as city after city was wasted, as tides of refugees flowed over the land. The people were being reminded just what they had been spared sixteen years ago, and if they had wits at all they must mourn the loss of the faithful doge who had stood between them and the evil, sacrificing his own children.
Around the bier stood twelve great silver candlesticks, each one as high as a man and holding a tall black candle, which the chamberlain’s men were just lighting. Piero had never been big, but he had seemed big when Oliva married him; now he was tiny. Only his head was visible; the rest of him lay hidden under a shroud of golden cloth pulled up to his chin. His hair and beard had turned completely white during his sickness. He wore the ducal coronet, and the jeweled sword of state lay at his side. As the candle flames brightened, the catafalque began to glitter in sad majesty.
The chamberlain solidified out of the darkness.
Oliva handed him the ducal seal and spoke the words she had been told tradition required: “Deliver this to the justiciar, Speaker Quarina, and inform her that the gods have placed the city in her hands.” The man bowed and disappeared as gently as he had come.
Bats wheeled high overhead. The rain grew louder beyond the pillars. Servants bowed and departed, leaving Oliva alone with memories. It was over. She had completed her duties. Soon Speaker Quarina would take charge. No doubt she was already rounding up a seer and her scribes and anyone else she needed for the formalities… And then what? The Winner? Those last words from Piero seemed more and more like a sending from the gods. He had shown no signs of awareness for a thirty before or after that moment, but Celebre had been his life, and why should They not let him name his successor? Except, he hadn’t. It still made no sense. Why not a name?
Something moved in the north doorway — thump, thump- and Oliva turned to glare at the big man limping toward her. Purque leaned heavily on the spear he used as a staff, the impacts of its butt syncopating with the lighter tap of his ivory stump. His striped smock was soaked, his white hair all rattails. At least he had had the decency to leave his escort outside, but she still half-turned from him to show that his intrusion was an insult to the dead.
He halted at the far side of the bier, studied the corpse for a moment, then looked across at her. “He was one of the bravest men I ever met, my lady.”
She thought he was mocking and snapped, “What do you mean?”
