Chapter Twenty-Four #2
I closed my eyes briefly.
“Really, Netta. I think he …”
“No,” I said, holding up a hand. “I know. I know, and …” I tried to sort out my complicated thoughts, with little success.
“I know he … cares about me, in his way. But if I stay near him, I won’t be able to decide for myself what I need to do.
Even if he has the best intentions, he can’t help but interfere.
Whatever I do, I need to do it away from him. ”
“Always?”
“Yes. No.” I sighed. “I don’t know.”
“Well, don’t disappear,” she said. “Not from me, at least.”
“Never,” I said, and finally let my hand curl round under hers to link her fingers with mine.
A soft knock at the door. The maid appeared again. “The king wants to see you, my lady,” she said almost apologetically.
Mieka and I exchanged glances. “Go back to the Book Man,” I said. “Tell him to meet me up on the roof when he’s ready.”
She nodded and slipped out, and I followed the maid down the interminable halls.
It wasn’t the king’s official reception room, but it was grand enough.
Well-dressed men and women stood about looking grave and official, while a servant passed between them, pouring wine into their cups from a silver pitcher.
Towards the back, in the shadows, I saw Patrick.
He was his usual impeccable self again, seeming to stand quite comfortably, with no sign of injury.
He met my gaze for a moment, giving me the ghost of a smile.
“Your Majesty.” I dipped into my best approximation of a curtsey, which was more like a nervous bob.
“Lady Edevane,” he replied. That was going to take some getting used to.
The king got to his feet. One of his courtiers made a movement, as if to hold his arm, but he waved them away and bowed, dipping so low that I could see the white line of his scalp in his pale-blond hair.
He wore only a simple circlet today and a plain velvet doublet, but somehow managed to look every inch a king despite his plain clothing and frailty.
“I hear you just prevented an uprising,” he said mildly. “My thanks.”
He had kind eyes, I noticed, and a smile of surprising sweetness.
He couldn’t be much older than me, and his open, clean-shaven face made him look boyish.
I found I was assessing him differently at this meeting, now that I knew what Patrick had planned for me.
This man could have been my husband. Still could, I supposed, depending on what the coming months brought to Virelith, and on what the consequences of my uneasy alliance with bone magic would be.
I realized he was still waiting for my reply.
“Er, yes, I suppose so,” I said.
“Virelith is grateful for your loyalty,” he said.
“What will happen to the Pontiff?”
“The Pontiff has been disgraced—but of course, the Temple is denying that he acted with their knowledge. So while we have imprisoned him, the Temple elders will cloister and elect another. It is likely that someone just like him will take his place.” He sighed.
“The Temple remains ever ambitious, especially when it comes to controlling every aspect of magic. But at least one avenue is now closed to them.”
“Oh.” I had hoped for more. “And Milady?”
“In hiding, I believe.”
“Will she be punished as well?”
He sighed. “In a darker, less civilized age, I would have been able to lock her up or execute her for her actions. Sadly, we at least pretend to be more civilized now. There is very little actual evidence linking her to the Pontiff’s actions.”
“But Patrick and I saw her …”
“Oh, I know. But she is expert at negotiating our courts … and garnering support.”
“So it made very little difference after all.”
“I wouldn’t say that. You prevented another Plague and forced our enemies into the open, where we can keep a better eye on them. They have to remain cautious—at least somewhat, while I still rule.” He said this rather ruefully.
“What about Ban Morin’s uprising? His soldiers?”
“Ban Morin will be caught and executed for his attack on the Followers and on the throne. His men are scattered, for now. They will re-form, perhaps. But not immediately.”
His smile was gentle, but his eyes were sharp as he watched my face. “I suppose I couldn’t persuade you to stay in Mirthwater for a while?” he said. “You don’t have to marry me, you know.”
This surprised a laugh out of me. “It was nothing personal, Your Majesty.”
“Oh, I know.” He grinned boyishly. He was handsome when he smiled, despite the shadows under his eyes and his unhealthy pallor. “I still think Patrick’s idea was a good one.”
Behind him, I saw Patrick shift his weight a little.
“Your Majesty, I …” I began.
“Take some time to think about it,” he offered.
“Even if you do not wish to be queen, I would offer you a position in my court. I am well aware I cannot compel you to do anything, and please believe me when I say I do not desire to try—I merely make the request. Please consider it. When you are ready.”
“Thank you, Your Majesty,” I said.
I knew without turning that Patrick had followed me out.
I walked a little way down the corridor to a pair of large doors that led to a stone balcony, then waited for him to approach.
He walked with his usual confident stride, face smiling and unreadable, but I saw the way he fiddled with his rings as he approached.
“All better?” I said lightly.
“Merely a scratch,” he said airily, waving a dismissive hand, then dropped the act and grinned. “Rather worse than a scratch, actually. But I have been stitched up and force-fed all sorts of disgusting elixirs, and I am assured that I will live to flee from danger in a cowardly manner another day.”
“You weren’t cowardly.”
“Well.” He shrugged, still smiling, but there was a tinge of bitterness in it.
“I wasn’t terribly useful. Thank you, by the way.
You know, for the minor matter of saving the kingdom.
And me. And for creating that horrible, cursed bone thing for us to fly out on.
Where is it, by the way? Back in the grave, I hope. ”
“No, I’m afraid I’m going to keep her around for a while.”
“Her?”
I shrugged. “Bone Bird doesn’t have a gender, but I’m coming to think of her as her. Perhaps because Baldbeak likes her so much.”
He feigned a shudder. “Dreadful creature.”
“I wanted to say goodbye,” I said.
A flicker of something in his eyes. “You’re leaving? When?”
“Immediately.”
He raised his eyebrows. “Why so soon?”
“I need to find out … what to do with all this.” I gestured vaguely at myself. “What it means.”
“If you stayed, I could …”
“No.” I had spoken more sternly than I intended to, and he flinched a little. “No, thank you, I mean.”
His face softened, and he reached for my hand. “Netta …”
“I’ll marry the king if I have to,” I said. “Not because you want me to. But because I choose it. If that’s the only way to stop the kingdom from coming apart, to stop a war, then fine. I’ll do it. But not yet. I need to … learn more about myself, first.”
He said nothing, but did not drop his gaze.
“Any news of Milady and Ban Morin?” I asked.
“As the king said …”
“I know you have your own ways of finding things out.”
He smiled, then shook his head. “No news. As far as I know, they have retreated and are licking their wounds, like the Pontiff, awaiting judgement … and probably forging alliances, and shoring up gold and weapons, I would wager. But word will spread of what they attempted. I do not think the common folk will take kindly to any hint of reviving the Plague. You have done wonders for the monarchy. Right now it seems to everyone that the safest option is to stay loyal to the king.”
“And … Will word spread about me?”
“It is inevitable, I’m afraid. But I feel the talk will be kinder to you. You are something of an enigma, you know. The all-powerful mage—”
I snorted. “Hardly.”
“—who appeared from nowhere to defeat bone magic and prevent a second Plague.”
“They won’t know what really happened?”
“How could they? Unless you tell them. Not even Milady, Ban Morin, and the Pontiff know exactly what happened after they left. Although the presence of an enormous skeletal bird spotted flying about the kingdom might give them a clue.”
“And what are you going to do?”
“I will stay with the king,” he said. “And keep an eye on my various interests throughout the kingdom, of course.”
“So, just like before then.”
“Very much like.”
“So nothing has changed. For you.”
He looked at me for a long moment, then said, “Come with me. I want to show you something.”
I hesitated.
“I’m not going to lock you up in a room, if that’s what you’re afraid of.”
We walked together down the long hall, in not-quite-companionable silence, until we reached his rooms. Despite the ornate decor, they were tidy and spare.
Patrick went to a desk by the window and unlocked a drawer, lifting out a narrow wooden box—the kind of thing you would store a gown in, with rosemary for freshness and to keep out the moths.
He laid it on the desk and raised the lid. I thought for a moment it was a gown, and then I thought it might be a bouquet of dried flowers, but then I realized the riot of color was a chaos of silks of all sizes, intricately embroidered by a deft hand. My hand.
All the pieces that I had made back at the Tower and given to Baldbeak for what I had thought were his own mysterious purposes. All of them were here. I dipped my hand into them as if they were a river, letting the silk flow over my skin. Patrick watched me.
“You’ve had these all this time?” I trailed my fingers over the designs. Some of them I remembered well, and others I had completely forgotten.
“I asked Baldbeak to bring me something of you, to help me understand you. I was curious.”
“Exceedingly curious, it seems,” I said. “I had forgotten most of these. And there is my map!”
“Ah yes, your map of the Tower. The first one that Baldbeak ever brought it to me. It is how I found out where you and your mother were hiding.”