6 Theodore
Theodore
No moon silvered the sky.
The night was heavy, endless, but the center of the main deck glowed with the light of dozens of swaying lanterns. The vines around the masts fluttered madly in the wind.
Below them, crew worked, and courtiers milled and mingled, all dressed in clothes that were far too fine for a voyage over the rough Obelian Sea. I lingered in the shadow of my stateroom watching them, arms crossed firmly over my chest, wishing no witnesses had come at all.
There had been no secrets in my court over what had transpired between Imogen and me. And now, word was spreading as virulent as a sickness, that I had altered my marriage contracts. The news widened the courtiers’ eyes and sent gossip buzzing through the air like flame sparks.
Over the musician’s plucking strings, I could just make out their words.
He’s heartsick.
He certainly won’t go through with it.
Of course he will, he’s not gone wholly mad.
I stood there listening, lungs tight and eyes locked on the vine-choked altar before the ship’s wheel.
Whoever had grown the vines up the altar’s posts had filled them full of big white blooms. It was easy to do when coaxing them with power, to make the pale flowers grow large and moonbeam bright, but at the behest of my instructors I’d learned to avoid weighing the vines with too many when I’d been young.
From my spot in the darkness, I watched Eftan inspect the altar and vines with a firm clamp to his mouth. He lifted one tendril higher, plucked a bloom to tuck into his coat, then pulled something small and glinting from his pocket.
A ceremonial knife—the kind used for marriage bindings.
My anger landed like a bolt through the chest, sudden and deep.
He set the blade beside the altar and made his way to stand between my steward and my marshal, strong chin tipped proudly up.
His hands moved passionately through the air as he spoke to them, no doubt going on about the altered contracts, how wayward I’d become, and how desperately I needed their guidance.
Markis Gabros, the steward on my council, listened to Eftan intently, nodding sagely. His gaze kept cutting my way before he patted Eftan on the shoulder and left the small huddle. Night shadows and lantern light passed over him as he strode my way.
“Your Majesty.” He bowed. “I’m surprised you’re not dressed yet.”
Markis was a loyal, but sly, man. Even when we’d been children, he’d had an air of artful cunning about him, and a quick enough mind to ensure that he almost always got his way. Qualities that made him an excellent steward of the purse, but a mediocre friend.
Reluctantly, I opened the door to my stateroom. “I suppose it’s time.”
“I’ll pour you a drink.” Markis followed after me. “Dare I ask you how you’re faring in your last hours as a bachelor?”
I dismissed the question with a grunt. “Eftan was complaining to you about the contracts, I take it?”
Wine gurgled into a goblet. “Ahh.” He sounded wary. “He’s in a right mood over them, yes.”
I yanked the fine black shirt over my shoulders as Markis brought me the wine. “What would you do?” I asked, drinking half of it in one gulp. “If the woman you agreed to marry worshipped a monster that hunted your people?”
Markis chuckled gravely. “If that were the only complication, my answer would be simpler. But you ignore the hefty detail of your betrothed’s parentage. One does not abandon the daughter of the empress of Obelia at the altar and hope to survive it.”
My stomach sank low. He was right. Only a reckless fool would offend the empress so gravely.
Markis gave me a sidelong glance from where he’d perched on the arm of the settee.
“Eftan’s… upset stems from something else, though.
He believes there’s a different reason for your refusal to wed Halla properly.
” He gave an oily smirk and dragged his fingers through his beard.
“A certain Siren who’s got her talons in you. ”
I pulled on my coat and scowled at the way my chest ached.
“All right.” He popped himself off the settee, his elegant voice taking on a cloying quality.
“What I do know is that your power is incomparable.” He swiped the shoulder of my coat and I fought the impulse to drive my fist into his weak chin.
“Eftan can gripe all he likes, but you’re both a king and a God, and you can do as you please.
I’ve read the amendments. You’ve kept the trade clauses intact; you’ve considered the kingdom and the continent’s overall well-being.
The rest is sentimental, inconsequential detail.
Obelians don’t care about bindings.” He gave a nonchalant shrug.
“If you want the princess as your mistress, but not as your divinely bound wife, that is your right.”
“I don’t want her as my—” I cut myself off, pinching the bridge of my nose.
Markis grinned like I was being coy. “I’m no great success in marriage, as you know, but what you have done with these contracts seems a prudent thing to do for all unions.
Let her know what she’s to expect. Keep her from getting too wide-eyed and demanding.
You’re saving yourself a tremendous headache. ”
For a moment, all I could do was stare. His severance from his wife had been a brutal, drawn-out, and public affair. If my memory served, he’d been a prodigious ass through the whole of it. “You’re speaking from experience, I take it,” I said through a tight jaw.
He adjusted his own dusky blue coat in the looking glass.
“Lady Gabros and I were a love match, as I’m sure you remember.
But it proved harder to tend the flame than I’d anticipated.
Perhaps if I’d told her what to expect, as you have, things between us might have turned out differently.
You’ve removed all expectation. You’ll be happier for it. ”
Happier. I nearly laughed. I had never felt so strangely, simultaneously bursting with fury and utterly hollowed out. The musicians started their playing in earnest, and I felt the first notes of their song—the one Imogen and I had once danced to—pour through me like a Mage’s draught.
It burned, ached, as I envisioned the piercing gold of her eyes.
I remembered the way the candlelight had gleamed bronze across her dark hair, how she’d smelled earthy and sweet, like lavender oil and jasmine.
She’d taken up the entire room, looking inevitable, even in that Gods-awful gown.
I could almost feel the phantom curve of her warm, firm waist in my hand.
I curled it into a fist as if I could grab hold of her.
Markis went on, mindless and too familiar. “But on the brighter side, it doesn’t hurt that the princess is a pretty thing. Makes the agreement a little more bearable, no?” He smirked. “Less likely to tire of her quickly.”
There was no keeping the acidic bite from my voice. “Is that what happened to you and Lady Gabros? You grew tired of fucking her?”
Markis winced. “No. Not entirely, Your Majesty.”
“What then?” Glowering, I crossed to the center table, where my capelet and crown sat.
He shook his head, clearly uncomfortable now. “I… I tired of other things.”
“Of what?”
“Her nagging, Majesty,” he said, quietly, with a new tension. “She wanted my time. I found her need for attention to be greater than what I was able to give.”
A jealous rage beat through me. Markis had had the woman he’d claimed to love—all of her. Then he’d disposed of her, quickly and callously. I forced my crown atop my head. “Perhaps it wasn’t a love match at all, then, Gabros.”
He straightened his gold-threaded doublet, defensiveness strengthening his voice.
“I did love her once. I couldn’t get enough of her.
I wanted to be with her every second. Wanted to touch her, feed her, bathe her.
” The smug way he tilted his head made me feel like a na?ve, lovesick adolescent.
“But I’ve learned that is simply what new love is like.
It’s a vase of fresh-cut flowers. It’s breathtaking and bright and changes the whole room, but only for a time. It fades eventually. It rots.”
I was still for a long time, my head full of crushing thoughts.
That Godsdamned song still played, the notes forcing their way through the door cracks.
It wouldn’t be wise to tell him he was patently wrong, or to let on that Eftan was right.
I had altered those contracts because of Imogen, but right now, wisdom was not what guided me.
I clipped my black capelet to my shoulders. “Do you remember the name of Varya’s vines?” I asked. “From your lessons.”
Markis gave a haughty chuckle. “I don’t, Your Majesty.”
“They’re called Malvinia vines. They’re named after my grandmother.
The blooms are easy to grow, but they wilt very quickly if not rigorously tended.
They leave a sticky mess, but Panos used to grow the vines full of them because they were my grandmother’s favorite.
When she died, and she died long before he did, my grandfather tried to stop growing them.
In his heartache, he instructed other Varians to grow the vines without the flowers too.
They all obeyed the command, but whenever Panos—the Great God himself—grew the vines, the Malvinia blooms always snuck in.
” I adjusted the weight of my crown. “Even he could not stop himself from being possessed by her.”
Markis made a neutral sound, then downed the last of his wine. “I’m no great romantic, it seems,” he said through the faintest laugh. “You say possessed like it’s something to hope for.”
I straightened, as some emotion I didn’t care to name moved through me like a rip current. “Leave me.”
“Of course.” He tried to hide it, but I saw the spike of derision in his look. He bowed reverently, made for the door, and stopped. “It’s a pity I never met your Siren, Your Majesty. She sounds rather… singular.”
I couldn’t determine if it was a threat, but my hackles rose regardless. As Markis left, his head at a pitying tilt, a servant appeared.