Chapter XXVI #3
“You’ve ruined me. The Honorian guard are everything I hate.
The king’s pressers are drawn from the guard, and you know what they are—they tear families apart, all to ensure the war in Vesper is kept fed with human tinder.
Besides which, how long do you think I’d last at Inver court before someone discovered where I’m really from? ”
“Of course I know what the pressers are,” Fia said, a warning note in her voice. “If you recall, they killed my brother.”
Nikolau had gone from dead pale to ashen gray and was livid with fury now. None of it bothered Fia—she knew him to be a man of quick and towering passions, which rose and fell in an instant.
“And you expect me to be a part of that?” Nikolau said. “Raea will have to kill me. I won’t do it, Fia. You might as well have run me through. There’s no way I’ll make good on that oath, goddess-sworn though it was.”
Fia heaved a weary sigh. “Nikolau. Listen. Do you think there’d be no opportunity to undermine the pressers’ work as captain of the guard?
Your deserters are what, five hundred strong?
Seven hundred at most?” Nikolau nodded reluctantly.
“You could hide twice that number in Inverlyn alone as guard captain, and no one would be the wiser. You could outlaw the practice of pressing citizens into service altogether, if you were patient and waited until enough courtiers were in your debt. That would do more to weaken Honoria’s hold in Vesper than anything else you’ve ever accomplished.
Just by accepting the position of guard captain, you’d have one power willing to back you already. ”
“Who?” Nikolau asked, his eyes narrowing.
“The Priest. He’s making a bid for the regency, to hold the throne for Justus till he comes of age.”
A scornful noise escaped Nikolau. “The Priest all of Inverlyn says you’re fucking?”
“I’m not yet, though I mean to,” Fia said with undented calm.
“But who I take to my bed is none of your concern. What should concern you is fulfilling the oath you’ve just sworn, and the fact that everything I’ve said is true.
You can undermine the pressers a thousand times more effectively as head of the guard, and put an end to them entirely before too long.
Imagine that. No more families torn apart.
And far, far fewer troops on the ground in Vesper. ”
Nikolau shook his head vehemently. “No. I won’t be nursemaid to your lover and the child you chose to replace our daughter with.”
“Watch your tongue or I will bite it out,” Fia snarled, finally ruffled.
“Our daughter is my guiding light. There is nothing I do without Miriel’s good in mind.
And the Priest as regent with Justus as king after him will be good for Honoria.
It will be good for the cause of peace. With Orden Inver dead, someone will fill the void.
If it is a new king or queen, they’ll have to prove their power and legitimacy.
They will redouble the war efforts in Vesper.
Add to the pressers, rather than diminish them.
Perhaps renew hostilities with Caervallion.
All of Honoria will suffer as a result. And I have no intention of handing our daughter a world more broken than the one I was given.
Whatever it takes, I will give her a life that is better and freer and closer to peace than mine ever was.
If I have to alter the course of a nation in pursuit of that end, so be it. Honoria must move, because I will not.”
By the time she finished her speech, Fia was in a temper to match Nikolau’s, her chest heaving, the set of her shoulders and jaw defiant. But his anger died out as swiftly as it had come, while Fia’s remained.
“You were right when you insisted you didn’t love me as you should, though I always disbelieved you,” Nikolau said quietly.
“I thought it was only your upbringing—that you couldn’t recognize love, even when it was something you felt.
But if this is how you love our daughter, I’d never have been able to bear the force of it. ”
“I was already too much for you when we were together,” Fia answered, reaching halfway across the table and leaving her hand upturned, a peace offering and an invitation.
“And not yet enough for myself. But I became enough, for Miriel. You had a part in that. And anything we lacked, she has more than made up for. You’ll see it when you meet her.
And I swear by my mark, that if you help me to help Honoria, you will meet her soon. ”
“I want to meet her,” Nikolau admitted. Reluctantly, he reached for Fia, too.
But when he took her hand, he didn’t hold it as a friend might, or a former lover.
Instead, he clasped her by the wrist as he’d do to a fellow renegade, a comrade-in-arms, and Fia’s heart soared as she returned the gesture.
It always sat ill with her, how she’d been with Nikolau, and how things ended between them.
Now she saw that they hadn’t ended, only taken a new form, and it eased her mind greatly. “I want it more than anything.”
“I know.” Fia’s voice was low and soothing.
“And I want my Priest and my Inver boy kept safe more than anything. You understand that I’m giving you that task because I trust you, Nikolau?
There’s no one else I could say that of.
I know it doesn’t go both ways, and you’re right not to trust me, but maybe it’ll help you forgive me a little for how I’ve gone about things.
Besides, you always wanted me to need you, and I never did.
Now here it is, at last—I need you for something. No one else will do.”
“I wish I’d never met you,” Nikolau said, but there was no ire in the words.
“Yes, well,” Fia answered. “I believe most people feel the same.”