A Magic Of Nightfall Part 30

"I don't know what to say."

She did smile then, the expression tinged with an underlying emotion Karl couldn't decipher. "Then you shouldn't say anything. I haven't said anything that needs a reply-beyond telling you that I'm going back with you no matter what you say."

She held his gaze, unblinking, until he nodded. "All right," he said. She nodded but otherwise said nothing. The silence grew long and increasingly uncomfortable, both of them staring at the small fire in the hearth. The thoughts roiled in Karl's head: all the times he and Varina had been together, the comments she'd made, the glances she'd given him, the occasional touches, the way she'd always deflected questions about any romantic interests she might have had, the way she'd flung herself into the work of the Numetodo.

He should have known. Should have realized. But the silence had already made the questions he should have asked more difficult. He cleared his throat. "If . . . If you're going back to Nessantico with me, then perhaps you need to start showing me more of this Westlander way of magic."

Retreating into work to avoid intimacy: that was what Ana had always done, after all.

Allesandra ca'Vorl.

SHE FOUND SERGEI'S TALE fascinating, though she knew the man well enough to know that there were details he was holding back. She wasn't bothered by that; she would have done the same in his place. She had done the same, during the long years she had been held in Nessantico. She had liked Archigos Ana, who had treated her fairly and respectfully, and she had been fascinated by Sergei, first by his reputation and his silver nose, then-as she'd come to know him-by his intelligence and his intriguing, dark personality.

"Ca'Rudka is an interesting and skilled man, and I would not be where I am now if it weren't for him," Archigos Ana had told her once, a few years into her exile, as Allesandra was blooming into a young woman. "But you can't entirely trust him. Oh, he's true to his word, but he gives that word carefully and grudgingly, and will keep to the letter of it and perhaps not the spirit. His true allegiance is to Nessantico, not to any person within it. I don't think he loves any person, don't think he ever has. His true love is the city and the Holdings itself. And some of his tastes, what he enjoys doing . . ." Ana had grimaced at that. "I hope those are only vile tales, and not true."

She remembered that conversation as she regarded Sergei, now dressed in current Firenzcian fas.h.i.+on and colors. He had come at her invitation to eat lunch in her rooms in Brezno Palais, and if he had been offended by the careful search of his body before he'd been allowed entry, or if he noticed the two armed gardai who watched him closely from their stations in the room, he said nothing. He smiled at her as he might have at any ca' in Nessantico, and he uttered pleasantries about the presentation and taste of the meal as the servants pa.s.sed in and out, and he leaned back in his chair with a cup of tea as if he were relaxed and at ease. He related how he'd been imprisoned in the Bastida, and how he'd escaped. She watched his face, watched his hands-none of them revealed any emotion at all; he might have been telling a tale that had happened to some distant relative once upon a time.

"So the Numetodo Amba.s.sador helped you?" Allesandra also remembered Karl ca'Vliomani, who was so obviously smitten with Archigos Ana, although she seemed to treat him as no more than a good friend. Allesandra had not cared much for him, or for the Numetodo, who scorned and mocked her own strong beliefs, who believed in no G.o.ds at all. They believed that the world had always existed, that it was impossibly old and that natural processes could explain everything within it-the sheer illogic and arrogance of their philosophy annoyed Allesandra. "That won't please Archigos Semini . . . or Archigos Kenne either, I would guess."

"It was an act of friends.h.i.+p and nothing else."

"Archigos Ana once told me that every act reflects on the faith of the person who commits it," Allesandra told him. "Are you a Numetodo now, Sergei?"

He shook his head. "No. I believe in Cenzi as strongly as I ever did."

She wondered if that statement was simply an artful deflection, but let it go. "Can Kraljiki Audric truly rule the Holdings? Can Archigos Kenne hold the a'teni together as Ana did?"

"Time alone will give you that answer, A'Hirzg," he responded.

"Then indulge me with speculation."

Sergei lifted a shoulder. "Archigos Kenne is . . . weak. Not just physically, but also when it comes to confrontation. He is a good, moral, and faithful man, but he's a follower and not a leader. To his credit, that defect is one that he knows and acknowledges. The Concordance of A'Teni elected him Archigos because of it; they didn't want another strong leader like Ana. As for Kraljiki Audric . . . well, he's but a boy, and in ill health. I'm sure you have your own people giving you reports, but I suspect they haven't told you the full story."

He leaned forward, setting down the teacup and plate silently on the table. She could see her distorted reflection in his nose. "Audric has gone mad," he said softly. He tapped an index finger to his forehead. "How fully, I don't know. I saw it myself before he sent me to the Bastida, and afterward my friends in court and with the Faith sent me word. He holds conversations with the painting of his great-matarh Marguerite; he puts the painting at his right hand in court as if she were his councillor."

"Truly?" Allesandra gestured, and one of the servants hurried forward to refill the teacups. She watched the golden liquid steam in her cup. "And no one says anything?"

"Kralji have sometimes acted strangely, and sometimes punished those who point out their strangeness. That's happened often enough in Nessantico's long history; we could both recite the names, I'm sure. And if it doesn't seem to directly affect the Holdings-" he lifted a shoulder, "-then it's best to keep such observations to yourself . . . and to be careful. I'm sure that's what Sigourney ca'Ludovici is doing: she wants the throne, and she watches for the opportunity to seize it. Most of the Council of Ca' would back her; the Sun Throne is hers if Audric dies or must be . . . removed. Either one of those is a very likely scenario in the next few months, I suspect."

Allesandra nodded. She lifted the teacup and blew over the fragrant surface, sipping carefully. Neither of them said anything for several breaths. "Why did you come here, Regent?" she asked finally. "I know what you told my son and the Archigos. But I think there's more."

He glanced over his shoulder at the gardai and said nothing. "They're my people," she told him. "My own handpicked gardai who have been with me since I returned to Firenzcia. I trust them implicitly. I'm sure you had men under your command whose integrity you trusted in such a manner."

"It's been my experience that nearly everyone has a flaw that can be exploited. I've learned that the fewer ears hear something, the more chances there are that statements won't be repeated."

She waited, sipping her tea; he rubbed at his nose, smearing her reflection.

"As you wish," he said at last. "Nessantico and the Holdings have been my life, A'Hirzg. That's not a loyalty I can or will give up. My sincerest wish is to see the Holdings restored to what it was when Kraljica Marguerite was on the throne. I would like to see you in Nessantico, as Kraljica Allesandra. You could be the Kraljica that Nessantico requires now."

Even though she'd been expecting the words, she still found herself drawing a quick inward breath. You see, Vatarh? You see? This is the legacy you wanted, and this is the promise you gave up when you abandoned me for Fynn. The emotional depth of the internal response surprised her; she could feel the warmth of it spreading upward from her chest to her face. She struggled not to show any of it to ca'Rudka. "Wishes are cheap," she told him. "We can wish for all we want. What we can accomplish is quite another thing."

"Yet if two people's wishes coincide, and they coincide with those of other people, and if those people are powerful enough . . ." He smiled, folding his fingers together on the lace tablecloth as if he were praying. "Would that be your wish as well, A'Hirzg? Can you see a ca'Vorl on the Sun Throne? I know your vatarh had that vision."

He knows. "Let's put that aside for the moment, Regent. There are other issues if this is something we would pursue-and I'm not saying that it is. What of the Faith? Who would be the Archigos in this restored Holdings you envision: Semini, or Kenne?"

"Despite what I said about his faults, I like Archigos Kenne. He is my friend, his faith is true, and as I said, he's a good man."

"He may be all of that, but he is not a friend of Firenzcia and, like Ana, would coddle the heretics. And Semini is my friend."

Sergei made a contemplative sound deep in his throat. "There are rumors, A'Hirzg, that he may be more."

She flushed hotly at that. The gardai behind the Regent moved his hand from his side to the hilt of his sword, but she shook her head to him. "You speak too freely about rumors and lies, Regent. You can't treat me like a girl or a royal hostage anymore. You're on my land, and it's your life at stake, not mine. If this is the way you spoke to Audric, then it's no wonder he no longer wanted you to be Regent."

He bowed his head, but there was no apology in his hawkish eyes. "My apologies, A'Hirzg. My stay in the Bastida has, I'm afraid, scrubbed away both my diplomacy and my patience. But those rumors and lies do concern me, if we are to work together."

"The Archigos already has a wife. That's all that needs to be said, and all the answer you'll receive. As to Archigos Kenne . . ." Allesandra remembered Kenne ca'Fionta also: a gentle man, a quiet man, one who was always an effective second-in-command but never questioned anything asked of him or spoke up for himself. She could not imagine him as Archigos. Ana could be gentle and affectionate also, but there was hard bone and steel underneath her velvet, and you did not want to be her enemy. Allesandra wasn't certain what lay underneath ca'Fionta's exterior, but she suspected that Sergei's a.s.sessment was correct.

But Semini-Semini could be as adamantine and strong as Ana. "If you want Firenzcia's help," she continued, "if you want the help of our war-teni, then it will be Archigos Semini, not Archigos Kenne, who reunites the Faith. Kenne needn't be killed; if he could be convinced to renounce his t.i.tle for the good of the Faith, perhaps even to become the a'teni of one of the cities. I suspect a friend could convince another friend of the sanity of that course. I hope so, for Kenne's sake."

Allesandra settled back in her chair. Sergei, for the first time, had a look of uncertainty in his face, and she was surprised by the strength of the enjoyment that gave her. She wondered if that was how a Kraljica or a Hirzgin often felt, if that was one of the gifts of power. A gift, or perhaps a trap for those who fell into the thrall of that feeling. "I know what I bring to you, Regent," she said to him. "I bring you my name and my genealogy. I bring you the unmatched army of Firenzcia through my son. I bring you the fearsome war-teni of the true Concenzia Faith through Archigos Semini. I bring you Miscoli, Sesemora, and the Magyarias, who answer to Firenzcia. I bring all that to the table. What is it that you bring us, Regent?"

He didn't answer quickly. His right forefinger stroked the lip of the teacup before him, and he seemed to be staring down at the pattern of the leaves in the bottom. "I bring you knowledge," he said. "I know the Garde Kralji and the Garde Civile and the strengths and weaknesses of their commanders. I know Nessantico; I know all her paths and all her secrets. There are those in the Garde Civile and the Garde Kralji who will answer if I call them. There are those among the ca'-and-cu' who will do the same. There are chevarittai who will come to me if I summon them. It may be, A'Hirzg, that I can deliver the Sun Throne to you with as few lives lost as possible."

"Why, if you could do all that, why isn't it that you're the Kraljiki yourself rather than a refugee?" she asked him, but gave him no time to respond. "And if you can do all this, what is it that you want in return?"

"Nothing," he said, and Allesandra felt surprise lift her eyebrows. "Give me whatever reward you see fit. I do this for Nessantico only, to whom I have always pledged my life. I once protected Nessantico from Firenzcia's aggression; now, I will give her to Firenzcia freely. Kraljica Marguerite believed in marriage as a way to reconcile opposing forces, and I believe the same, because the marriage of Nessantico to Firenzcia is what she needs now to survive."

Pretty words, she wanted to say scoffingly. She wasn't certain she believed the man at all. But Cenzi had brought the Regent to her, all unexpected, a gift she couldn't refuse. "You are an intelligent, talented, and attractive young woman," Archigos Ana had told her when news had reached Nessantico that her vatarh had named the infant Fynn as the A'Hirzg and refused to pay the ransom that Kraljiki Justi had demanded for her release. It had been less than a year into her cus.h.i.+oned and bejeweled imprisonment, and Allesandra had wept in bewilderment and fright. Ana-the enemy-had held her and comforted her, had stroked her hair and calmed her again. "I know Cenzi has a plan for you. I can feel it, Allesandra. There is a great part for you to play yet in life. . . ."

She would play that part. She would have what her vatarh had once promised her: the brilliant necklace of Nessantico. That was the reason that Sergei ca'Rudka had appeared now.

"We shall see, Regent ca'Rudka," was all she told him now. "In the end, it will be as Cenzi wills. . . ."

Niente.

NIENTE STOOD ON THE SLOPE of Karnor with Tecuhtli Zolin and his High Warriors, the city spread out below him, and he saw the vision he had glimpsed in the bowl.

The windows of the temple just below them were shattered, gouged-out eyes in the skull of a ruined building. Soot blackened the stones around them, greasy smoke still rising through them. The golden half-dome was broken, the gilded masonry fallen in. Fires flared skyward at a dozen places in the city, brighter than the setting sun.

The attack had gone quickly and easily. As soon as they had glimpsed the heights of the Easterners' great island Karnmor, Niente had called together the nahualli who could control the wind and the sky, and they had conjured a wall of dense fog to conceal the Tehuantin fleet as they approached. The fog bank wrapped them in gray-white air and m.u.f.fled the sounds of their preparations. By the time the spell-fog failed and drifted away in wisps, the Yaoyotl-flying the eagle banner of Tehuantin-was already at the mouth of Karnor Harbor, its sister s.h.i.+ps spread out in two great wings to either side. Karnor Harbor was vast and deep, nested in cliffs of stony arms with the city perched far back, leagues away.

A hand of Holdings naval s.h.i.+ps were stationed there, and they tacked to face the onslaught even as fis.h.i.+ng and pleasure vessels fled for safety. Niente had to admire the bravery of the Holdings captains: in the face of a vastly superior force they didn't flee but turned to confront them directly with their blue-and-gold flags fluttering atop the masts. Still, it had been slaughter. The sea wind was behind the Tehuantin fleet and the Holdings s.h.i.+ps had to beat slowly into the wind. The war-teni aboard the Holdings galleons had little time to prepare their spells-perhaps more powerful than those of the nahualli, but slow to create, and Niente had pushed his nahualli all that day. Their spell-sticks were full, the black sands already prepared. The spells of the nahualli had been able to deflect most of the arcing fire of the war-teni away from the s.h.i.+ps, though the s.h.i.+p alongside the Yaoyotl took a direct hit that fanned into a monstrous blossom of fire and destruction along the decks, sending dozens of men screaming into the cold swells and setting the s.h.i.+p aflame and dead in the water, so that the s.h.i.+ps behind had to tack suddenly to avoid it.

Tecuhtli Zolin was on deck, screaming orders from the forecastle; the Tehuantin s.h.i.+ps answered with the ma.s.sive bolts tipped with capsules of black sand and flung from catapults on the decks: the engines had flung the sputtering missiles toward the defenders of Karnmor; the capsules, enchanted with fire spells, exploded on impact, sending boards to splinters, ripping and tearing b.l.o.o.d.y limbs from the unfortunate sailors. The Nessantican s.h.i.+ps had faltered, their sails afire, or drooping as they lost the wind under the a.s.sault. Tecuhtli Zolin shrieked orders and a second round of fire missiles raked them.

They left the defenders behind as nothing more than hulks burning down to the waterline, and the fleet advanced into the inner harbor of the city. The soldiers of Karnor ma.s.sed there under command of a few horsed chevarittai, but again Tecuhtli Zolin called his orders and the catapults flung their awful messengers into their midst, the explosions trembling the steep hills on which Karnor was built and starting fires among the buildings. The soldiers and the nahualli shouted in victory as they approached the harbor, the sound itself terrifying as swords clashed against s.h.i.+elds and spell-staffs clattered. Niente shouted with them, his own throat raw from yelling and the smoke of battle. He saw residents fleeing through the streets in unorganized mobs, streaming up and away from the sudden clash of battle in the harbor as gangplanks boomed down and disgorged the Tehuantin soldiers. They charged out screaming, their tattooed faces furious and joyful at the same time. Tecuhtli Zolin led them, his curved sword flas.h.i.+ng in the sunlight and his voice calling challenge to the waiting enemy. Niente and his nahualli rushed after them, and their spell-staffs gleamed white as they flung war-bolts into the ranks of the soldiers. Niente's own stave had been quickly depleted, and he had taken the bundle of eagle claws lashed to his back, turning the ivory tubes to activate the contact fire spell and tossing them high over the front ranks of the soldiers to explode in their midst. Once, a wounded Nessantican soldier had risen up from the ground as he stepped over him. Luckily, the man was weak from his wounds, and Niente was able to step away from the wobbly thrust of the sword. He'd taken his knife from his belt and slashed the keen edge across the man's exposed throat before the soldier could recover. Hot blood had spattered Niente's hand, and the man gave a gurgling cry as he collapsed for a final time. A deep knife thrust to the side of the man's neck had finished him, and Niente had risen to find the battle nearly over, with the defenders retreating into the city, pursued by the Tehuantin.

By the time the sun had set-red and sullen through the smoke of the burning city-Karnor was theirs, what was left of it. Below him, Niente could hear faint screaming and wailing as the Tehuantin sacked and plundered the city and killed those they found there. Far below, in the harbor, the holds of the Tehuantin s.h.i.+ps were being stuffed with the largesse of the city.

Niente stood with Tecuhtli Zolin and the Tehuantin High Warriors Citlali and Mazatl. Nearby, guarded by tattooed warriors, the commandant and three chief offiziers of the defenders knelt bound and silenced. The prisoners stared at the fire that the nahualli had built at Niente's direction, and at the flat altar stone from the Karnmor Temple that Niente had ordered dragged here to the summit of Mount Karnmor.

Four eagle claws, their horns filled with black sand, had been placed in the center of the altar stone. They stared at those most of all.

"These Easterners," Tecuhtli Zolin commented, "are poor fighters. They ran like frightened children." He glanced back to the prisoners with a scowl. The Tecuhtli wore his armor, the leather-backed bamboo notched here and there by an enemy blade, the supple tubes rattling softly as he moved. The armor was spattered and stained with blood, though little of it appeared to be his. The sun was fully down now, and the moon had risen in the east-Zolin glanced that way. "Axat won't even accept the offering of these incompetents."

Niente remembered the battles around Lake Malik, and shook his head. "Tecuhtli, they were caught unawares and unprepared for us. That won't happen again. The whispers of what happened here will come to their Kraljiki and the commanders of their army. Perhaps . . ." He hesitated, not wanting to say the next words. "Perhaps it would be best if we take what we have gained here and return home."

Tecuhtli Zolin laughed mockingly. "Go back? Now? When we're standing here in the smoke of victory, just as you foresaw? Nahual Niente, you disappoint me. I came here to challenge this Kraljiki who would send his people to steal our cousins' land but who won't even lead his own army. Citlali, Mazatl-what do you say?"

Mazatl was already frowning, firelight playing over his marked face. Like Zolin, he still wore his battered and gore-marked armor. "I say that I'm glad to be standing on the ground, even here. To be at sea again?" He spat on the rocks at his feet. "I came to fight, not to sail. I say we give Axat what She has earned here, and go on." Citlali muttered his agreement, but appeared less convinced.

The nahualli and the warriors gathered nearest the fire had already begun the low, haunting chanting of the prayer to Axat. The moon's light fell bright and full on the altar stone, glinting on the thick gla.s.s tips of the eagle claws. Niente nodded to Zolin.

Two nahualli grabbed one of the prisoners and hauled the man forward. The offizier was blubbering with fright, calling out to Cenzi. The nahualli pulled him onto the altar stone and pushed him down to his knees. He stared up at Niente in terror. "Go bravely to your death," Niente said to the man in his own language as he picked up one of the eagle claws. He turned the horn at the tip, the ominous click loud as the spell was activated. "Pray to your G.o.d. This will be quick. I promise you that much." Niente nodded again, and the nahualli held the man's arms tight as the man closed his eyes, his lips moving in silent prayer.

Niente opened his own mind to Axat and the moon glow, and pressed the bone of the muzzle to the man's stomach. The sound of the eagle claw's detonation echoed over the city.

Allesandra ca'Vorl.

JAN LOOKED ALMOST FRIGHTENED, his eyes so wide there was white entirely around the pupils. "Matarh . . . taking the army against the Holdings . . . I don't know."

"I understand the danger," she told him. "Yes, it is a huge step to take so early in your time as Hirzg, and I understand how you must feel. I do. You would need to trust Starkkapitan ca'Damont's expertise; even so, this would test you beyond anything you've ever done in your life. But, Jan, I know this is something you can do. Taking the army into battle is something you must eventually do-as nearly every Hirzg of Firenzcia has done. Even your vatarh would tell you that. Fynn was eighteen, only two years older than you, when he first did so." She nodded toward Semini, who sat silently in his own chair. They were in Allesandra's chambers, the three of them. The servants had been dismissed after they had served dinner, the remnants of which decorated the table between them. "Semini knows," she said. "He commanded the war-teni when your great-vatarh Jan nearly took Nessantico."

"And he would have succeeded, had that vile heretic of an Archigos not used her Numetodo magic against us," Semini grumbled. He seemed more like a bear than ever, hunched over on his chair. He tapped his plate, but looked carefully away from Allesandra. She could still remember the shock of that evening: she had been in the tent sitting on her vatarh's lap. "You are my little bird," he was saying, "and I love-" Then his voice cut off and-impossibly-she was outside far from the encampment, sprawled on rain-soaked ground in the night as Archigos Ana and some strange man fought each other with Ilmodo magic she would have thought impossible. Yes, she remembered that all too well-and she knew that her capture was the reason her vatarh had failed, and that he blamed her for it. "Oh, there's much that the Holdings hasn't yet answered for," the Archigos continued, looking only at Jan. He pounded softly on the tablecloth with a fist. "I look forward to demanding payment. Hirzg Jan, I stand ready to be at your right hand, with all the war-teni of the Faith alongside me."

Jan still looked uncertain, and Allesandra reached out to pat his hand. "Jan," she said, "ultimately this must be your decision, not mine. I'm not the Hirzg, you are."

"You didn't want this when you could have had it," Jan said, tapping the golden band of the Hirzg's crown on his head. "And yet now you want to-" He stopped, abruptly. Blinked. "Oh," he said. His eyes narrowed.

She worried at the look on his face. "Think of what we could accomplish together, Jan," she told him hurriedly, "with the same family on the Sun Throne and on the Throne of Firenzcia. We could bind the Holdings together and create a greater, more peaceful empire than Marguerite's."

He said nothing. He looked from Semini to Allesandra, then rose from his seat and walked quickly to the door. "Jan?" she called after him, and he paused there. He spoke without turning around to her.

"I'm beginning to understand some of what Vatarh said about you before he left, Matarh," Jan said. "He told me that you use people for your own purposes; he said that was exactly the way your own vatarh had been, so it wasn't all that surprising. He said that was what had made Great-Vatarh an effective Hirzg, but a dangerous friend. I wonder if I can ever be such a good Hirzg. I wonder if I would ever want to be." Jan knocked on the door and the hall servants opened it.

Allesandra rose to her feet and pushed back from the table; she started after him as plates clashed and goblets s.h.i.+vered. "Jan, stay. Please. Talk to me."

He shook his head and left without another word, the door closing again.

Allesandra stood in the center of the dining room and could not hold back the sob that came. I never meant to hurt him. I don't want to hurt him. At the same time, she wondered at his declaration: had she made a mistake placing him on the Hirzg's throne? Was she seeing Jan with a matarh's eyes and not those of truth? She felt Semini's hands on her shoulders and realized that he had risen to stand behind her. "Don't worry, Allesandra," he said to her. His words were a low growl in her ear. "Let the boy alone for a bit-and remember that in many ways he still is a boy. He knows you're right, but right now he's feeling that you gave him the crown of the Hirzg as the consolation prize."

"It truly wasn't that way." Tears threatened, and she sniffed and blinked them back. "I love him, Semini. I do. He doesn't realize how much. It hurts me to see him angry with me. This wasn't what I intended."

"I know," he whispered. "I'll talk to him. I can convince him that you're right."

She shook her head, staring at the door. "I need to go after him."

"If you do that, the two of you will just end up in a worse argument. You're both too much alike. Give him time to calm and think about things, and he'll realize that he was overreacting. He may even apologize. Give him time. Let him be angry now."

His hands kneaded her shoulders. She felt his lips brush the hair at the nape of her neck, and let her head drop forward in response. "He's my son. It hurts me when he's hurting."

"If you get what you're after, then that's something you might have to accept. The Kralji of Nessantico and the Hirzgai of Firenzcia have always had their differences and their separate agendas. If you don't want a struggle between the two of you, then you should give up this idea of yours."

She stiffened under his kneading hands, and he chuckled. "There, you see. Jan's not the only one who gets irritated when someone tells them what they must do." He continued to work the muscles of her shoulders. "There's another matter we should discuss, the two of us," he said to her. "I am with you in this, my love, but I have ambitions, too. I would be Archigos of a unified Faith, and I would sit on Cenzi's Throne in the Archigos' Temple and be your Hand of Truth. And I would be more than that, Allesandra. I would be Archigos ca'Vorl."

She turned to him, and found his face close to hers. She kissed his lips without heat. "Semini . . ."

"You told Jan to think of what the two of you could accomplish together as the same family on two thrones. I would ask you to consider what might be accomplished if the same family held not only the political thrones, but that of the Faith."

"What you're suggesting isn't possible," she told him. "There's Pauli. And Francesca. Yes, I enjoy the stolen time we have together, and I wish it were otherwise, but it's not. Semini, how would it seem if the Archigos were to dissolve his own marriage and that of the A'Hirzg, for his own convenience? What would the ca'-and-cu' say, if only privately? What damage would that do to the Faith and to the Sun Throne?"

"I know," he growled, stepping back. "I know. But my marriage to Francesca was political from the beginning-there was never any love between us, nor much intimacy at all after the first few years and her miscarriages. Orlandi insisted that I had to marry his daughter and he was the Archigos, and your vatarh thought it would be good as well, and you were . . ." He paused. "I know I'm much older than Pauli, Allesandra, but I thought . . ."

"The differences in our ages mean nothing," she told him. She reached out to touch his face, his graying beard surprisingly soft under her fingers. "Semini . . . I do have affection for you. I love what we have, but it has to be enough. What you're suggesting . . . It would be a terrible mistake."

"Would it? I don't believe that, Allesandra. If you knew how much I've wrestled with this, if you knew the prayers I've sent to Cenzi . . ." He shook his head under her fingers. "It would not be a mistake," he said. "How could it be if there are true feelings between us? Can you tell me that the feelings are one-sided and our affair is simply a matter of convenience to you. Is that what it is, Allesandra? Tell me. Tell me the truth."

She stared at him, his face cupped in her hands. "One-sided?" she whispered. "No."

He breathed a long exhalation, nearly a word or cry. And then he was kissing her, and she was kissing him back, and she lost herself and her worries about Jan and what might come in the heat that enveloped her.

Jan ca'Vorl.

JAN LET THE SWEAT POUR from him as he jabbed and parried with his sword against an invisible opponent. Sometimes it was Semini, sometimes it was his matarh, sometimes it was the ghost of Fynn or ini, sometimes it was his matarh, sometimes it was the ghost of Fynn or his great-vatarh. Jan let all his anger out into the practice. He slashed, he spun, he thrust until all the ghosts were dead and his muscles were burning.