Nazar is nowhere to be seen, though I could use his counsel before I proceed into the banquet hall like a stuffed doll. I force Caleb to carry an extra two blades for me just to ease my mind. He strides down the halls to my left, chattering the whole way about who’s still remaining at the First House, who’s left just today, and how much he’s looking forward to getting all the gossip he can about the Twelfth House from their retainers—the moment he gets them drunk. Which, from his keen eye, won’t take long.
His words serve me the way they always do, easing my tension at least during the long walk. Still, by the time we reach the great hall, my resolve has all but deserted me.
“Caleb…” I mutter, and he reaches out and grabs my arm at the elbow, just below my warrior band.
“Let me tell you what else Nazar wanted you to know, before you walk in there. He was as surprised as you were that Tennet existed. There’s absolutely no record of him in any of the official Protectorate records, nor in the First House annals of the Twelfth House. Much like your situation, it’s not outside the realm of possibility that he’s who he says he is, the firstborn unacknowledged son of Lord Orlof. But it’s also possible that he was sent here on a mission to deceive, to set himself up as the son of a dead lord, a man at arms for a boy who is in no position to rule a house. A boy who could use someone like you to help him rule his house.”
“Well, he’s going to be waiting a long time for that to happen,” I say, and Caleb squeezes my elbow.
“I agree, but it would explain a lot of things. Nazar says there’s no way Tennet’s an agent of the Imperium. He’s not some forerunner of the army that’s supposedly coming.”
I glance at him sharply. “Nazar told you about that?” Honesty in this house certainly is proving useful.
“He did, and he’s about chewed off the end of his pipe thinking about what it could mean. But no matter that he’s not Imperium, Tennet may not be who he says he is. If, in truth, he’s just a soldier who’s been sent here to drag you off by your hair to force you to honor the marriage contract to Orlof’s actual heir, I mean…that does make more sense.”
“It does…” I wonder if Fortiss has put Tennet to the question already, while the effects of his spell are still in place. I would have.
Caleb waggles his brows at me. “I will say, we need to find a way to get his Divh to show up. That would be instructive don’t you think, if he is actually Orlof’s son? A Divh of a mountain holding should be large, but not too large, but if he’s the Divh of a first-blooded and firstborn son, they usually grow them bigger for that. That said, I can’t see a giant on the scale of Gent stamping around the mountains and not being noticed. We need to see that Divh, tournament or no tournament. And we can’t wait till we actually have a genuine battle. I’m back at the coliseum tonight training, and some of the Divhs of the soldiers are impressive. What if Tennet’s Divh is the size of an overfed cow?”
I snort. I’d pay good coin to see that. Maybe then I’d stop noticing the way Tennet’s voice curls around my name like it still belongs to him. “I can’t tell you how happy that would make me, I’m not going to lie.”
“You say that now, but we’ve had four weeks of holding our breath, waiting for Rihad’s books to catch on fire in Fortiss’s inner chambers. They haven’t done that, but even Nazar issaying that Fortiss doesn’t seem quite right, that there’s some strange energy in the halls of the First House. That’s bad. That has to be bad, right? That feels bad.”
“All of this feels bad,” I mutter. But I lift my chin up and sail into the room.
Chapter 9
The banquet is a disaster.
The food is, as always, exceptional—I’ve grown spoiled so quickly by the First House’s largesse. I confine myself to eating only that which I can reach without effort—my glass of wine and the portion of my plate closest to me. I can barely breathe in this gown—I certainly can’t eat in it. So, it’s no hardship to do little more than sip at odd turns and smile serenely as Fortiss tells Tennet the tale of the tournament once more, while my father pointedly ignores me and corrects Fortiss at every possible turn when the subject turns to history before Fortiss’s time.
Eventually, Fortiss invites the warriors in the hall to join us at the main table, and another hour goes by with the warriors taking turns discussing their role in the melee, as well as picking apart any word received back from the houses who lost so many fighting men. It’s heartening, in its way—it seems that more fighting men are coming to the First House to band with new Divhs. For all the families who have lost great warriors, they seem ready enough to send sons or brothers.
No one sends a female, of course. Young women who hear of the unrest will have to bring themselves—and news of myown participation in the tournament has been relegated to whispers and the occasional accusation of a bald-faced lie. Not even the bards, as eager to stir up trouble as any group in the Protectorate, are trying to push the narrative of a woman commanding a Divh and meriting her own house. It’s dangerous talk, apparently.
My mood grows fouler by the moment.
“And where’s the former lord protector now?” Tennet asks abruptly, drawing my attention back to him, though I take care not to look at him directly. That takes some work, because Fortiss positioned me directly opposite the man. Intentional? Does he want me to see Tennet…or Tennet to see me? Or—Light help me—does he want to see what I’ll do, caught between them both like this?
Carefully setting that question aside, I take another sip of my wine and scan the group before us as all eyes turn to Fortiss—none more so than my father’s.
The new lord protector has been busy, too. For an event assembled in less than a few hours since the arrival of the Twelfth and Tenth House riders, we nearly have a quorum of representation of Protectorate might. Fully six houses are represented at the table. The First, of course, and the Second, whose stronghold is so close they might as well be an adjunct of the First, but also the Fifth and Ninth, and of course the Tenth and Twelfth. I could argue that I represent the Thirteenth as well, but on this night and at this table, I’m here for my fighting skill.
In a gown that would send me sprawling in a battle before I took three steps.
“Lord Rihad is safely confined to a suite of rooms first fashioned for high-level prisoners sent here from the Imperium in the first century of the Protectorate’s rule over these lands,” Fortiss says smoothly. “The lord protector is a hereditary role,conferred from the Imperium at the founding of our state. It’s always flowed through this house or been conferred by the decision of the lord protector himself, should he not have the family to sustain the role. The actions this past month are right and true, but uncharted territory. The Imperium must weigh in.”
“The Imperium hasn’t seen a sunrise in the Protectorate for over two hundred years,” grouses warrior Berryl, a junior warrior of the Fifth who is now one of their few banded warriors. He’s junior in name only—he’s served long and well beneath the first-blooded knights of his house, and he’s nearly twice my age. “We aren’t beholden to their laws, or their decisions. Lord Protector Rihad declared battle against his own houses. The man is clearly mad. You were right to lock him up, but you would have been even more right to drop him on the battlefield.”
A murmuring of agreement rolls around the table, then stops abruptly at my father’s seat, as well as the dinner plates of the gray-cassocked duo who are positioned between me and Fortiss. Councilors Miriam and Dolor, of course, know better than to agree to anything—or disagree, for that matter.
Apparently unconcerned about the line of conversation, however, Miriam lifts her voice to be heard above the murmurings. “The actions of our new lord protector are right and true. You’re not wrong, warrior Berryl. We haven’t been honored by a visit from the Imperium for too long. I assure you; it’s not for lack of trying. We send out riders at the turning of each season, seeking counsel of course, but above all advocating for the return of an Imperial envoy for which we would gladly give safe passage. In all the years I’ve served, we have never been taken up on that offer. We are left only with the approval of the Imperium to continue conducting matters as we see fit and reporting on the safety of the Protectorate and the strength of our borders.”
Berryl scowls at this. “But surely now they would show interest. They must. Lord Rihad created a tournament that destroyed everything it celebrated. And if the rumors are to be believed, rumors culled from your own house, councilor Miriam, Lord Rihad was engaged in dark matters, matters that go beyond treason to the other destruction of us all. What say you to these claims?”
The man to Miriam’s right fields this question. Councilor Dolor is aptly named, his pale face receding into his cowl, his skin a muddy gray that gives him the appearance of a man who has not seen the sun in decades. But he’s a calm man, a cautious one, and his words flow over the table like an unctuous balm.
“I am one of the longest-tenured members of the council,” he informs us gravely. “I’ve served since before Rihad took power some twenty years ago, himself barely more than a boy, ushered into the roll by the untimely death of his father. Rihad was always impetuous and headstrong, but he served the Protectorate. He observed all the dictates of the Light and the Imperium. The accusations you level are profound, warrior Berryl, and not for idle conversation around the table where anyone can hear you without the full context of what we speak.”
