Blood Succession (Knight Protector Book 4), page 5
Which seemed a little farfetched to Aria, as they piled golden rings on her fingers, and laced golden sandals on her feet. Claims to humility and being draped in gold seemed distinctly at odds with each other. But she wasn’t a priest, or a diviner; understanding the ways of the gods and goddesses were the province of others, and those others had decided that this was the ritual dress of a new queen.
So she let them dress her and tried to ignore the strangeness of it all. She felt something like a child’s doll, bathed and brushed and dressed to the child’s specification. Maybe there was something to the humility aspect of ruling after all: for all the gold and pomp, she was being dragged around by strangers and told when and how and where to dress, when to stand and when to kneel, when to speak and when to listen. An actual child had more autonomy that that.
Then they led her through the many levels of the palace, down open stairways and through closed ones, until she stood in a vast, open courtyard overlooking the city. A great sea of people stretched out in front of her.
For half a moment, Aria froze. She could think of nothing but the one-legged man with the gun, and how such a gathering might hide a hundred such men. But the priests kept walking, and the priestess took her elbow, saying, “This way, Majesty.”
She walked on. They positioned her in the center of the courtyard and told her to stretch out her hands to the heavens. By now, the sun was setting behind her, and rich, golden light washed over her.
The priest in the nemes headdress spoke in a powerful voice that carried far. First, he recited another prayer, and the crowd prayed with him: thousands of voices, all repeating the same words.
Aria’s arms began to burn as the prayer dragged on, but she held them in place. The sunlight bathed her in crimson and gold.
Then the priest said, “Behold your queen, Aria, child of the gods.”
Men and women in pale tunics and red cassocks stepped forward, some carrying burning sage, others flicking droplets of scented oils at Aria’s feet. The high priest circled around her and placed a circlet of gold on her hair.
“Beloved Aria, blessed of the gods, first of her house, chosen daughter of the South: in the sight of these men and women, in view of the gods, in accordance with the ancient ways of our people, and in observance of your blood rights, do you accept the crown of your ancestors?”
She felt the same dread, the same panic she’d felt at seeing the crowd all over again, welling up inside her. She hesitated a second, and then two, and three, before she could get it under control. Then she called out in as firm a voice as she could manage, “I do.”
The high priest knelt before her, and all the other priests followed. Then the crowd dropped to their knees. She remained standing, arms upraised, and they knelt for a long moment.
He rose first, and then his priests and priestesses, and then the people. He took her hands and lowered them. One of the priestesses placed a scepter in her right hand, and another put a book of law in her left.
The high priest called, “Behold your queen,” and the crowd broke into raucous applause. The noise rose like thunder all around her, booming up from the lowest reaches of the city. The sounds of her earlier procession were nothing in comparison to this. There, the noise had been contained to a few streets and blocks at a time. Here, it seemed all the city had turned out, and all the city celebrated.
All the city, except Aria. She smiled and waved and did all the things that were expected of her. But her heart trembled at the enormity of it, and she saw in that crowd of well-wishers a thousand possible assassins. Every hand that raised or lowered, every shuffled movement, every ducked head or sideways body might have been a killer. She couldn’t know differently.
It was different in the country. She’d never had to worry about her life at all, in the country. But there, everyone knew everyone else. Here, everyone was a stranger. There, she knew who liked her, and who didn’t; who pretended to like her, and who actually did. Here, she knew nothing at all. There, if anyone had threatened her life – anyone’s life – they would have had half the county to contend with; here, she had no friends and no allies.
Then her eyes fell on Crassus. She hadn’t been consciously trying to seek him out, but she figured her thoughts had led her there all the same. He was near the front of the crowd. She’d seen him earlier, with his wife and two children. The children seemed grim. Maybe they were thinking the same thing she was: that it was madness to have such a public ceremony when only earlier in the afternoon someone had tried to assassinate her.
But these two had stepped up to save her, the woman – Terese – disarming the man, and the man – Augustus – killing him. She was sorry for that. It seemed that the killing might not have been necessary; her would be assassin had lost his weapon, after all. Then again, she didn’t know what else he’d been capable of. She didn’t even know his name, or his reason for trying to murder her.
She supposed she’d find it all out soon, once she’d been settled and the prefect reported. Or would the city constabulary handle that? She didn’t know.
But she couldn’t fault Augustus for pulling the trigger in the heat of the moment, even if it had been a precaution too many. Hell, he’d probably done the man a service. What would be the penalty for attempting to assassinate a sovereign? She imagined it would involve death, but probably not right away; certainly not instantaneously.
It was a terrible business, and she shuddered to think of it. Still, seeing those faces in the crowd helped a little. So she smiled and nodded her way through the rest of the ceremony but was grateful when it ended.
Her night, of course, was just beginning. Now, she changed again, this time into a luxurious and regal gown. She wore the same crown and rings as before, because the priestess told her too. But they provided more comfortable sandals and led her to a great reception hall.
She spent the next two hours meeting hundreds of people, hearing names and seeing faces in such a rapid succession that she would be hard pressed to remember them all. Not that these were the men and women it would do to forget. These were senators and generals, high priests and priestesses, the wealthiest merchants and landowners in the nation: the whole roster of important people, she figured, or pretty near.
The sun had by now set, and bright, modern electric torches, and the more traditional lanterns, lit the palace. The reception moved to the dining room.
And what a dining room it was: tables longer than whole homes, laid out in rows. Her own table was shorter than that. It sat on a dais raised above the rest of the room. Two dozen men and women sat with her, and the rest filled out at the tables below.
She could not remember the names of everyone who sat with her. Of the four, she only really recognized Crassus and his family. But aside from them, she saw, Vespasian, the High Protector – a man of middle years with a stern face, receding hairline, and athletic build; Rufus, leader of the Senate – a portly man who embodied most of her earlier preconceptions of senators; General Junius, a senior military adviser; and a handful of men she recognized from earlier introductions as bankers and senate leaders.
The food was all excellent, but she had little stomach for any of it. She was too on edge for anything at all, until Crassus suggested, “A glass of wine, perhaps, my queen? It is a very good vintage.”
She took his meaning from the tone rather than the words themselves: a sip might bolster her nerves. She nodded and took a sip, and then another. It did help, a little.
Crassus was seated at her left hand – a final honor, she gathered, stemming from his assignment to escort her back to the city. His wife and children sat at her side.
Priscilla was talkative, but not obnoxious. She seemed to sense Aria’s discomfort and didn’t press her into too much conversation. She offered her congratulations, and her well wishes, and her earnest desire that she would have the honor of getting to know her queen; and that was the extent of it.
The son and daughter, Terese and Augustus, didn’t speak at all. She supposed that was due to the distance, and perhaps discomfort. All eyes were on them almost as much as her. He was destined to be king, if the senate’s recommendation carried. She had saved the queen’s life and bore a nasty red welt on her cheek as evidence of the effort. She was glad for their presence, but glad for their silence too. She felt her own discomfort reflected in theirs, which made her more inclined to like them than less.
The other members of her party proved less courteous, though. Vespasian repeated the same kind of pleasantries that Priscilla had done and spoke at length about the meetings they would need to have, and the plans for her security they would need to make. “Today’s incident in the streets demonstrates, I think, better than anything I could say the need for immediate and preemptive attention to safety concerns.”
Rufus wanted to know – with all the politeness a practiced politician could muster – when the senate leadership could expect her to begin their sessions. They had plenty planned, it seemed. And not without reason: she would need to be informed of the national concerns, from agriculture to war.
On that front, at least, General Junius would be only too eager to educate her. He told her as much, with less civility and decorum than the senator, and more enthusiasm. He’d snorted at the mention of agricultural concerns. “Let the farmers worry about their own concerns. Unless we address the North, there’ll be no South for them to till.”
Rufus smiled in a patient sort of way. “But with no crops, what will you feed your troops, Junius? They cannot eat snow and ice – as, I believe, they already discovered in the current campaign.”
That had put a scowl on the general’s face, and he’d offered a smart remark about the faulty counsel of politicians and diviners. This, in turn, earned a rebuke from the nemes-wearing high priest she’d already met. His name, she learned, was Djet. “The diviners tell us what the gods show them can be. But the diviners cannot control the actions of men.”
“A pretty business that, where you can give advice but wash your hands of the consequences of it.”
This, she gathered, was a reference to the diviners who had predicted victory for Agalyn’s invasion. Junius assigned the failure of the campaign to the priests and their poor advice, and Djet found no fault with the counsel. On the contrary, he blamed Agalyn – though not by name – for the implementation of that advice.
They went a few rounds, Djet projecting a superior attitude, Rufus veiling his barbs with a congenial smile, and Junius regarding them all with undisguised distaste.
When she caught his eye, Senator Crassus would flash her a sympathetic smile, like he was sorry in his own way that she was now in the middle of this. Once or twice, he observed, “As you can see, there is much work to be done,” or, “You can understand, I think, why so many of us are eager for a steady hand at the helm of the ship of state.”
She did. In half an hour, she’d formed a picture of a South that was as much at war with itself as the North. So she fully appreciated Crassus’s desire for a steady hand to lead. Without it, she wasn’t certain there would be a South left in the next few months.
The problem was, the steady hand he had in mind was hers. And at the moment, it didn’t feel very steady.
Chapter Six – Terese
She wasn’t sure how, exactly, but her father had wrangled seats for all of them near the queen – an honor reserved only for Senator Rufus, whose wife Clarissa accompanied him. It seemed to her that Crassus was counting his chickens before the proverbial eggs hatched: affording his family the honors of a marital tie that, as of yet, did not exist.
She didn’t have a particularly strong opinion about it one way or the other. In a day chock full of folly, it was the least of what she’d seen so far. But it did mean all the court could see her – and the red mark her father’s hand had left on her cheek.
She had strong opinions about that – the same kind of opinions that had driven her to apply to the academy in the first place. She listened to the laughter and the music, the clinking of glasses and the vain toasts, the pompous speeches and the sycophantic well-wishes; and she thought of her father’s words.
I thought you gave up playing the hero when you flunked out of the academy?
Her cheeks burned redder than the mark. In the moment, she would have traded every jewel in her box at home, every ounce of gold and every fine dress, every taste of exquisite cuisine and fine wine, to have that one, solitary event in her life go a different way.
She still didn’t know how she’d failed. She’d studied and trained with a determination that bordered on mania. It had been her path to freedom, to escape. And she’d passed the physical portion of her tryouts with flying colors. She could fight and shoot with the best of them. She could hold her own against anyone.
The written portion is what had doomed her. She didn’t know the particulars of what she’d done incorrectly. She’d gone over the test in her mind so many times since, trying to recall the exact phrases of the questions and the precise wording of her own answers. She couldn’t remember anything that she might have got wrong.
But she had, obviously, since she didn’t pass; and it hadn’t been a few wrong answers, either. With her fighting marks, she would have had to flunk the written exam badly to fail out of the program.
Which had been a serious blow to her confidence. She’d always regarded herself as reasonably intelligent, and reasonably learned. But there was nothing like public humiliation to knock you off whatever pedestal you’d imagined for yourself.
And Terese had humiliated herself, badly – herself, and her father. Crassus had been furious with her for applying to the academy. He’d barely spoken to her when she returned, except to inquire if she was content now that she’d made the name of Crassus a laughingstock.
Priscilla had been kinder than he. She’d shaken her head in the same disappointed fashion, but then told her, “Well, don’t look so forlorn, Terese. Soldiering is a brutal, dirty business anyway. If the gods decided to close that path to you, they must have had their reasons. Trust in them. It will all work out.”
If the gods had some kind of plan, well, she couldn’t begin to fathom what it was. Unless it’s to keep humiliating me. That seemed to be the only thing happening in her life. Here she was, three and twenty, and bearing the evidence of her father’s displeasure for all the world to see: the headstrong bastard child, who still had to be put in her place.
No, Terese would have given anything at all to be anywhere at all but there. But that was a childhood fantasy, not real life. In real life, she had nowhere to go and no escape.
So she picked at her sumptuous plate and sipped at her fine wine. The night passed slowly, but eventually even evil things pass, and it ended. The queen rose first, and then everyone else followed.
She looked a little unsure, like perhaps she hadn’t yet got the tour of the place, so didn’t know where she was going. But a priestess stepped up and spoke in low tones, and Aria nodded. She turned to go, taking her leave of those around her one by one.
She paused by Crassus. “I thank you for your aid today, Senator. And I am honored to meet you, Lady Priscilla.” Then, she glanced at Terese and Augustus. “And I am sorry that I have not yet had the opportunity to thank you both for saving my life. I am in your debt. I do not know what the next days have in store – I believe I shall be very busy – but I hope before long I may make both of your acquaintances.”
They curtsied and bowed respectively and murmured their desire for the same. Aria took another step, as if to pass by them, but paused. She raised a hand toward Terese’s cheek, pointing at the welt. “And, I’m very sorry that you were injured on my behalf, Terese.”
Then she moved on, leaving Terese blushing furiously, and her parents smiling in a very good impression of fondness and pride. As if they didn’t know the real source of the mark.
They didn’t see the new queen the next day, or the next week. Their father kept them apprised of her comings and goings.
“She’s getting settled, but slowly. I think she’s still entertaining the notion of running, or resigning. I hope we didn’t make a mistake in choosing her,” he opined after the second day.
“Give her time, my dear. If she works out, she’s bound to be better than the others. And if she doesn’t…well, it wasn’t your call. The blame will rest with others.”
On the third day, he allowed that she was, “Clever, I suppose. But pitifully naïve. You’ll need to take a firm hand with her, my son, or she’ll be played the fool by every second-rate conman in the empire.”
“As opposed to being played by first rate-conmen like ourselves,” Augustus quipped, which earned him a frown from both of their parents.
The fourth day brought an agitated Crassus to their dinner table. “The woman’s a disaster. She has no idea of what it means to rule an empire and keep people in their respective places. She’s going to ruin us all.”
After a glass of wine, Priscilla managed to cajole a little more out of him. Aria’s offenses involved critiques of the kaladorn system, specifically the execution of returning prisoners. “She wants pardons, and pensions even. She’s talking about paying cowards who fled the field of battle.
“Do you know what that will do to morale? We might as well lay out the red carpet to the damned Northerners. There’ll be no army to stop her. She’ll destroy it.”
The next day brought worse news. Crassus turned the servants out of the dining room and downed a full glass of wine before he spoke of it. “She’s lost her mind. She’s asking what it would take to eliminate the entire kaladorn caste. Can you imagine?”
