The Empress's Parting Command
Lucas studied the Empress with careful attention.
Senevier Taren Guerta sat at the head of the long banquet table, conversing with easy grace among the eastern nobles. Those same nobles, who ought to have regarded her with suspicion, hung on her every word as though spellbound. The sight drew a hollow laugh from Lucas. His gaze drifted to the woman seated at the Empress’s left.
While Senevier held the hall with her dazzling charm, Talia Roem Guerta remained utterly still, her face an icy mask as she silently raised her wine cup again and again. The contrast unsettled him.
Why does that woman always look so wretched?
At a glance the two could have passed for twins. Had Talia chosen to smile and charm like her mother, no one in the castle would have been able to resist her. Instead she bristled like a hedgehog, forever driving away anyone who drew near.
For a time she had at least pretended to play the duchess, yet these past several days she had abandoned even that pretense. Nobles who once extended her courtesy now turned away in open distaste.
Perhaps her health has taken another turn for the worse.
The thought made Lucas narrow his eyes. Talia looked paler than usual, her gaze empty as she stared at the candle flame on the table. She truly appeared unwell.
A restless unease stirred in him. He shifted in his seat just as Barcas stepped into the banquet hall.
Lucas felt his own body tense. The moment Barcas appeared, the lively air that had filled the room seemed to freeze solid. He was not the only one who sensed it; every face around the table turned toward the silent confrontation between the Empress and the duke.
“It is rather disappointing that seeing your face should prove so difficult.”
Senevier was the first to break the strained silence. She lifted her wine cup, moistened her lips, and arranged a deliberately disappointed expression.
“Catching up with old colleagues is all very well, but you might spare a thought for me and my daughter as well.”
“If I have caused you discomfort, I can only apologize.”
Barcas reached the head table, answered calmly, and took his seat.
“A great deal has occurred at the imperial palace in the meantime. I was delayed while exchanging various reports. I ask your forgiveness.”
A chillingly smooth smile curved the Empress’s mouth at the barbed reply. Lucas clicked his tongue inwardly. She sat in the very heart of enemy territory, half her escort drawn from the Roem Knights, yet she remained perfectly composed.
The Empress’s eyes curved like crescent moons. “I trust the conversation proved meaningful.”
Another uncomfortable silence settled over the hall. Senevier clearly knew Barcas had been working to thwart her; Barcas made no effort to conceal it.
Lucas glanced sideways at Talia. She clutched her wine cup with rigid fingers, worrying her lower lip. She must already have heard that her husband was exerting every effort to save his former fiancée.
Lucas raised his own cup and studied his brother’s unreadable face. Since their father’s coffin had been laid in the mausoleum, Lucas had been formally appointed aide to the Duke of Sieorkan. In the weeks since, he had come to understand the political currents both in the east and at court.
Cracks were forming between the eastern nobles and the conservative faction. The northerners were already moving to exploit the rift. Their ambitions went beyond mere political influence. Balto forces had been quietly strengthening their military at an alarming pace, and intelligence suggested they were also gathering secret war funds through merchant guilds. Should their goal be Balto’s independence, Ayla Roem Guerta might well become a hostage to pressure the imperial family. The first princess’s new marriage proposal carried the very real risk of fracturing the empire.
That was why Barcas had set aside duchy business and thrown himself into persuading the crown prince and the conservative lords.
If only Brother had married Ayla Roem Guerta in the first place, none of this would be necessary.
Lucas grumbled inwardly. Had Barcas honored his loyalty to the crown prince instead of yielding to the emperor’s pressure, he would not be running himself ragged now. Laedgo Castle would still be harmonious. Perhaps Laina would have borne their father’s death more easily. Ayla, renowned for her gentle nature, would have cared for the girl. Talia would never have had to suffer in a foreign land.
No—whether that woman suffers or not is none of my concern.
Lucas reined in the thought at once. His duty lay with the Sieorkan family and with Laina. The Empress and her daughter were nothing more than a headache threatening the east.
He slipped quietly from the banquet hall. Watching his cold brother, the fox-like Empress, and his ghostly pale sister-in-law any longer would drive him mad. He tugged at the stiff collar of his doublet as he crossed the corridor.
He already missed the days when he could ride across open fields without a care. For the first time he felt a flicker of sympathy for the brother who had shouldered such burdens all his life.
Rubbing his stiff nape, he paused at a corridor window and looked down into the rear garden.
Perhaps I should go see Turkan.
He was massaging the tension from his shoulders when two figures standing in a corner of the garden caught his eye. Servants wandering the yard were nothing unusual, yet something about the pair made him stop and watch.
A woman whose face seemed faintly familiar was speaking in low, serious tones with a young man who looked like an envoy. After a moment Lucas recognized her as Talia Roem Guerta’s personal healing mage.
Do they know each other?
He tilted his head. The man’s attire marked him as one of the Empress’s attendants. Since the healer was herself of Taren blood, meeting an acquaintance among the Empress’s retinue was hardly strange. Still, a vague sense of unease lingered at the back of his mind.
“What are you doing in a place like this?”
A deep voice spoke behind him. Lucas turned to find Tyrone strolling down the corridor in a loosely belted black satin tunka. He had evidently followed Lucas after the latter slipped out of the banquet hall.
Lucas opened his mouth to describe what he had seen, then closed it again. There was no real reason to find the scene suspicious. When he glanced back toward the window, the two figures had already vanished. He scanned the garden with a dissatisfied expression, then shook his head.
“It’s nothing.”
The imperial envoy remained exactly one week before departing.
Talia watched the procession disappear from the windowsill, then let the curtain fall.
Until the final moment Senevier had continued to urge obedience. Talia had given no answer, yet the Empress had left convinced her daughter would not defy her. Or perhaps she had not been entirely certain; she had simply filled her loyal follower with enough wind to ensure compliance.
“You must share the marriage bed tonight.”
The nanny drew the sheer scrap of fabric the Empress had presented as a gift from its chest and spoke in a firm, unyielding tone.
“The funeral rites are finished. There is no longer any reason to delay.”