Troubled Waters (50 page)

Now Darien’s eyes closed for a longer stretch of time; he appeared to wait out a spasm of pain. “Then all of them know—all your friends—”

“No,” she said sharply. “I did not share with Calvin the details of the drug, nor did I tell the trader the identity of the patient. I know you think I am careless and indiscreet, but even I know that some things do not bear repeating.”

He was regarding her again, his gray eyes a little warmer. “I have that to thank you for, then.”

“You haven’t answered my question.”

He hesitated, then sighed and moved toward the table with its assortment of tempting foods. “Can we at least sit?” he said. “I am tired unto death myself.”

They settled at the table and Zoe found herself uncharacteristically moved to take care of him, pouring his water, filling a plate with delicacies, asking if he needed anything else. He looked exhausted, and no wonder. No doubt he spent most of his energy every day maintaining the fiction that the king was healthy. She rarely felt sorry for Darien Serlast, but at this moment it was clear he deserved some kindness.

He ate three dainty sandwiches, finishing each one in two bites, and drained his entire glass of water. Zoe poured him another one, stirring in a teaspoon of crushed fruit. “The king fell ill early last year,” Darien said with no more prompting. “In early Quinnelay. Everyone was sick with one cough or another, so at first no one thought much of it. But he did not get better and he did not get better. Elidon was worried, but, of course, we had to proceed with caution. When you send for a physician to see the king, the whole nation is uneasy. Particularly when his daughters are so young—and none has yet been named heir.”

“One of those problems he could have solved quite easily,” Zoe pointed out. “Just pick his successor.”

“Two things made the selection a far from simple process,” Darien said. “One, Natalie had not yet been born, and Vernon wanted to see if Romelle might bear a son.”

All of Zoe’s sympathy for Vernon evaporated in an instant. “Of all the narrow-minded, ill-considered, disastrous reasons to put your entire kingdom in jeopardy—”

Darien managed to produce a faint smile. “I am in complete agreement with you,” he said. “I am prepared to believe women make much better leaders than men do. Mirti and Elidon, for instance, would be splendid rulers, either one of them.”

“So once Romelle only managed to produce another girl, what kept him from choosing his heir? You said there were two reasons.”

“Any choice would have had to be ratified by all five primes,” Darien said, “and one of the primes was missing.”

Zoe stared at him for so long that he had time to eat another sandwich. “Are you telling me—after all this time—after all the reasons you gave me, all the lies you told me about why you came to fetch me from the village—this was the
real
reason? This was why I suddenly had to be in Chialto, at the palace, under your watchful eye? So I could fulfill my part as prime?”

He bowed his head in acknowledgment, though he still watched her from under his lowered brows. “It was an urgent necessity that you be present to ratify the choice of the king’s successor,” he said in a quiet voice. “The stability of the kingdom depended on it. And yet, all of the other reasons I gave you were true. The king
was
negotiating with his wives, and your name
was
put forward as a choice for his fifth bride. I
did
promise your father, and my own, that I would come for you when Navarr was dying. These were not lies. But they did not matter to me as much as the knowledge that the fifth prime had to be on hand or we could never choose the next ruler of Welce.”

She made a strangled sound of exasperation and shook her head, trying to dissipate her incredulity and her ire. But how could she be surprised or even annoyed? It had always been clear he had secrets, some of them monstrous. She was not sure she could entirely blame him for concealing this particular ungainly and terrifying truth.

“Very well, then, you came searching for me, but at the same time you did what you could to keep Vernon alive,” she said, bringing the conversation back to its original topic. “When did he start taking the drug?”

“By the middle of Quinncoru last year. As I said, we went to some trouble to bring in a physician in stealth, and we pretended that Elidon was the sick one. She spent a great deal of time languishing in her quarters and depriving herself of food, so that she would look pale and thin. Vernon came to her rooms to be present when the physician examined her.” Darien shrugged. “He was fairly quick to make the diagnosis and to lay out our wretched options. He was honest about the repercussions we might face with the renaissance, but the alternative was unthinkable. The king to be dead within a quintile. We all agreed we would risk the drug.”

“Who was in on the agreement?”

“The king, Elidon, and me.”

“And the doctor.”

“An
elay
man. Elidon’s nephew and utterly reliable.” He must have seen the skepticism on her face because he almost smiled again. “Obviously, or this news would have gotten out long before now.”

She was forced to agree that was true. “So none of the other wives know?”

He shook his head.

“And none of the other primes? Not even Mirti?”

“I would not be surprised to learn Mirti has guessed. But she has said nothing—at least, to any of us. Kayle and Nelson and Taro—no.”

“The king’s valet—the one who buys the illicit drugs—
he
must know something.”

Darien nodded. “Again, I’m sure he has his suspicions, but he has not voiced them. He is utterly loyal. He has been with Vernon since they were both boys.”

“Still. You must know this is a secret that cannot be kept forever.”

“I am astonished it has not been discovered before now.”

“How much longer do you think he has before—he has to live?”

“Two quintiles, maybe four. For a while, his deterioration was so greatly slowed that I began to think he had been misdiagnosed. That he was actually recovering. He seemed quite strong last summer—in fact, the only symptoms I even saw in him were the ones caused by the drug.”

Zoe remembered the king’s oddly vulnerable manner that day in Ilene’s shop, his inability to choose a buckle for his shoe. “A childishness in his behavior,” she murmured. “A loss of focus.”

“Exactly. But other than that, he seemed quite healthy. Hearty, even.”

“When did you realize that this burst of vigor was not, unfortunately, a sign of recovery?”

“When we decided to take him off the drug for a couple of ninedays. Actually, it was only a few days. That quickly we saw him lose ground. His pain returned. His nausea. He couldn’t sleep for the headaches. We put him back on the renaissance—and increased the dosage at that.” He shook his head. “There was no more lying to ourselves. He is a very sick man.”

“So you have until, perhaps, the end of the year before he dies.”

“Yes. And less time before he becomes so weakened it will be impossible to conceal his condition.”

“So now it has become urgent that his heir be identified.”

Darien nodded. “It is our constant conversation to discuss the strengths and weaknesses of the three girls. Josetta is the oldest and thus the one who will soonest be an adult, which means the regency period would be that much shorter. But if, as I would hope, the next queen sits on the throne for thirty or forty years, perhaps a regency that is only three years longer should not be a foremost consideration. Is Corene the better candidate? She certainly has more strength of will than Josetta. She is quick-witted and passionate, while Josetta is cautious and sometimes timid. I am far from certain who would be a better queen.”

“You don’t even consider Natalie?”

He shrugged. “She is barely a year old, and I, at least, cannot judge her personality well enough to gauge how fit she would be to rule. But an even bigger barrier, I think, is the idea of a twenty-year regency. Certainly
I
am not eager to spend so much of my life in such a role.”

“And are you so convinced that
you
would be picked for the position?”

His face showed the ghost of a smile. “Who else?”

“I can think of a couple of women who would consider themselves qualified to stand beside their daughters and lead.”

“I would trust Elidon’s guidance, but Seterre or Alys as regent? Seterre would divide loyalties and pit factions against each other, leaving the court fractured and at odds. Alys would beggar the kingdom and then send us into war to refill our coffers. She would randomly elevate favorites and banish those who disagreed with her. Who knows? She might dispatch assassins in stealth to rid herself of the councilors she particularly distrusted.”

His tone was so bitter that Zoe had a hard time hiding her astonishment. “You despise her more than I realized.”

“And even more than that,” he said.

“What happens if the king dies without naming his successor?”

Darien slumped back in his chair, weariness once again evident on his face. “Oh, then I suppose the brangling and the scheming and the plotting begin in earnest. The queens will each lobby for their favorites, but the primes will have to do the real job of choosing the next monarch. I hope you can bring yourself to be impartial.”

Zoe smiled. “Who do you think the other four would favor?”

“Kayle would choose Corene, for Wald’s sake,” Darien said instantly. “Nelson is new enough to power this time around that he would probably follow your lead. Mirti always has her own agenda, so she is hard to predict. But she’s unlikely to change her mind once she makes it up. As for Taro, he likes little Natalie because he is fond of Romelle.”

“You realize there is yet another option, one that is sure to be obvious to everyone very soon.”

He caught his breath. She thought he might actually have forgotten. “I am not used to including a fourth child in my calculations,” he admitted.

“I think you must,” Zoe said. “I think we have solved the mystery of who sired the child Romelle is carrying now. The renaissance drug has given Vernon new virility, and that baby is his. The king’s subjects—and the primes of the Five Families—might simply decide to hand over the crown to the only one of the four children who is truly the offspring of the king.”

Darien watched her for a long time with narrowed eyes. “You know nothing for certain yet—or so I assume. Until the baby is born, you will not be able to decode its blood.”

“That’s true,” she said. “But if, as you say, Romelle has had no other lovers—”

“That I know about,” he interrupted. “I am willing to believe her abilities of subterfuge overmatch my skills of surveillance.”

“Let us assume she has been chaste,” Zoe said. “This child is the king’s. Shouldn’t his legitimate son or daughter be the first choice for heir?”

“We have gone to a great deal of trouble to make the king’s subjects believe that all of his supposed daughters are, in fact, legitimate,” Darien countered. “To suddenly retract that would render the whole kingdom uneasy, don’t you think? Would make them wonder what other lies have been perpetrated at court?”

“I think these simple country folk you worry about already believe there is a great deal of lying going on at the palace,” Zoe said. “And I think most of them don’t care. They want order in the realm. They want safe borders and opportunities for profitable trade. It doesn’t matter to them who governs as long as he or she governs well.”

“In which case, you have lost your own argument,” he replied. “Why must the next ruler be blood of the king’s blood?” He leaned forward, his pose almost accusatory. “And, since
you
are the only one who can—or
claims
she can—determine a child’s parentage simply by touch, you might have a hard time making anyone else believe you. Or, if they believe you, care. Josetta and Corene and Natalie have all been presented as heirs of the king’s body. This fourth child is unimportant, almost inconvenient. He or she will not be a factor in the upcoming struggle for power.”

Zoe regarded him for a moment in silence. She wished her uncle Nelson was here, or Taro Frothen—either one of them, she thought, would answer her truthfully; she was less sure of Mirti Serlast and Kayle Dochenza.

“Do you seriously think that such a gift was given only to the
coru
line?” she asked softly. “Don’t you think your aunt Mirti can squeeze a man’s hand in hers until she feels the alignment of the bones? Don’t you think Taro Frothen can rest his fingers against a girl’s wrist and read the heritage in her skin? I don’t know how Kayle Dochenza analyzes the souls of those he meets—perhaps he has to kiss them on their mouths, perhaps he only has to feel their breath against his cheek. And I am even less certain what skill Nelson uses to read a man’s mind, but I have no doubt he can do it. I am not the only prime who can decipher your secrets, Darien Serlast. The others either have not been in a position to make discoveries—or they have decided to keep their knowledge to themselves.”

Now she was the one to lean forward. “If you must rely on the Five Families to anoint and protect the heir, you had better let them know that a fourth candidate is on the way—and that
this
child is truly born to the king. Because if they discover that fact after they have bound their power on behalf of one of the other princesses, I promise you, the whole court will be in an uproar. You will see alliances shattered and vows revoked. And your own days of power as confidante to the throne will be irretrievably behind you.”

“I do none of this to increase my own consequence,” he snapped. “Is that what you think? I don’t keep secrets and try to influence events merely to feel like an important man. I would have happily shoveled my responsibilities onto someone else’s shoulders anytime these past two years! But Vernon chose me to trust and I had no choice but to be trustworthy. Perhaps that is not something a
coru
woman can understand.
I could not bend.
If you think that makes me ambitious, then fine. Think the worst of me. It does not change that I have done the best I can.”