Page 79 of The Castle & the Cloister

When the first light of dawn stained the eastern horizon faintly gray, a noise from the doorway in the room behind her brought Fia’s heart to her throat, her pulse racing. She whirled, hoping to find her queen, but it was only Beneson letting himself in.

“The king wants to speak with you,” Beneson said. “He’s been speaking to a lot of people. I think… I think changes are coming. He’s had the Priest in, and Hadrian for hours, with Lucian coming and going too. It’s been busy in his study all night, mostly with his merchants and spies.”

“Is Ariana with him?” Fia asked in a rush as she left the balcony and reentered the queen’s chambers. “Has she come up from the sanctuary yet?”

“Not that I’ve seen,” Beneson said. “But I had to step away a time or two. She might’ve gone in and I missed it.”

Fia turned away from him because she didn’t want him to see her grow pale, sudden fear running like ice through her veins. Everything was unsteady and uncertain, and the memory of the bloodborne dream dogged her like a haint.

“Fia,” Beneson asked softly from his place by the door. “Are you all right?”

“Yes,” she said, steeling herself against the fear. “Will you watch Justus, or did the king want him too?”

“I can stay with him.”

Fia was under no illusions as she went down the queen’s narrow stairs and through the corridors that led to the king’s broader, more expansive staircase. If Ariana had chosen to align herself with Orden, and to ask Fia to join them, a refusal would end in death. They couldn’t have her going back to Dolenza, bearing tales about an Inver plot to take over the cloister and replace its Matria. Fia’s death would have to be made to look like an accident, to avoid giving Dolenza cause to sanction the castle—a fall, perhaps, or an unfortunate meeting with bandits on the road back to the plains. Whatever happened, if Fia refused the king, her life would dwindle to a few days’ span at best.

The irony of it all, Fia thought as she stood on the threshold to the king’s chambers, was that she’d never, even for an instant, craved the martyrdom some sorias desired.

“He’s waiting for you,” one of the door guards said. “You can let yourself in.”

If Fia had ever thought to envision a room that fully reflected the Inver kings, it would have been the one she walked into. Shutting the door in her wake, she found herself in a sitting room with expansive views of the southern plains. Pale gray light illuminated the space, which was masculine in its appointments. Tapestries of hunting scenes draped the walls, the furniture was heavy and dark, and the room’s central furnishing was not for comfort, but for statecraft—an enormous oak desk sat near the windows, its surface strewn with maps and ledgers. The whole place was suffused with Orden Inver’s energy, redolent with an air of restlessness and power and potential. At the room’s far end, an open door offered a glimpse of the king’s bedchamber, where the covers of his shadowy, ornately carved four-poster bed were thrown back. A pair ofwiry-haired hounds lounged on the bedroom hearth, but neither seemed bothered by a stranger’s presence. They were used to comings and goings, Fia expected, bred for companionship and the hunt rather than service as guards, like some of the vicious-tempered curs she’d encountered in the mountains.

Drawing in a deep breath to steady herself, Fia frowned. The very air in her lungs smelled of Honoria’s king, potent with sandalwood and phelamon spice, and beneath that, with the sweat of horses and men. She felt, more than ever, like a creature in a trap and fought down the urge to turn and bolt.

No. Fia had never run from anything. She’d only ever traveled toward a goal—moving from hardship to hope. Honoria desperately needed hope and healing just now, and Fia seemed uniquely placed to give it. She’d bide her time. She’d accept whatever unholy bargain Orden offered her, playing into his hand just long enough to ensure she was trusted. Then, before Dolenza could be harmed, and when it could not be traced back to a postulant and the cloister, Fia would do what Raea’s own daughters had taught her.

To heal through bloodshed. To cut off what was rotten in order to save what was sound. She would sever Orden from the Hand like so much spoiled flesh.

“Your Majesty?” Fia called, her voice perfectly even. “How can I be of service?”

XXII

For assistance in this little matter of seizing your wife’s dowry, I commend to you my new spymaster, Lucian. He bears no loyalty to anyone but himself, and knows no master but his own ambition. If you are able to further his aims and stoke his vanity, you will find him of great use. I certainly have done so.

—FROM DARIAS INVER TO HADRIAN INVER

The sound of running feet echoing through his cavern sanctuary did not startle the Priest, nor the gasping breaths that punctuated the noise. He was accustomed to Silith’s ghosts reliving the moments just before their dying—as morbid and soul-destroying as such reenactments were, one really could get used to anything.

What he did not expect was Beneson’s sudden presence alongside him on the altar rise, and the boy speaking in a jumble as he struggled for air.

“Priest… upstairs… everything’s gone wrong… they say the king’s dead.”

The Priest’s pulse did not so much as jump. He’d lived through three feigned assassinations of his father, Darias, all of which had been ploys to ferret out those who might seize the throne after the king’s demise. And following the battle summer in Corrin, news had been brought to him once that Orden was dead—he’d clashed with Afon on the field, not during the battles but after. Somehow, both kings had strayed from their respective encampments and been seen fighting hand to hand beforea cloud of leftover witchsmoke seeped up from the earth and hid them from view.

They should not have survived the smoke. Of course, the Priest should not have either. But he bore the scars to show for his narrow escape, while Orden and Afon had emerged unmarked. Thankfully, Orden’s presumed death in Corrin had been announced and retracted, all in the span of two hours—the Priest did not like to think what would have happened to the capital and the throne had his brother been missing much longer. A bloodbath, no doubt.

As Beneson stood panting beside him, shuffling nervously and waiting for some word of reassurance for the Priest, he put away the cloth soaked in illiath oil with which he’d been cleaning Tyrus’s altar. No doubt this was some scheme of Orden’s to root out would-be usurpers before his departure to Caervallion at harvest time.

“Well, all right,” the Priest said at last. “If my brother’s supposedly dead, where is he hiding? I want a word with him.”

“There are guards swarming the king’s chambers,” Beneson said, his voice breaking a little with concern. “I think he’s in there. Lucian and Gaius are managing things. They’ve arrested the queen and the nurse. It’s not… I don’t think this is a ruse. I think the king’s really dead. You know what he’s like with Her Majesty. They forced her through the halls in chains, weeping as she went. He doesn’t like people looking at her wrong, let alone that. Please come up.Please.”

Slowly, the hair on the back of the Priest’s neck was beginning to rise, and the internal sense that warned him of danger to jangle. He should leave. That was the first thought that struck him. He should leavenow. If it was true—if Orden had finally been felled—they’d come for the Priest next. If it was only some ruse, he could invent an explanation for his absence. A pilgrimage, or something of the sort. But better to be safe. Better to vanish and return when the dust from whatever this was had settled.

Instead, a question tore itself from him. “Where is my nephew?”

Until he spoke it, the Priest did not realize how badly he needed to know. It would be Justus who was claimed next, if Orden had truly died and the Priest vanished. Even if Gileta had carried out the assassination, the moment the Invers realized the throne stood empty, someone would find the baby and remove him in their own bid for power.