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runicloreDeterminacy
Author: Amber Michelle
Day/Theme: December 09 - generations of poison, centuries of poison (LATE)
Series: Fire Emblem 10
Character/Pairing: Sanaki, Sephiran, Soren, Ike, Tanith, Valtome, Seliora, others
Rating: K+
Words: 6846
Warnings: butchering of court procedure. Will eventually be remedied.
Notes: AU, part eleven of the Summer Chronicle. This is a first and ongoing draft; a list of known issues is being compiled here.
Court proceedings in this chapter are currently a loose, probably bad interpretation of different models, because I don't have the material to research what I really want to use yet. If I ever finish the Chronicle, this will be one of the chapters I edit heavily. So... it'll have to be vague and/or wrong for now. Sorry.
Yet another month-long entry. 11-13 will be much less gen than usual, but then we'll go back the other way with 14, so don't worry~
.............................................
"The transcript from your interview records your claim you were present on your provincial property in Seliora with your wife and two children a week after the Emancipation. The date was the twenty-second of the fourth month, 624. Is this correct?"
Sanaki tried to suppress a yawn, holding her fingers to her lips to hide it. Her ears popped. The duke answered in the affirmative, and the chair creaked under his shifting weight, the wooden legs scraping the marble floor. It echoed in the audience chamber, and she saw his shoulders twitch, hunch slightly. His eyes flicked up toward the throne, slid back to her prime minister.
"Official records state you did not release your slave holdings until the seventeenth of the fifth month." Sephiran slid his paper to the bottom of the sheaf. She wished his face were visible to her; his hair was tied back with her ribbon, falling straight, thick, and dark against the back of his white coat. "Why wait?"
"Our staff was occupied with preparations for the Spring masque--"
"Which concluded with an auction--"
"Of material goods."
"Of course. Furniture from your brother's estate, silk, a ring of heron make, a bracelet of the same..."
Seliora's mustache twitched. Behind him, on the first tier of seats, a junior senator let his head loll back onto his chair. Sanaki turned her eyes up to stare at the domed ceiling and the sunlight beaming through the windows, dancing with dust motes and rainbows cast by the prism-edges of the glass. Why did he bother to argue? It was still early, perhaps nine-thirty or ten. Sephiran's voice was monotone, a single sound echoed back and forth to ring in her ears, and she wondered if he did it to lull his defendant into a careless reply, or to discourage the rest of the senate from attending by putting them to sleep and letting them embarrass themselves, like the fool on the third tier who nodded off when Seliora first took his seat, and woke himself with a snort to punctuate the word heron.
Sanaki traced a curling vine worked onto her velvet mantle, bowed her head slightly, and felt the pins holding her headdress shift and poke her scalp. Numida's trial stretched across three five-hour sessions because he insisted on lying, and her prime minister resorted to going over every line of his transcript, word for word, and then chose choice portions of Hetzel's statement.
Was he rotting in his cell? She'd wanted to send him down to the bottom floor - she'd wanted to have him flogged - but his money and rank demanded better treatment.
"I'm sorry Duke Seliora, but I cannot believe you failed to recognize a man you purchased laguz from on multiple occasions. Would you care to explain?"
"It was dark."
"You could not light a lamp?"
"It was not the sort of transaction one conducts in a well-lit chamber, Minister."
"I... see."
Sanaki closed her eyes, giving in and rubbing her temple. Knots were forming in her neck, the bad taste in her mouth tempting her to purse her lips. She'd rather imagine Seliora made of stone, the children merely a fluke - perhaps the product of his wife's earlier marriage, never mind she was only five years older than Sanaki herself. Change the subject, change it, change it--
At two the session was concluded. She motioned for the guard to remove Seliora, and the senate stood with her when she rose from her throne and led Sephiran out of the chamber, into the anteroom behind the dais where she reached up and picked the pins from her hair. The headdress slanted. "Are they all sleeping with their servants, or is it only the two?" She dropped down on a bench carved into the wall and bit her lip. The cushion was almost as hard as the wooden seat beneath. "Not that I have any sympathy for a slaver."
"It's a time-honored tradition, empress." Sephiran pried the pins from her hand. "You can be assured every nobleman and probably their wives are conducting something on the side."
"I've been trying to guess who you are dallying with - that female senator from Chaldea?" Sanaki pulled the crest from her hair and a pin clinked onto the floor. She rolled it away with her foot. "Or Oliver?" He protested and she talked over his just a moment, crossing a leg over her knee, the silk skirt sliding down to bare her ankle, her calf. "No, according to Kilvas's report-- Lekain's wife, who seems to have disappeared, an impossible feat unless she had help from one of us."
He rolled his eyes to the ceiling, lifted his chin. "She's staying with Lady Amelia."
Sanaki untied her sandal straps, let the coils around her leg loosen. "The Amelia throwing this year's spring pageant, whose invitation suggested pointless revelry might ease my nerves?"
Sephiran snorted softly. "Better than brooding over the transcripts by candlelight."
"You want me to meet her."
He bent down to pick up the abandoned pin. "She can tell us where to look for the pact."
She hmmed and turned the crescent headdress over in her hands, fingering the beads sewn into the silken seams. Some were red, some gold. The facets glittered. "You've already accepted your invitation, I suppose."
"I told her I would attend with you."
Sanaki held the crescent to her chest. "But the pr--"
"Damn the prince." Sephiran pulled her up by the shoulder, tossed the pins onto the cushion and the headdress with it, yanking it from her hands. Her breath caught when he leaned close. "Are you worried about insulting him?"
"No." Heat rushed to her face, and she looked down at the violet shawl folded over his shoulder, the symbol of his office, bordered with indigo and lavender embroidery. "All this time you've insisted I keep up appearances to appease them. Why the sudden turnaround? The council isn't taken care of yet."
"They are." He let go of her. She picked at the lavender stitches and glanced up, but he was looking past her - at the wall, at nothing. "Lekain can slip out of his collar tomorrow for all I care, and he will never be able to show his face in Begnion again. That much success is assured." He straightened the plaited rolls holding her hair back. "Attending the pageant together is our tradition, and I am a creature of habit."
Sanaki let him have his way, tuck loose strands back, and he leaned over to retrieve one of the pins to hold the adjustment in place. Tanith and Marcia waited at the door, the elder facing away, and Marcia caught her eye. Her smile was quick, and Sanaki said, "I'm wearing the indigo dress."
His eyebrow lifted, and he tugged her hair a little harder than necessary. "I cannot in good conscience let the prince anywhere near you, in that case. It may be necessary to follow you everywhere to make sure Amelia's guests keep their hands to themselves."
She laughed, biting her lip to muffle the sound. "Of course, Sephiran. Everywhere."
"I'll call on her later to arrange something." He put his arm around her waist and pulled her away from the bench. "You have other matters to worry about right now."
Prince Soren, of course.
The hall outside the audience chamber was still glutted with senators in their stiff white robes and tall hats. Guardsmen formed a red armor wall across the mouth of the corridor, but they were too busy talking, sometimes yelling amongst themselves to notice her exit at the far end of the hallway. She heard Sephiran's name mentioned more than once, and his aide shouted above them to announce when they would next convene to continue Seliora's trial. Tomorrow morning at eleven fifteen-- and the immediate protest, why so late, it's unfair to grant him less time-- but Duke Seliora wasn't as skilled at lying as his colleague.
How long would Lekain's trial take? By saving him for last, they were allowing him time to concoct any number of stories. He likely had people running about spying and setting up bribes in spite of their efforts to isolate him. Sanaki had no doubt there were individuals among her guard, and among Sephiran's people, who were willing to bend their loyalties for the right price. What could they do - watch their own people, undercut their morale? They may as well dispense with personal intelligence the way they'd done with personal servants.
She thought that might be the plan. Sephiran banned the servants from her rooms after one of them got in with a blade. It was someone they knew, someone Sanaki remembered from the day of her coronation, when she was met with smiling faces in the parlor of her new rooms. She never thought any of those women would try to harm her. Now he wouldn't even allow his own people past the antechamber to see her without his presence.
It must look bad from the outside - like he controlled all access to her. That she often found his proposals and reforms agreeable probably didn't help.
He excused himself when they came to the corridor leading to his office, and Sanaki continued down the open hallway bordering the garden, glancing past the stone screens, between the trees. Tanith walked to her right, between her and the open air, surcoat jingling, hand curved on her sword hilt. She heard the tap of Marcia's boots behind them.
Perhaps it was time she cultivate her own network of informers - one that did not rely on Kilvas. She would release him soon, if he'd not already found and destroyed the contract, and simply neglected to tell her. He would do that. His proximity to her put him in an advantageous position with the senators, the prince-- everyone. Kilvas would betray her without a second thought, even threaten her life. Sephiran thought she'd forgotten about that, to risk depending on him so heavily, but Sanaki remembered every time she asked Kilvas to do something and he gave her that narrow look, as if he were already trying to find a way around her command mere seconds after she'd given it.
Soren met her at an intersection of corridors leading inside, where the wing reserved for guests met the hall leading to the imperial residences and opened into a small courtyard. Wisteria vines dangled from the overhang and curled around the white marble columns. The grasping ends curled into Ike's blue hair when he moved to emulate Tanith, standing between his prince and the open area, and he swatted them away. Water pattered in a small fountain at the center of the courtyard, spilling from a stone Ashera's outstretched hands.
"I didn't see you in the audience today," Sanaki said, folding her hands behind her back when he bowed. "I can't blame you. I wish I could spend my time elsewhere."
Soren's mouth turned up slightly at the corners. "The novelty has worn off, and a Lady Medina persuaded me to be elsewhere." He combed his fringe back with his fingers, behind his ears, and glanced at the fountain. "I think Duke Seliora might have been more interesting, but please don't quote me on that."
"Her salons are notoriously dull - the sort hosted for people who only want to appear learned." She motioned to the courtyard, and Marcia's boots clopped away on the stone; her bright hair caught Sanaki's eye in her peripheral vision when she circled the small space to check for intruders. She led the prince to the fountain when she saw the all-clear signal. Without the knight to hold it, the train of her dress dragged over the dusty stone, slithering and whispering, the velvet of her mantle pooled atop. "She must have liked you. What did you say to her?"
"Oh, I don't know." Soren sat on the lip of the fountain; his shadow was diffuse on the stone tiles, the sunlight veiled by a thin, hazy layer of clouds. "Something about Duke Numida's dull wit, probably. Every conversation I have with these people is identical."
Sanaki looked at Ike, watched him scan the balconies - second, third, fourth, fifth - and shift into an at-rest posture reminiscent of the one Zelgius adopted in her presence of late, one arm folded back, the hand fisted by the opposite arm. The sort of posture that implied his hand was hovering over a hidden weapon. How many knives did he have tucked on his person - four? five? Or were her estimates too modest? She imagined trying to defend herself against a force like that with her slim silver stiletto; even if his strength didn't overwhelm her immediately, one knife against half a dozen did not offer favorable odds.
Tanith-- she had three, and Marcia had throwing knives. It still wouldn't be enough if he drew his sword. And Soren was surely armed - with magic, always, and perhaps with a blade as well. His father was a warrior, and surely wouldn't have allowed his son to leave the fold without some skill in melee weaponry.
Sanaki didn't want to make an enemy of this prince. However-- "Medina is easily impressed. You might favor Lady Amelia and her retinue instead."
He looked up, an eyebrow arched. "Truly?"
She shrugged her shoulders back. The sunlight brightened, the haze parting, and she felt its heat warm the crown of her head, the skin beneath her lace coat. "Her husband is our principle military strategist, and Amelia is a well-published historian. They don't indulge in idle chatter. If they take a liking to you, it will be genuine."
"Is that so." Soren's back straightened, his brow smoothed. He tilted his head. "Then I might accept her invitation after all. To be honest, this spring pageant doesn't sound very different from the other events I've attended."
"It has some slight ritual significance for Ashera's servants," Sanaki said. "The celebration is meant to welcome the new season and celebrate the goddess's eventual awakening. Amelia will probably choose a historic or literary theme to underpin that, and it will be worth seeing."
"And... will you be attending? Or is this trial monopolizing your time?"
She smiled, working a fold of her velvet mantle between her fingers. "This is the only celebration I attend without fail. Sephiran and I have made it a tradition."
He tilted his head, a thin-lipped smile creasing his pale face. "She had volumes to say about your minister - Lady Medina, that is."
"Oh really."
"Is it true, what she says?"
"Is what--"
"She couldn't make up her mind - Lord Sephiran is using his charming smiles to sway your decisions at court, or you are entangling him with your 'feminine wiles.'" His lips pursed, as if he tasted something sour. "She was quite graphic in her descriptions of how."
Sanaki bit her lip. She'd thought Kilvas was lying when he told her about Medina's stories. "She's disappointed he denied her hand when she was offered to him. Pathetic, isn't it? He turns everyone down."
"It lends credence to the rumor." Soren stood up. "Anybody with eyes should see it isn't true, however."
She couldn't tell how he felt about that - if he was mocking her, or serious. His eyes appeared dull, and his mouth had relaxed into its neutral line. It would be best for him to continue thinking that way, but what nerve. Sanaki tried not to frown. "Your observations are never wrong. So I'm told."
"I wouldn't go that far." He inclined his head - to Tanith, she thought, until she heard the knight's armor creak, and saw Ike's eyes fixed to the point beyond her shoulder. She heard the soft footsteps too late, but she knew who it was before Soren opened his mouth - she would have been warned, were it anybody else. "I'll be the first to admit that I can't pierce your veil of secrecy, Minister. Lady Medina sends her regards."
"How nice of her." She felt Sephiran pause a step behind her, felt the brush of his shoulder, then his hand on her elbow. "Lady Sanaki is needed for some official business. I hope you don't mind."
Soren's eyes slid to her. "Not at all. What about your general - will he be attending?"
Sanaki looked over her shoulder, lifted her brow, but Sephiran shook his head and said, "He prefers not to, but I'm sure he can be persuaded."
"No," Soren said. "But if he doesn't feel the need to be present, perhaps I can spare Ike the boredom."
Ike rolled his eyes skyward - and she saw his gaze trace the balconies again, a reflex. "I'll live."
"And complain, complain--"
Sanaki muffled a laugh with her hand. "Have you tried taking him to the opera yet?" She heard Ike mutter under his breath, something she didn't quite catch and likely didn't want to, and didn't bother to hide her amusement. "My knights will see to your protection if you decide to come alone. Tanith will assign her own deputy and select the best among their number. Will that suffice?"
"That's very generous." Soren glanced at his companion, who pointedly did not look at him, and shrugged. "Thank you, Empress. I accept. Please, don't let me keep you from business."
Sanaki left him standing by the fountain, glancing back once she returned to the cover of the corridor and passed behind a screen. Through the lotus-shaped mesh of stone, she saw the prince pause close by his protector's side, and the tall man bow down to hear whatever he said, and then a wall of sculpted juniper bushes blocked her view. The hall ended in blue-tiled steps. Someone lifted her train again, and she lifted her skirt to her ankles to climb.
"Are you sure about this, your majesty?"
She slowed her step at the top landing, looked at Tanith. "Watch who he speaks with. Listen if you can. It's a good opportunity."
Tanith frowned. If they assigned extra duty to anyone, she said, they would spend the next two days tired, or out of commission, and in either case their performance as a whole would be lacking. Her disapproval blunted when Sanaki suggested enlisting the general to contribute his presence during the day, but when she fell back to speak with Marcia, her I suppose somewhat clipped, she didn't look wholly convinced. Sephiran remained silent at her left, shook his head when she opened her mouth to ask what business brought him back to her, and Sanaki sighed. Her senators would be pleased to hear she was offering her own guard to the prince - perhaps that was reason enough to reconsider, but she didn't think Amelia's security was so lacking as to present a danger to her person.
She worked her hands together beneath the mantle, behind her back, taking the next flight of stairs more slowly. He was more personable, now the trial of the senior council was underway. Soren smiled more, though she didn't believe it any more now than before, and he left the palace almost every day to attend some event - Medina's salon, the tragedy staged at the coliseum, and the opera - apparently. They didn't have such entertainment in Daein, he told her. There were theater and musical performances in the keep during the winter months for his mother's entertainment, but Ashnard preferred the art of war even in the dead of winter. A hunt was staged on the solstice that the king led personally. Sanaki regretted asking what prey they chased almost immediately, and he knew-- you look pale, your majesty. Are you well? Mocking.
Why did he condone such things? How could his mother? Soren's brand was impossible to miss. Did their subjects recognize it for what it was, or were they deluded, preferring to believe him a spirit charmer, or marked - marked by the goddess, as her ancestors were said to be?
Or was it that dragons were the race of laguz acknowledged for their power? Sanaki knew tales of their strength. A dragon would fly faster than a wyvern, a pegasus, and a black's searing breath would melt dirt, rock, and metal. Legend said their king burned a swath in the battlefield against the dark goddess several meters wide and almost a league long.
But those were stories. Sephiran was nothing like the figure she learned about as a child. He was as beautiful as they said Lehran should be, kind, but 'saint' was not a term applicable to the man she knew. She wanted to ask him more about his history, but at the end of the day it was always too much effort. She would sink into her chair, nibble on whatever was served for supper, and he would leave his plate to knead her muscles into submission because she always had a headache by seven and nothing else would do - not tea, not feverfew, nothing. Her timing had yet to fail.
Her rooms smelled like incense, jasmine, and the curtains were pulled back and tied to let the sunlight in. The balcony doors were closed and locked. "Well?" Sanaki stretched her arms above her head, heard her joints crack. "Is there really business to take care of?"
"Somewhat." Sephiran was combing his fingers back through his hair when she turned around and spread her hands. "At the celebration - feign a headache, and a meeting will be arranged when you retire."
Sanaki worked her lip between her teeth. "Your plan or hers?"
"Her note said Lady Gaddos will be costumed in the family livery. She'll bring your refreshment, I suppose."
Sanaki wasn't going to drink anything from that woman. The entire Gaddos family was black-hearted. "Don't you think this is-- predictable? Transparent?"
"Their families don't get along," Sephiran said. "She sought refuge with Amelia on my advice. If the other guests suspect anything when you withdraw, rumor will dwell on our supposed affair and skip the girl entirely. I made sure Medina appeared on the guest list."
"Wonderful." She let the mantle slide over one arm and flung it over the back of a chair, breathing deeply once it was off her shoulders. His footsteps sounded on the marble, then quieted when he moved behind her, onto the carpets. She unclasped the choker and her lace coat, shrugging it from her shoulders. "Maybe she'll decide which of us is the seductress."
"That should be obvious." Her head snapped around, and Sephiran's eyes moved quickly to her face. "Daein crossed the western border into Crimean territory yesterday."
Sanaki clenched her fingers in the lace bunched around her hands. He would have laughed if he meant only to startle her, and she remembered that fragment of a report from Kilvas: there's some military activity northwest of the wall, but it looked like they were facing Crimea. "Did they request my intervention?"
Sephiran pulled the coat over her hands and folded it, resting it over her red velvet. "Not yet. Daein occupies the bridge and a stronghold on the other side, and I have word Crimea's general army is on alert and stationed somewhere in the area, but that's all we know. The area is blanketed in fog this time of year, and the size of Ashnard's force is currently undetermined."
"But it hasn't moved any farther?" He shook his head, and Sanaki pulled her braid around to untie the end and unravel her hair. "If he wants a war that badly, I wouldn't mind letting him sharpen his teeth on one of our northern provinces."
"Don't say that." He brushed her hands away and unplaited the strands more carefully, pushing the loose mass over her shoulder. "If he were foolish enough to do so--"
"Ashnard is a mad king, not a stupid one."
"His son is a viper, and he will strike the moment you turn your back to him. Don't forget about him."
"I know." Sanaki held his hand to her throat, curving his fingers over her palm, and said, "You shouldn't worry so much. It will lead to wrinkles."
His eyes narrowed, but the line of his lips curved slightly. "I'm too young for that."
"Really?" She didn't wait for him to answer, but pulled him by the hand across the room, to the divan by the window, and sat down. He sat beside her, turning his back on his customary place at the other end, and dragged the ottoman over when she stretched her feet and fell short of the edge. Sanaki untied her sandals and pulled her shoes off to curl her toes into the crimson tassels embellishing the edge. "So tell me about Daein. I suppose we should take care of this before the next session begins."
*
They convened at the end of the week to begin Culbert's trial after a day to recover from his colleague's conviction, and Sanaki was ready to throw the formal headdress into the fire and let it burn until the beads scorched and the silk crumbled to ash. Her scalp felt raw where the pins pulled her hair and twinged. Sephiran tried to arrange her hair differently and secure it at a different angle, but it still pulled, moved a fraction of a centimeter when she moved her head to the side, up, down, anywhere but facing front with chin held high. I should have made you wear this every day when you were young, he said, smiling when she glared. And Tanith, instead of scolding him as she should have, took some perverse pleasure in reminding Sanaki yet again of her favorite memory: you were so busy trying not to trip over your robe I thought you'd never learn to keep your chin up.
That was the problem with keeping one's childhood retainers - they reminded one of embarrassing incidents at the worst possible times. It was bad enough Kilvas came to her the other day with a box of chocolate from Tanas in honor of the tenth anniversary of their business relationship, which began with an order to fetch a basket of candy truffles before her minister could get to it.
She was eight; what did they expect? At that age other girls were still riding ponies at their countryside manors and spending days cooped up in drab sitting rooms with their tutors. Sanaki's rooms were full of senators, and the cloying narcissus scent of Culbert's signature cologne. His estate made thousands every year selling it to nobles who sought to imitate his terrible taste, and she was thankful his his stiff, crimped hair style hadn't caught on in the capitol.
Sephiran bribed her to cooperate with a crystal vial of oil that smelled like cinnamon and apple blossoms, and a golden teardrop pendant to wear beneath her gowns that held a ball of sticky resin scented with her new perfume. The metal warmed on her skin as she walked down the corridor to the audience chamber with her hand resting on his arm, at his elbow, dangling below the neckline of her dress. She kept looking down at it as she walked, the glint catching her eye, the shift of the chain still new, skittering when she took the wide steps down into the courtyard and startling her into thinking something slipped down into her dress. He nudged her chin up, finally, and she pursed her lips.
No, she wouldn't take it off. No, she didn't want a shorter chain, and they didn't have time to send for one. She turned her face up slowly when they passed down the cobbled pathway into the central wing of the cathedral to check the cherry trees for the beginnings of blossoms, eyes seizing on each little green bud and the pink and white swirls at the tips. She heard the scrape of Tanith's ornamental spear behind her, the crease of gauntlets, Marcia's steps matched to her own and the tug of the velvet train she held up while they walked.
"Are there cherry trees in Daein?" She turned her face forward again, hand on the headdress, pressing it to her hair.
"No." She caught the movement of his head in her peripheral vision, the turn downward, the sweep of dark hair pulled over his shoulder when he looked at her. "They're a symbol of Begnion, apparently, and the soil is bad in the capitol."
"Pity." She traced her fingers over the chain, from her neck to the gold stitching and pearls worked into her bodice. "Will we have our night of reading when they're in bloom?"
Sephiran folded his arm to his side, pulling her a step closer. "What did you have in mind?"
It was three steps up through the arching entryway of the cathedral, flanked with pale marble pillars and hung with lamps shaped into spheres of brass filigree mesh. "The Faerie Queen," she said, and felt her knight lower the train of her dress once they crossed the threshold. It slid behind her, almost silent on the polished floor. "Especially the last two acts. Nobody ever performs those at festivals. It can't be they're reluctant to sling magic at each other."
He breathed the barest chuckle. "It must be all the kissing involved."
"They all have that, thank you."
"Of course, Empress."
Culbert was ten minutes late to his own trial. There were whispers amongst her knights about such disrespect while they waited in the antechamber for word of his arrival, but Sanaki shushed them. If the man had any respect for law or throne he wouldn't be on trial. Sephiran thought he was concluding some sort of communication with Lekain, but she was more optimistic - Valtome once told her, in the interest of commenting on her own appearance, how long he spent each morning setting his hair to perfection. He slept with his hair twisted in something like pincurls after soaking them in a pomade to keep them smooth. Of course it was uncomfortable, he said, but that was the price of beauty. If she would allow him to suggest a hairdresser to advise her on more elaborate styles suitable for her station--
She never let him finish. Being an empress wasn't about showing her wealth; her money and power were meant to be used for the benefit of citizens without either, and her influence to accomplish things they could not - repaving the roads after hurricanes, lending aid to disaster victims. She wasn't allowed to spend a fortune on clothing, ever, in her memory. A costume suitable to your rank and dignity is enough - that was the lecture she heard whenever she wanted a new dress or pair of shoes, or a piece of jewelry she didn't need. Let him comment all he liked about Sephiran's feminine features - at least her prime minister didn't curl his hair or use cosmetics, or waste his money on silk brocades. He was beautiful without artifice.
At noon, when the sun beat upon the apex of the chamber's high, arching dome and thickened the air with heat and sparkling dust motes, Culbert was led to the wooden chair at the bottom of the dais steps. His hands were in irons, his face without its perpetual smile. He was allowed a clean set of formal robes to maintain the dignity of his office, but all chains and decorations pertaining to his rank were removed before he entered, and his coat looked plain without them, incomplete. With his hair tied back tightly his face looked narrow and sharp.
"Duke Culbert." The creeping whispers of the other senators fell silent, the echo of their voices faint as a ghost, and then gone. "You are charged with keeping household slaves, aiding in the capture of laguz for trade with Daein--"
The list of charges wasn't long, but it was by far the most damning to date. No critical whispers floated down from the tiers of senators ranked behind him. Even Oliver, who admitted guilt in allowing smugglers to transport laguz across his borders, had not purchased any himself, or involved his household in the process. His 'surplus funds' were obtained through his involvement with Kilvas piracy off the coast - inappropriate by any standard, but not in violation of the law in question.
Culbert did not deny his crimes. That alone saved them the time of reading the interview transcripts, but his answers were short and curt, merely yes when asked if he had dealings with the two slave rings conducting business in the Serenes and Salinos regions, which forced Sephiran to list each name, each trade, back straight, posture stiff. Culbert didn't look at her minister, but directed his eyes to the throne, and Sanaki wished he would look away; she couldn't, as long as he saw fit to challenge her. The white and gold senate became a blur of light in her peripheral vision, the senator and Sephiran's voice reciting the list of goods stolen from Rafiel upon his capture her focus.
His voice couldn't make that beautiful. It wasn't enough they sold the heron prince into slavery; his jewelry, his robes, his sandals, all found their way into the hands of others. Locks of hair, a handkerchief stained with his tears, even feathers were stolen if they were found on the floor of his cage. Duke Culbert had the nerve to look annoyed as Sephiran listed the items found in his possession. What use did the heron have for a feather fallen from his wing? If his hair snagged on the padlock and had to be snipped off to free him, what of it?
"Every item of Serenes make was purchased legitimately, Minister. I cannot be responsible for the method of their acquisition," Culbert said, his hands flat on his knees, relaxed. "The fabric was obtained by normal means - gold."
A breath of silence preceded a change in Sephiran's tone, a slight clipping of his words. "Testimony from Numida and Tanas contradict--"
Culbert's lip curled. "Duke Tanas is hardly a reliable witness in matters involving heron laguz. I would question his honesty."
"Yours is not above reproach, clearly." The senator's eyes narrowed slightly. Sanaki tapped the arm of her throne with the ring on her left hand, and her minister reached into his folder and pulled out a slip of yellowed paper. "The date here reads the thirtieth of the fifth month, in Duke Seliora's handwriting, and the list indicates you accepted a gift of wisteria brocade..."
They had enough evidence to skip this step. She would have, if advice from all quarters - including Prince Rafiel, of all people - had not advised her to relive every agonizing detail in public. A written report didn't have the power of vocal confession. If you want to destroy them you have to extract those confessions in front of their peers Kilvas had said, and Sephiran said the other monarchs will not be able to ignore this once it's public. If they were shamed before everyone-- Sanaki couldn't overlook the potential benefit.
The senate would have nowhere to run. Not this time. If they evaded punishment, they still would not escape justice.
Culbert's eyes moved to Sephiran, and Sanaki was finally able to look away. She wished they'd never spoken, that she'd never laid eyes on him. She wished he'd had the decency to commit suicide before capture. She wished he were stupid enough to lie and compound his crimes.
Even with the duke's nominal cooperation, the session stretched more than three hours. The red satin cushions on her throne weren't soft enough, the air was stifling. Sanaki considered asking Sephiran to use a warp staff to take them directly to her office, but Tanith would stop her - this is a dangerous time for both of you, your majesty, she would say. Please do not go anywhere alone. Not even her own office, her own quarters. Every time she returned to her rooms they searched every corner, chamber, and passage before she was allowed past the antechamber.
Assassination would be so predictable. The senior council was most definitely capable of trying, but she didn't think they'd make such an obvious move. Unless they want to take credit for it, Sephiran replied when she told him, and Sanaki compressed her lips in a frown.
They didn't last time. Maybe they would now - if they succeeded. Who knew?
Tanith and Catalena waited with them in the hall outside her office while Marcia and two other knights checked the main chamber, and the small closet of a room in the back where she napped sometimes or hid Kilvas during meetings. Sanaki used the pause to unpin the headdress and slide the velvet mantle from her shoulders. When they were allowed to enter, when the door closed, she threw them at a chair, missed, and let the velvet crumple onto the rug. Sephiran didn't pause to pick it up, but went straight to her desk to put his folders down.
She clasped her hands behind her, stretched her arms back. The joints cracked too loudly. He didn't look up.
He'd smiled and spoken to her on the way back. Now he leaned on the edge of her desk, hair spread over his back like a blanket and slipping over his hunched shoulders. Sanaki pulled his hand, made him straighten, and turned him by the shoulders to face her. "You're tired. We can discuss it later."
His smile was self-deprecating. "I should be saying that to you."
"I'm tired of looking at their faces." She sighed. Did he even sleep last night? He told her he didn't need as much sleep as she did. Sanaki was willing to believe there were some small differences in physiology, but he must be lying about that. He almost insulted Culbert in public, at court. Sephiran never slipped like that. "You've been staring at them longer. I shouldn't complain."
He looked at his papers again. Sanaki ignored his murmured reply and locked her arms behind his neck to pull him into a hug. Sephiran didn't protest, but let his head rest on her shoulder, and she felt his sigh on her shoulder beneath the lace, a long exhalation it seemed he'd held forever.
It was a little awkward because he was so tall. She stroked her fingers through the hair over the back of his neck and felt him unbend a little, press his face into her hair instead. "You've been waiting a long time for this," she said softly. Yes, he said in her ear, and Sanaki's arms felt weak, hands shaking when she tried to gather his hair into a tail at the back of his head. "It's almost over. Just a few days--"
His embrace was sudden, tight enough to squeeze the air from her lungs. She gasped and clung to his neck, up on her toes, and the force of Sephiran's arms eased almost immediately. "I know." He kept her close, talking to her hair. "It's difficult to wait."
Sanaki tried to take a deep breath. His hold slackened further. She lifted her head and pressed her hands to the side of his face, pulling him back to look at her. "We'll discuss Culbert later. And Crimea - I'll take care of that while you rest. I know when your smiles are fake so don't try to trick me by pretending to feel better."
Sephiran almost smiled. "Is that an order?"
"This time?" Sanaki brushed the shadow under his left eye with her finger, lifted her eyebrow, and seized her chance to kiss him. "Yes."
........................................................................
I admit to rushing so I could get this out before the turn of the year. It's been a freaking month, come on. I used to write these things in three days. (7k in three days is only something I can do for Nanowrimo, though. It hurts.) The Valtome scene could use some tensing up, though.
Sanaki is apparently an opportunist.
How did this get so long? I start with a tiny outline of stuff to do, and the word count just happens. Some people like long fic, and some people don't; to me, it just takes more time to read and discourages people from making the effort, which is why I always feel apologetic when I break 5000.
Author: Amber Michelle
Day/Theme: December 09 - generations of poison, centuries of poison (LATE)
Series: Fire Emblem 10
Character/Pairing: Sanaki, Sephiran, Soren, Ike, Tanith, Valtome, Seliora, others
Rating: K+
Words: 6846
Warnings: butchering of court procedure. Will eventually be remedied.
Notes: AU, part eleven of the Summer Chronicle. This is a first and ongoing draft; a list of known issues is being compiled here.
Court proceedings in this chapter are currently a loose, probably bad interpretation of different models, because I don't have the material to research what I really want to use yet. If I ever finish the Chronicle, this will be one of the chapters I edit heavily. So... it'll have to be vague and/or wrong for now. Sorry.
Yet another month-long entry. 11-13 will be much less gen than usual, but then we'll go back the other way with 14, so don't worry~
.............................................
"The transcript from your interview records your claim you were present on your provincial property in Seliora with your wife and two children a week after the Emancipation. The date was the twenty-second of the fourth month, 624. Is this correct?"
Sanaki tried to suppress a yawn, holding her fingers to her lips to hide it. Her ears popped. The duke answered in the affirmative, and the chair creaked under his shifting weight, the wooden legs scraping the marble floor. It echoed in the audience chamber, and she saw his shoulders twitch, hunch slightly. His eyes flicked up toward the throne, slid back to her prime minister.
"Official records state you did not release your slave holdings until the seventeenth of the fifth month." Sephiran slid his paper to the bottom of the sheaf. She wished his face were visible to her; his hair was tied back with her ribbon, falling straight, thick, and dark against the back of his white coat. "Why wait?"
"Our staff was occupied with preparations for the Spring masque--"
"Which concluded with an auction--"
"Of material goods."
"Of course. Furniture from your brother's estate, silk, a ring of heron make, a bracelet of the same..."
Seliora's mustache twitched. Behind him, on the first tier of seats, a junior senator let his head loll back onto his chair. Sanaki turned her eyes up to stare at the domed ceiling and the sunlight beaming through the windows, dancing with dust motes and rainbows cast by the prism-edges of the glass. Why did he bother to argue? It was still early, perhaps nine-thirty or ten. Sephiran's voice was monotone, a single sound echoed back and forth to ring in her ears, and she wondered if he did it to lull his defendant into a careless reply, or to discourage the rest of the senate from attending by putting them to sleep and letting them embarrass themselves, like the fool on the third tier who nodded off when Seliora first took his seat, and woke himself with a snort to punctuate the word heron.
Sanaki traced a curling vine worked onto her velvet mantle, bowed her head slightly, and felt the pins holding her headdress shift and poke her scalp. Numida's trial stretched across three five-hour sessions because he insisted on lying, and her prime minister resorted to going over every line of his transcript, word for word, and then chose choice portions of Hetzel's statement.
Was he rotting in his cell? She'd wanted to send him down to the bottom floor - she'd wanted to have him flogged - but his money and rank demanded better treatment.
"I'm sorry Duke Seliora, but I cannot believe you failed to recognize a man you purchased laguz from on multiple occasions. Would you care to explain?"
"It was dark."
"You could not light a lamp?"
"It was not the sort of transaction one conducts in a well-lit chamber, Minister."
"I... see."
Sanaki closed her eyes, giving in and rubbing her temple. Knots were forming in her neck, the bad taste in her mouth tempting her to purse her lips. She'd rather imagine Seliora made of stone, the children merely a fluke - perhaps the product of his wife's earlier marriage, never mind she was only five years older than Sanaki herself. Change the subject, change it, change it--
At two the session was concluded. She motioned for the guard to remove Seliora, and the senate stood with her when she rose from her throne and led Sephiran out of the chamber, into the anteroom behind the dais where she reached up and picked the pins from her hair. The headdress slanted. "Are they all sleeping with their servants, or is it only the two?" She dropped down on a bench carved into the wall and bit her lip. The cushion was almost as hard as the wooden seat beneath. "Not that I have any sympathy for a slaver."
"It's a time-honored tradition, empress." Sephiran pried the pins from her hand. "You can be assured every nobleman and probably their wives are conducting something on the side."
"I've been trying to guess who you are dallying with - that female senator from Chaldea?" Sanaki pulled the crest from her hair and a pin clinked onto the floor. She rolled it away with her foot. "Or Oliver?" He protested and she talked over his just a moment, crossing a leg over her knee, the silk skirt sliding down to bare her ankle, her calf. "No, according to Kilvas's report-- Lekain's wife, who seems to have disappeared, an impossible feat unless she had help from one of us."
He rolled his eyes to the ceiling, lifted his chin. "She's staying with Lady Amelia."
Sanaki untied her sandal straps, let the coils around her leg loosen. "The Amelia throwing this year's spring pageant, whose invitation suggested pointless revelry might ease my nerves?"
Sephiran snorted softly. "Better than brooding over the transcripts by candlelight."
"You want me to meet her."
He bent down to pick up the abandoned pin. "She can tell us where to look for the pact."
She hmmed and turned the crescent headdress over in her hands, fingering the beads sewn into the silken seams. Some were red, some gold. The facets glittered. "You've already accepted your invitation, I suppose."
"I told her I would attend with you."
Sanaki held the crescent to her chest. "But the pr--"
"Damn the prince." Sephiran pulled her up by the shoulder, tossed the pins onto the cushion and the headdress with it, yanking it from her hands. Her breath caught when he leaned close. "Are you worried about insulting him?"
"No." Heat rushed to her face, and she looked down at the violet shawl folded over his shoulder, the symbol of his office, bordered with indigo and lavender embroidery. "All this time you've insisted I keep up appearances to appease them. Why the sudden turnaround? The council isn't taken care of yet."
"They are." He let go of her. She picked at the lavender stitches and glanced up, but he was looking past her - at the wall, at nothing. "Lekain can slip out of his collar tomorrow for all I care, and he will never be able to show his face in Begnion again. That much success is assured." He straightened the plaited rolls holding her hair back. "Attending the pageant together is our tradition, and I am a creature of habit."
Sanaki let him have his way, tuck loose strands back, and he leaned over to retrieve one of the pins to hold the adjustment in place. Tanith and Marcia waited at the door, the elder facing away, and Marcia caught her eye. Her smile was quick, and Sanaki said, "I'm wearing the indigo dress."
His eyebrow lifted, and he tugged her hair a little harder than necessary. "I cannot in good conscience let the prince anywhere near you, in that case. It may be necessary to follow you everywhere to make sure Amelia's guests keep their hands to themselves."
She laughed, biting her lip to muffle the sound. "Of course, Sephiran. Everywhere."
"I'll call on her later to arrange something." He put his arm around her waist and pulled her away from the bench. "You have other matters to worry about right now."
Prince Soren, of course.
The hall outside the audience chamber was still glutted with senators in their stiff white robes and tall hats. Guardsmen formed a red armor wall across the mouth of the corridor, but they were too busy talking, sometimes yelling amongst themselves to notice her exit at the far end of the hallway. She heard Sephiran's name mentioned more than once, and his aide shouted above them to announce when they would next convene to continue Seliora's trial. Tomorrow morning at eleven fifteen-- and the immediate protest, why so late, it's unfair to grant him less time-- but Duke Seliora wasn't as skilled at lying as his colleague.
How long would Lekain's trial take? By saving him for last, they were allowing him time to concoct any number of stories. He likely had people running about spying and setting up bribes in spite of their efforts to isolate him. Sanaki had no doubt there were individuals among her guard, and among Sephiran's people, who were willing to bend their loyalties for the right price. What could they do - watch their own people, undercut their morale? They may as well dispense with personal intelligence the way they'd done with personal servants.
She thought that might be the plan. Sephiran banned the servants from her rooms after one of them got in with a blade. It was someone they knew, someone Sanaki remembered from the day of her coronation, when she was met with smiling faces in the parlor of her new rooms. She never thought any of those women would try to harm her. Now he wouldn't even allow his own people past the antechamber to see her without his presence.
It must look bad from the outside - like he controlled all access to her. That she often found his proposals and reforms agreeable probably didn't help.
He excused himself when they came to the corridor leading to his office, and Sanaki continued down the open hallway bordering the garden, glancing past the stone screens, between the trees. Tanith walked to her right, between her and the open air, surcoat jingling, hand curved on her sword hilt. She heard the tap of Marcia's boots behind them.
Perhaps it was time she cultivate her own network of informers - one that did not rely on Kilvas. She would release him soon, if he'd not already found and destroyed the contract, and simply neglected to tell her. He would do that. His proximity to her put him in an advantageous position with the senators, the prince-- everyone. Kilvas would betray her without a second thought, even threaten her life. Sephiran thought she'd forgotten about that, to risk depending on him so heavily, but Sanaki remembered every time she asked Kilvas to do something and he gave her that narrow look, as if he were already trying to find a way around her command mere seconds after she'd given it.
Soren met her at an intersection of corridors leading inside, where the wing reserved for guests met the hall leading to the imperial residences and opened into a small courtyard. Wisteria vines dangled from the overhang and curled around the white marble columns. The grasping ends curled into Ike's blue hair when he moved to emulate Tanith, standing between his prince and the open area, and he swatted them away. Water pattered in a small fountain at the center of the courtyard, spilling from a stone Ashera's outstretched hands.
"I didn't see you in the audience today," Sanaki said, folding her hands behind her back when he bowed. "I can't blame you. I wish I could spend my time elsewhere."
Soren's mouth turned up slightly at the corners. "The novelty has worn off, and a Lady Medina persuaded me to be elsewhere." He combed his fringe back with his fingers, behind his ears, and glanced at the fountain. "I think Duke Seliora might have been more interesting, but please don't quote me on that."
"Her salons are notoriously dull - the sort hosted for people who only want to appear learned." She motioned to the courtyard, and Marcia's boots clopped away on the stone; her bright hair caught Sanaki's eye in her peripheral vision when she circled the small space to check for intruders. She led the prince to the fountain when she saw the all-clear signal. Without the knight to hold it, the train of her dress dragged over the dusty stone, slithering and whispering, the velvet of her mantle pooled atop. "She must have liked you. What did you say to her?"
"Oh, I don't know." Soren sat on the lip of the fountain; his shadow was diffuse on the stone tiles, the sunlight veiled by a thin, hazy layer of clouds. "Something about Duke Numida's dull wit, probably. Every conversation I have with these people is identical."
Sanaki looked at Ike, watched him scan the balconies - second, third, fourth, fifth - and shift into an at-rest posture reminiscent of the one Zelgius adopted in her presence of late, one arm folded back, the hand fisted by the opposite arm. The sort of posture that implied his hand was hovering over a hidden weapon. How many knives did he have tucked on his person - four? five? Or were her estimates too modest? She imagined trying to defend herself against a force like that with her slim silver stiletto; even if his strength didn't overwhelm her immediately, one knife against half a dozen did not offer favorable odds.
Tanith-- she had three, and Marcia had throwing knives. It still wouldn't be enough if he drew his sword. And Soren was surely armed - with magic, always, and perhaps with a blade as well. His father was a warrior, and surely wouldn't have allowed his son to leave the fold without some skill in melee weaponry.
Sanaki didn't want to make an enemy of this prince. However-- "Medina is easily impressed. You might favor Lady Amelia and her retinue instead."
He looked up, an eyebrow arched. "Truly?"
She shrugged her shoulders back. The sunlight brightened, the haze parting, and she felt its heat warm the crown of her head, the skin beneath her lace coat. "Her husband is our principle military strategist, and Amelia is a well-published historian. They don't indulge in idle chatter. If they take a liking to you, it will be genuine."
"Is that so." Soren's back straightened, his brow smoothed. He tilted his head. "Then I might accept her invitation after all. To be honest, this spring pageant doesn't sound very different from the other events I've attended."
"It has some slight ritual significance for Ashera's servants," Sanaki said. "The celebration is meant to welcome the new season and celebrate the goddess's eventual awakening. Amelia will probably choose a historic or literary theme to underpin that, and it will be worth seeing."
"And... will you be attending? Or is this trial monopolizing your time?"
She smiled, working a fold of her velvet mantle between her fingers. "This is the only celebration I attend without fail. Sephiran and I have made it a tradition."
He tilted his head, a thin-lipped smile creasing his pale face. "She had volumes to say about your minister - Lady Medina, that is."
"Oh really."
"Is it true, what she says?"
"Is what--"
"She couldn't make up her mind - Lord Sephiran is using his charming smiles to sway your decisions at court, or you are entangling him with your 'feminine wiles.'" His lips pursed, as if he tasted something sour. "She was quite graphic in her descriptions of how."
Sanaki bit her lip. She'd thought Kilvas was lying when he told her about Medina's stories. "She's disappointed he denied her hand when she was offered to him. Pathetic, isn't it? He turns everyone down."
"It lends credence to the rumor." Soren stood up. "Anybody with eyes should see it isn't true, however."
She couldn't tell how he felt about that - if he was mocking her, or serious. His eyes appeared dull, and his mouth had relaxed into its neutral line. It would be best for him to continue thinking that way, but what nerve. Sanaki tried not to frown. "Your observations are never wrong. So I'm told."
"I wouldn't go that far." He inclined his head - to Tanith, she thought, until she heard the knight's armor creak, and saw Ike's eyes fixed to the point beyond her shoulder. She heard the soft footsteps too late, but she knew who it was before Soren opened his mouth - she would have been warned, were it anybody else. "I'll be the first to admit that I can't pierce your veil of secrecy, Minister. Lady Medina sends her regards."
"How nice of her." She felt Sephiran pause a step behind her, felt the brush of his shoulder, then his hand on her elbow. "Lady Sanaki is needed for some official business. I hope you don't mind."
Soren's eyes slid to her. "Not at all. What about your general - will he be attending?"
Sanaki looked over her shoulder, lifted her brow, but Sephiran shook his head and said, "He prefers not to, but I'm sure he can be persuaded."
"No," Soren said. "But if he doesn't feel the need to be present, perhaps I can spare Ike the boredom."
Ike rolled his eyes skyward - and she saw his gaze trace the balconies again, a reflex. "I'll live."
"And complain, complain--"
Sanaki muffled a laugh with her hand. "Have you tried taking him to the opera yet?" She heard Ike mutter under his breath, something she didn't quite catch and likely didn't want to, and didn't bother to hide her amusement. "My knights will see to your protection if you decide to come alone. Tanith will assign her own deputy and select the best among their number. Will that suffice?"
"That's very generous." Soren glanced at his companion, who pointedly did not look at him, and shrugged. "Thank you, Empress. I accept. Please, don't let me keep you from business."
Sanaki left him standing by the fountain, glancing back once she returned to the cover of the corridor and passed behind a screen. Through the lotus-shaped mesh of stone, she saw the prince pause close by his protector's side, and the tall man bow down to hear whatever he said, and then a wall of sculpted juniper bushes blocked her view. The hall ended in blue-tiled steps. Someone lifted her train again, and she lifted her skirt to her ankles to climb.
"Are you sure about this, your majesty?"
She slowed her step at the top landing, looked at Tanith. "Watch who he speaks with. Listen if you can. It's a good opportunity."
Tanith frowned. If they assigned extra duty to anyone, she said, they would spend the next two days tired, or out of commission, and in either case their performance as a whole would be lacking. Her disapproval blunted when Sanaki suggested enlisting the general to contribute his presence during the day, but when she fell back to speak with Marcia, her I suppose somewhat clipped, she didn't look wholly convinced. Sephiran remained silent at her left, shook his head when she opened her mouth to ask what business brought him back to her, and Sanaki sighed. Her senators would be pleased to hear she was offering her own guard to the prince - perhaps that was reason enough to reconsider, but she didn't think Amelia's security was so lacking as to present a danger to her person.
She worked her hands together beneath the mantle, behind her back, taking the next flight of stairs more slowly. He was more personable, now the trial of the senior council was underway. Soren smiled more, though she didn't believe it any more now than before, and he left the palace almost every day to attend some event - Medina's salon, the tragedy staged at the coliseum, and the opera - apparently. They didn't have such entertainment in Daein, he told her. There were theater and musical performances in the keep during the winter months for his mother's entertainment, but Ashnard preferred the art of war even in the dead of winter. A hunt was staged on the solstice that the king led personally. Sanaki regretted asking what prey they chased almost immediately, and he knew-- you look pale, your majesty. Are you well? Mocking.
Why did he condone such things? How could his mother? Soren's brand was impossible to miss. Did their subjects recognize it for what it was, or were they deluded, preferring to believe him a spirit charmer, or marked - marked by the goddess, as her ancestors were said to be?
Or was it that dragons were the race of laguz acknowledged for their power? Sanaki knew tales of their strength. A dragon would fly faster than a wyvern, a pegasus, and a black's searing breath would melt dirt, rock, and metal. Legend said their king burned a swath in the battlefield against the dark goddess several meters wide and almost a league long.
But those were stories. Sephiran was nothing like the figure she learned about as a child. He was as beautiful as they said Lehran should be, kind, but 'saint' was not a term applicable to the man she knew. She wanted to ask him more about his history, but at the end of the day it was always too much effort. She would sink into her chair, nibble on whatever was served for supper, and he would leave his plate to knead her muscles into submission because she always had a headache by seven and nothing else would do - not tea, not feverfew, nothing. Her timing had yet to fail.
Her rooms smelled like incense, jasmine, and the curtains were pulled back and tied to let the sunlight in. The balcony doors were closed and locked. "Well?" Sanaki stretched her arms above her head, heard her joints crack. "Is there really business to take care of?"
"Somewhat." Sephiran was combing his fingers back through his hair when she turned around and spread her hands. "At the celebration - feign a headache, and a meeting will be arranged when you retire."
Sanaki worked her lip between her teeth. "Your plan or hers?"
"Her note said Lady Gaddos will be costumed in the family livery. She'll bring your refreshment, I suppose."
Sanaki wasn't going to drink anything from that woman. The entire Gaddos family was black-hearted. "Don't you think this is-- predictable? Transparent?"
"Their families don't get along," Sephiran said. "She sought refuge with Amelia on my advice. If the other guests suspect anything when you withdraw, rumor will dwell on our supposed affair and skip the girl entirely. I made sure Medina appeared on the guest list."
"Wonderful." She let the mantle slide over one arm and flung it over the back of a chair, breathing deeply once it was off her shoulders. His footsteps sounded on the marble, then quieted when he moved behind her, onto the carpets. She unclasped the choker and her lace coat, shrugging it from her shoulders. "Maybe she'll decide which of us is the seductress."
"That should be obvious." Her head snapped around, and Sephiran's eyes moved quickly to her face. "Daein crossed the western border into Crimean territory yesterday."
Sanaki clenched her fingers in the lace bunched around her hands. He would have laughed if he meant only to startle her, and she remembered that fragment of a report from Kilvas: there's some military activity northwest of the wall, but it looked like they were facing Crimea. "Did they request my intervention?"
Sephiran pulled the coat over her hands and folded it, resting it over her red velvet. "Not yet. Daein occupies the bridge and a stronghold on the other side, and I have word Crimea's general army is on alert and stationed somewhere in the area, but that's all we know. The area is blanketed in fog this time of year, and the size of Ashnard's force is currently undetermined."
"But it hasn't moved any farther?" He shook his head, and Sanaki pulled her braid around to untie the end and unravel her hair. "If he wants a war that badly, I wouldn't mind letting him sharpen his teeth on one of our northern provinces."
"Don't say that." He brushed her hands away and unplaited the strands more carefully, pushing the loose mass over her shoulder. "If he were foolish enough to do so--"
"Ashnard is a mad king, not a stupid one."
"His son is a viper, and he will strike the moment you turn your back to him. Don't forget about him."
"I know." Sanaki held his hand to her throat, curving his fingers over her palm, and said, "You shouldn't worry so much. It will lead to wrinkles."
His eyes narrowed, but the line of his lips curved slightly. "I'm too young for that."
"Really?" She didn't wait for him to answer, but pulled him by the hand across the room, to the divan by the window, and sat down. He sat beside her, turning his back on his customary place at the other end, and dragged the ottoman over when she stretched her feet and fell short of the edge. Sanaki untied her sandals and pulled her shoes off to curl her toes into the crimson tassels embellishing the edge. "So tell me about Daein. I suppose we should take care of this before the next session begins."
*
They convened at the end of the week to begin Culbert's trial after a day to recover from his colleague's conviction, and Sanaki was ready to throw the formal headdress into the fire and let it burn until the beads scorched and the silk crumbled to ash. Her scalp felt raw where the pins pulled her hair and twinged. Sephiran tried to arrange her hair differently and secure it at a different angle, but it still pulled, moved a fraction of a centimeter when she moved her head to the side, up, down, anywhere but facing front with chin held high. I should have made you wear this every day when you were young, he said, smiling when she glared. And Tanith, instead of scolding him as she should have, took some perverse pleasure in reminding Sanaki yet again of her favorite memory: you were so busy trying not to trip over your robe I thought you'd never learn to keep your chin up.
That was the problem with keeping one's childhood retainers - they reminded one of embarrassing incidents at the worst possible times. It was bad enough Kilvas came to her the other day with a box of chocolate from Tanas in honor of the tenth anniversary of their business relationship, which began with an order to fetch a basket of candy truffles before her minister could get to it.
She was eight; what did they expect? At that age other girls were still riding ponies at their countryside manors and spending days cooped up in drab sitting rooms with their tutors. Sanaki's rooms were full of senators, and the cloying narcissus scent of Culbert's signature cologne. His estate made thousands every year selling it to nobles who sought to imitate his terrible taste, and she was thankful his his stiff, crimped hair style hadn't caught on in the capitol.
Sephiran bribed her to cooperate with a crystal vial of oil that smelled like cinnamon and apple blossoms, and a golden teardrop pendant to wear beneath her gowns that held a ball of sticky resin scented with her new perfume. The metal warmed on her skin as she walked down the corridor to the audience chamber with her hand resting on his arm, at his elbow, dangling below the neckline of her dress. She kept looking down at it as she walked, the glint catching her eye, the shift of the chain still new, skittering when she took the wide steps down into the courtyard and startling her into thinking something slipped down into her dress. He nudged her chin up, finally, and she pursed her lips.
No, she wouldn't take it off. No, she didn't want a shorter chain, and they didn't have time to send for one. She turned her face up slowly when they passed down the cobbled pathway into the central wing of the cathedral to check the cherry trees for the beginnings of blossoms, eyes seizing on each little green bud and the pink and white swirls at the tips. She heard the scrape of Tanith's ornamental spear behind her, the crease of gauntlets, Marcia's steps matched to her own and the tug of the velvet train she held up while they walked.
"Are there cherry trees in Daein?" She turned her face forward again, hand on the headdress, pressing it to her hair.
"No." She caught the movement of his head in her peripheral vision, the turn downward, the sweep of dark hair pulled over his shoulder when he looked at her. "They're a symbol of Begnion, apparently, and the soil is bad in the capitol."
"Pity." She traced her fingers over the chain, from her neck to the gold stitching and pearls worked into her bodice. "Will we have our night of reading when they're in bloom?"
Sephiran folded his arm to his side, pulling her a step closer. "What did you have in mind?"
It was three steps up through the arching entryway of the cathedral, flanked with pale marble pillars and hung with lamps shaped into spheres of brass filigree mesh. "The Faerie Queen," she said, and felt her knight lower the train of her dress once they crossed the threshold. It slid behind her, almost silent on the polished floor. "Especially the last two acts. Nobody ever performs those at festivals. It can't be they're reluctant to sling magic at each other."
He breathed the barest chuckle. "It must be all the kissing involved."
"They all have that, thank you."
"Of course, Empress."
Culbert was ten minutes late to his own trial. There were whispers amongst her knights about such disrespect while they waited in the antechamber for word of his arrival, but Sanaki shushed them. If the man had any respect for law or throne he wouldn't be on trial. Sephiran thought he was concluding some sort of communication with Lekain, but she was more optimistic - Valtome once told her, in the interest of commenting on her own appearance, how long he spent each morning setting his hair to perfection. He slept with his hair twisted in something like pincurls after soaking them in a pomade to keep them smooth. Of course it was uncomfortable, he said, but that was the price of beauty. If she would allow him to suggest a hairdresser to advise her on more elaborate styles suitable for her station--
She never let him finish. Being an empress wasn't about showing her wealth; her money and power were meant to be used for the benefit of citizens without either, and her influence to accomplish things they could not - repaving the roads after hurricanes, lending aid to disaster victims. She wasn't allowed to spend a fortune on clothing, ever, in her memory. A costume suitable to your rank and dignity is enough - that was the lecture she heard whenever she wanted a new dress or pair of shoes, or a piece of jewelry she didn't need. Let him comment all he liked about Sephiran's feminine features - at least her prime minister didn't curl his hair or use cosmetics, or waste his money on silk brocades. He was beautiful without artifice.
At noon, when the sun beat upon the apex of the chamber's high, arching dome and thickened the air with heat and sparkling dust motes, Culbert was led to the wooden chair at the bottom of the dais steps. His hands were in irons, his face without its perpetual smile. He was allowed a clean set of formal robes to maintain the dignity of his office, but all chains and decorations pertaining to his rank were removed before he entered, and his coat looked plain without them, incomplete. With his hair tied back tightly his face looked narrow and sharp.
"Duke Culbert." The creeping whispers of the other senators fell silent, the echo of their voices faint as a ghost, and then gone. "You are charged with keeping household slaves, aiding in the capture of laguz for trade with Daein--"
The list of charges wasn't long, but it was by far the most damning to date. No critical whispers floated down from the tiers of senators ranked behind him. Even Oliver, who admitted guilt in allowing smugglers to transport laguz across his borders, had not purchased any himself, or involved his household in the process. His 'surplus funds' were obtained through his involvement with Kilvas piracy off the coast - inappropriate by any standard, but not in violation of the law in question.
Culbert did not deny his crimes. That alone saved them the time of reading the interview transcripts, but his answers were short and curt, merely yes when asked if he had dealings with the two slave rings conducting business in the Serenes and Salinos regions, which forced Sephiran to list each name, each trade, back straight, posture stiff. Culbert didn't look at her minister, but directed his eyes to the throne, and Sanaki wished he would look away; she couldn't, as long as he saw fit to challenge her. The white and gold senate became a blur of light in her peripheral vision, the senator and Sephiran's voice reciting the list of goods stolen from Rafiel upon his capture her focus.
His voice couldn't make that beautiful. It wasn't enough they sold the heron prince into slavery; his jewelry, his robes, his sandals, all found their way into the hands of others. Locks of hair, a handkerchief stained with his tears, even feathers were stolen if they were found on the floor of his cage. Duke Culbert had the nerve to look annoyed as Sephiran listed the items found in his possession. What use did the heron have for a feather fallen from his wing? If his hair snagged on the padlock and had to be snipped off to free him, what of it?
"Every item of Serenes make was purchased legitimately, Minister. I cannot be responsible for the method of their acquisition," Culbert said, his hands flat on his knees, relaxed. "The fabric was obtained by normal means - gold."
A breath of silence preceded a change in Sephiran's tone, a slight clipping of his words. "Testimony from Numida and Tanas contradict--"
Culbert's lip curled. "Duke Tanas is hardly a reliable witness in matters involving heron laguz. I would question his honesty."
"Yours is not above reproach, clearly." The senator's eyes narrowed slightly. Sanaki tapped the arm of her throne with the ring on her left hand, and her minister reached into his folder and pulled out a slip of yellowed paper. "The date here reads the thirtieth of the fifth month, in Duke Seliora's handwriting, and the list indicates you accepted a gift of wisteria brocade..."
They had enough evidence to skip this step. She would have, if advice from all quarters - including Prince Rafiel, of all people - had not advised her to relive every agonizing detail in public. A written report didn't have the power of vocal confession. If you want to destroy them you have to extract those confessions in front of their peers Kilvas had said, and Sephiran said the other monarchs will not be able to ignore this once it's public. If they were shamed before everyone-- Sanaki couldn't overlook the potential benefit.
The senate would have nowhere to run. Not this time. If they evaded punishment, they still would not escape justice.
Culbert's eyes moved to Sephiran, and Sanaki was finally able to look away. She wished they'd never spoken, that she'd never laid eyes on him. She wished he'd had the decency to commit suicide before capture. She wished he were stupid enough to lie and compound his crimes.
Even with the duke's nominal cooperation, the session stretched more than three hours. The red satin cushions on her throne weren't soft enough, the air was stifling. Sanaki considered asking Sephiran to use a warp staff to take them directly to her office, but Tanith would stop her - this is a dangerous time for both of you, your majesty, she would say. Please do not go anywhere alone. Not even her own office, her own quarters. Every time she returned to her rooms they searched every corner, chamber, and passage before she was allowed past the antechamber.
Assassination would be so predictable. The senior council was most definitely capable of trying, but she didn't think they'd make such an obvious move. Unless they want to take credit for it, Sephiran replied when she told him, and Sanaki compressed her lips in a frown.
They didn't last time. Maybe they would now - if they succeeded. Who knew?
Tanith and Catalena waited with them in the hall outside her office while Marcia and two other knights checked the main chamber, and the small closet of a room in the back where she napped sometimes or hid Kilvas during meetings. Sanaki used the pause to unpin the headdress and slide the velvet mantle from her shoulders. When they were allowed to enter, when the door closed, she threw them at a chair, missed, and let the velvet crumple onto the rug. Sephiran didn't pause to pick it up, but went straight to her desk to put his folders down.
She clasped her hands behind her, stretched her arms back. The joints cracked too loudly. He didn't look up.
He'd smiled and spoken to her on the way back. Now he leaned on the edge of her desk, hair spread over his back like a blanket and slipping over his hunched shoulders. Sanaki pulled his hand, made him straighten, and turned him by the shoulders to face her. "You're tired. We can discuss it later."
His smile was self-deprecating. "I should be saying that to you."
"I'm tired of looking at their faces." She sighed. Did he even sleep last night? He told her he didn't need as much sleep as she did. Sanaki was willing to believe there were some small differences in physiology, but he must be lying about that. He almost insulted Culbert in public, at court. Sephiran never slipped like that. "You've been staring at them longer. I shouldn't complain."
He looked at his papers again. Sanaki ignored his murmured reply and locked her arms behind his neck to pull him into a hug. Sephiran didn't protest, but let his head rest on her shoulder, and she felt his sigh on her shoulder beneath the lace, a long exhalation it seemed he'd held forever.
It was a little awkward because he was so tall. She stroked her fingers through the hair over the back of his neck and felt him unbend a little, press his face into her hair instead. "You've been waiting a long time for this," she said softly. Yes, he said in her ear, and Sanaki's arms felt weak, hands shaking when she tried to gather his hair into a tail at the back of his head. "It's almost over. Just a few days--"
His embrace was sudden, tight enough to squeeze the air from her lungs. She gasped and clung to his neck, up on her toes, and the force of Sephiran's arms eased almost immediately. "I know." He kept her close, talking to her hair. "It's difficult to wait."
Sanaki tried to take a deep breath. His hold slackened further. She lifted her head and pressed her hands to the side of his face, pulling him back to look at her. "We'll discuss Culbert later. And Crimea - I'll take care of that while you rest. I know when your smiles are fake so don't try to trick me by pretending to feel better."
Sephiran almost smiled. "Is that an order?"
"This time?" Sanaki brushed the shadow under his left eye with her finger, lifted her eyebrow, and seized her chance to kiss him. "Yes."
........................................................................
I admit to rushing so I could get this out before the turn of the year. It's been a freaking month, come on. I used to write these things in three days. (7k in three days is only something I can do for Nanowrimo, though. It hurts.) The Valtome scene could use some tensing up, though.
Sanaki is apparently an opportunist.
How did this get so long? I start with a tiny outline of stuff to do, and the word count just happens. Some people like long fic, and some people don't; to me, it just takes more time to read and discourages people from making the effort, which is why I always feel apologetic when I break 5000.
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no subject
Date: 2009-01-01 03:25 pm (UTC)You mean 'wear'.
I am looking forward to seeing the senate get their asses kicked, I quite liked Ike's little 'I'll live' moment, and I thought that Tanas remembering their 'anniversary' was amusing~
I like to read long-fic - if it's good I'll read 100,000 word-fic in one sitting - but I can't seem to write it myself. So no complaints from this direction.
no subject
Date: 2009-01-01 11:47 pm (UTC)I'm rather looking forward to their ass-kicking as well. Of course, there will have to be a few little complications along the way, but that just makes it more satisfying~
In my canon, Tanas owns the best chocolatiers in the world.
no subject
Date: 2009-01-01 09:16 pm (UTC)On the other hand, my inner fangirl is hoping that they run off during the party and have wild monkey sex in a closet or something and then Sanaki catches them whilst she and Sephiran are seeking to have sex IN THE SAME CLOSET. And it's just one of those moments where they're both "let us never speak of this again". Though, this dream of mine will probably never be realized considering the scope of this story ;_;
I like long fic. I like short fic too. It really depends on what the author is doing with the format for me.
no subject
Date: 2009-01-01 09:22 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-01-02 12:14 am (UTC)Thank you! I'm glad you're enjoying it. I certainly am. XD
no subject
Date: 2009-01-02 05:32 am (UTC)I always imagined Sanaki and Sephiran doing some heavy making-out whlist tearing each other's clothes off and then fumbling open the door latch with one hand (a rather skillful move on Sanaki's part) to see... gasp! Ike and Soren totally doing it against a wall with their clothes half off.
Ike totally cracks open one eye and pauses for a bit - then Soren (who's completely gone) is all "why the hell did you stop! Keep going! Ah! Just- Like- THAT!" At this time Sanaki has recovered enough from her shock to start ranting in a semi-insane manner about how she owns all the closets in Begnion and they should get the hell out. All the while Sephiran, with his magical heron slut-magic, de-rumples himself in showers of sparkles.
This fanfiction of a fanfiction kind of ends there so far but there's some kind of resolution in where each pair is talking to each other in a closed room and they both decide not to use the acquired information to their strategic benefit because the fallout may be much more dangerous (and embarrassing).
Well - that kind of ended up longer than I intended. BUT YES PLEASE DO SOME KIND OF OUTTAKE ; A; I'll die of happiness if you do.
I'll draw something nice for you~
no subject
Date: 2009-01-02 06:40 am (UTC)