Instead, he told me the truth.
13
Ransom
WAIT. SOMETHING HAPPENED BEFORE THAT. I don’t mean to get things so mixed up; I’m sorry, it’s just hard to think. It was the morning after I found the silver apricotstone, three days before. Wasn’t it? Before I went to Viraine, yes. I got up that morning and readied myself for the Salon, and found a servant waiting for me when I opened the door.
“Message for you, Lady,” he said, looking immensely relieved. I had no idea how long he’d been standing out there. Servants in Sky knocked only when the matter was urgent.
“Yes?”
“Lord Dekarta isn’t feeling well,” he said. “He will not be joining you for today’s Consortium session, should you choose to attend.”
T’vril had intimated that Dekarta’s health played a factor in his attendance at the sessions, though I was surprised to hear it now: he had seemed fine the day before. And I was surprised he’d bothered to send word. But I hadn’t missed that last bit; a subtle reprimand for my skipping the session the day before. Suppressing annoyance, I said, “Thank you. Please convey my wishes for a swift recovery back to him.”
“Yes, Lady.” The servant bowed and left.
So I went to the highbloods’ gate and transferred myself down to the Salon. As I had expected, Relad was not there. As I had feared, Scimina was. Once again she smiled at me, and I merely nodded back, and then we sat beside each other, silent, for the next two hours.
The session was shorter than usual that day because there was only a single item on the agenda: the annexation of the small island nation Irt by a larger kingdom called Uthr. The Archerine, former ruler of Irt—a stocky, red-haired man who reminded me vaguely of T’vril—had come to lodge a protest. The king of Uthr, apparently unconcerned about this challenge to his authority, had sent only a proxy on his behalf: a boy who looked not much older than Sieh, also red-haired. Both the Irti and the Uthre were offshoots of the Ken race, a fact that apparently had done nothing to foster genial relations between them.
The core of the Archerine’s appeal was that Uthr had filed no petition to begin a war. Bright Itempas detested the chaos of war, so the Arameri controlled it strictly. The lack of a petition meant the Irti had had no warning of their neighbor’s aggressive intent, no time to arm, and no right to defend themselves in any way that would have caused deaths. Without the petition, any enemy soldiers killed would be treated as murders and prosecuted as such by the law-keeping arm of the Itempan Order. Of course, the Uthre could not legally kill, either—and they hadn’t. They had simply marched into the Irtin capital in overwhelming numbers, literally forced its defenders to their knees, and booted the Archerine out into the street.
My heart went out to the Irti, though it was clear to me they had no hope of succeeding in their appeal. The Uthre boy defended his people’s aggression simply: “They weren’t strong enough to hold their land against us. We have it now. It’s better that a strong ruler hold power here than a weak one, isn’t it?”
And that was what the whole matter boiled down to. What was right mattered far less than what was orderly, and the Uthre had proven their ability to keep things orderly by the simple fact that they’d taken Irt without shedding a drop of blood. That was how the Arameri would see it, and the Order, too, and I could not imagine the Nobles’ Consortium daring to disagree.
In the end, to no one’s surprise, they did not: the Irt appeal was rejected. No one even proposed sanctions against Uthr. They would keep what they had stolen, because making them give it back was too messy.
I could not help frowning as the final vote was read. Scimina, glancing over at me, let out a soft amused snort that reminded me of where I was; quickly I schooled my expression back to blankness.
When the session ended and she and I descended the steps, I kept my eyes forward so that I would not have to look at her, and I turned toward the bathroom so I would not have to travel back to Sky with her. But she said, “Cousin,” and at that point I had no choice but to stop and see what in the unknown demons’ names she wanted.
“When you’ve had time to settle in back at the palace, would you be interested in having lunch with me?” She smiled. “We could get to know each other better.”
“If you don’t mind,” I said carefully, “no.”
She laughed beautifully. “I see what Viraine meant about you! Well, then; if you won’t come out of courtesy, perhaps curiosity will draw you. I have news of your homeland, Cousin, that I think will interest you greatly.” She turned and began walking toward the gate. “I’ll see you in an hour.”