Naamah's Blessing
Page 23

Murmurs ran around the chamber. Rogier de Barthelme frowned. It was not a tack he had expected me to take.
I took another deep breath. “It is a difficult truth I must ask you to hear today. As you know, I also stand before you as Desirée de la Courcel’s oath-sworn protector, chosen by King Daniel himself. What you do not know is that his majesty planned to replace Duc Rogier de Barthelme as the Royal Minister.”
In the shocked silence that followed, his face flushed with anger.
“Is it true?” someone from the upper tiers called.
“No,” Duc Rogier said shortly. “It’s not.”
“His grace was unaware of this turn of events.” I met his gaze. “The day after his majesty made his decision, he received news of Prince Thierry’s return, rendering his decision moot. After that…” I spread my hands. “To our everlasting sorrow, we all know what transpired.”
There were a few moments of shouting and pandemonium before the Parliamentary adjudicator banged his gavel and called for order. “Your grace, do you wish to rebut the accusation?” he inquired.
“I don’t deem it worthy of a rebuttal,” the Duc retorted in a scathing tone. “But I would ask Lady Moirin on what grounds she bases this ridiculous accusation. Why would the King replace me?”
“Because he grew wary of your ambitions when you proposed a betrothal between your eldest son and his four-year-old daughter,” I said.
Duc Rogier laughed. “Because I proposed strengthening the alliance between our houses based on the fact that the young princess dotes on my boy? Why in the world would Daniel take offense?”
I raised my voice. “Because she’s four years old!”
He shrugged. “And if she were to come of age and have a change of heart, the betrothal would be annulled. This is Terre d’Ange, after all.”
It was a lie, but it was an effective one. In the gallery, even in the upper tiers where the Low Council sat, heads nodded. I’d had them—and I’d lost them.
Even so, I shook my head. “By then it would be too late. You’ve coached your son to manipulate her, to engage her affections by false means. You arranged that whole business with the Sun Prince—”
“Enough.” The Duc de Barthelme slammed his hand down on the marble railing in front of him. “This is serious business we’re about here, Moirin mac Fainche of the Maghuin Dhonn.” His eyes blazed with righteous fury. “King Daniel indulged you long enough in memory of the inexplicable favor his late wife bestowed on you. But I think we have had enough, and more than enough, of your fanciful tales, your dragons and tumblers and blind princesses and the like; and now these absurd accusations. Your presence here has sown nothing but scandal, gossip, and discord from the day you arrived. Go home to Alba, and spin tales for your own folk. Go back to the land Alais de la Courcel chose to make her home. Leave the governance of Terre d’Ange to D’Angelines.”
The lower galleries roared in approval, clapping their hands and stamping their feet. The upper galleries were silent.
I felt my shoulders slump in defeat.
“Are you calling my daughter a liar, Rogier?” my father asked from the back of the chamber in a clear, carrying voice. Unbidden, he came onto the speaker’s floor to join me, elegant and graceful in his crimson robes. The guards let him pass unimpeded, reluctant to lay hands on a Priest of Naamah. “Because I will not have it.”
“This isn’t Naamah’s business, Phanuel,” Duc Rogier said curtly. “Stay out of it.”
My father ignored his command. “Do you say Moirin lies?”
The Duc locked gazes with him. “I do.”
“Well, then.” My father inclined his head. “I fear this concludes the long friendship between us.”
Duc Rogier’s jaw tightened visibly. “You would do that, Phanuel?” There was genuine pain mixed with the anger in his voice. “You would throw away our history, everything we have been to one another, for the sake of a daughter you barely know?” He gestured at me. “A daughter gotten on a single night’s pleasure with a half-wild Alban bear-witch?”
“You don’t need to do this,” I whispered.
My father turned to me, gazing at me with his green eyes so very like my own. “I do.” He turned back to face the gallery. “Yes, Rogier, I would. Because I didn’t need to know Moirin long to come to love her. Because I know that she did not lie here today. And I would remind you, and all here assembled, that it was Naamah herself that called me to Moirin’s mother.”
There was a hushed silence in the chamber.
Spreading his arms, my father continued. “You say it is not Naamah’s business you do here; but who are you to say? Can you discern the will of the gods? As surely as Naamah called me to Moirin’s mother, it was Naamah who led Moirin to Queen Jehanne, whose daughter she seeks to protect here today, in obedience to her oath. So, my lords and ladies, I bid you think on that as you make your decision.”
All eighty-four voices of the members of Parliament spoke at once, repeating and discussing my father’s words.
Belatedly, the adjudicator banged his gavel and called the proceedings to order. “My lords, my ladies!” He gave me a stony look. “Lady Moirin, your allotted time has come to an end. Have you any final words?”
I did not think I could surpass my father’s comments. “No, messire. I do not.”
The adjudicator banged his gavel again. “Then you are dismissed.”
TWENTY-SIX
The debate I had sparked in Parliament, fueled by my father’s words, raged on for two more days.
In the end, it was closer than it might have been, but not close enough. When at last the two branches agreed to vote on the confirmation of Duc Rogier de Barthelme as the Regent of Terre d’Ange, almost a full third of the members voted against it.
Almost.
All fourteen members of the Low Council voted against it; and seventeen members of the High Council joined them. But it wasn’t enough. By a quorum of two-thirds of his peers, Rogier de Barthelme was appointed Regent.
“You did your best,” Bao consoled me. “And your father was splendid.”
I sighed. “Aye, but now we’ve a new dilemma.”
Bao glanced westward. “Terra Nova?”
I nodded. “It’s not as though there’s a ship on which we can book passage. I don’t have the first idea about how to get one to take us there. Do you?”
“No,” he admitted. “But I know who does. And I think he will be very interested in what you have to say.”
“Do you think he’ll believe it?” I asked. “Because apparently, my credibility is questionable.”
Bao shrugged. “We can but try, Moirin.”
Somewhat to my surprise, Balthasar Shahrizai did believe me. He heard me out as I told of Jehanne’s appearances in my dreams, and the last one in which she had revealed that Prince Thierry was alive. When I had finished, he paced our parlor like a captive panther, lean and restless, his blue-black braids swinging. “You’re sure?” he asked, echoing my question to Jehanne. “You’re sure?”
My diadh-anam flared. “Quite sure, my lord.”
“I know it may seem strange,” Bao added. “But I would willingly wager my life on it.”
Balthasar paused and tapped his lips in thought. “Money’s no object,” he said absently. “House Shahrizai is swimming in it. I’ve no doubt I can persuade my great-aunt Celestine to back a second expedition, and I daresay there are others who would be willing to support it, especially on the rumor that Thierry lives. But it would require a letter of decree from our blasted Regent to authorize it.” He gave me a deep look. “I suspect it best if you stay far, far away from that process, Moirin.”
I shuddered. “Gladly.”
“We need more information,” he said in a decisive tone. “We need to talk to Denis de Toluard and find out everything he knows. What made him so certain that Thierry was dead? And if he’s not, what in the seven hells happened to him?”
“Good questions,” Bao agreed, slinging his staff over his shoulder. “Let’s go find him.”
As it happened, that was easier said than done. At Denis de Toluard’s townhouse, his steward informed us that his lordship had gone to Night’s Doorstep to drink himself into a stupor after the funeral, with strict orders that he was to be left to his own devices until he was good and ready to return.
“But that was two days ago,” the steward added, a worried look on his face. “I’d be grateful if you’d find him and bring him back. I haven’t seen him in such a state since—” He gave me a sidelong glance and didn’t finish.
I knew what he was thinking. Other than that day on the docks, the last time I’d seen Denis de Toluard was the day the Circle of Shalomon summoned Focalor, and Claire Fourcay had been killed.
The steward wrung his hands. “Just bring him home safely, will you? I’d never forgive myself if he followed in his majesty’s footsteps.”
“We’ll find him,” Balthasar promised.
We spent the day searching every tavern and wineshop in Night’s Doorstep, where no one had seen Denis since the night before. At last, a worn-looking young woman in a threadbare gown, pretty enough to serve Naamah, but not pretty enough to serve in one of the Houses of the Night Court, told us that she’d seen him staggering toward the wharf around dawn.
“I recognized him,” she said. “So I followed him for a time. I was afraid he might…” She hesitated.
“Follow in his majesty’s footsteps?” I asked gently.
The young woman nodded. “He didn’t, though. He turned into the first tavern he came to. So I went home.”
“You’re a good girl,” Balthasar said in approval, fishing in the purse at his belt. “What’s your name?”
She curtsied. “Caterine, my lord.”
He pressed several coins into her hand, closing her fingers over them. “A token of thanks for your concern. Buy yourself a new gown, my love.”
Caterine peered into her hand and gaped. A good deal of gold glinted in her palm. “My lord!”
Balthasar patted her on the head. “Or a dozen gowns, or a pony. Whatever you like. Come, let’s on to the wharf.”
“See, I told you he was a good fellow, Moirin,” Bao said to me as we set out to follow him in the direction of the river, the girl Caterine staring after us.
“So it seems,” I agreed. “Despite appearances.”
“Keep it to yourselves,” Balthasar said with an ironic glance over his shoulder. “I wouldn’t want to ruin my hard-won reputation.”
The taverns along the wharf were rough places, catering to the sailors and boatmen who frequented them. These were not establishments where one went to enjoy the conviviality and slightly disreputable thrill of Night’s Doorstep. They were places where men went to drown their sorrows and brawl. To be sure, I received some strange looks as we searched for Denis de Toluard in them, and Bao unslung his staff after our first unsuccessful foray, holding it in a casual defensive pose, his dark eyes glinting in warning.
The sun was beginning to set in the west, slanting rays gilding the Aviline River, when at last we found our quarry. It was in the fourth tavern or fifth tavern we tried along the docks; a fusty little place with rough-hewn walls streaked with the soot of decades’ worth of candle and lamp-smoke.
“Him?” The innkeeper nodded at Balthasar’s inquiry, jerking his thumb toward the back of the room. “Oh, aye. I reckon that’s who you’re after.”
Denis de Toluard was a wreck.
When I’d first met him, I’d reckoned him a pretty enough fellow with a handsome face, brown curls, and bright blue eyes. Now his face was haggard and lined beyond his years, his hair was greasy and matted, and his bleary, red-rimmed eyes could barely focus on us as we approached him where he slumped over a table, surrounded by half a dozen drunken sailors.
“Balthasar?” he slurred.
Balthasar Shahrizai folded his arms over the chest of his elegant velvet doublet. “Time to go home, Denis.”
“Nuh-uh. Nuh-uh.” He wrapped his hands protectively around a leather tankard, giving me a blurry look. “Moirin?”
“Hello, Denis,” I said softly. I had lingering cause to be angry with him, but I couldn’t be cruel. Not here, not now. “Balthasar is right. It’s time to go home.”
“No!” His hands tightened, denting the leather tankard. “I don’ wanna!”
“You’re coming with us,” Balthasar said mildly, exchanging a glance with Bao. “Willing or no.”
“I’m not goin’ anywhere with you. You didn’ even have the ballocks to come with us. These are my friends, my only real friends.” Denis de Toluard gestured around him with drunken dignity. “Sailed with ’em to Terra Nova and alla way back. Damn bloody Nahuatl, damn bloody place. Thierry, Raphael, alla them… Gone, all gone. And we did nothing. Nothing, I tell you! Don’ know what we could, but we didn’t.” He rubbed at his eyes. “They unnerstand, they do. So lemme be.”
One of the sailors rose unsteadily, looming over the table. “You heard ’is lordship. Let ’im be.”
“Sit down.” Bao tapped him smartly in the center of his chest with the butt end of his staff. The sailor fell back into his chair and looked surprised. Others rose with menacing intentions. Bao grinned and twirled his staff until it was a blur, making the air sing. “It’s been too long since I had a good fight,” he said cheerfully. “Go ahead.”