State of Sorrow (Untitled #1)(36)

Charon leant forward. “Do you know why Harun banished him?”

“No.” Sorrow didn’t. If she was honest, once she realized Rasmus could stay after his father left, she hadn’t cared. She’d asked Rasmus, of course, but he hadn’t known either. They’d decided it must have been because of Lamentia. They assumed he’d argued with Harun over it, as Arran Day and Coram Mellwood had, and, like those men, had been sent away for it.

“He’d been petitioning Harun for land, here in Rhannon.”

“What?” Sorrow’s eyes widened. She didn’t understand. “Why would he want land here?”

“For his Alvus trees. Vespus has been attempting to build a thriving forest of them on his estate for decades, with weak results.”

Sorrow nodded; she knew that. Rasmus had told her the wood, the sap, even the leaves were valuable. But they were rare, because they were hard to cultivate, Rasmus said. If it hadn’t been for his father’s ability with plants, he could never have made them grow at all.

“So he thinks the land here is better?” Sorrow said.

“It is. In the north of Rhylla there’s not enough sunlight, few natural pollinators, nutrient-low soil… He asked Melisia time and again to grant him lands in the south, where it would be easier for him, but she refused to take it from people who already owned it.”

“I take it Father refused him too?”

“On the contrary, he considered it,” Charon said, surprising Sorrow again. “Until the Jedenvat reminded him of the rumour that Vespus had opposed the peace treaty because he believed Rhylla could win the war once Harun presided. He’d urged Melisia to fight on for decisive victory, hoping to claim the North Marches as his own – land which he could use to farm.”

Sorrow’s mouth formed an “O” of understanding. “So you think this is him trying for that land again? That he’d go as far as to put an imposter in power, all for what? A few miles of land?”

“With his puppet in office it wouldn’t be a few miles of land, Sorrow. Why on Laethea would he be content with just that? It would be all of Rhannon. A chance to rule, like his half-sister. Don’t forget, they have different fathers. Melisia’s father was a king. Vespus’s was only a minor lord. She goes on to be queen and rule a country, and he… He gets his father’s estate in the north. From what you know of Vespus, do you think that fulfils him?”

Sorrow shook her head.

“But this… Well, after what Harun has done, who’s going to complain when the firstborn son returns from the grave and restores the land, even if he does have a Rhyllian as his right hand?”

“If this is true, then he’s been planning this for… How long? Since he left Rhannon, if what they said about finding Mael two years ago is true.”

“And does that not strike you as more than a coincidence too? He leaves, and almost immediately finds the lost heir? Now do you understand my scepticism?”

Sorrow nodded. She should have seen it before. Why would the half-brother of the Rhyllian queen be content to be the ambassador to a place like Rhannon? Someone raised in luxury that he couldn’t inherit, and ambitious enough to encourage his half-sister to continue a war everyone knew she didn’t want, so he could get some land. Would a man like that really give it up to live in Rhannon for eight years for nothing? So he’d changed tactics, intending to wheedle the land from Harun. And when that failed…

“We need to write to Queen Melisia. She should know what her half-brother is planning.” Sorrow spoke decisively.

Charon’s eyes were full of pity. “Sorrow, that boy has been living in her castle for the last two years. And at no point did she write to us. I’m not saying I believe she’s working with Vespus on this,” he added carefully, “but it’s imperative we don’t do anything that might alert him to our suspicions, until we know more. Which also means you can say nothing to attaché Corrigan when he returns, either. We can’t be sure how much he really knows.”

Sorrow opened her mouth to defend Rasmus. Then paused. Given Harun’s parenting, she’d never questioned why Vespus would have been so happy to let his only child remain in a land far from home.

“Rasmus would have told me,” she said aloud, speaking without meaning to. “If he’d known about Mael. He would have written. That’s why Vespus let him stay. Because he’d already set this in motion. Found some boy he could use.” Goosebumps broke out along her arms as she had a sudden sense of foreboding.

“Wait.” Sorrow remembered the rest of what Mael had said. “He said he didn’t know they were coming today, until late last night. They hadn’t planned to come today but last night … something changed Vespus’s mind.”

Charon was right. Lincel must have written to Vespus straight away and told him what had happened with Alyssa. And Vespus had been at the Rhannish palace for eight years, long enough to predict how Charon would respond, the motions Charon would begin. He’d decided to reveal Mael today to thwart them.

And, she realized, he had. They wouldn’t be going back to Istevar to depose Harun. Instead Harun was travelling to the Summer Palace, to determine if the boy Sorrow had just met was his long-lost son.





The Summer Palace

The Summer Palace had been called the Jewel of Rhannon; the former royal family and their entire court had moved there during the relentless summer months, bathing and enjoying the gardens, plucking dates and figs from the trees and splitting them open with their bare hands where they stood. It was a tradition the Ventaxis chancellors had maintained, inviting the ambassadors, the Jedenvat and their families to join them for a week or two.