The Disappearance of Winter's Daughter (Riyria Chronicles #4)(100)
“What will the patriarch do? Will he recognize me as the rightful ruler of Alburn?”
Of course! Venlin said, his smooth delivery two parts velvet and one part barrel-aged whiskey. Venlin was the intellectual of the two, the brilliant confidant and adviser, the shrewd politician. That old recluse granted you complete freedom to choose the best successor to Reinhold. He did so because you know each of the candidates personally. Who better to select the most devoted, the most pliable, the best ally. You’re doing that. He can’t get upset because you did what he asked.
“But it’s probably not how he expected me to do it.”
Novron scoffed. Are you serious? Doing what people expect gets you nothing and nowhere. Honestly, man! How did you rise in the ranks with that attitude?
“I should have asked permission, shouldn’t I? I mean, it feels like such a deception.”
Novron shook his head and addressed Venlin. Talk sense into him before I throw him out the window, will you?
Venlin sighed. It doesn’t matter if it’s a lie or not. If it helps you sleep, then wrap it around you each night and smile. If you had asked for consent, or even floated the idea past Saldur when he was here, you know he wouldn’t have liked it. Better to seek forgiveness than ask for permission. What you count on is that the world will come to see the truth in time. At first, it sounds crazy; worse, it sounds conceited and self-centered. But you were granted the choice to anoint whomever you saw fit, and Oswal, you’re going to do just that. There isn’t anyone in the running who isn’t a shortsighted, self-centered idiot. And, of course, all the candidates will be dead.
Novron parroted back Saldur’s words, Well, whoever you pick, best keep in mind that he actually has to rule a kingdom, you know?
That was why he had to pick himself, but Saldur wouldn’t see it that way, and Maurice Saldur was typical of the church. Oswal was the Bishop of Alburn, but somehow Maurice Saldur was more influential. How that was possible was hard to determine. Perhaps it was location. He was Bishop of Medford, and that was but a short carriage ride to Ervanon.
I didn’t actually chat with the patriarch. I’ve never seen the man.
Oswal was certain this had to be a lie. While he was busy writing letters, Saldur was handling affairs like the disappearance of the Eternal Empire. Even after botching his own efforts to replace the ruling family of Melengar, Nilnev had given Saldur another chance. He hadn’t even trusted Oswal to take care of his own king.
They all have it better than you, Novron told him. And Saldur isn’t your problem. Garrick Gervaise, lord of Blythin Castle, is the ox you’ll need to yoke or slay.
Oswal nodded. He was about to defy the intent, if not the letter, of the patriarch’s orders while living in the shadow of the Seret’s base and ancestral home. Blythin Castle was less than a day’s ride up the coast to the east, and the castle commander wasn’t a philosophical man. Reason and logic, to Garrick Gervaise, were sinful things. Oswal knew that convincing the black knight to support him wouldn’t be easy. Garrick wouldn’t see Oswal’s initiative as a positive development. After all, Garrick saw his job as regulating the clergy, and crowning oneself king would certainly attract close scrutiny. Handling Gervaise would be his most dangerous battle.
If only he would attend the feast.
Oswal settled deeper into his chair and drained his cup. He felt exhausted, the sort of fatigue that hits only after all the work is finished.
“Is it finished?” he asked.
For now—your part at least, Novron said. All the pieces are in motion.
He got up and searched for the bottle to refill the chalice.
“I don’t want to kill them, the nobles, I mean, but it’s best to eliminate one’s competition.” He held his cup away from the desk as he poured so as not to spill on anything important. Although his hands had stopped shaking, his head felt a tad loose, and he had a vague sense of it floating like a bubble on his shoulders. This was only his second cup, but he had hardly touched the breakfast tray. He couldn’t eat then, but he thought he might now. I’d better, or at the rate I’m drinking I’ll pass out before the feast.
Would that be so bad? Novron asked.
You do need an excuse not to attend, Venlin said. You can’t trust Villar to contain his violence to only those dressed in blue.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Keys and Coins
By the time Villar woke up, the sun was high. Light streamed in through the drape that Mercator had hung in place of a door. The old one had likely rotted away centuries ago. The new drape was—like everything else Mercator touched—blue. The long dyed cloth fluttered lazily, letting in varying degrees of brilliant sunlight, changing the shadows in the room. For a long moment, Villar lay on the floor, feeling the pleasant flower-scented breeze and watching the light war with the darkness. Sunbeams ricocheted up the wall, exposing the dye-stained pots and dust motes. Then the breeze exhausted itself, the cloth fell flat, and the room returned to its dull darkness. Outside, birds sang and bees hummed. A perfect spring day, he thought with detached judgment, as if he weren’t part of it but rather some distant observer.
That aloof perception lasted no more than a minute. It took that long for the pain to catch up with his sleep-muddled mind. When it did, the observer became the tortured. Villar felt terrible. He always did the morning after. His head throbbed, his body ached, and his muscles were drained. He continued to lie there, breathing slowly, letting the blood bang at his temples. It would subside in a little while, always had in the past. That’s when he realized this wasn’t like the other times. He’d stayed with the golem longer than usual because the little hooded foreigner was fast and agile and saw him coming. That was odd. No one had ever seen him before. But that wasn’t all that made this time different. Villar felt pain in his chest. It, too, throbbed, but it also burned, and that didn’t make any sense at all.