Part of Your World (Twisted Tales)(41)

“Thank you for seeing me, Your Highness.” One hand went from his cap to his mustache, a plain, albeit thick, salt-and-pepper affair. His brown eyes were almost fully shaded by woolly eyebrows. “I wish my daughter could have come. She loves all the…royal things, you know. Princess things. Gowns, teacups, golden spoons. She’s even mooning over several of the Drefui boys—sons of the duke, you know. I told her, ‘You’ll always be my princess, but don’t set your sights above your station.’”

“What is it you want?” Ursula whispered, barely able to contain her irritability.

“Beg pardon?” he asked, leaning forward.

“What,” she whispered as loudly as she dared. “Do. You. Want.”

“Oh.” He blinked, surprised at what he saw as an odd change in the conversation. He took his cap off and twisted it in his hands, dark skin cracking into white lines around his knuckles and wrists and palms and scars. “It’s just…we need a new fishing trawler, Your Highness. I mean, I would like us to get it, of course, but one of the other companies would be better than nothing. We’ve been short one since the Chanderra sank.”

“We’re in the middle of a number of military campaigns,” Ursula whispered haughtily. “I can’t be throwing money around willy-nilly.”

Lucio leaned forward, nodding as if he understood.

Everyone was silent.

He obviously hadn’t heard a word she said.

“She said she’s not going to buy you a new ship because the funds are being spent on war,” Jetsam hissed impatiently.

Lucio blinked first at him in confusion, then at Vanessa.

“No, no, you misunderstand, Your Highness. We have the funds. It’s just that the shipyard is busy working on your warships full time. We were wondering if maybe…you could take a break…or…maybe establish another shipyard….Yes! Another shipyard. That would be good. For everyone.”

Ursula’s eyebrows shot toward the ceiling.

“You want me to what?” she whispered. “Waste time with another building project for—what? So you can fish?”

“Yes, Your Highness. So we can fish. That is what we do.”

He was obviously terrified…but it was also obvious that he had a cause and a belief he was committed to, and he wouldn’t back down.

Ursula hated people like that.

“I think. As a princess. I know. What is best. For my people,” she whispered, slowly and clearly.

“But…”

“Your audience is over,” Flotsam added swiftly.

Ursula whispered something that none of the three men could understand. All leaned forward in confusion.

“Your daughter,” she said, letting a little of her real voice come through.

The fisherman looked understandably startled.

“Yes?”

“What is her name?” she said.

“Julia,” he said, first seeming confused, then saying her name again with pride. “Julia. A beautiful, but sometimes na?ve, girl.”

Good.

Ursula loved people like that.

Flotsam took the fisherman by the elbow and steered him out.

The sea witch wondered for a moment how, with all their fables, stories, and morality plays, humans still fell into the same old traps. It was kind of amazing. With their pathetically short lives they repeated the same mistakes of previous generations, almost as if they were all one endless being. Why tell a stranger the real name of someone you love? Why brag to a person in power about the beauty or skills of your son or daughter? Why offer up any information, or any need, when it could be used against you?

“Send in the next,” Ursula said with a chuckle. The meeting with the fisherman had put in her a surprisingly good mood after all.

“Iase Pendrahul of Ibria,” Flotsam announced.

With rather more sureness than she liked, the ambassador—spy—sauntered calmly into the room. Now that’s a powerful gait, the sea witch thought. His skin was clear and his cheekbones high, his hazel eyes lit from within like an ember you thought you had put out. Thick, curly brown hair attacked the air around his head, barely contained in a riotous ponytail.

“My dear Iase,” Ursula whispered indicating the only other chair—a stool, really, with no back, set there for the express purpose of making the other person feel lesser. Yet the representative from Ibria took it and sat arrogantly at ease.

“I’ve heard you have a cold. A thousand blessings on your health,” he said, touching his heart.

“Forget about it, it’s nothing,” she whispered. “Let’s talk about our alliance.”

“We can talk—or at least I can,” he said with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes, “but I do not see any advantage to our siding with you. Your fleet is still short three of the warships you swore to provide—six, I believe, was the original promise. Your land skirmishes have been of questionable success at best. Burning down defenseless villages isn’t really much of an accomplishment—I’m fairly certain Gaius Octavius would agree with me on that one. Ibria is wealthy enough. We have no reason to spend resources on a war that doesn’t directly lead to our advantage.”

“Oh, but it will,” Ursula whispered, putting a hand on his arm.

Iase stared at her fingers with distaste.