The Book of Battles

Zahem

After the funeral they all came to him, murmuring pious words, but it was only one woman, all in the white that was worn into the Temple, who genuflected slowly and then, pushing the veil from her face, kissed his hand.

“Mother.”

“It must be done,” she murmured, rising. “You are the Prophet, and they must remember it.”

“They are sussing me out.”

“Yes,” she said, a bit of her golden hair escaping the veil as she rose, “and will continue to do so. You never had the chance to move through the proper channels, to establish allies.”

“What in the world am I going to do? They say I’m the Prophet, but I feel like a fifteen year old boy. What’s more, I feel like they feel that way too.”

“Study your history,” his mother said as she linked arms with him and they walked about the white room with its crystal chandeliers and ivory pillars.

“I do.”

“So do I,” she said. “Find the men here who have grown to care for you. Find all of your friends. Begin with them. Pay attention to all the factions and set them off against each other. Be for the people, but do not count on the people, for they do not live in the palace or run the great councils. And speaking of councils, you need a chief councilor.”

“Has a Prophet ever made his mother a councilor?” Dahlan jested and Aimee said, “This is a man’s world. Choose the man you trust most.”

“I trust Erek Skabelund the most, but Allman is the older.”

“He is without guile,” Aimee said. “Make one your first minister and the other your second. Be on guard against priests.”

“Do you have any other advice?”

“Yes,” Aimee said, parting from him and pointing to the corner of the room near the cakes.

 “That girl over there.”

“Sariah.”

“She’s been staying back from you all day, and I know you were the closest of friends. When I say make allies I mean make allies of all, keep all of your friends, low and high.”

Dahlan, nodding to his mother, walked away. He put his hands behind his back and walked across the room toward Sariah, nodding politely to those who approached him, but in a way which signaled that he was on other business.

“Dah—” she began, and then said, “Prophet.”

“Are we friends no longer?” Dahlan asked her.

“I,” Sariah began. “This has never happened before.”

“You knew I would be Prophet one day.”

“One day, yes. But…”

“Can we talk?”

“Right here?” she said. “But there are very important people here.”

“You,” Dahlan stated, “are a very important person.”

“All the same,” Sariah said.

“Well, then tonight?”

“Alright,” Sariah said. “Tonight.”

“What is the Temple like?”

“Surely you have seen it.”

“Only from the outside,” Sariah said.

They were walking through one of the gardens in the labyrinthine palace.

“And I have gone inside the first court,” she admitted. “But never beyond. You must be initiated to go beyond, and this doesn’t happen for a woman until she marries.”

“Well,” Dahlan said, “it is some dull stuff.”

Sariah looked to their right, the three spiraling towers of the Temple shone in the floodlights placed on it every night, and she said, “What a shame. You’d think the Temple would be more exciting.”

“It ought to be,” Dahlan said.

“Did you know,” he added, “there are tales that long ago there was another and greater temple beneath it, and in that temple secret things of great importance really did happen?”

“But not in ours?” Sariah said. “We are always told they are great secrets. You are the Prophet.”

“Well, the Prophet prophecies. Perhaps the temple was not meant for me. Most of the time it will be Phineas who leads temple matters. The Temple holds very little interest for me.”

They stopped walking, and Sariah looked away from the Temple as if, now that it held no interest for Dahlan, it did not hold interest for her either.

“What does interest you?” she said.

He smiled to himself, and then turned the smile on her. He touched her brown hair and bent to kiss her.

“Sariah, stay with me tonight?”

She said, “Alright.”

---

Kingsboro

The smoke from down south had come on a wind through Kingsboro so that even the Red District smelled like a summer fire. Isobel Tryvanwy rose from her prayers before the altar she’d set up in her room. She bowed to the image of Addiwak, and stood a little longer in her presence before straightening her gowns, taking the stick of incense and waving it around the space before the goddess and between the two great candles, and then blowing them out, offering a little saliva to the altar, and crushing the incense out in it.

She lay the stick down and turned to leave the room.

Outside of it, Teryn Wesley was taking notes, and he looked up at her.

“Your Grace,” he said.

“Do you know if the King is available?” Isobel said.

“I actually do not,” Teryn said, smiling up at her and rising, realizing it was his place to rise before the woman who would be Queen of Westrial.

“Well, then let us suppose that he is,” Isobel held her hand out to Teryn.

“Lady?”

“We are going to him,” Isobel said. “We are going right now.”

They passed out of her chambers, through the corridors of East Tower, and then through the sunlit gallery that led to the King’s offices. Teryn was surprised that a woman who had been here only as long as he, had mastered the palace so quickly. She was a princess, though, and used to such places.

A guard was before the door, and when they nodded to her, she said, “I am here to see the King.”

“Princess, he is occupied.”

“His occupation is with me,” Isobel said simply. “Tell him his betrothed is here.”

She looked to Teryn, “with her senechal, the Lord Teryn.”

“Lord—” Teryn began.

“Would you like to be a lord?” she said to him.

“Lady…” he began, then, “Princess…”

“Of course you would,” she said, then to the guard, “Tell him at once.”

Her tone was irresistible, and the guard nodded, opened the door, and went through. A moment later, he said, “The King will see you for a short time.”

“He will see me as long as I see fit,” Isobel said, “and the sooner you learn this the better. Come, Lord Teryn.”

“But, my lady—”

“Come,” she said, and the boy followed.

“You don’t look very busy,” Isobel said as she entered the large room where Cedd was sitting before his desk with Anthony beside him.

The door closed behind them.

“Isobel,” Cedd said, rising, and then he looked confused, as did Anthony. “Teryn?”

Isobel came forward and said, “The first order of business is that this place would benefit from some light, but there is a second order of business that must be discussed now.”

“The palace is not used to having a queen,” Cedd said, “and they will learn proper respect soon.”

“Husband, I will teach them proper respect soon. The wedding will teach them. My mother’s appearance will teach them. That is of little matter. What we must address, principally, is how things are between us. All of us.”

“All of…” Anthony began.

“Anthony, I am no fool. Maybe I am too headstrong, too forward for everyone’s good, but I have seen the way you look at Teryn. I know what is between the two of you. And I had begun to suspect what is between you and the King.”

When Cedd’s eyebrow rose, Isobel continued, “What I had not seen is what is between the King and Teryn. I saw that quite clearly. More than appreciation for a handsome boy or admiration for a king. And what I have seen is no one’s eyes are on me.”

“My dear,” Cedd began.

“As I have said,” Isobel continued, “I am no fool. I am your queen, and your support, the one who rules beside you. I expect to work beside you, help you in all things, be a proper queen and yes, to bear your son. But the three of you may do as you wish. I know your affection does not lie toward women. Only one thing, King Caedmon.”

Cedd looked at her, waiting.

“You must let my heart do as it pleases as well as long as I bring no disgrace to your name.”

When he said nothing, Isobel said, “I know I have given you much to think on, so think on it, and then come back to me.”

She curtseyed.

“Teryn,” she called, and then she went to the door, knocked on it, it opened for her, and Isobel was gone with Teryn Wesley after her.