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When the princess Irene requests, white-faced, to be left alone on the last night before her marriage, the ladies appointed to tend to her hoot with laughter.
“ Ought we to go?” trills one among them. “Better she grow accustomed to company, before tomorrow night.”
“Better she grow accustomed to solitude, all the nights after that,” counters another, who bears to the King-to-be’s favor about her neck, and they giggle once more. It is no impertinence, to point out the princess’ plain face and unpleasing manners. It is only simple honesty.
Irene stands in their midst, stiff-backed and silent as ever, and eventually their pleasure in baiting her fades. It always does, provided she doesn’t appear clever enough to understand their implications. She has learned that, over the years.
Only when the last among them disappears about the corner does Irene trust herself to open the door to her chambers, not because she worries they might notice her visitor, but worse, because they might notice the unguarded relief on her face.
“I told you,” Gen says petulantly, “My great-great-grandfather helped build this palace. I could find my way around it in my sleep.”
Irene finds that unlikely; she can hardly do so, and she’s lived all her life within these walls, excepting only the past year. But years of friendship with this little Attolian vagabond, ever since she discovered him spying upon her from the orange trees above, are enough to convince her of the futility of starting an argument. Not when there are more important things she must say to him tonight.
“I’ll be married in the morning,” she says flatly.
Gen doesn’t seem much affected by this—and why should he? He’s young enough that marriage must seem more a game than anything else, too far in the future even to contemplate. She sighs.
“It won’t be safe after that,” she tries once more, “for you to visit me. I should hate to see you come to any harm.”
Though surely, even did he know of Gen’s existence, her boor of a fiancé wouldn’t read any ill intent in her friendship, assuming he even bothered to notice between his various dalliances; no, the loudest protests would come from the Baron and Baroness his parents, hating to see Irene come under any influence that was not their own. Gen, child though he was, would be accused of treason and seduction and any other number of filthy inferences, and—
Irene swallows. “Never come to me again,” she commands.
He makes a face. “All right,” he says. “But what if you could come with me instead?”
“What?”
“Come with me!” He takes her hands, eyes bright with his latest mad scheme. “We could be gone from Attolia before any of the guards knew you’d even left the palace, and you could meet Grandfather and my brothers and even Father, if you must—“
Irene can’t help but laugh. A kind thought, truly, but to spend the rest of her days on an Eddisian goat farm? Never. She says as much to Gen, and he frowns.
“Well—then—you can stay with the King of Eddis and his family!” he blusters, with the impracticality of a boy his age. Though if anyone were silver-tongued enough to find a way through to the royalty of stubborn, proud Eddis, it would be her Gen.
For an instant, watching him, Irene feels a rush of affection. If only her fiance were more like him. If only things were different. If only—Well. He isn’t. They weren’t.
“We’ll go there,” Gen goes on, noticing her expression. “We’ll go anywhere you like, anywhere you want to be!”
For a moment, she very much wants to agree.
But it would mean turning her back on Attolia forever, abandoning the kingdom to its fate. At best, her fiancé would claim the throne, fabricating a private wedding ceremony; at worst, the crown would be fought over by her barons as the lions that lurked among the Mede did their prey. It is no choice at all; she has never had any choice, save that of the coleus leaves still pinned safely to her skirts.
“No,” she says gently, and again: “Never come to me again.”
She might die for what will happen at her wedding feast tomorrow. She will not drag Gen to his doom, as well.
He doesn’t understand, though; she sees as much on his face, angry and hurt as it is. Perhaps it is better this way. Perhaps that will do what any amount of persuasion on her part will not. Perhaps it was always meant to be this way.
“But—“
“Goodbye, Gen,” she says instead and before she can think better of it, shouts down the hallway for the guards.
When, years later, she meets him again, dirty as ever and every bit as shameless, she does not expect it to be in her dungeons, trying to spirit one more treasure from Attolia on behalf of Sounis, of all things. He has hardly changed, except to grow longer, and she? She has changed in all too many ways, none of them for the better.
Still. She owes it to her people to try and keep Hamiathes’ Gift within her grasp by any means necessary. She doesn’t buy his sudden allegiance to Sounis for a moment; the Gen she remembers loved his mountains more than anything in the world. Which means that, somehow, she’ll have to discover something he wants more. She coaxes and cozens, forcing herself to smile again and again, and yet:
“You are more beautiful, Your Majesty.” Her lips tilt up unbidden; as outrageous a liar as ever. “But she is more faithful.”
( A hit , thinks Attolia dryly. A palpable hit )