The other counts fall silent, heads bobbing, blinking their consideration. As if buoyed by their silence, Count Reményi presses on.
“Régország is a country for Régyar,” he says. “For Patritians. If we are to stand against the Merzani, we cannot risk a divided nation. Our neighbors already think poorly of Régország, and are eager to cast us as eastern barbarians. If we follow their example in banishing our Yehuli, it will improve our country’s standing in their eyes.”
I know these are Nándor’s words too. There is a sleekness to his argument that even pulls at some part of me, making my mind splutter at the possibility. Would Zsigmond be happy to live somewhere else, in a city or town of only Yehuli? Would he give up his house, his street, even his Régyar name? The notion sits in the base of my stomach like a stone. If I were truly one of the Yehuli, I would already know the answer.
“I will think on it,” the king says. His eyes are half-lidded. “Until then, I will need you all to send more soldiers to the border.”
A shared murmuring passes among the counts, like wind whispering through the reeds. Count Reményi draws a breath.
“You concern yourself greatly with the threat beyond our borders, but there are as many threats inside,” he says, voice steady despite the low set of his brow. “The continued existence of the Yehuli and the pagans threatens to plunge all of Régország into a heretic darkness. And yet you ask us all, your trusted councilors, to stand by and watch? The Yehuli celebrate a holiday next week, and they will fill the streets with their unholy worshipping. What will our Volken guests think when they see it?”
Fear grips me, cold and tight. Count Reményi’s words are nearly treasonous, but the king only sits up a bit straighter in his seat, balancing the crown of fingernails on his head. When he speaks, there is not much fire in it.
“It was Saint István who gave you your fortress and all the green lands surrounding it, and you are speaking now to his heir. You will give me the men I need now.”
Finally, Reményi goes quiet, his hand tensing around the edge of the table. The white feather on his chest seems to bristle, even though the air in the chamber is stiff, still. I know he is thinking of another one of Saint István’s heirs, one that he would like to see wear the crown instead.
“Come with me,” the king says brusquely. “I must consult the Prinkepatrios.”
After my sleepless night with Zsigmond the council meeting has left me particularly weary, and I don’t have the strength to refuse, even if my oath would allow it. My mind is reeling with everything I have learned, and all that I still don’t know. It is like the blank spaces where the Yehuli vowels ought to be, something you must be taught by someone older and wiser, if you ever want to understand how to fill the absence.
The chapel surprises me by being carved right into the cliffside. Its oaken door is wedged between two knuckles of rock, scarcely wide enough for the king and I to walk through at once. Torches are mounted on blackened stones, and candles are set in the cave’s many small orifices, casting bubbles of filmy light. Green moss spangles the ceiling, a damp, breathing topography. The Sons and Daughters of the Patrifaith scuttle through the pews, looking like little brown mice. Their shaven heads are as glossy as pearls in the recessed candlelight. I wonder which among them drew up the missive calling for my death.
Gáspár and Nándor have both joined us here, looking properly contrite. After hearing Count Reményi’s ramblings I am even more loath to meet Nándor’s stare, though he watches me with hawkish scrutiny, his eyes holding the pale candlelight. Gáspár keeps his face turned away from me, too, but I see his gaze flicker toward me once, so briefly I might only have imagined it.
“Some say the three-pronged spear is really a trident.” Gáspár’s voice, hushed as it is, still echoes through the near-vacant church. Syllables scrape the craggy ceiling. “They say that the Patrifaith began as the cult of a sea god in Ionika, but it morphed and changed as it moved further north.”
“Detractors and infidels say that,” Nándor replies flatly. “And princes who spend too much time reading the mad scribblings of heretics in the palace archives.”
“These things should not be spoken of in a holy place,” the king says, sounding almost queasy.
A narrow aisle breaches the pews, clambering over the rock and up to a large stone altar. Melting candles are heaped upon it like dirty snow. They have cooled and hardened into a single mound, needles of ossified wax dripping off the edge of the dais. Mounted above it is the three-pronged spear, or trident, of the Prinkepatrios, set in gold, and below it a marble statue, dyed pale green by a hundred years of moist air. It’s of a man, entirely nude, his muscled arms coiled around the throat of a huge bull. Moss grows over his bare toes. Ivy wreathes the bull’s long horns.