Talasyn turned to Elagbi, the look on her face a mix of gratitude and disbelief. This gave Alaric pause. Her expression made him think of certain things that he’d wished for during his own childhood. How he had longed for someone to give a damn about his welfare. For a parent, for anyone, to stand up for him—
No. Those were a child’s insecurities, the chips on a foolish boy’s shoulders. They had no place in an emperor’s head.
“Her Grace Alunsina Ivralis will be treated in accordance with how she behaves herself,” Alaric said curtly, brushing aside how odd it felt to refer to Talasyn by another name.
“Am I to be your obedient wife, then?” Talasyn spoke for the first time since taking her seat, hurling each word at him like a spear. “Shall I simper while millions suffer under your tyranny?”
Gods, he really was going to get a headache. “Nothing that happened in Sardovia will happen in Nenavar as long as the Dominion upholds its end of this bargain.”
“I am their end of this bargain!” While some traitorous part of Alaric had always found the Lightweaver magnificent in her defiance, gold and gemstones gave her a sharper edge, made her burn as if she were a vengeful goddess. Her eyes flashed like bronzed agates afire with the dawn. “You come here all high and mighty to seek my hand in marriage and you bring with you the commodore who razed the Great Steppe and the legionnaire who participated in the siege of Lasthaven, not to mention that you yourself have killed countless of my fellow soldiers. So—forgive me if I am not too enthused by all of this, you cruel, pompous ass!”
Alaric could feel a vein in the hollow beneath his left eye start to twitch, as it always did when he was about to lose his temper. Trying not to appear too obvious about it, he inhaled slowly, and when next he spoke, it was in steady tones. “Your fellow soldiers?” he repeated. “If you still consider yourself Sardovian, my lady, then these negotiations are a waste of time and effort.”
He watched her lips press into a taut line. She looked so angry that it wouldn’t have been a surprise if she’d started levitating. When she didn’t say anything, he continued, “Even if I were spineless enough to apologize for military actions undertaken during a time of war, I would hardly do so at the behest of a temperamental child. We made the crossing in the hopes of coming to terms and avoiding yet another blood-soaked conflict, but if the notion offends your sensibilities so much, Lachis’ka, all you have to do is say the word and I will see you again on the battlefield.”
In the stony silence that ensued, Queen Urduja leaned forward in her seat, immediately drawing everyone’s attention. “I believe that tensions are too high to facilitate any sort of agreement presently. May I suggest that we put this meeting on hold?” Based on her demeanor, this was more of a command. “We can resume negotiations tomorrow, when we have all gotten suitably used to one another. In line with this, the Kesathese delegation is more than welcome to stay here in the palace, where they will be treated as honored guests.”
Lueve’s pleasant composure had faltered during Alaric and Talasyn’s verbal duel—in fact, it had appeared as if she were having a heart attack when Talasyn called the Night Emperor an ass—but, now that her sovereign had stepped in, the chief negotiator was quick to gather her bearings. “Yes, Harlikaan, I believe that would be ideal,” she said smoothly. “We shall adjourn for now.”
Kai Gitab had held his peace all throughout the meeting. In Talasyn’s experience, the rajan was a shrewd and extremely calculating man who dispensed words as reluctantly as a miser parted with their coins. Once the Kesathese delegation had left the room, however, he turned to Urduja. “Begging your pardon, Harlikaan, but I am not sure that it is prudent to let the Night Empire have the run of the Roof of Heaven while a formal treaty has yet to be drafted.”
“I am quite certain that Ossinast won’t slaughter us in our beds,” Urduja said dryly, “although some people appear to be rather set on persuading him to do that.”
Talasyn bristled as her grandmother shot her a pointed glare. Before she could defend her actions, however, Niamha piped up, drawing everyone’s attention, “More of that sort of thing might prove beneficial to our side. The Night Emperor strikes me as the type of man who is very difficult to rattle. Somehow, though, the Lachis’ka rattles him. I was watching him closely earlier. It seems that he can do a remarkable job of keeping a level head until prolonged interaction with Her Grace.”
“We just really hate each other, that’s all,” Talasyn mumbled, embarrassed.
“Hate is a kind of passion, is it not?” Niamha countered.
“I’m— Passion?” Talasyn echoed in a squawk, a hot blush suffusing her cheeks. “There’s no— What are you talking about—I can’t stand the sight of him and the feeling is mutual!”
Niamha and Lueve observed her with varying degrees of amusement. “It would seem,” Niamha remarked with a faint grin, “that Her Grace still has much to learn about the ways of men.”
Elagbi clapped his hands over his ears, which made Lueve Rasmey burst into peals of melodious laughter. “Perhaps we should stop teasing the Lachis’ka,” she quipped. “I doubt that Prince Elagbi’s tender paternal heart can take much more.”
“Yes, well, before he starts weeping all over the place”—Urduja narrowed her eyes at Talasyn, who stiffened upon realizing that she wasn’t off the hook just yet—“I cannot stress this enough, Alunsina. If Kesath hadn’t gotten their hands on void magic, we might have stood a chance. As it is, however, they’ve already wounded one of our dragons. The Night Empire is only willing to negotiate because they don’t want to expend resources any more than we do, and it is your duty to ensure that they remain willing. If you fail, the consequences will be dire for all of us. Govern your pride, Your Grace—or, at the very least, be smarter about how you cling to it.”
The Kesathese delegation had an entire wing of the palace to itself. A large bronze door in Alaric’s chambers opened out into an orchid garden with a miniature waterfall, bisected by two stone paths. One led from his door to a westward hallway, while the other met the first path at its terminus and linked up with what appeared to be someone else’s suite of rooms in the opposite wing, judging from the canopy bed that he glimpsed through a gap in the curtains on the other side of the garden.
Such luxury was not without its price. There were sariman cages affixed to the walls and pillars at seven-meter intervals, shutting off the Shadowgate, making it impossible to speak to his father in the In-Between. And there was also the fact that the pleasant garden view was ruined by Commodore Mathire, who was trampling all over the neatly trimmed grass with pacing footsteps.
“I don’t care what the Lightweaver or that old hag said, this has to be a trick.” Mathire was obviously still smarting from her gaffe in the council room. Her face was pale with fury.
“First of all, Urduja Silim is hardly a hag,” Sevraim pointed out from where he sat beside Alaric on a stone bench, “and, secondly, that’s the Night Emperor’s grandmother-in-law you’re talking about.”