Elantris - Brandon Sanderson [185]
The servants were no better. Where they had once been subservient, now they cringed. Her dinner had come late, and though the cook insisted it was because one of her serving women had suddenly run off, Sarene was certain it was simply because no one wanted to face the fearful princess’s wrath. The entire situation was putting Sarene on edge. Why, in the blessed name of Domi, she wondered, does everyone in this country feel so threatened by an assertive woman?
Of course, this time she had to admit that woman or not, what she had done to the king had been too forward. Sarene was just paying the price for her loss of temper.
“All right, Sarene,” Roial declared. “That is enough.”
Sarene started, looking up at the elderly duke’s stern face. “Excuse me, Your Grace?”
“I said it’s enough. By all reports, you’ve spent the last three days moping in your room. I don’t care how emotionally disturbing that attack in Elantris was, you need to get over it—and quickly. We’re almost to my mansion.”
“Excuse me?” she said again, taken aback.
“Sarene,” Roial continued, his voice softening, “we didn’t ask for your leadership. You wiggled your way in and seized control. Now that you’ve done so, you can’t just leave us because of injured feelings. When you accept authority, you must be willing to take responsibility for it at all times—even when you don’t particularly feel like it.”
Suddenly abashed by the duke’s wisdom, Sarene lowered her eyes in shame. “I’m sorry.”
“Ah, Princess,” Roial said, “we’ve come to rely on you so much in these last few weeks. You crept into our hearts and did what no one else, even myself, could have done—you unified us. Shuden and Eondel all but worship you, Lukel and Kiin stand by your side like two unmoving stones, I can barely unravel your delicate schemes, and even Ahan describes you as the most delightful young woman he’s ever met. Don’t leave us now—we need you.”
Flushing slightly, Sarene shook her head as the carriage pulled up Roial’s drive. “But what is left, Your Grace? Through no cleverness of my own, the Derethi gyorn has been neutralized, and it appears that Iadon has been quelled. It seems to me that the time of danger has passed.”
Roial raised a bushy white eyebrow. “Perhaps. But Iadon is more clever than we usually credit. The king has some overwhelming blind spots, but he was capable enough to seize control ten years ago, and he has kept the aristocracy at one another’s throats all this time. And as for the gyorn …”
Roial looked out the carriage window, toward a vehicle pulling up next to them. Inside was a short man dressed completely in red; Sarene recognized the young Aonic priest who had served as Hrathen’s assistant.
Roial frowned. “I think we may have traded Hrathen for a foe of equal danger.”
“Him?” Sarene asked with surprise. She’d seen the young man with Hrathen, of course—even remarked on his apparent fervor. However, he could hardly be as dangerous as the calculating gyorn, could he?
“I’ve been watching that one,” the duke said. “His name is Dilaf—he’s Arelish, which means he was probably raised Korathi. I’ve noticed that those who turn away from a faith are often more hateful toward it than any outsider could be.”
“You might be right, Your Grace,” Sarene admitted. “We’ll have to change our plans. We can’t deal with this one the same way we did Hrathen.”
Roial smiled, a slight twinkle in his eyes. “That’s the girl I remember. Come; it wouldn’t do for me to be late to my own party.”
Roial had decided to have the eclipse-observation party on the grounds behind his house—an action necessitated by the relative modesty of his home. For the third-richest man in Arelon, the duke was remarkably frugal.
“I’ve only been a duke for ten years, Sarene,” Roial had explained when she first visited his home, “but I