Kushiel's Mercy - Jacqueline Carey [33]
If it was a contest of wills, L’Envers lost. He bowed stiffly and departed.
“Thank you,” Sidonie said quietly to her mother.
“Don’t.” Ysandre rounded on her. “Just . . .” She drew a sharp breath, her violet gaze settling on me. “Find her,” she said simply. “I’m willing to place resources at your disposal once you do. Whatever it takes to bring Melisande Shahrizai to justice, I will provide. Bribery, diplomacy, force of arms. Only find her, Imriel.”
“I will,” I promised.
Eight
Winter’s grip on the land began to ease.
I wrote to Diokles Agallon, the Ephesian ambassador, a member of the Unseen Guild.
It was a calculated risk. I was circumspect in what I wrote. I promised nothing; I didn’t dare, not knowing what he might ask. I didn’t mention my mother by name. I alluded to our conversation in roundabout terms. I implied that if he had learned aught of the origins of a certain medallion, I might be willing to ply whatever influence I wielded in exchange for the knowledge.
Might.
I made no promises.
“You did make one promise,” Sidonie reminded me, dark eyes grave. “You promised Alais a puppy come spring.”
I winced. “I’d forgotten.”
She kissed me. “She’s like to forgive you. She’s got larger matters to consider.”
Of a surety, that was true. Unlike Sidonie, I’d always regarded Alais as a sister, a true sister. And although she was young, she was older now than Sidonie had been when first I’d begun to fall in love with her. Alais was still affianced to her own cousin in Alba, Drustan’s nephew, Talorcan. The wedding had been postponed a number of times.
Everything had been so certain once.
The lines of succession in Alba were matrilineal. Terre d’Ange had feared losing its foothold. That was why Ysandre and Drustan had pressed me to wed Dorelei, Talorcan’s sister. Our son would have been his heir.
Our son, the monster.
Now Alais was pressing for change. She was willing to wed Talorcan . . . but she wanted assurance that their children would inherit.
“I don’t blame her,” Sidonie said. “’Tis a rule based on men’s mistrust of women and fear of being cuckolded. I daresay there are any number of Alban women who would support her in this, and a few men, too, when you come to it.”
“Drustan’s thoughts changed after he became a father, didn’t they?” I asked.
She nodded. “He can’t do it, though. It’s tied too closely to Maelcon the Usurper’s revolt.”
It was yet another event that had happened long before we were born. The old Cruarch’s son, Maelcon, had seized the throne and overturned the old traditions of succession. Drustan, the Cruarch’s nephew and heir, had fled into exile among the Dalriada. In time, with the aid of the Dalriada—not to mention Phèdre and Joscelin—Drustan had raised an army of his own and taken the throne back. He had restored the matrilineal lines. There would be a fearful outcry against the hypocrisy if he overturned them now.
“Gods.” I groaned. “I know it’s not old history to those who lived it, but I get infernally tired of having our lives shackled to the past.”
“I know,” Sidonie said with sympathy. “Believe me, I do. But it won’t be forever, or at least not all of it. Mayhap the Ephesian ambassador will have a swift reply at a cost we’re willing to bear.”
“Mayhap,” I said. “Claudia said there were factions within the Guild, and I got the sense Agallon was no ally of my mother’s. If he had been, he would have known the medallion’s origin and dangled it before me as a surety, not a possibility. I pray he can discover it, and I pray he’s willing and eager to betray her, because that’s exactly what we need.”
It had been one of the factors, a big one, in my decision to contact Diokles Agallon. Ysandre had made her decree in a public forum, heard and acknowledged. By now, all of Terre d’Ange knew, and gossip had doubtless spread beyond our borders. There was simply no way my mother was unaware of it. And while I had come to believe that she did indeed love me in her own way, I didn’t think she was likely to wait patiently for me to find her and fetch her back