Kushiel's Scion - Jacqueline Carey [52]
"It's not enough," I said tersely.
"No?" Mavros smiled. "What does Phèdre say?"
I glared at him, my heart filled with sudden fury. "You know nothing of her!"
"No." He swallowed then, hard. "Forgive me, I do not. Once again, I have overstepped my bounds, Imriel." He was silent for a moment, thinking. "I only want you to understand. What you are… there is beauty and majesty in it. But perhaps…" He glanced across the meadow. "Perhaps it is better if I let Roshana explain."
We spoke no more of it that day, and for several days afterward.
They were sensitive to such things, the Shahrizai, and capable of great delicacy. I knew why. It was what I had experienced with Maslin in Lombelon when it seemed I stood outside myself and saw into him—they saw the fault-lines in my soul, my flaws and weaknesses, and trod gently near them.
For a time, at least.
And that, I thought, was what truly made them dangerous. It was a comfort to know that my kin were capable of kindness, and not necessarily wont to exploit Kushiel's gift for personal gain or vaunting ambition. But they saw too much, and they were drawn to what they saw. In time, Mavros—or perhaps Roshana—would prick me once more where I was sore.
In the meanwhile, we spoke of less consequential matters.
I learned a great deal of my heritage. House Shahrizai was the oldest family in Kusheth; one of the oldest, indeed, in Terre d'Ange. Their holdings were extensive, lying on both coasts of the province. For all that, theirs is not the sovereign duchy in Kusheth—that falls to Quincel de Morhban, who holds the Pointe d'Oest. To hear Mavros speak, it was by choice; although I didn't wholly believe him. I suspect it has long served the Crown's interest to keep House Shahrizai in check. They were powerful and numerous enough to be a threat, if they chose.
But it was true that they were a strange and insular clan in their own way. Cousins often wed within the family, and they held their own traditions. Other than the ruling Duc de Shahrizai, they did not use land-titles among themselves—only the Shahrizai name, as though it superseded any holdings. And they were fearsomely loyal to one another.
Mavros claimed that my mother acted without her House's blessing or knowledge. Whether or not it is true, I cannot say, but he believed it to be so. He thought she did so in order to protect the Shahrizai, should matters go awry. Perhaps he was even right. They held her in a strange mix of awe and… I did not even know a word for it. Regret, perhaps?
"I wish I had known her," Baptiste announced when we spoke of her late one evening, sitting in the manor's great room. "I do, truly."
Roshana, who was unbraiding his hair, smiled quietly. "She was dangerous to know, my heart. Even for family."
It was a cardinal sin among them, to endanger the well-being of the family; and yet their greatest disdain was reserved for Marmion Shahrizai, who accidentally caused the death of his sister Persia. It was she who aided my mother in escaping from Troyes-le-Monte, loyal to the end.
Roshana spoke truly; my mother was dangerous to know.
"Why did she do it?" I asked my cousins that night. "Why did she do what she did?"
They exchanged glances and shrugs. There was a moment of silence, broken only by the soft sound of Roshana running a boar-bristle brush through Baptiste's unbound hair.
"Did she never tell you?" Mavros asked me.
"No," I said, and thought of Phèdre seated behind a pile of unsealed letters, looking pain-bruised and weary. I was abashed. "I don't know. She sent… she used to send letters, before she vanished. But I never read them."
"I would!" Baptiste raised his head, an eager light in his eyes.
"Hush, my heart." Roshana stroked his cheek, until he subsided under her touch. "Imriel must make his own choices." She set about