The Born Queen - J. Gregory Keyes [42]
He stared at her for a moment, then stood and paced across the room, hands folded behind his back.
Maybe he had.
“Stephen. Talk to me.”
He turned. “When we first met, you told me you had attended a coven. A coven not sanctioned by the Church.”
“And you didn’t believe me.”
“I believe you now. Tell me about it.”
Her face went blank. “This whole time you’ve never asked me about that. Why now?”
“Why now? A very good question. You talked me into coming here. No woman has ever shown all that much interest in me, but you were kissing me the first night we met. That doesn’t make any sense, does it?”
“Stop it, Stephen,” she cautioned. “Don’t walk that trail. Think. Why are you suddenly so angry with me?”
“I’m not angry,” he said. “But it wouldn’t be the first time you kissed a man to—”
“Stop it right there,” she said. “You don’t want to say that.”
You slept with Hespero, his mind urged him to continue, but part of him knew she was right, and so he stopped.
“Sorry,” he said.
She nodded. “You’re not entirely wrong,” she said. “I wanted to win your trust. But I kissed you because I wished to. Maybe no one was ever attracted to you before, but more likely you were too inexperienced to see it. I am bolder than most women, Stephen. I don’t wait for the things I want.”
He sat on a stool and passed his palm across his eyes.
“I know,” he said. “I know. I told you there’s something wrong with me.” He looked straight at her then and saw a tear on her cheek.
“Look,” he sighed. “When you met me, you had an interest in all of this. You may have liked me, but you still had an agenda. And you weren’t working alone. Zemlé, I need to know who you work for. If the coven isn’t the place to start…”
“It is,” she said. “It’s the place to start.”
“Well, then please start.”
She wiped the tear away and pulled the covers about her like a cloak.
“It was the Coven Saint Dare,” she said.
“As in Virgenya Dare.”
“Yes.”
“Go on.”
“You know that Virgenya Dare unlocked the secret of the sedos power and used it to defeat the Skasloi. You know that she ruled the first Kingdom of Man and that one day she walked away from it and never came back.”
“Everyone knows that story.”
“It’s easiest to start there, Stephen, because here is where the story my coven tells is different from the one your Church does. According to canon, Virgenya left the throne to her husband, and it was he who founded the Church and became the first Fratrex Prismo, Niro Promom.”
“You dispute that?”
“My order does, yes. According to our teachings, Saint Dare had a council of four women and two men known as the vhatii. She left them in charge when she vanished. For half a century, the majority of highest officials of the Church were women.”
“The Revesturi told me a similar tale,” Stephen said. “Except they mention only one woman ruling, like a fratrex.”
“That’s true. When the vhatii finally understood that Saint Dare would never return, they elected a mater prisma, because Virgenya taught that a woman must rule the church.”
“Why a woman?”
Zemlé frowned. “I don’t know. The sisters believed that women rule with more mercy, but I can’t recall any text that says that. Doesn’t the journal say?”
“I haven’t gotten that far. She’s still a girl, a Skasloi slave.”
“How can you resist skipping to the end?”
“It’s in cipher, and the cipher changes as I go along. Besides, I don’t want to miss anything.”
“Well, read faster.”
“I will. Go on with what you were saying.”
“The arrangment didn’t sit well with some of the men, but the older generation respected Virgenya’s wishes. But eventually a mater prisma was elected who was really little more than the mistress of a powerful sacritor named Irjomen. She died soon after—murdered, probably—and he assumed the title of Fratrex Prismo. The vhatii objected, and war followed, but Irjomen had been planning his rebellion for some time. The loyal were slain, the male vhatii joined the fratrex, and the women fled into exile. Women were eliminated from all positions of power, and the covens where