“This is outrageous! You cannot simply walk in and make these ridiculous accusations!”
“Haldred is dead, you say?” Valdir blurted out, “How?”
In that single word, Regis knew that the Ridenow lord, whatever his other failings, had been ignorant of the prison-school and his cousin’s role in it.
“Haldred was one of three men holding children as hostages from important families in order to ensure their obedience to this—this pretender.” Regis saw his brother flush and half rise, but he did not falter. “One of them was my own niece, my sister’s daughter. Another was Felix Lawton.”
“Lawton?” Valdir sounded dazed.
“He is still alive, although gravely injured. Most of this blood is his. He may not survive.” Regis glared at his brother again. His breath caught in his throat, and he shoved away the memory of adrenaline and blaster fire. “The Federation sent in a rescue team.”
“What is he talking about?” one of the minor lords stammered.
“Federation police?”
“The last time that happened, there was rioting all through the Old Town—”
“People will never stand for it!”
“It wasn’t my idea!” Rinaldo protested. “It was—Luminosa said—she took care of everything! I didn’t know about the Lawton boy!”
Meaning,Regis thought angrily, that youdid know about the others.
“Where is she?” Valdir demanded. “My kinsman is slain! Why is this woman not here to answer for it?” He pointed to the vacant chair.
Rinaldo pounded on the table. The councillors, all except Valdir, flinched. “You forget yourself!” he roared at Valdir. “ Iam king here, not you! Igive the commands.”
“Are you hiding her?” Valdir shot back. “Protecting her? I say, bring her forth!”
“You have no authority over this council or Lady Luminosa.” The cristoforoshook off the moment of mute shock. “She answers only to His Majesty and the Lord of All Worlds!”
“We will find her,” Regis said, ignoring the priest, “and then we will hear the truth.”
“You’re distraught, brother, and you forget yourself.” Strain rendered Rinaldo’s voice tinny. “You cannot give orders here! I am the Head of Hastur, your legitimate liege, and I am king over all of you!”
That is about to change.
Before Regis could reply, he heard shrieks coming from the corridor outside. A woman’s voice, he thought. The councillors fell silent.
Rinaldo gestured curtly to Danilo. “Find out what that commotion is about. We have important business here and must not be interrupted.”
Danilo went to the door and returned a moment later with one of the Guardsman and Tiphani Lawton. For once, she wore the ordinary clothing of a Darkovan noblewoman, a high-necked gown of embroidery-trimmed wool, instead of her usual version of cristofororobes.
Anguish churned about Tiphani like a miasmic haze. She rushed to Rinaldo’s side and threw herself at his feet. Her eyes were wide and red rimmed, as if she saw the world through a blood- smeared lens. One of the councillors gasped.
Regis and Danilo exchanged glances. Danilo gave a small shake of his head. Regis steeled himself even as his gut twisted into an icy knot.
With surprising gentleness, Rinaldo lifted Tiphani to her feet. “Dear lady, domna cariosa, calm yourself. Tell us, whatever is the matter? Has—has something happened to the queen?”
Between gulping breaths, Tiphani managed to force out the words, “No, Her Majesty lives. But the baby—”
Although Rinaldo lacked the gift of laran,the force of his emotional reaction—denial, rage, stunned daze—battered them all. Regis recoiled as if he had been physically struck. Danilo looked nauseated, almost ill. Gabriel’s face turned ashen.
Rinaldo fell back into his chair. “My son . . . born too soon?”
Tiphani lifted her face, and Regis thought he had never seen such bleak confusion, not even when Felix had been so sick.
Felix! Had she heard—d id she yet know?
A few mute movements of her lips, and then she forced the words out: “The babe is gone, vanished from my lady’s womb!”
Appalled silence hung in the air.
“Is—is it certain?” stammered one of the courtiers. Tiphani looked as if she would break down again.
“My son . . . my son . . .” Rinaldo swayed like a man who has suffered a fatal wound.
“How can this be?” the other councillor recovered himself sufficiently to ask. “A babe spirited away, unborn?”
“It cannot be natural,” the cristoforopriest intoned.
The words passed over Regis like so many puffs of air, devoid of meaning. As angry as he had been with his brother only a few moments before, now his heart responded to the bewilderment on Rinaldo’s face.
And Tiphani, for whom he had never cared, whom he held responsible for the whole bloody disaster and Zandru only knew how much friction yet to come with the Federation, surely she deserved a morsel of compassion as well. She did not even know of her son’s desperate condition.
As gently as he could, Regis said, “My brother, these are matters that call for a lady’s tender care. Let me send for my wife. She has training in healing—”
Tiphani’s head shot up, her eyes filled with too much white. “Trained, yes, in that nest of sorcery you call a Tower! Do you not see, my lord,” to Rinaldo, “how she could have cast her evil spells out of jealousy—”
“No, no, my dear,” Rinaldo replied with surprising calm as he patted her hand. “My brother’s wife is a woman of virtue, and she has not been anywhere near Bettany.” In a quicksilver shift of mood, like the sudden fall of night over Thendara, his features darkened. “ Shehas not . . .”
His gaze lit upon Danilo.
“Lady Luminosa is correct. This tragic affair smacks of wizardry!” the priest repeated. “As I said before, it cannot be natural!”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about!” Regis snapped. Cloistered away from women, new to the ways of the world, what monk could be acquainted with the ills of women? But this was no time to educate the man about false pregnancy. “If you will not have Linnea’s help, then let us send for a healer-woman. MestraTiphani is overwrought—”
“Call me not by that vile Terran name!” Tiphani spat.
“—and will need support to bear her own tragedy.”
“What could be worse than the supernatural death of the king’s unborn son?” she demanded, her voice rising shrilly.
“Please, calm yourself—” Rinaldo said.
“Tell me!” she shrieked at Regis. She looked as if she would claw out the eyes of any man who crossed her. Danilo moved to intercept her.
In that brief hesitation, Valdir growled, “Your son was almost killed, you heartless vixen—and my own kinsman is dead! The Terrananraided the house in the Trade City—because youtook your son there!”
“Lies! Foul lies, spread by this scheming usurper!” Tiphani pointed at Regis.
Regis gazed back, and for a moment, his heart ached for her, so lost in self-righteous fury that she could not understand what had happened.
Then awareness flickered across her face. She lowered her hand. Her tone shifted from strident to hoarse. “What . . . what have you done?”
“I, lady?” Regis said. “I tried to save your son and would have done so, if the Federation men had not opened fire. I am sorry, more than I have words to tell you.”
Tiphani began to weep soundlessly. She turned away, blocked by the solid bulk of Gabriel. He put his arms around her with the same tenderness he would have used with a younger sister.