“The Key will remain with the bearers until their deaths, when they will be returned to Berayma, or until the death of Berayma, when his successor will determine their possession.”
Usharna paused to catch her breath, her eyes red with exhaustion.
“You must sleep, Mother,” Berayma insisted, patting her hand. “We will come back in the morning.”
She feebly shook her head. “No time, my son. My past is catching up with me. I had the good fortune to enjoy the pleasure and company of three husbands, but the poor judgment to outlive them all.”
Her bony hands scrabbled at the Keys, and she looked at Berayma. “As king, you must have the Monarch’s Key,” she said, and gave him a star-shaped piece with a thick rod fixed in its center. “The Key of the Scepter,” she intoned, her voice seeming to gather sudden strength.
Berayma seemed unsure what to do with it. “Put it on, Berayma,” Usharna insisted. He slipped the silver chain over his head, the Key resting against his broad chest. “That’s fine,” she said, and patted his shoulder.
She took hold of a second Key, a square with two crossed swords pierced by a single spear. She handed it to Areava. “My secondborn, you will have the Key of the Sword. Grenda Lear will look to you for protection against our enemies.” Areava bowed and stepped back a pace.
“Olio,” the queen continued, waving him forward, “you are the gentlest of your siblings, and perhaps the least understood. You will have the Healing Key, the Key of the Heart.” There was a quiet murmur in the room, which Usharna silenced by looking up sharply. “It is said that this Key holds the greatest magic of all. Perhaps it is true, but if so its power is one of creation, not coercion.” She handed the Key, a triangle holding the design of a heart, to Olio. He stepped away from the bed, fingering his gift curiously.
Usharna now looked back at Lynan, and her eyes seemed to soften. Lynan swallowed hard and resisted the temptation to move out of her line of sight. He had rarely been the focus of her undivided attention.
“Poor Lynan, lastborn, you shall have the last Key.” Lynan moved forward until he was touching the bed. Usharna’s left hand crossed over to hold his in a firm, cold embrace. “I wish my hand was warmer,” she said softly so that no one else could hear. “As warm as my heart whenever I think of you.” With her right hand she passed him the remaining Key, a simple, golden circle.
Lynan nervously placed the chain over his head. The Key was surprisingly heavy against his chest. He thought he could feel everyone’s gaze fixed on his face. He looked around and saw that it was so, except for Orkid who stared strangely at the Key itself. A shiver passed down his spine.
“The Key of Union,” Usharna announced. “With this you represent the kingdom’s commonwealth. You will be the king’s representative to all our peoples.”
The queen fell back against her pillows, her hands collapsing by her sides. Berayma and Olio were pushed away by Trion, her personal surgeon. He felt her pulse and temperature. “She has no other duties,” he said somberly. “She needs to sleep now. Everyone must leave.”
Berayma nodded and led everyone from the room. Besides his family, Orkid, Trion and Dejanus, there were nurses, attendants, and guards, including Kumul. They had all been standing quietly to attention against the walls, watching with fascination as power was passed from the dying queen to her four children.
The thought made Lynan frown. Power? What would he do with the Key of Union? He wasn’t even sure he wanted it.
When they were all in the hall outside, Berayma ordered Kumul to set two guards at the door, and then advised everyone to return to their quarters.
“We all have much to consider,” he said in his low monotone. “Grenda Lear has not seen such changes for a generation.” He looked down uncertainly on Lynan as he said the last sentence. “But I’m sure our mother knows what she’s doing. Age may have made her weary, but it will not have affected her mind, of that we can be sure.”
“She won’t live through the night, will she?” Olio asked, his voice tight.
“Enough of that,” Areava said as kindly as possible, putting a comforting hand on Olio’s shoulder. “It will do no good to think such thoughts.”
Olio’s eyes suddenly brightened. “Wait! I hold the Healing Key—”
“I can see where your thoughts are leading you, your Highness,” Harnan interrupted, “but you must understand the nature of what the queen has done. She wielded the Key of the Heart herself, and it will have no effect on her now that she has surrendered it. Death is not a sickness for her, it is a relief and an ending.” The old man blinked back tears as he spoke, and when he had finished, he hurried away.
Lynan felt a lump in his throat, so he quickly turned away from the others so they could not see his sorrow. They had shared little with him before, and he was damned if he was going to share his grief with them now. He was confused by the strange emotions he was feeling. He had loved his mother after a fashion, the way a servant might love a good mistress, but they had never been close.
The gift of the last Key, and her few kind words, had sharply reminded him of his loneliness and unhappiness as a child. Why now, Mother, when it’s all too late?
“I will see you all tomorrow,” he told the others. Berayma and Areava stared after him, the brother they had never before truly considered a brother at all.
Lynan fell asleep in his clothes, so when he was woken by Pirem for a second time that morning he felt uncomfortably cramped and pinched. Wan sunlight filtered through his room’s only window high in the eastern wall.
“What news, Pirem?” he asked, shaking his head to clear away the cobwebs of interrupted sleep.
“I regret to have to be the one to tell you, your Highness, but your mother, Queen Usharna, is dead.”
Lynan felt numb. “When?”
“Within the last few minutes. Word is being sent to your siblings right now. You must gather again at her bedside.”
“Of course. Thank you, Pirem.”
“Is there anything else I can do for you, your Highness?”
Lynan shook his head. Why don’t I feel anything ? What is wrong with me? “I will call you if I need anything.”
Pirem bowed and made to leave but Lynan suddenly called him back. “Tell me, did you love the queen?”
“Why, yes, of course.”
“Was she loved by the people?”
“Those I knew, your Highness.” Pirem looked curiously at Lynan. “An‘ respected,” he added. “She was loved an’ respected. We’ve had a prosperous and largely peaceful quarter century. A people cannot ask for more. Is there anything else, your Highness?”
Lynan shook his head and Pirem left. How much better simply to have been one of her subjects, he thought.
Chapter 8
It was a golden morning. Sunlight poured through the windows in Berayma’s chambers. Around him, servants and courtiers fussed over his robes and accouterments, making sure everything was in its right place and hung in the right way. His garments were resplendent, as befitted Grenda Lear’s new king, even though he was being dressed to attend his own mother’s funeral. Conversations were going on all around him, a constant background hum of human noise.
He stood ramrod stiff, arms out straight as a cloak was pulled behind him. He closed his eyes.
Not now, he told himself. You cannot cry in front of all of these people. You would shame her memory.
He swallowed hard. Everything he did, everything he thought, reminded him of his loss. Since the death of Usharna the morning before last, there had been no time to grieve alone. He understood that this was part of his duty now, to ensure a peaceful and rapid succession, but he longed desperately to have half an hour alone by his mother’s white corpse, to let himself indulge in his own feelings one last time without concern for the kingdom’s greater good, the kingdom’s greater need.