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Target.
She stopped, halfway from pillared bay to dancing floor, as if struck in the head by a two-by-four.
“Milady Miriam? What is it?” Brilliana was tugging at her sleeve.
“Shush. I’m thinking.”
Target. Thirty-two years ago someone had pursued and murdered her mother, while she was en route to this very court to pay attendance to the king—probably Alexis’s father. During the civil war between the families, before the Clan peace was installed. Her mother’s marriage had been the peace settlement that cemented one corner of the arrangement.
Since she’d come here, someone had tried to kill her at least twice.
Miriam thought furiously. These people hold long grudges. Are the incidents co
Someone ignorant of her past. Of course! If they’d known about her before, or on the other side, she’d have been pushed under a subway train or run over by a car or shot in a random drive-by incident long before she’d discovered the way back. How common is it to conceal an heir? she wondered.
“Mistress, you’ve got to come.”
“What is it?” Something about Brilliana’s insistent nudging attracted Miriam’s attention. It’s not me, it’s something to do with who I am, she realized vaguely, groping for the light. I’m so important to these people that they can’t conceive of me not joining in their game. It would be like the vice president refusing to talk to the Senate. Even if I don’t do anything, tell them I want to be left alone, that would be seen as some kind of deep political game. “What’s happening?” she asked distractedly.
“It’s Kara,” Brill insisted. “We’ve got a problem.”
“I’m here,” she said, shaking her head, dazed by her insight. I’ve got to be a politician, whether I like it or not… “What is it now?”
As it happened, Kara was somewhat the worse for wear, not to say steaming drunk. A young Sir Nobody-in-Particular had been plying her with wine, evidently fortified by freezing—her speech was slurred and incoherent and her hair mussed—quite possibly with intent to climb into her clothing with her. He hadn’t got far, perhaps because Kara was more enthusiastic than discreet, but it wasn’t for want of trying. Though Kara protested her i
“Course I can,” Kara slurred. “N’body does ’t better!”
“Right.” Miriam glanced at Brilliana. “Let’s get her home.”
“Do you want to stay, mistress?” Brilliana looked at her doubtfully.
“I want—” Miriam stopped. “What I want doesn’t seem likely to make any difference here,” she said bleakly, feeling the weight of the world descend on her shoulders. Angbard named me his heir because he wanted me to attract whatever faction tried to kill my mother, she thought. Hildegarde takes against me because I can’t bring back, or be, her daughter, and now I’ve got these two ingénues to look out for. Not to mention Roland. Roland, who might be—
“Got a message,” a
“A message? How nice,” Miriam said dryly.
“For th’ mistress,” Kara added. Then she focused on Miriam. “Oh!”
From between her breasts, she produced a thin scrap of paper. Miriam stuffed it in her hand-warmer and took Kara by the arm. “Come on home, you,” she insisted.
The carriage was literally freezing. Icicles dangled from the steps as they climbed in, and the leather seats crackled as they sat down. “Home,” Brilliana told the driver. With a shake of the reins, he set the horses to walking, their breath steaming in the frigid air. “That was exciting!” she said. “Shame you spoiled it,” she chided Kara. “What were you arguing about with those gentles?” she asked Miriam timidly. “I’ve never seen anything like it!”
“I was being put in my place by my grandmother, I think,” Miriam muttered. Hands in her warmer, she fumbled for the blister-pack of beta-blocker tablets. She briefly brought a hand out and dry-swallowed one, along with an ibuprofen. She had a feeling she’d be needing them soon. “What do you know about the history of my family, Brill?” she asked.
“What, about your parents? Or your father? Families or braids?”
Miriam shut her eyes. “The civil war,” she murmured. “Who started it?”
“Why—” Brilliana frowned. “The civil war? ’Tis clear enough: Wu and Hjorth formed a compact of trade, east coast to west, at the expense of the Clan; Thorold, Lofstrom, Arnesen, and Hjalmar returned the compliment, sending Andru Arnesen west to represent them in Chang-Shi, and he was murdered on his arrival there by a man who vanished into thin air. Clearly it was an attempt to prevent the Clan of four from competing, so they took equivalent measures against the gang of two. What made it worse was that some hidden members of each braid seemed to want to keep the feud burning. Every time it looked as if the elders were going to settle things up, a new outrage would take place—Duchess Lofstrom abused and murdered, Count Thorold-Arnesen’s steading raided and set alight.”
“That’s—” Miriam’s eyes narrowed. “You’re a Hjahnar, right?”
“Yes?” Brilliana nodded. “Why? What does it mean?”
“Just thinking,” Miriam said. Left-over grudges, a faction that didn’t want the war to stop, to stop eating the Clan’s guts out. She hit a brick wall. It’s as if someone from outside had stepped in, intervened to set cousins against each other… She sat up.
“Weren’t there originally seven sons of Angmar the Sly?”
“Urn, yes?” Brill looked puzzled.
“But one was lost, in the early days?”
Brill nodded. “That was Markus, or something. The first to head west to make his fortune.”
“Aha.” Miriam nodded.
“Why?”
“Just thinking.” Hypothesis: There is another family, outside the Clan. The Clan don’t know about them. They’re not numerous, and they ‘re in the same import/export trade. Won’t they see the Clan as a threat? But why? Why couldn’t they simply marry back into the braids? She shook her head. I should have tried those experiments with the photograph of the locket.
The carriage drew up at the door of the Thorold Palace, and Miriam and Brilliana managed to get Kara out without any untoward incidents. Then Kara responded to the cold air by stumbling to the side of the ornate portico, bending over as far as she could, and vomiting in an ornamental planter.
“Ugh,” said Brilliana. She glanced sidelong at Miriam. “This should not have happened.”
“At least the plants were dead first,” Miriam reassured her. “Come on. Let’s get her inside.”
“No, that’s not what I meant.” Brill took a deep breath. “Euen of Arnesen plied her with fortified wine while she was out with my sight. I should have seen it, but was myself besieged when not following your lead.” She frowned. “This was deliberate.”
“You expect me to be surprised?” Miriam shook her head. “Come on. Let’s get her up to our rooms and see she doesn’t—” a flashback to Matthias’s warning—“embarrass us further.”
Brill helped steer Kara upstairs, and Miriam ensured that she was sat upright on a chaise lounge, awake and complaining with a cup of tea, before she retreated to her bedroom. She started to remove her cloak then remembered the hand-warmer, and the message Kara had passed her. She unrolled it and read.
I have urgent news concerning the assassin who has been stalking you. Meet me in the orangery at midnight.
Your obedient servant, Earl Roland Lofstrom