The Wager

Vidanric Renselaeus, Marquis of Shevraeth, had learned the dangers of acting on impulse by the time he was fifteen, when he was sent away for training.  Since then he'd regarded it as a luxury far too dangerous to indulge.  His life was made up of a series of considered decisions.  That is, until last year, when a small, determined countess crashed her way into his carefully constructed existence, trampling every aspect of his life with her high-minded but lethally misguided notions of honor, and what was due to the kingdom.

Every single time he tried to re-erect his orderly structure (both external and internal) whack!  Down she'd smash it again, her wistful confusion, hopeless gallantry in impossible situations, and her well-meaning but mule-stubborn sticking to principles at least as destructive as her ready temper--of late aimed at him personally.  She'd accepted--rationally--his place in politics. Or had she?

So when, after all these years of vigilant care, he spoke impulsively--"How about a wager?"--he shocked himself as much as he did the Countess Meliara.  Shock swiftly faded to dismay, and then to bleak humor.  Yet again he'd set himself up for another good smack.

But instead of the disgust she readily showed--for example, at the name Galdran--she stilled, as if sniffing for predators on the wind.  Then said warily, "A wager?"

The impulse had arisen from his wish to avoid a long, uncomfortable amble next to a determinedly silent riding partner, while Bran and Nee had the coach to themselves for a long, cozy interlude.  As always, Bran had failed to see that his desire to ride with Nee (with whom he'd shortly be spending the rest of his life) had upset the careful travel plans.  But then Bran in his own way could be as blindly destructive of delicately balanced social illusions as his sister was of political ones.  And emotional ones.

"Yes," he said.  Now he had to go through with it.  Ah, well, what's another candlestick thrown at his head?  At least this one would be metaphorical.  "Who reaches Jeriab's Broken Shield in Lumm first."

Meliara looked at her brother, the sky, the road, the coach--as if realizing the alternative was trotting along by the side of The Enemy--then said, "Stake?"

Candlestick, meet heart.  "A kiss."

Meliara jerked upright, her eyes round, small form rigid with affront.  She was so shocked--Vidanric recognized with a deep sense of gratitude--that she didn't see Nee clap her hand over her mouth to keep from laughing, or Bran's shoulders shaking as he dove into the coach to hide his mirth from his sister, the coward!

Then Meliara lifted her head, staring down the road with that expression of wistful confusion that Vidanric had never seen in anyone else's face, ever.  She squared her shoulders as if facing up to a death-threat--and took him totally by surprise.  "Done," she said, and bustled back into the inn, vanishing just before Bran lost control and whooped in helpless hilarity.  Nee promptly began scolding him;  Vidanric waved to the driver on the box and the coach rolled away.

While Meliara changed to riding clothes he arranged the hire of the horses, scrupulous in making certain she had the better of the best two he could discover among the loaner stock.  They set out at racing pace: he could see that she had no intention of losing.  No coy flirt Meliara!  He had expected no less, of course; what he did not expect was the pang straight through the heart at the sight of her laughing for joy despite rain and mud and chilly wind, her cheeks glowing, utterly unaware of her sodden clothes and tendrils of hair plastered to skin under her ruined traveling hat that had never been meant to get wet.  A joy that doused as definitely as fire under a drenching rain when he met her eye.

Should he win?  Should he let her win?  Yes--no--what would tear their fragile truce the least?  For he would win.  There was no question of superior worth or talent, it was just that he'd been trained by the best in the world, and the only people who could outride him were a few of his own Blues whom he had trained himself. 

But of course there could be no question: Meliara distrusted courtly artifice, and so, with a sense of regret, when they stopped to change horses he took off down a path he remembered discovering the year before when traversing this same territory, and he'd had to be faster than anyone else on her trail.  At least she'd ridden ahead when he was detained by his couriers--did she really stick her tongue out at him?--thus avoiding the decision to offer her the turnoff or leave her to discover it on her own.

The ride felt good after the enforced slow trot of the day before.  Between bands of rain he read through the dispatches--he'd learned the art of reading on the fly--and when the first drops fell, he tucked the papers away again and mentally sorted those he'd had to address at once, and those that could wait on his arrival at Remalna-city.  

He arrived first, and thus had the opportunity to arrange things.  What would lessen the awkwardness of a situation he ought to have bit his own tongue rather than set up?  Work, of course: the steady neutrality of work, and not the remotest sign of what could possibly resemble an assignation.  And so he did not change his clothes, though he would have liked to get rid of the mud-splashed boots, at least.  He hung his cloak over an empty sconce, set aside his hat and gloves as he gave his orders to the staff, and soon sat before a writing table, the contents of the dispatch bag spread out, the refreshments to be brought in hot at the arrival of the Countess of Tlanth.

The flow of work soon absorbed him, but its steadying effect did not, as he'd expected it to, protect him from the sudden and intense flare--no, conflagration--of laughter that shot through him when Meliara stalked in, shivering, her clothing so sodden it squeaked and sloshed at every step, her cold blue lips squinched into a pucker under a pair of glaring eyes.

He raised the quill as a defensive shield.  "As the winner I choose the time and place."  There, he managed that; the rest of the mirth subsided when she relaxed as if granted a last-moment pardon from execution.

The prospect of a kiss from him was the equivalent of a death-threat. Or was it the kiss?  For a year his father's even voice had knifed him again and again with gentle but inescapable wisdom: "She sees you as Galdran."  After every single unpleasant interaction with Meliara, in retrospect when trying to figure out what he'd done, the moment he'd substituted himself with Galdran, Meliara's reactions made sense.  She saw him as another Galdran.  Despite the fact that she had acknowledged that her brother would not be a good king.  Despite his exerting himself to do everything possible to prove that he was not Galdran, despite the fact that other people did not regard him in the same way they had Galdran.  So why did she?

All this ran through his mind as they exchanged a few comments--none of them incendiary--and so he gave in to his second impulse, which was to show her Arthal Merindar's latest effusion.

It was his worst mistake yet.

At first it seemed she was going to ignore him as she worked away with obvious determination at the unexceptional conversation.  But then she did read it, and hunched up expectant of a Galdran-type threat, just as she had a year ago.

And he remembered that one of the Marquise's riders had passed them on the road just below the fork up into Tlanth.  A series of images from the days just before they left Remalna-city raced through his mind--Branaric laughing out loud at a letter, spinning it toward Vidanric as he said, What's all this about?  Burn it, here we speak the same lingo but I can never make out her meaning--Vidanric seeing at once glance one of the Marquise's charming missives intended to provoke a response, sent in many forms to just about everyone in court--his own answer, She wants to talk to you about your ideas of government, I believe--Bran's saying cheerfully to the Marquise at that night's party, Yes, I did get your note, but life!  I don't bother my brains about those things.  If you want to talk government, write to m'sister.  She'll rattle and yap about taxes and guilds and laws until the stars burn out.

Vidanric looked up, to discover that Meliara's expression had gone from expectation of threat to accusation.  I'm Galdran again.  And indeed, it was exactly the sort of cruel trick Galdran had loved to play on people he suspected of conspiracy.  It was a Merindar trick.  Vidanric knew the Marquise was playing a double game with her letters, not only probing for allies, but testing him to see what he would do, because she certainly had not troubled to hide her actions.  The Merindars seemed to be partial to secrecy, spying, conspiracy--if they weren't causing it, they were looking for signs of it.

So why did Meliara look so afraid, so guilty?  Her words--just spoken--echoed in his mind, and so he answered the real question:  "You think, then, that I ought to cede to her the crown?"

Meliara answered right back,  "Will she be a good ruler?"  No YES.  No denial, either.  No courtly evasion.  Her question was honest, but immediately afterward there was the old anger and anxiousness, her shoulders tight, her fingers knotted together and he knew he had become Galdran again.  She did not want to admit to receiving a letter from the Marquise because he would suspect her of conspiracy.  And he couldn't tell her that the Marquise had sent 'secret' letters to everyone because it would sound like he'd been spying.  Could he get Bran to--no, blast it, he remembered the first day they arrived in Tlanth he'd asked Bran if he'd kept the Marquise's letter, to which Bran had replied, "What letter?"  He'd already forgotten it.

There was no answer to be made, then:  I am not Galdran could be said, it could be repeated, but the truth of it had to be proved.  But how?

As soon as she paused he tried diplomacy.  From her silence it was clear that she was as glad as he to end the conversation that had so suddenly become a dispute.  Would every attempt to speak to her end with dispute?  He was beginning to fear it would because he was Galdran--a false-faced, lying courtier, now with the power of life or death at hand.  How could he lay all that aside to get her to just see him?

More to the point, why should he even try?

He had to consider that question, but not while his own emotions were roiling.  So he  kept his eyes on his stacks of papers and went on sorting as though he were alone in the room, as the quality of the silence altered gradually into quiet.

He finished writing his responses, and his notes to himself to be discussed later, the straightforward tasks soothing to the spirit, until he was interrupted by the clatter and bustle of arrivals echoing up the courtyard walls outside the window.  He dropped his pen and rose.  Meliara's stillness was immediately explained: she'd danced half the night away, rising early, and so now was asleep, curled up on a cushion.

He'd ride the rest of the way to Remalna city, and straight-arm Bran into doing so--

No, he wouldn't have to, he thought wryly.  Meliara would straight-arm Nee into doing so, to prevent another painfully awkward situation like this one.  Because Meliara didn't flirt.

It was then, in the calm light of afternoon, as Mel lay there breathing slowly, her tension for once smoothed away, that he saw what he had so nearly missed.  Meliara did not flir.  He did not know why--he suspected she did not know why--she had accepted that wager, because she did not flirt.  But one thing was absolutely certain, so certain he knew it with bone-deep conviction: she would never have accepted that wager from Galdran.

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