Kushiel’s Dart

Thus was born Terre d’Ange, and thus did we acquire history and pride. In the three-score Years of Elua, the Companions dispersed, placing their numinous stamp on the land and its people. Blessed Elua himself claimed no portion, but delighted to roam at will, a wandering bridegroom in love with all that he saw. When he tarried, it was in the City, which is why she is the queen of all cities, and beloved in the nation; but he tarried seldom.

All this I knew, and yet it was a different thing, to learn it from Delaunay: not stories, but histories. For this too I learned, that a storyteller’s tale may end, but history goes on always. These events, so distant in legend, play a part in shaping the very events we witness about us, each and every day. When I understood this, Delaunay said, I might begin to understand.

What I was to understand, it seemed, was everything. It was not until I began to study the labyrinthine maze of court politics that I truly despaired of my sheltered life in the Night Court. Alcuin had been learning such things for two years and more, and could effortlessly recite the lineage of each of the seven sovereign duchies, the royal family and its myriad entanglements, the duties of the Exchequer, the limits of judiciary powers, even the by-laws of the Guild of Spice-Trading.

For this, as for so much else, I despised him; and yet I admit freely that I loved him, too. It was impossible not to love Alcuin, who loved nigh the entire world. Unlikely as it seemed to one raised in the Night Court, he was unaware of his startling beauty, which only increased as he got older. He had a quicksilver mind and a prodigious memory, which I envied, and yet he took no pride in it save the pride of pleasing Delaunay.

When Delaunay entertained, which in those days was often, it was Alcuin who waited on his guests. In contrast to the revels and delights staged by Cereus House, these were civilized, erudite affairs. What Delaunay liked best was to invite a small number of friends, who would recline on couches a la Hellene in the inner courtyard, enjoying an elegant meal and spinning out the night in convivial conversation.

Alcuin stood by to serve wine or cordial at these affairs, and while I was contemptuous of his lack of sophistication, I could not deny that he was a charming sight, all untutored grace and gentle eagerness, the vine-cast shadows throwing traceries of green on his moon-white hair. When Alcuin proffered the wine-jug with his grave smile, as like as not guests smiled back and raised their glasses, whether they wished them refilled or no, merely to see the pleasure of serving light his dark eyes.

This, of course, was Delaunay’s intent, and I’ve no doubt that many a tongue was loosened in that courtyard by virtue of Alcuin’s smile. I have never known a mind more subtle than that of Anafiel Delaunay. Yet to those who cite such things as proof that he used us without regard, I say: It is a lie. Of a surety, we loved him, both of us in our differing ways, and I have no doubt in my mind that Delaunay loved us in turn. I would have proof enough of that ere things were done, little though I welcomed it at the time.

As for the guests, they varied, and so widely it scarce seemed possible that one man could have so many acquaintances from such far-flung quarters of the nation. He chose his guests with great care, and never did I see a mix that soured, unless it was at his will. Delaunay knew court officials and judiciaries, lords and ladies, shippers and traders, poets and painters and moneylenders. He knew singers and warriors and goldsmiths, breeders of the finest horseflesh, scholars and historians, silk merchants and milliners. He knew scions of Blessed Elua and his Companions, and members of all the Great Houses.

I learned that Gaspar Trevalion, Comte de Fourcay and kinsman to Marc, Duc de Trevalion, was a great friend of his. A clever, cynical man with streaks of grey at his temples, Gaspar was adept at sniffing the political winds to see which way they blew. It was he, doubtless, who had told Delaunay how the Princess Lyonette whispered in her son Baudoin’s ear about an ailing King and an empty throne, and the portent people might take from the symbolic wedding at the Midwinter Masque.

Such things surrounded me and were a part of my life on a daily basis, for what I did not observe, I later learned when Delaunay obtained Alcuin’s recitation of a night’s events. He was ever scrupulous in including me during these sessions, that I might increase the knowledge that already crammed my aching skull. For a long time, I resented his favoritism of Alcuin, when I was better-trained to serve; but even so, I listened.