~ (Continued) Dvoday, 30th of Septembrie, 11831 ~
Cordelia lay in bed, reading a letter from Perdita about the royal wedding. Her friend must have penned it either late last night after the reception, or gotten up early to do so, for it already reached her in Folia. Or perhaps Perdy had simply not slept at all if the fête went on until dawn.
“Oh, their vows were whispered,” she said to her growing belly. Her daughter kicked in reply, and Delia smiled with fond exasperation. “Now, don’t you start! I could not go because of you, you know.” Even in the heavier clothes of the season, it was hard to hide her condition. It would have been both dangerous and improper for her to travel like this, and she could not fault her father-in-law for ordering her to stay in Folia. She even found it kind that he worried. Perdy had sworn to write, though, and the letter in her hand proved that her friend took the duty seriously. She turned back to the message.
There were, of course, many of the land at the reception, but not as much as one would think. I believe you are not the only one confined to bed with child from springtime’s blessing. I dare say that I saw the socialites from Piques, His and Her-Future-Graces’ friend Nina with her husband, and she is almost as round as you!
“So maybe I could have gone. Would you have liked to be at the wedding, Arielle?”
A knock on the door interrupted her, and she placed the letter on her side-table, hiding it under a book.
“Yes? Please come in.”
Her father-in-law stepped into the room. His expression was carefully neutral, but his eyes were sharp as he came up beside her and bent down to kiss her cheek.
“How is my grandchild?”
“She is well,” Delia said cautiously. Something about his manner was not quite right and the hairs on the back of her neck stood up. Comte Frederick nodded absently, turning to look out the window overlooking the courtyard, and folding his hands behind himself.
“I wish to spend the evening with you. As you are to stay abed, I will have dinner brought to us here. Is that acceptable?”
“I… Oui, of course. Thank you for your company.”
Frederick nodded and sat at a writing desk, rapping at it with his knuckles. A servant entered the room bearing a tray, which was set before Cordelia, and another followed with foods to be put in front of the comte. Neither the servants, nor the comte, spoke, though Cordelia murmured her thanks.
Once he began to eat, she did as well, and they made small talk with each other. It was pleasant, as far as interactions with him went, and Cordelia found herself even smiling and laughing, the eerie feeling from earlier forgotten.
She thought it a victory when his own smile became genuine.
“My lord,” she began, after the main course was taken away and a dessert brought forth. “May I ask of you a question?”
“Of course, my dear Delia,” he said.
“I am glad for this evening,” she began. “And thank you for your generosity. This is something I have needed. But I must ask for a favor. Would it be possible for me to return to my parents’ home for the rest of my confinement?” Hearing of Nina at the wedding had emboldened her. While perhaps she would not have traveled all the way to the castle, to go to her parents’ home would not be far at all. “It would not even be a day’s ride. You see, I heard—”
“You may not.”
“But, Father, you—”
“Both of my children are dead.” He placed his spoon down and looked up at her with the coldness returning to his features. “You carry my only grandchild. I will not have you leaving this manor.”
“I…” Words failed her. Of course, he had lost both of his sons and would be terrified for his grandchild.
“Now that you brought it up,” he continued, cutting her off again and not giving her a moment to think, “I must speak with you of the fact that you are with child.”
“Oh… Of course.” She wanted to wrap her arms around Arielle, hide herself under more blankets, ask him to leave the room and not turn this dinner into something unpleasant. But that was silly. She had never been overly fond of the comte, but he was her child’s grandfather. There was no danger.
“It is a delicate political situation. You were not aware, but I made Renaud my heir at the start of the year.” He met her eyes and there was almost an apology in them. “I cut Jourdain from the line of succession. You and he wanted a more simple life, I believe, and Renaud wished to rule. The announcement was held back after His Grace came to Spadille, and then… there had been no time.”
Cordelia bit her tongue to keep from being rude. Several times in their marriage, her husband lamented to her that he was the firstborn and he would be comte Feuilles. He had desired a more simple life, true. But in the last year or two, Jourdain had begun to accept his position upon encouragement from Prince Aimé. Then, upon meeting Duc Pierre, Jourdain had even been happy to imagine being the comte and working with the duc. Yet only after this had Frederick decided to use an old privilege to strip him of his birthright! The privilege was meant to be used in dire situations where perhaps an heir had been lost to Faery, but not pronounced dead, and a younger sibling could rule in their stead without fear of the elder returning and taking the throne once fay. It was not to be used to choose which child one preferred to be their heir. And that is exactly what happened, as per Frederick’s words this had happened long before Jourdain was take through Faery.
“Why are you telling me this?” she asked. “They are both gone. Does it matter which was the heir?”
Renaud had no children, who would have inherited before her child if Renaud was made heir by choice (instead of him merely inheriting until Arielle came of age). The line of succession in Triumphe included the male siblings of the heir before his own children if they were underage. It allowed the children to grow into adults before assuming power. Sometimes female siblings would inherit, but it was often seen as better to have a young boy in power rather than a woman.
“Because I want you to know why things will be as they are, and that I had planned otherwise. Were these any other circumstances,” the comte said, “I would insist that your marriage is no more and you are free to return to your family, along with your child, if you desired. I would give you a stipend for raising my grandchild and let you live your life as you please, while I found another wife and had more children to restart my line.
“But Jourdain had still been known as my heir in public when he passed, while you carried his child in your belly.”
“I… I do not understand,” Cordelia said, though the beginnings of what this meant were forming in her thoughts. Arielle began to move, restless, and Delia tried to soothe her as she listened to Frederick with worry growing in her soul.
“I have been informed that your child is seen as an Heir of Sebelas for Feuilles. Not only among the people, but spoken of at churches. Were your daughter already born, it would be a simple enough matter to show that I had made Renaud the heir some time ago, and she would be out of the line of succession as soon as I had another child. Even a daughter of my flesh would hold rank above a grandchild, born of a deceased son who was not the heir.
“But not if she is an Heir of Sebelas.”
It was a tradition based on the myth of the son of Amôru and Saiva, and how the goddess had been with child when her husband, the One God of Everything Good, disappeared when sin entered the world. Though they had had many children before Sebelas, it was he, the youngest child, who took over his father’s duties and inherited most of His power. And so the heirship of the eldest child in all realms was taken and given to the youngest unborn child, should the father die before birth.
“My lord,” Cordelia said, changing from the familial to the social way of address. “I do not see a problem. Arielle will be raised as your heir and granddaughter. You are still my father-in-law, and Folia is my home, though I have been away in Spadille. I wished to visit my family, but I do not want to move away from my connections to Jourdain.”
“As the only heir? With both of my son’s deaths within the same year, have we not seen that it was folly for me to never remarry?”
“She need not be the only heir. As you say, you can remarry, and have more children. I would wish it, for I hope a wife would make you more pleased. Arielle can be your heir, with your other children in line after her. It is not traditional, but I believe it would be legal. She would be raised here in court with her uncles and aunts.”
“And if you were to marry again?” he asked.
“I do not wish to.” She loved Jourdain and always would. Her heart had not the room for another.
“I did not either, but as you can see, circumstances demand.”
The lovely food she had eaten sat heavy in her stomach. She still did not see the problem, or why Frederick was forcing this. She would stay at court and her daughter would be raised as the heir.
“Then…” she began, but bit her lip.
“Then what? You would leave with your new husband and take my heir? Or leave her with me.”
“I would never leave her!”
He nodded as if he had won some argument.
“You are no longer bound to this home as your marriage is over,” he said again. “And while you say you will stay, there is no guarantee of it, especially if you find yourself in the arms of another and he wishes to take you away. You say you will not leave her—and what am I to do if you remarry and he wishes to adopt her? The people would be displeased unless it was by her own voice that she stepped down. If you wed and took her, they will wait, and they will not submit to a child of mine, while whoever you choose to wed becomes the new father to the de jure heir.”
And that man, this theoretical husband, would have influence over the future comtesse of Feuilles. Influence that Frederick could not subvert.
Was that a threat against her child? His own grandchild?
“I… I will then not remarry,” she said again. Her voice was shaking. Her worry had turned into fear and it clawed at her throat. She had become used to swirling humors and emotion while with child, but this was too much. What did Frederick want from her? “It is that simple, then.”
“Oh, my dear, I agree that it is simple.” He paused and waited a moment to see if she would understand.
The claw around her throat tightened. She began to shake her head as he spoke.
“You and I will marry. Arielle will be my heir and my daughter, the new eldest child. You will become my comtesse. And we will have more children after her. The wedding will take place after you recover from her birth.
“So, you see,” he said with a sigh. “I had other plans, Cordelia. But this is how it must be.”
The Chef was waiting for him when he left Cordelia’s room. Frederick gave the girl credit—she had shaken her head at his proclamation that they be wed, but said nothing to the contrary. He had expected protesting and shouting, but perhaps he had been wrong in assuming Cordelia would hate him and this plan. He was not fond of it either, but it was the only one that he could think of.
“Make sure she does not hurt herself or the baby,” he told Remigius. “Your duties now include keeping an eye on her until I am certain she will do nothing foolish.”
“Of course, my lord.”
“What did you want?”
“The wedding did not have a coronation, my lord. The duc is not yet ruling Piques, though perhaps that is to allow him time with his new wife.”
Frederick nodded and dismissed Remigius before going to his study. It would have been easier to tell his spymaster to allow, or even insist, Cordelia be harmed. If she, or her child, died, then he would be free of this business with the Heirship of Sebelas. But she was his daughter-in-law, and she carried his granddaughter. He did care for them.
Damn Renaud and his being an idiot. First his affair with a fée girl, and then the mess that had happened in the wake of Jourdain’s death. Frederick rubbed at his chest where his own son had attacked him on Midsummer. It was only, ironically, the festival’s magic, along with Remigius’s plants and poultices, that had saved him.
All the boy had had to do was to hold himself together and wait a few weeks, and he would have been publicly announced as the heir to Feuilles by choice! Then they could have begun to plan another way to end His Grace’s life.
The announcement truly should have been made the moment it had been done, but Frederick had wanted to make certain Renaud would do as commanded. There had been no point in changing his heir from one son to the other if neither of them bent to his will. And had not Renaud showed him that he was not malliable? He had gotten it into his head that Pierre was involved with Jourdain’s death, had wanted revenge, even turned to some vampires for help, becoming one of those creatures… As much as it pained him to think it, perhaps Renaud’s death was the right outcome.
If only it had been after he was named heir.
A few confidants knew, though, and the papers were signed. But as priests were calling Arielle an Heir of Sebelas, the matter was not of legality anymore, but of religion. Frederick could announce the change and give the evidence that it had been done months ago, and it would not matter.
Maybe this truly was Amôru’s will.
