The guard’s jaw clenched. “Apologies, Princess.” He opened the door without another word.
“ — which changes everything,” Tasia heard her father saying once the door was open. He sat behind his desk, hands folded in front of him, a placid expression on his face. Norix sat on one side of him; the General sat on the edge of the divan. Cole was in his normal place against the wall.
Her grandfather stood a few feet from the desk. “It changes nothing!” he shouted.
Tasia slipped into the room, Joslyn a step behind her.
“Ah, Princess. You’re here,” Norix said. He sounded remarkably relaxed, given the fact that Lord Hermant had just shouted at the top of his lungs. He waved at the divan. “Come sit down.”
Tasia nodded and settled herself next to General Remington.
Lord Hermant whipped around. He glared at Tasia and Joslyn for a moment before turning back to the Emperor.
“What is she doing here?” he demanded.
“Given recent events,” said the Emperor, “I’ve decided to name Natasia as my heir. She is here because she will be present at all of my meetings from now on.”
Lord Hermant was the only one whose face registered shock. General Remington raised both of his bushy eyebrows, glancing at Tasia beside him.
Tasia’s stomach clenched, and suddenly she was very glad that Norix had prepared her to hear the unprecedented proclamation her father had just stated with such casual ease.
“Wh — What?” the Lord sputtered. In his youth, Lord Hermant’s hair and mustache had been a red-blond, much like Tasia’s mother and Tasia herself. But he had gone white years earlier, and as his face rapidly reddened in apparent anger and shock, the hair looked somehow even whiter. He pointed behind him without turning around. “She’s a woman!”
The Emperor met Tasia’s gaze. He held it for a moment, giving her a small nod before looking at the red-faced lord before him. “She is my eldest child.”
“She is a woman,” Lord Hermant repeated stubbornly. “No — worse than that. She is a girl.”
Perhaps emboldened by her father’s presence and support, perhaps simply irritated and falling victim to her typical impulsiveness, Tasia spoke up from her place next to the General. “Actually, my Lord, you were correct the first time: I came of age last year. I am a woman.”
Now her grandfather turned around to look at her. “Adulthood is more than a number, granddaughter. And the whole of the Empire knows you are nothing but a child. A spoiled, impetuous child.” He spat the final word.
Tasia opened her mouth to give a sharp retort, but her father beat her to it.
“Hermant, remember whose presence you are in,” he growled. “You just insulted my heir. In front of me.”
Lord Hermant looked prepared to argue, but he snapped his mouth closed instead.
The office door opened and Wise Man Evrart, Norix’s protege, strode in. He crossed quickly and bent to speak quietly into Norix’s ear.
Norix turned to the Emperor. “With your leave, Majesty, something has happened with our, erm, new guest which requires my attention.”
New guest? Tasia wracked her mind to think of who Norix could be referring to. The spring council meetings would be starting shortly; were there other lords from far afield besides Lord Hermant wandering the palace Tasia hadn’t seen yet? Then, with a chill running down her spine, she realized who the “new guest” must be: her assassin. Given the dark circles under Wise Man Evrart’s eyes, they’d no doubt been interrogating him — the polite way of putting it — since the night before.
“Attend to it,” the Emperor said. “This meeting is over anyway. Cole, see to it that Lord Hermant is escorted from the palace grounds.”
Cole stood and took one long step in the older man’s direction.
“This conversation is not over, Andreth,” said Lord Hermant.
The Emperor rose swiftly from his seat, pressing his fists into the surface of the heavy wooden desk. At his full height, he towered above the older man before him. “I have been patient with you, Lord. More patient than you deserve.” His tone was deadly calm. “But if you think the fact that you were, for a while, my father-in-law gives you the right to speak to me with the same casualness as my own father, you are gravely mistaken. I would strongly recommend that you do not speak another word in my presence today. I don’t know what kind of impetuosity I might be capable of if you do.”
Lord Hermant pressed his lips tightly together, as if resisting the temptation to argue. Commander Cole ushered the older man ahead of him, walking him out of the office.
The Emperor let out a heavy sigh once the door closed and lowered himself back to his seat with a grunt. “That went about as well as I expected.”
“Does this mean the Lord is withdrawing his financial support for the war effort?” asked General Remington.
“It would seem that way,” the Emperor said. He propped an elbow on the arm of his chair and bent his head, rubbing his brow.
Tasia stayed quiet, chewing the inside of her cheek. Her grandfather was more than a stubborn old mule with a propensity for criticizing the Emperor. He was a stubborn rich old mule with a propensity for criticizing the Emperor. In particular, he hated the fact that the War in the East still had not been won, despite the fact that it had continued, on and off, for nearly a decade and a half. For the past few years, the silver mines of the House of Farrimont had been a primary source of funding for the war. But it seemed her father would need to find another funding source if the war was to continue. Tasia wondered what the commoners would do if he raised their taxes yet again.
Wise Man Evrart looked down at Norix expectantly.
“Your Majesty…” Norix began.
“Yes, yes, Norix, you have my leave to go,” the Emperor said impatiently, waving his hand at the Wise Man. “What’s the problem with our guest?”
“The problem is…” Norix paused, seeming to gather his thoughts. “The man who attacked the Princess last night is dead.”
#
“Poison,” Tasia said to Mylla, flopping down onto the bed. “Some concoction with bizarre ingredients that Norix tried to describe before Father cut him off.”
“At least he’s dead,” Mylla said. She sat cross-legged near the head of Tasia’s bed, filing her nails while she listened to Tasia talk about her day. “But how did he manage to poison himself? Didn’t they confiscate everything on him when they brought him into the palace dungeons?”
“He had it hidden in a false tooth,” said Tasia. “Norix said it was exceedingly rare and hard to make. Yet another sign that whoever tried to kill me has deep pockets and Wise Men in their service.” She yawned. “Gods, it’s been a long day. First I get a new bodyguard — ” she gestured towards the antechamber where Joslyn was doing whatever she did when outside Tasia’s presence “ — then Norix tells me my father wants me to be his heir, then my grandfather withdraws his financial support for the war and nearly gets himself beheaded at the same time, and now the man who tried to kill me is dead, without giving us so much as a single clue as to who hired him.”