The emperor expected him at the grand hall by noon to go over the new corn laws, but given the distance between the town square and the palace, he was definitely going to be late. Another occasion to invite the ire of his father.
Recently, tardiness became a habit. And he could only put it down to one thing—all the goddamn time he spent trying to convince Rea that he wasn’t the greedy villain she thought him to be.
Because for some mysterious reason only the creator could ascertain, he hated being hated by Rea. War might be his lifeblood but being at war with her didn’t sit well with him. He’d once told her that being enemies was far more enjoyable than being friends but being friends with her was more enjoyable than being at odds with her.
Considering the state of his leg, he could no longer partake in morning exercises or engage in swordplay with his comrades. Nor could he ride out as he did before. That left his mornings bereft of purpose. The only alternative was chess and honest conversation. Since he could count the number of honest men in the palace with one finger, he instead allocated his empty morning hours to seeking out the only interesting person he could play chess with and talk to.
It was true that sometimes, Rea and he didn’t talk as much as they argued. But they were honest with each other, never hiding their resentment or repressing their feelings. She never backed down and neither did he. It was a refreshing change of pace from the daily court politics.
Riding on a sudden burst of courage, Sebestyén beat his knuckles against the wood. Moments later, he still stood alone on her doorstep, only his joints ached more than before and his vision was starting to double from the heat. She wasn’t there. Or she didn’t want to open the door. Another futile day spent in the pursuit of the impossible.
“Looking for me?”
A voice shot at him from behind. All his senses screamed that it was her, though the logical side of him necessitated turning around to confirm this hunch. A petite woman wearing a plain black tunic blinked back at him. It was her. Rea in the flesh. He noticed the flush on her cheeks from hauling a large basket up the narrow staircase. Since she never tied her hair, the unruly black curls framed her face like storm clouds.
“Please hear me out before slamming the door in my face.” Sebestyén spit out the words in rapid succession before she could move. “I’m not here to persuade you to change your mind about the ‘Heaven’s Eye’. I’ve given up on that.”
He abandoned the thought of getting the tattoo the moment he saw Rea’s horror at the mention of the word. Also, while immortality may have seemed like a panacea to his problems in the haze of night, morning forced him to evaluate his situation more objectively. Immortality meant an eternity with a limping leg. He was barely getting by day to day. No. She was right. It was a hideous idea.
“Then you have no cause to be here. If you’ve lost interest in the ‘Heaven’s Eye’, what else could you possibly want from me?” she said sliding past him and unlocking her room. He couldn’t help but notice how soft her skin looked up close; how that one stray hair, floating over her ear, begged to be tucked behind it. A frisson of heat ran through him.
Rea hustled into her rooms, her skirts brushing his hand. He trailed her, mostly because his head ached too much to risk a trip down the stairs. Rea’s new room was on the second floor of a hostel for women of limited means. It was adequate for a single woman but nothing luxurious. She slept on quilt laid on the floor, and there was no window to let air in meaning the room was always stuffy.
“The spare maids’ quarters in my vacation home are more luxurious than this,” Sebestyén said.
“But are they cheaper than three silvers?” she retorted.
Three silvers. That was indeed cheap. “You’re paying money for this place?” he asked, flabbergasted.
Rea stuck her nose in the air. “You can stop looking at me so suspiciously, general. I didn’t steal the coins.”
“I know,” he said. “You earned the money through honest labor. Well done.”
She moved there from the Valverdens’ house while the new cottage he promised her in Crua valley was under construction. According to the spy he tasked with finding her whereabouts after he lost her on that spring night, he learned she was working as a maid to the Valverdens’ since winter. The man he saw with her at the revelries was the son of the family, and from all accounts, the relationship between the two wasn’t even remotely romantic, which blew Sebestyén’s assumption of them being married out of the water. And returned him his night’s sleep.
“Would you care for an apple? You look pale.” She fished out a slightly brownish, stale-looking apple from her basket.
Sebestyén considered refusing outright but sharing an apple might prolong his time with her. His head felt dizzy and plunging back into the hot sun might make it worse. “Sure,” he said.
She tossed him the whole apple and pulled out another from the basket for herself. A loud crunch slit the air as she bit into her fruit.
Sebestyén stared at his apple, wondering how he could politely get rid of it without offending her.
“Don’t eat if you don’t want to. I doubt it’ll satisfy the tastes of an archduke anyway.”
“I’ll save it for later,” he said, then when an awkward silence bloomed between them, quickly changed the subject. “How’ve you been?”
“Quite well, as you can see.”
She was so guarded; he swore she must’ve built a brick wall in front of her face. Though, he supposed it was partly his fault for making a grand mess of things in spring.
“Have you had any communication with your tribe?” He wasn’t curious; he was just desperate to keep talking, to invent a reason to stay there for a moment longer. He looked around for a chair he could sit on, since standing made all his muscles sore. He wondered why.
“No. Suveri don’t generally write letters to each other.” There was a sharpness to her voice.
“I’m not a complete imbecile. I’m aware of the fact that the Suveri don’t write. But I assumed you had other ways of talking to each other.”
“We don’t. We’re like the wind. The wind blows wherever it wants to. And if someday, we happen to blow past someone else in our tribe, we consider it a happy reunion.”
“Isn’t it scary, not having a family you can depend on?” Without his father and brothers, he would be lost.
“Wind doesn’t fear its course, and neither do the Suveri fear where we may end up after being separated from our brethren. Bonds as strong as ours aren’t weakened by time or distance,” said Rea.
Bonds as strong as ours aren’t weakened by time or distance.
Sebestyén admired the depth of those words. A bond untouched by time and distance. Wasn’t that what everyone dreamed of? But in reality, like him and Rea, people separated by life tended to grow apart.
“I came here to present you an offer,” he said. “Now that I’m the emperor, I’ve decided to make some changes to the way we treat Suveri.”
“Oh?”
Unexpectedly, Rea looked hopeful rather than cynical as she usually did. He told himself that was a good sign.
“I want to stop the persecution of the Suveri,” he continued. “I want to welcome the Suveri to our land. Give them a place to live. Ensure they’re paid fairly for their work instead of forced into it like slaves. You made me realize that it could be different. We can help each other, can’t we? Your tribe’s tattoos could strengthen the army and our borders could provide them a safe haven they never have to flee from.”