Bailli waved a hand. “Surely he can be persuaded to forfeit. What does he want?”
“Besides winning? He wants to marry Ekaterina,” Eirhan said.
There was a short, ugly silence. “How do you know this?” Itilya asked.
“It is the way he can best legitimize himself. The citizens of Kylma Above may be grumbling, but they’re not in open revolt yet. People will adjust to him better if he marries into the family.”
“And the trial marriage?” Annika said.
“We all know the girl can’t be grand consort.” Eirhan didn’t even say Inkar’s name, and I flashed hot with anger.
“We can pick a different brideshow delegate. There are many other young ladies to choose from if Her Grace is not partial to anyone else,” Rafyet suggested.
“Why not make Sigis consort instead?” Bailli said. “Remove him from the trials, place Ekata in the lead, retain the line. When her family is revived, we don’t have to bother with the question of succession. She can go to Drysiak; things resume as normal.”
I opened my mouth to tell him he could marry Sigis and move to Drysiak if he loved the idea so much. But my ministers, only newly reminded of my existence, had no trouble talking over me.
“Impossible,” Itilya said. Her clear blue eyes and raised chin didn’t look to me as if she’d be caught sniveling under Sigis in the library.
Yannush’s eyes darted around the table, like an eel sizing up the smallest, weakest fish. “Not to mention, what happens if her family is not revived?”
Reko nodded and crossed his arms. “I agree. That plan could backfire and leave Sigis in charge of the duchy. Though, of course, if Ekata were removed immediately—”
“And allow Sigis to win the coronation trials by forfeiture?” Eirhan said.
Reko’s smile was sharklike. “Parliament.”
Annika tugged at the collar of their coat, eyeing me from beneath their lashes. “A parliament would keep things stable.”
“It would allow for an equal discussion,” Yannush said.
“It would put less pressure on Your Grace,” Urso said to me.
“It’s not up for debate.” My voice echoed loud and harsh in the room. “You’re my advisory council. You advise me. You don’t decide whether we get a parliament or whom I marry.”
Reko looked as though he very much wanted to disagree. But Eirhan shuffled his papers, and we moved on to the Avythera problem. Avythera had put us under embargo, which was starting to affect our charcoal and firewood stores. The kingdom of Rabar had provided us with some aid, but unless we found another source of trade—or cracked their negotiations—we’d be up against a wall.
Arguments flurried around me like snow, and names I couldn’t keep track of flew back and forth across the table. Reko sneered, while Annika seemed to lose their train of thought whenever they caught me watching them. Yannush swung his head back and forth until he made me dizzy. They could all be betraying me in a thousand different ways. I tried to ground myself in logic. What did they want? What could be their motives? But the reality was, I knew my ministers as well as I knew the guests in my palace: not at all.
The conversation changed faster than I could open my mouth. Ministers weaved old debates into new ones, referencing problems and people they’d been discussing long before I became grand duke.
I focused on my coffee, on the table—oak, sturdy, used in shipbuilding and storage and to make half-timber walls for some of the houses in the city. From there I went to the tapestries. Bears, wolves, marmots, snow hares, pastoral scenes from the mountains surrounding the duchy Above. The corners were embroidered with plants that thrived in the cold and had various medicinal properties. Before I knew it, Eirhan was calling the meeting to a close, and I’d missed more than half. If I’d hoped to win anyone to my side during the cabinet meeting, I was a dismal failure.
I left the room first so that Eirhan couldn’t block my exit and make me feel useless, or come up with more ways for me to flirt with Sigis. I was tempted to give Reko the parliament he wanted so I’d never have to sit through a meeting like that again.
As I entered the royal wing, Viljo trotted up. “Your Grace, I have been given the preliminary results of the audit. Everything seems to be in order. Bailli is… scrupulous with his funds and how he tracks them.”
I bit my lip instead of letting Viljo bear the brunt of my frustration. I didn’t have time to chase after the wrong culprits. “Maybe he has a second set of books.”
“It’s possible, Your Grace.” Viljo sounded as though he believed the exact opposite.
“Do you have a list of transactions involving magic?” I asked.
“Yes. The last person to requisition magic from the treasury was Minister Farhod, four weeks ago, and that was an order of raw magic.”
Out of the question. It wasn’t Farhod. “Who else?”
“Your Grace, may I say something?” Viljo asked.
You just did. “Go ahead.”
“Minister Olloi reported broken locks on the gate to Below. Two, maybe three, weeks back. He said nothing had been vandalized or stolen, but…”
But no one would break into the entrance to Below for reasons of theft. They’d break the gate to go… Below. “I presume the guard told someone.”
“An official report was made, which went to the captain, Your Grace. He would have told Prime Minister Eirhan if he felt the crime constituted a threat.”
So. Not only did I need to ask Below for help breaking the curse, but I needed to accuse them of hosting visitors behind my back. Wonderful.
Aino waited in my rooms, fixing one of my shoes so that the iron spike on the side was firmly attached again. “Farhod came by,” she said.
“What did he say?”
“He didn’t look happy. Said something about a fluid increase in the lungs. Certainly nothing about your family getting better.”
I tried to bury my frustration on that, too. It wasn’t Farhod’s fault that the search for the remedy was going poorly. “Anything else?”
“There’s a message on your desk.” She frowned at my shoe.
I went over. My heart skipped a beat as I spotted the pale green paper.
Your request for an audience has been granted.
Yours in friendship, etc.
“Get me a change of clothes,” I told Aino. “We’re going Below.”
Olloi met me at the entrance to Below. His unblinking eyes examined my hands, then my belt. “Your Grace risks great offense by going Below without a gift.” Olloi unlocked the rusted padlock that secured the iron bar across the door.
“I’ll have one sent. Below knows we’re living in unusual circumstances.” Besides, could they afford to offend me? I was the head of a sovereign nation, one that Below relied on for any contact with the world above. “How fast does that lock rust?”
“One or two years, Your Grace. We’re due a replacement.”
“Hmm.” Had Viljo been lying to me about the break-in, or was Olloi lying to me now?
I caught a flash of silver beneath the dark water. My problems Above would have to wait. Aino helped me out of my dress and finished pinning my hair to my head. “Are you sure about this?” she murmured.