Kushiel's Mercy

known.”
    I could tell there was no comfort I could offer that Drustan would accept. Not now. I bowed to him, then left in search of Sidonie.
    I located Kratos first. He was seated outside one of the chirugeons’ tents, his thigh bandaged, telling our tale in broken D’Angeline to a group of wide-eyed soldiers who had suffered minor wounds. I paused, listening to his words.
    “. . . put her hand on his and zzzzt !” Kratos gestured. “They push the sword into Astegal’s black heart.”
    “You saw it?” a soldier asked in awe.
    “Oh, yes.” Kratos nodded, then caught my eye and shrugged. I smiled and said nothing.
    Let him tell the story. Let him give them heroes: let him redirect their horror and self-loathing into anger toward Astegal and Carthage. It could only help.
    I found Sidonie in another one of the tents, holding the hand of a Namarrese marquise whose brow had been gashed badly enough to require stitching, a young woman with a hereditary seat on Parliament she’d scarce warmed before the night of the marvel. The woman would have been tended to earlier, but she was sobbing too hard for the chirurgeons to do their work.
    “. . . thought, thought, thought it was real !” she gasped.
    “I know,” Sidonie murmured, stroking her hand. “So did I, so did we all.”
    “And I don’t want to have a scar !” the woman wailed. “Every time I look in the mirror, I’ll have to see it and remember!”
    Sidonie looked up, feeling my presence.
    “Yes,” I said to the distraught young marquise, sitting on a stool beside her cot. “You will.
    A very faint, tiny scar.” I traced a line on her brow. “And one day you will bear it with pride. You will say to your children and your children’s children, ‘See? I was there that day in Elua’s Square, when Blessed Elua proved that there is no magic so dire it can stand against the force of love. I bear this scar as proof.’”
    The marquise looked at me with fearful hope. “Will I?”
    “You will,” Sidonie promised her.
    It calmed her enough that she allowed the chirurgeons to sew her wound. Once they began, Sidonie rose. She looked tired, but steady.
    “Are matters under control?” she asked.
    I nodded. “Well enough.”
    “We need to send word to Alais and my uncle.” Sidonie shuddered. “They need to know that they’re not under attack. We have to send a messenger.”
    “The Baronesse de Bretel?” I asked.
    “Yes.” She sighed. “I should have seen to freeing them immediately, but it seemed important to be here. Will you come with me?”
    “Of course.” I glanced around. “Where’s Ysandre?”
    Sidonie nodded toward another tent. “Lending comfort. It’s the only thing she trusts herself to do right now, and I daresay she won’t leave until Father’s been seen to. Phèdre and Joscelin are with her. I promised to call an audience as soon as everything’s settled.”
    There was a bit of confusion over who was to attend us. Diderot Duval, the Captain of the Palace Guard, was missing. In the end, Sidonie called for her personal guard. Claude de Monluc flung himself on his knees before her, head bowed, apologizing, to her, to me.
    “Don’t,” Sidonie said firmly. “Just serve.”
    Claude gathered himself. “Yes, your highness.”
    We rode through the City to the royal dungeon. Despite Sidonie’s orders, there were a good many folk wandering the streets, looking dazed and lost. One might have imagined that some great disaster had struck, that a vast earthquake had leveled the City, leaving its inhabitants to question the will of the gods. Most of them were ordinary citizens who had been too far away to hear Sidonie speak in the Square. On seeing us, they pressed close around our escort, begging for answers, halting our progress. Claude and his men had to push them away with their shields.
    “Hold,” Sidonie said to him. She raised her voice. “My people, you will have your answers by the day’s end. That, I promise. But I beg you now to let us pass. We must send word to let the rest of Terre d’Ange know that the City of Elua is no longer under the sway of Carthage’s spell.”
    They fell back slowly, some still shouting pleas. I looked at Sidonie. Her face was drawn with sorrow and weariness. “How are you holding, Princess?”
    “Holding.” She glanced back at me. “And you?”
    “The same,” I said.
    Everything was in disarray everywhere. We reached the royal dungeon and found ourselves besieged by bewildered