Kushiel's Mercy

her voice, steadily recounting the story. The rising suspicion and fear she’d felt, the realization that pieces of her memory were missing. New Carthage. How Astegal had left to beseige Amílcar. The attempt on her life. How I had come to know myself, how she had drugged her guards. How I had shown her the golden ring stolen back from Astegal, how I had told her of the spell, how I had revealed myself to her.
    Astegal’s mark etched in her flesh.
    Begging me to cut it out of her.
    “He did,” she said simply. “And I remembered.” Sidonie fell silent. The hall was so quiet, the only sound was that of Lady Denise Grosmaine’s, the Secretary of the Presence, quill scratching softly against paper, recording our history.
    “We made a plan.” I took up the story. “A desperate plan.”
    I told them how Sidonie had tricked Bodeshmun. How I’d killed him, how I’d found the talisman on him. Our harrowing escape, our flight on Captain Deimos’ ship. The pursuit.
    Our fiery entrance into the harbor of Amílcar.
    When I grew hoarse, Sidonie resumed the tale. Back and forth we traded it. Our negotiations with the council in Amílcar, our escape from the besieged city. The Euskerri’s ambush of the Amazigh, the bargain on which the Euskerri insisted. The return to Amílcar and the terrible battle outside its walls. The bloody, costly victory.
    Astegal’s capture.
    Astegal’s death.
    Here and there I saw nods. Kratos had told parts of the story in the Square and some had heard bits and pieces of it. We told the whole of it. Sidonie and I wove the story between us, spinning it with our voices. My weariness vanished as I watched all those faces hanging on our words. We gave them the story as a gift. Its origins reached back into the past. A traitoress had given birth to a boy raised to believe himself a goatherding orphan; two heroes of the realm had rescued a stolen boy and taught him to be good. The rulers of two nations had given birth to two girls and instilled ideals of valor and justice in them.
    And it reached back farther into the tales of those who had shaped them: Anafiel Delaunay, Phèdre’s mentor and patron. A grandfather I’d never known whose vicious charm had shaped my mother’s youth. On and on it spiraled, backward into the mists of time.
    But it would go forward, too. I thought of the words I’d spoken to the injured young noblewoman today. The story would go on and on. One day, Sidonie’s and my great-grandchildren would stand in the Hall of Portraits, holding their own children’s hands.
    They would point to our likenesses and tell our story.
    These were your great-great-grandparents . . .
    And they would live tales of their own, spinning it ever farther into the future. On and on without end.
    My voice faltered and ran dry. I’d reached the present. The balance of our story was yet to be written.
    In the silence that followed, no one spoke. Phèdre was the first to move. She came forward, her eyes shining with too many emotions to name. It didn’t feel right to be raised on the dais, so I stepped down to her level, then helped Sidonie down beside me.
    Phèdre embraced us both in wordless gratitude.
    They all came forward then—Drustan and Ysandre, Joscelin. Ghislain nó Trevalion. All the hundreds of peers and citizens and soldiers packed into the hall. They embraced us and they embraced one another. Raul L’Envers y Aragon was there, his face streaming with tears. His wife, Colette, whom I’d known since I was a youth; her brother, Julian, unfamiliar in an officer’s livery. Mavros. Courtiers and priests and chambermaids, all mingling together. Kratos, a limping hero.
    I embraced them all—I, who had once been a damaged, brooding boy reluctant to be touched. I took them into my heart and held them there.
    And through it all, I felt the lingering echo of the presence of Blessed Elua and his Companions—a promise of hope, a promise of healing, a promise of happiness. And always, I felt Sidonie’s presence, as sure and unfailing as sunlight, her heart bound to mine by a golden cord.
    How long it lasted, I couldn’t say. Three hours, four . . . the moment stretched, endless and infinite.
    It was what was needful.
    It lasted as long as it lasted.
    Slowly, slowly, it moved onward. The throng began to thin. They took our story and our blessing and carried it out into the City. The Queen’s Couriers took Sidonie’s proclamation and rode forth to announce in every quarter that