Kushiel's Mercy

live, deserved or not, I will coast on the goodwill she and her consort, Joscelin, have engendered among folk who long for heroes.
    But there were others, too.
    Not many, but enough. Knots of folk, here and there, amid the throngs. Men and women of middling age, sporting black armbands, eyes hard and faces grim. Where they congregated, the cheers were dampened. As we passed, they held out their hands, thumbs outthrust, rotating their hands to give the ancient signal of Tiberian imperators.
    Thumbs down.
    Death.
    “Why?” I asked Sidonie as we rode. “Who are they?”
    Her face was pale. “Families of her victims.”
    I swallowed. “My mother’s?”
    “So they reckon, yes. Families with loved ones who died during Skaldia’s invasion.”
    Sidonie met my eyes. Hers were dark and troubled. Cruithne eyes, the only sign of her mixed heritage. “It’s a reminder that your mother was condemned to execution and escaped it. They have a right to their anger, Imriel. No one said this would be easy. Are you willing to face it?”
    “You know I am. Are you?” I asked softly. “The cost you bear is higher.”
    Somewhat shifted in the depths of her black eyes, a certitude settling into place. Her slender shoulders were set and squared. “Yes.”
    “Then I stand beside you.” I kneed the Bastard. My speckled horse snorted and pranced, jostling alongside Sidonie’s palfrey. I reached out to lay my hand over hers briefly.
    “Always. For as long as you will have me, and longer, I will stand at your side.”
    She squeezed my hand. “I know.”
    Neither of us knew for a surety what we would face upon our return. The Queen was opposed to our union, that much was certain. Whether or not she would actively seek to part us, not even Sidonie could say.
    Our company parted ways in the City of Elua. Phèdre and Joscelin, along with their loyal retainers Ti-Philippe and Hugues, would retire to Montrève’s townhouse. I meant to continue on to the Palace with Sidonie and her personal guard. I’d had quarters there, once. Queen Ysandre had granted them to me herself, delighted with my impending marriage to Dorelei, niece of the Cruarch of Alba. Of course, she’d not known I was already in love with her daughter.
    She knew now. I didn’t know if my quarters still existed. I didn’t even know if I’d be welcome at the Palace. Still, there was no way to find out but to try.
    “You’re sure?” Phèdre asked, searching my face. “You could stay with us and send word to Ysandre seeking audience. It might be easier.”
    I shook my head. “I’m too old to hide behind your skirts, Phèdre. Or your sword,” I added to Joscelin.
    He snorted. “When did you ever?”
    It made me smile a little. “Well, the cloak of your heroism, then. I need to face this myself. Anyway, I’ve broken no law, committed no crime.”
    Phèdre sighed. “As you will, love. I’ll send word to Ysandre myself. Mayhap she’s ready to hear reason.”
    They had been away as long as I had, Phèdre and Joscelin; bound first on a mysterious errand, then setting out in pursuit of me after learning I’d nearly been killed in Alba and was hunting the man, the magician, who had done it, who had slain my wife and our unborn son. If anyone could make the Queen hear reason, I thought, it would be Phèdre.
    She had been the one to expose my mother’s treachery in abetting the Skaldi invasion, and she had been the one who gave the testimony that condemned my mother to death.
    But when I thought about those folk on the street, their thumbs pointing downward in a stark reminder that Melisande Shahrizai had evaded justice, I wasn’t so sure.
    “Mayhap,” I said. “We’ll see.”
    She hugged me in farewell. “Come to dinner on the morrow and we’ll talk. Everyone will want to see you.”
    “I will,” I promised.
    I turned in the saddle to glance after them as they rode toward the townhouse. If Phèdre and Joscelin could weather everything that fate had thrown at them, I reckoned Sidonie and I had a chance. Sidonie caught my eye when I turned back and read my thoughts.
    “It’s just politics,” she said. “Not hordes of Skaldi, shapeshifting magicians, or deadly madmen bent on destroying the world.”
    “True,” I said. “There is that.”
    As it transpired, I needn’t have worried over our reception, which was cordial and proper.
    After all, Sidonie was returning from a state mission, representing her mother in Alba—
    and it was true, I’d done