The Tyrant's Law (Dagger and the Coin)

nailed in one place to keep it from straying. It made the coming slaughter feel cleaner. To see that the enemy came from outside and that they would be brought to their knees by Antean strength was a return to the way things were supposed to be. Even Geder found it relieving.
    On those years when the first thaw came after the end of the hunt, tradition called for a final occasion. A ball, a feast, the comparing of honors. Canl Daskellin held the feast in a massive glassed ballroom, braziers burning at the ends of every table keeping the air thick and warm. Outside the massive network of glass, the sea was the color of slate flecked with white, the setting sun a glory of orange and gold. Geder sat at the high table, Prince Aster at one side, Basrahip at the other. It was like something from an old poem, and these men toasting each other and trading barbed rhymes, competing with extemporaneous speeches on patriotism and piety and bragging about how many women they’d bedded in their youth were the dragons of old reborn in human form. It made him wish that his own father attended the hunt, just so that he could be sitting at Geder’s side and watching it all.
    And yet he was not wholly at peace.
    The seating was, as always, arranged by the status within the court. The nearer to the high table, Geder, and Prince Aster, the more honored. Canl Daskellin, as host, shared the high table, as did his wife and his daughter, Sanna. Sanna wore a gown that left Geder feeling something between embarrassed and excited, and kept smiling at him. Then, one table farther, Ternigan and his family along with Lord Skestinin and his son, Bynal. But not his daughter. Geder tried to ignore the absence, but it gnawed at him from the first soup through the pheasant. When the venison came, he excused himself.
    The apartments were in the north wing of the holding, positioned well enough for an honored merchant or the lowest of the noble. When Geder’s personal guard announced him, no servant came to see him in. Sabiha’s hair was the color of wheat, and her cheeks were round and touched with a permanent rose that made her seem younger than she was. The politeness of her expression didn’t match the coolness of her eyes. Now that he’d spent some time with Lord Skestinin, he could see something of him in her, but for the most part she only seemed herself.
    The sitting room was cooler than the ballroom, though it had no windows. The lamp that burned on the mantel put out a dull, buttery light that almost forgave the worn upholstery of the divan. Geder understood. Like everything in court, the amenities of the hunt meant something. Not so many years ago, he would have been given a room much like this, if he’d bothered coming to the hunt at all. Still, its shabbiness disturbed him.
    “Lord Regent,” she said with the curtsey that etiquette required of her.
    “Sabiha,” Geder said. “I was looking for you at the feast. And Jorey. I was looking for both of you.”
    “My father thought that, given the situation, it would be better that we not appear.”
    “Yes,” Geder said. “Well. I was wondering if I might speak with Jorey for a moment. And … and can I have food sent to you? There’s a whole feast, and some of it’s very good, and just because the politics of the things are what they are, it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t eat.”
    He was babbling. He knew it, and he could no more stop it than hold back the springtime. Sabiha’s smile was crooked, and he didn’t know whether she was amused or annoyed. Not that it mattered. He was Lord Regent of Antea. She would accede to his suggestions, whatever they were. If he’d asked her to throw off her gown and dance naked for him, she would have had to or risk the displeasure of the crown. It was odd how having power over people meant not knowing their true minds. Not without Basrahip there to tell him, anyway.
    “It would be kind of you, my lord,” Sabiha said.
    “Geder. Really, in private, call me Geder.”
    “It would be kind of you, Geder,” she said. “Wait here if you’d like. I’ll get Jorey.”
    “Thank you,” Geder said. Sabiha walked into the gloom of the corridor. Geder heard her voice, and then Jorey’s, and then hers again. He thought there was a warmth in them, the sound of husband and wife. His own mother had died when he was a child, so he only had the servants and slaves to judge from, but he thought he’d heard the intimate kindness in the servants’