Queen of Sorrows--Part Three, Chapter Five

[Evie]

Previous chapter: https://rhemuthcastle.com/index.php/topic,3487.0.html


Chapter Five

June 17, 1465
Along the Tralian Coast
Near the mouth of the Beldour River
Early afternoon

The Corwyn fleet had made good time after leaving the Port of Coroth under cover of darkness, making it to the waters around the Île d'Orsal by daybreak, some of their ships sailing past it to nearby Orsalis to check on conditions at the Hort's winter palace of Vár Adony on the mainland as well.  Two other ships had been sent even further northeast, around the Tralian coast towards where the mouths of the Twin Rivers forked. Where the rivers forked, the southwesternmost point of Beldouria began, the port town of Furstánán gleaming in the distance.

Captain Conor O'Flynn, youngest brother to the Earl of Derry, captain of the lead ship and in charge of this particular mission, was very familiar with Furstánán. He wished he was heading there now. Instead, he was heading for the opposite bank, the Tralian stretch of coastline just a little beyond Furstánán where the lands belonging to Comte Réhon-Rogan von Horthy lay.

The ship's captain was only slightly familiar with the Tralian Count, but he knew the late Duke of Corwyn had liked and respected the man, which was more than could be said about Duke Alain's feelings for some of the other Tralian lords. Since Captain O'Flynn had met the man a few times before and would recognize him if he saw him again, the current Duke of Corwyn had asked him to head up the expedition to warn the Count about the coup that had taken place in Horthánthy the night before, knowing the man's days were numbered if Lord Davorin was behind it.

A peek through his spyglass gave him the sinking feeling that they had arrived at Nouveau Richemont too late. Where there used to be a large, palatial estate, there was only a charred ruin.

Still, it was possible the Comte de Nouveau Richemont had managed to escape. At any rate, Duke Joscelin would want to know as much as possible about what had happened here and whatever evidence they might discover to show who had been behind it. He turned to his lieutenant.

"Alert the soldiers down below that we'll be putting into that small cove up ahead. Have the men on deck ready the boats. It looks like the enemy has managed to get here before us, so keep a wary eye out for them when we drop anchor."

#

June 17, 1465
The Palace of Horthánthy
A dungeon cell
Mid-afternoon

Lord Davorin was beginning to feel the effects of very little sleep and extreme frustration. He had been able to extract a little information from the Queen's Chaplain and his wife, her Mistress of the Robes, but what tiny bit he had managed to force them to reveal had been little more than what he already knew. Most of what the priest knew, he had hidden behind strong shields along with the secrets of the confessional, which would also be very handy information to have access to, except that his tentative probes at that portion of the priest's mind revealed that forcing his way past that barrier was likely to result in the man's immediate death, thus ensuring the destruction of the very information Davorin sought.

He briefly considered turning the Marley woman over to his hired men, thinking that being forced to witness the violation of his wife might loosen the priest's lips, but Davorin knew the mercenaries were likely to be too brutal for his liking. He had already seen the evidence of that this morning, after his daughter had allowed them free reign over the other ladies of the Queen's household. It was not that he cared for the women's well-being–after all, they were all destined for execution–but it would hardly do to present them to the general public looking battered and half-dead already when they were brought to the headsman's block. That might generate too much sympathy for their plight, rather than indignation at the thought that they had risen up against their rightful sovereign and conspired to commit regicide. He'd had to find some other diversion for the mercenaries, lest they spend any more of their energy wreaking more havoc he would need to smooth over, so he had set them to building some gallows instead. In theory, most of the captured prisoners were entitled to a swordsman and a sharp blade instead, being noble born, but a few were mere commoners. Those could swing from a rope instead. That would make it easier to put them up for display later.

He could Mind-Rip the information from these two captives, and as a last resort, that idea was not completely off the table, but that would result in having to have their mindless shells carried to the courtyard later for execution. Again, while that would certainly demonstrate to the watching world the great severity of the crimes he had proclaimed them guilty of, and would certainly prevent them from making any denials of their guilt, that too could serve to stir up public sentiment against him. No, tempted though he was, he needed the good will of the people, at least for the moment. He must be seen by the good folk of Orsal and Tralia to be their savior, the great leader who stepped in to exact well-deserved justice at a moment of grave crisis. Once he had fully won their trust and the transition from Adémar's reign to the purported reign of his son Létald was complete, his own role as Orsal and Tralia's Regent secure, his own son born and thriving, and a spare on the way, then it would be time for him to tighten his grip. Adémar's son would suffer some form of tragic death, the people would grieve for a time, but by then none would question Lord Davorin's claim on the Hortic Throne. By then, the young princesses might even be old enough to marry off, or at least for him to arrange betrothals to those whose good will it would be advantageous to cultivate. The eldest was shaping up to look much like her dam; finding a willing suitor for her would hardly be difficult. As for the younger, well, she took more after Adémar than her mother's more exotic beauty, but who knows, she might turn out pretty enough also. Only time would tell. If he failed to find a suitable husband for her, he could marry her to his son; that would strengthen his dynastic claim if he someday had a grandson who was as much Von Horthy as Bogdanovich.

After the throne was indisputably his, he could be as lenient or as harsh as he chose to be.

There was a quiet knock on the door. "Enter," he said, turning away from the Marley woman. There was little more to be learned here. The two nursemaids would be far easier to wring information from anyway, being mere humans.

"Where did you want these two, my lord?" asked the Jouvian merc, a blood-stained bundle tucked beneath each arm. Lord Davorin realized belatedly that they were the two extraneous infants he had asked the men to deal with.

"Bloody hell!" he murmured, feeling momentarily unnerved. How many people had seen the man and recognized what it was he was carrying?  "Just...stack them in the corner there." Yet another damn mess he would need to cover up later!

The dolt complied readily enough, turning to face his employer with a look of complete nonchalance, as if he'd just taken a leisurely stroll and it was just another Sunday. Lord Davorin realized that as useful as the Corps Phénix had been, they could swiftly become just as much of a liability. "Has the mercenary unit I sent to Nouveau-Richemont reported back yet?" he asked the man.

"Oh yeah," the barbaric buffoon said with a shrug. "They reported in about an hour ago."

"You might have let me know earlier," Lord Davorin said with forced patience. "Which cell have they put Réhon-Rogan in?" He would go there next. It would give him great satisfaction to inform his distant cousin of his impending execution personally.

"Oh, they haven't. The man scarpered off with his family. But they set his manor to the torch and made sure it burned hot enough that it should be difficult to prove their bodies aren't in with all the rest."

Davorin stared at the man. "That was not what I ordered! I said to either bring the man back alive for execution or make certain he was dead and bring back his body for display! What the hell good will it do me to have a pile of smouldering bodies at Nouveau-Richemont, unless one of those bodies belongs to the Comte?! Tell them to go find him!  And what of the fugitives hiding out at Lady Marija's dacha? The missing ladies-in-waiting? The boy, Dmitri? Lady Marija? Queen Bloody Swiving Miranda? Have they been retrieved yet?!"

"That unit ain't returned yet." The merc looked unconcerned. "Give 'em a few more hours. Sometimes the men like to have a bit of extra fun, spice things up a bit. You were planning on killing 'em anyway, ouais?"  He shrugged. "They'll turn up with your missing fugitives soon enough."

#

June 17, 1465
The Palace of Horthánthy
A servants' tunnel
Mid-afternoon

After Lord Davorin's noon announcement in the grand Central Courtyard and their brief conference with each other afterwards behind the scullery, Duke Joscelin had broken up his men into four smaller teams, each headed by one of the Deryni among them, the appearance of their clothing changed to suit whatever would blend in best with their purported duties and their surroundings, in order to scout out whatever they could discover about the whereabouts of the prisoners and the Royal children as well as any ways into and out of the buildings where they were being held. Any other news of interest that they were to overhear, they were to bring back to their Duke as well. At the third hour of the clock, they were to join forces once again at a particular out-of-the-way section of the servants' passages that they had discovered in their earlier wanderings, or if that did not appear to be a safe place to meet at the appointed time, then two other locations were to be tried next until all the entire party was back together.

The four teams had finally returned from their explorations. Joss fought down a surge of impatience as he led them into a storeroom, where they busied themselves with pretending to take inventory of supplies, just in case someone else should happen to peek in. It had been important for them to get as much information as possible, yet he was very conscious that time was running out for at least some of the prisoners that Lord Davorin had captured, if not all.

The leader of the first team, a young officer named Rafe De L'Isle, reported some success in finding out where the prisoners from the Queen's Apartment were being kept, although his team had not managed to figure out a way into that section of the palace yet, it being under very heavy guard. They had also learned that not all of the Queen's ladies had been accounted for, so it was possible that a few had managed to escape by means of the same Portal the Queen and Lady Marija had used, although it was less certain how many still remained to be rescued.

The leader of the second team, Marc of Kiltuin, had other, more disquieting news to share. For  some reason the prisoners taken from the Royal Nursery had been imprisoned apart from the ladies of the Queen's Household, in a part of the main Keep that appeared to be impregnable. Those prisoners were believed to include the Queen's chaplain, the Earl of Marley's youngest daughter, and either two or three nursemaids, depending on which rumor one chose to believe. Even more disturbing had been the report from a young chambermaid that she had witnessed two babies wrapped in bloody linens being carried into the building where these prisoners were believed to be held for questioning personally supervised by Lord Davorin.

The leader of the third team, Bennet of Northgate, informed the others that his team had discovered all three of the royal children were still alive, although they were being held in the so-called Lord Protector's personal apartment for the time being along with a nursemaid who might or might not have been among their original caregivers. A posted notice had also been spotted that additional nursery help was sought by Lady Mirna, who was rumored to possibly be either Lord Davorin's wife or at least his paramour now, even though she purportedly shared quarters with Lady Jesaminda and Lady Arijana instead. They had also discovered that all three ladies had once been Ladies-in-Waiting to Queen Miranda, although all three had been dismissed from the Queen's Household several months before the young heir's birth. Whether that dismissal had led to the three ladies harboring a grudge against the Queen, or whether their dismissal had been the result of some pre-existing hard feelings between that faction of ladies and their royal mistress, it was harder to determine, though given that it seemed to be universally acknowledged that Lady Jesaminda had been one of the late Hort's most influential paramours for a time, Bennet's personal opinion was that there had been an enmity of long standing between Lord Davorin's daughter and the Hortic Queen, and that it had been the imminent arrival of the Hort's long-awaited heir that had served as the fulcrum to tilt his preference more permanently in the Queen's favor.

Joss himself had led the fourth team. They had also discovered the whereabouts of the Royal Children. What's more, he thought he might have discovered a best time for entering Lord Davorin's apartment in order to spirit them away when the apartment was least likely to be occupied by others besides their nursemaid and the children, although figuring out the best method to gain entry was likely to be a more difficult problem. Getting the children out safely and undetected would be another. One bit of fortuitous news was that Lord Davorin's apartment was directly connected to his daughter's, so it might be possible to use the Transfer Portal that Lord Jourdain had discovered in Lady Jesaminda's apartment to get the children to safety if Lord Davorin didn't also have a portal of his own. It seemed unlikely that they would have two portals in such close proximity to each other, though anything was certainly possible.

#

June 17, 1465
Along the Tralian Coast
Near the mouth of the Beldour River
Mid-afternoon

Captain Conor O'Flynn and his men had not found any sign of the missing Count of Nouveau Richemont, unless one of the charred bodies discovered in the remains of the burned manor belonged to the late Hort's distant cousin, but judging by what remained of their clothing, these appeared to be primarily liveried servants. A few armored corpses littered the grounds here and there, some also wearing the Count's livery, while others were clad in brigandine armor with a phoenix emblem embroidered on a badge that marked them out as members of the same corps. Something about the badge brought back a memory; if he wasn't mistaken, King Nicholas and Queen Catalina had been attacked by men wearing the same or similar badges when they'd been midway between Andelon and Fianna en route to Rhemuth to prepare for their wedding. He had not been in that traveling party, but he had heard the tales about their misadventure months later, around some war camp bonfire or another when the Corwyn troops had fought alongside the King's during the War of Four Armies.

Using his belt knife, he cut one of the badges off a dead merc's armor to bring it back to Gwynedd. He felt certain that both the Duke and the King would want to know what manner of men the Hort's killer had hired to assist him in his work.

"Captain O'Flynn, there's a band of riders heading this way!" one of his men shouted in warning. He looked up sharply, thinking the mercenaries had returned, but the lead rider heading towards them unfurled a banner that he recognized. He believed this man to be a friend rather than foe. Given the present uncertainty of Tralia's political situation at the moment, he hoped his assessment was correct.

"It's the Duke of Bočna, the Count's brother-by-marriage," he shouted back. "He's likely an ally, so don't provoke any hostilities." Then again, their presence on the site of the burning remains of the Count's former home might cause the Duke's men to wonder if they had been the ones to set fire to it. An uncomfortable thought, that!  "But be prepared to mount a defense if we must." HIs men gathered by his side, watching warily as the Tralian party made its way swiftly towards them.

#

June 17, 1465
Lady Marija's dacha
The undercroft
Late afternoon

Lady Ailis MacArdry Montrose wiped her sweaty brow on her sleeve. She was exhausted and had already been forced to resort to using a fatigue-banishing spell, but there was no time for her to rest.

She and Lady Anna had taken turns trying to bring the other ladies-in-waiting to safety. After learning the Portal signature here, Ailis had gone back to the Queen's apartment for Jadviga and Katja, then Anna had gone next, bringing Eva back with her. Ailis had intended to return for others next, seeing that Anna's energy was beginning to wane, being only partially trained and unused as she was to making more than the occasional Portal jump, and never before with more than one passenger in tow. But Eva had arrived in a panic, completely unnerved by the suddenness of the magical leap into the unknown, and there had been the brief delay caused by attempting to calm her down. By the time Ailis had exerted temporary control over the girl's mind to calm her, Anna had gone back to Horthánthy again, never to return. After an uncomfortably long wait, although it had likely been less than a full minute, Ailis had nearly gone back for her, but Jadviga and Katja held her back despite Svetlana's pleading, eventually convincing the others that the most likely explanation for Anna's failure to return with anyone else was that Lord Davorin's men had finally managed to overcome the guards and made their way into the Queen's apartment and the Royal Chapel, and therefore it was too late to rescue Anna or their remaining companions. They would simply have to trust that Lord Davorin's hired men would honor the customary tradition of allowing the remaining ladies to claim sanctuary on consecrated ground. Hopefully the Lord Chief Chamberlain would allow them to return to their families once he discovered the Queen was no longer in their midst.

Outside, Ailis could hear the distant sounds of fighting, drawing her back from her memories of their arrival to the present moment. Lady Marija's dacha had started out as a fortified manor when it was first built some three hundred years earlier, but that had been in an age before handgonnes and pots-de-fer. Fortunately there had been wards built into the walls–wards which had been replenished very recently, quite likely by the Hort himself after the death of his young daughter–but even the strongest of Deryni wards were not completely resistant to the level of bombardment the manor's external walls had been receiving in the past few hours.

It had become very clear several hours earlier that the people sheltered within those walls could not remain here for much longer, even though a few of the mercenaries laying siege to the dacha had done them the huge favor of accidentally blowing themselves up with one of their own siege cannons, thus reducing their own numbers. Lady Ailis had originally considered the idea of following the Queen's lead and trying to bring the other ladies-in-waiting to safety in Gwynedd, but unfortunately the only other Portal signature she was familiar enough with to make the attempt was at her family home in Transha, too far a leap for her to dare to make repeatedly in her fatigued state while attempting to carry others through as well.

Fortunately she was not the only trained Deryni among those seeking refuge at Lady Marija's country estate. Lady Jadviga was also Deryni, and if anything, even better trained than herself. When they had first ventured upstairs shortly after their arrival, after Lady Svetlana had informed Lady Marija's senechal of the Hort's death and Lady Marija's escape with her son and the Queen to Gwynedd and alerted Marija's household to the dangers they all faced, Lady Jadviga had made the welcome discovery that they were relatively near her uncle's ducal seat of Bočna, and even closer to Comte Réhon-Rogan's lands, who was certainly no friend to Lord Davorin. If there was a portal at Nouveau-Richemont, Jadviga was unaware of it, and at any rate if Lord Davorin had been the mastermind behind the plot against the Hort as the Queen suspected, it was likely that the Lord Chief Chamberlain would be sending his hirelings against the Comte next, if he hadn't already. Therefore, the decision had been made to appeal to the Duke of Bočna for help.

After Lady Svetlana had worked with the steward and the head chambermaid to gather suitable garments for all the Queen's Ladies to wear, so they need not present themselves to the Duke as refugees while clad only in the sleepwear they'd all fled in, Lady Jadviga had made the short portal jump to Bočna. It had been several long, heartstopping hours before she had finally returned along with two of the Duke's men, leaving them all to fear in the meantime that the worst had happened, that Lord Davorin's men had taken Bočna as well. Instead, it had turned out that Jadviga had simply been detained by the Duke's loyal guards, her intentions unclear to them and her pleas for help appearing spurious, possibly some sort of ruse to get close to the Duke, possibly in order to assassinate him. By the time her uncle had returned to the castle and discovered his niece was being held under lock and key in a warded cell until he could return to sort the matter out, Lord Davorin's mercenaries had already arrived at the dacha and were laying siege to its warded walls.

Now the few Deryni among them had spent the past hour taking turns evacuating Lady Marija's remaining household, keeping only enough of her guards at the dacha spending their arrows every so often to convince the mercenaries outside that all were still here, trapped within the perimeter of their siege. In the meantime, as Marija's household staff had slowly been brought to safety along with what few valuables and necessary possessions they could bring with them, more of the Duke's soldiers were being brought in along with their own light artillery, their intent being to take the remaining mercenaries by surprise once the wards eventually fell and they attempted to take the dacha.

Ailis almost wished she could remain to see the reaction of Lord Davorin's hirelings once the trap was sprung, but she could barely stand upright anymore as it was. She took Katja's hand, drawing strength from her for the final leap to Bočna.

#

June 17, 1465
The Palace of Horthánthy
Outside the Servants' Gate
Late Afternoon

Queen Miranda, still in her guise as a young man of common birth, had decided her best chance of gaining entry into the Palace might be to check to see if there were any written notices posted outside of the Servants' Gate informing the townspeople of any opportunities to enter service at Horthánthy Palace. It was not the typical means of seeking applicants, to be sure, but at some point Adémar had decided to insist on at least a dame school level of education for those who sought to work at the Palace, and thus among other simple tests, applicants for all service positions were required to prove at least a basic level of literacy. He had reasoned that if the servants could read and write, it would be an easy enough matter for those in charge of supervising them to provide them with written instructions if needed to bring all staff up to a uniform standard of performance. As Adémar's ideas went, it had not been the worst. Personally, it mattered less to Miranda if a chambermaid or a cook's assistant could read or write, so long as she knew how to tidy up a room or prepare meat or vegetables for the evening feast, but she could see how literacy might be an asset to either, allowing the chambermaid to take special note of a particular lady's special preferences, or allowing a cook's assistant to follow a simple recipe without having to be told step by step what to do next by the head chef.

If a potential applicant did not possess at least basic literacy, he or she could not read the postings on the notice board, so being able to ask after the specific positions posted at the gate was considered to be the initial test to gain entry. In theory, if an applicant managed to be allowed in through the gate, the next step would be a brief audience with the Lord Chief Chamberlain so he could determine the applicant's suitability for the position, but it had been years since Lord Davorin had held such audiences himself, preferring to delegate the tedious task to others instead. If it was a woman seeking women's work within the Palace walls, there was a small chance she might be brought in to see Lady Jesaminda instead, but again, the risk of that was almost equally low.

To Miranda's dismay, there were very few postings currently hanging outside the gate, and what few there were listed tasks that relied more on physical strength than intellect. While she was reasonably strong for a woman of gentle birth, she would not be capable of doing the heavy lifting of stored goods that these postings required. She was about to turn away, thinking she would need to figure out some other means of entering the Palace unnoticed, when the postern door opened and a maidservant walked through it, unrolling a new notice to nail it to the board. She saw Miranda standing nearby, and seeing only an unfamiliar young man of slight stature, she shook her head with a smile.

"Sorry, there's naught for the likes of you today. Just moving sacks and crates and other heavy lifting work, and this new posting for a nursemaid. Best check back again tomorrow." Casting a quick glance over her shoulder, she added in a quiet whisper. "Or check in Orsalis instead. This ain't the safest place to be right now, with His Lordship in charge o' things, his hired thugs out an' about causing mayhem, and heads about to roll."

#

June 17, 1465
The Palace of Horthánthy
A dungeon cell
Late afternoon

They weren't going to get out of this alive. Lady Genevieve had made her peace with that now. She had been terrified earlier, when she and Gareth had been arrested. When the mercenaries had dragged them away along with two of the nursemaids after tearing the children from their arms. She had known that Miranda's children would likely be allowed to live, being far too valuable to Lord Davorin as hostages–the boy Hort without whom his claim to the Regency would come to nothing and the young Princesses who could be traded for valuable alliances someday. But she had feared for her own little Brendan and for Ciardha, her dear friend Ailis's son, the only child Ailis would ever have by her late husband, Laird Lachlan Montrose of Drumlithie, lost in the recent War of Four Armies when the Duke of Cassan's forces had taken heavy losses against the men of Nördmarcke and Eistenmarcke.

She had not been willing to give the usurper the satisfaction of seeing her tears, not even when his hireling had brought the dead infants back, dumping them in a corner of their cell as if they were mere refuse. After they'd left, she'd broken down briefly in Gareth's arms, biting her clenched fists to stifle the sobs that threatened to escape her lips, not wishing their guards to overhear her and gloat. But now her tears were all spent. Now that Brendan and Ciardha were dead, their tender ages not sparing them from the brutality of the men who had taken them all captive, Genie had nothing left to lose. Nothing aside from her beloved husband, but they had spent what moments they could doing their best to prepare for what seemed inevitable now. After Lord Davorin had finished his incessant questioning and had finally left them alone, Gareth had taken them each to one side and heard their whispered confessions. He had no priestly stole with him, no holy oil with which to give them their Last Rites, but the usurper could not take his faith from him, nor steal his devotion to the tiny flock within his care. If the traditional forms were somewhat lacking, under the circumstances she felt certain God would understand.

Death would be a mercy now. She only hoped it would be quick.

She drew strength from her husband's loving embrace. "Father Emrys," she whispered, "I love you."

A kiss, feather-light, landed on her red-gold hair. "I have been the most fortunate man alive, to be allowed to wed you, my brave Genie."

Lord Davorin's hired thugs came for Gareth first. She had suspected that they would. That gave her a little more time to prepare herself.

Crouching down, using the wall to help her support herself, for she was bruised and battered from her captors' treatment of her, she picked up the two slain boys, cradling one in each arm. When the guards returned for her, she refused to give them up, but she went with her captors willingly.

The crowd in the courtyard fell silent as she emerged into the sunlight, blinking against the brilliant sun as her captors led her to the block. Lord Davorin stood before her, his face reddening with fury as he realized what she was holding in plain sight of all who had gathered by his order to witness her execution.

Gareth's lifeless body lay to one side. She must not let that distract her. She clutched the children even closer, strengthening her resolve. The nightmare would be over soon.

"My Lady," said the executioner, looking disconcerted, "Pray forgive me. If you would please put down your children, kneel, and place your head upon the block...."

She stood straight and tall, her defiant gaze never leaving Lord Davorin's face. "I am a Coris of Marley," she proclaimed proudly, her voice carrying clearly over the stunned crowd. "We do not bow the knee to a usurper." Genevieve turned to look at the executioner with a faint smile. "You shall have to strike my head off as I stand, sir. My neck is bare. I'll do my best not to flinch."

Next chapter: https://rhemuthcastle.com/index.php/topic,3490.0.html

[DerynifanK]

Hope this will turn the people against Davorin

[Evie]

Hope this will turn the people against Davorin

It certainly isn't going to help him!

[tmcd]

Why kill the two babies?

[Evie]

Why kill the two babies?

That wasn't in the original plan, but as Lord Davorin said, they were extraneous to his needs, and I couldn't imagine him caring about the welfare of two soon-to-be orphaned, high maintenance children who would be constant reminders to others of the people he needed to eliminate to maneuver himself to the top. Granted, he likely hoped they would be quietly disappeared, but that's not the kind of guys he is dealing with, and he's quickly discovering that the mercs he hired are not exactly the best folk he might have partnered with for this mission.

Also, as DFK has pointed out, the general public is more likely to look favorably at the execution of evildoers believed to have conspired to commit regicide, but no one is going to believe that two toddlers were guilty of such a crime. So by allowing the mercs to kill them, and the mercs not simply disposing of the bodies discreetly, that gave Genie the perfect opportunity to get some small measure of justice by undermining Davorin even as she was being led out for her very public execution.

[DerynifanK]

Genie was a lovely person. Hated to see her murdered for no real reason. I look forward to seeing Davirin pay for his evil deeds.

[Evie]

Genie was a lovely person. Hated to see her murdered for no real reason. I look forward to seeing Davirin pay for his evil deeds.

At least she, like her great-great-something-grandsire Brendan, helped to redeem the Coris name that Bran Coris formerly dishonored, ironically by bowing his knee to a would-be usurper!

[Demercia]

And her great great something grandmother Richenda would be so proud of her

[Demercia]

In a way I feel more sorry for Lady Ailis, having to live with all that loss. And of course the Queen, who left them.  Not that she had any choice, but I doubt that will comfort her.

[Evie]

In a way I feel more sorry for Lady Ailis, having to live with all that loss. And of course the Queen, who left them.  Not that she had any choice, but I doubt that will comfort her.

Yup. The Queen, who ought to be somewhere very safe right now, but who has just returned home in the midst of all this.... 

Fortunately Lady Ailis got away safely. Or did she? I guess we'll find out in a chapter or two!  Though yes, she has been through a lot in the past few months, though at least at the moment she is only aware of her first loss, not this second one.

[Jerusha]

Seems to me Lord Davorin did not think through the potential reaction in Gwynedd and Marley at the execution of Genie and the death of the children.  That could be one former alliance shot to you can guess where.

[Evie]

Seems to me Lord Davorin did not think through the potential reaction in Gwynedd and Marley at the execution of Genie and the death of the children.  That could be one former alliance shot to you can guess where.

Since his plan involved accusing Queen Miranda with conspiring with the Regent to murder the Hort, I would imagine Davorin figured that alliance was beyond salvaging anyway. It's not like King Nicholas would think, "Well, you killed my sister, but hey, at least the Earl of Marley's daughter and grandson and the Earl of Transha's grandson are fine, so OK, we're still cool."