“Some of the Sacred Hundred—that is the advisory council of high nobles in el rey’s court—have begun pressuring Carlemmo to declare his younger son, Príncipe Julio, to be his rightful heir so that the line of succession will remain direct and unbroken. Alas, Julio is unmarried.”
Isabelle couldn’t imagine that problem would be hard to solve. Every Glasswalker sorceress in Aragoth must have been eager for the chance.
Kantelvar waited for her to respond. When she didn’t, he made a weary noise, like the last air being let out of a bagpipe. “Unfortunately, there are very few female Glasswalkers. For nearly two hundred years Aragoth was under Skaladin rule. During the occupation, the heathens made a point of hunting down and murdering every sorceress they could find to appease their false god. Without saintblooded women to have saintblooded children, the Glasswalkers dwindled almost to extinction. The reason the Sacred Hundred bears that name is that by the time the Skaladin were evicted, there were only a hundred or so Glasswalkers left. In the centuries since, their numbers have climbed, but the population has become rather … closely bred. Once one removes Julio’s first and second cousins from consideration, along with women who are already married or betrothed, the pool of potential applicants dries up to a puddle of infants, crones, and mental defectives.”
Isabelle stood mutely, her skin going slowly cold, for she could see which way the wind of this conversation was blowing, and it made no sense at all.
Kantelvar said, “As there are no candidates left inside Aragoth, we must therefore look outside. That, at last, brings me to you.”
Isabelle was stunned despite having guessed this was coming. “Impossible. It’s forbidden.” She shouldn’t have had to tell that to an artifex. The care and breeding of sorcerers in preparation for the coming of the Savior was the Temple’s raison d’être. Canon law stretching back to the Dominion of Rüul forbade the dilution or intermixing of those bloodlines. Such unions brought forth abominations, the Breaker’s get. It was a rule even Grand Leon, famous for his contempt of the Temple, assiduously observed in the many marriages that bound his empire together.
Was this the trap she was meant to fall into, to be tempted by this offer and thereby prove herself morally corrupt? But surely such a scheme would not require an artifex, and why else would an Aragothic ambassador come to l’?le des Zephyrs?
“Why should it be impossible?” Kantelvar asked.
“I’m Sanguinaire,” Isabelle said. “By birth if not ability.”
“Demonstrably not.” Kantelvar pointed with his staff to the certificate of unhallowedness by her door. “But though you lack sorcery, you are provably saintblooded.”
“An inheritance without property. A broken cup,” she protested, even while her pulse raced and her imagination conjured dreams of sitting on a throne in that strange far-off land, her wise and kind husband lowering a crown onto her head. What would it be like to command deference from her peers instead of being subject to their scorn? And what resources she would have, money and influence to spare!
But no. Such dreams were too dangerous to entertain. No one in all the Risen Kingdoms would permit her such a place in the world, much less offer it to her; more likely she’d be thrown to a mob and torn to pieces.
Kantelvar’s expression was still hidden and his voice was flat, but he straightened his spine and opened his hand like a hidden king rising up to bestow alms on the downtrodden. “Say rather your womb is a fallow field waiting for the right season and the right seed.”
Isabelle said nothing. If she was going to be damned, it would not be by any slip of her tongue.
Undeterred, Kantelvar continued, “Such cross-marriage has the most famous of precedents. During the Dominion of Rüul, the Firstborn Kings faced a similar problem to what Aragoth faces today. There were not enough female saints to ensure the continuation of the saintblooded, so the Firstborn Kings took clayborn women to wife. These Blessed Mothers were not only noble of mind but deemed worthy vessels for divine seed. And lo, they brought forth the Secondborn Kings, whose descendants are still with us today.
“But sorcery is not the only birthright. Sometimes the gift is that sacred fertility, that ability to blend dynasties without corruption. That is the prize that has been handed to you.”
Isabelle boggled. Kantelvar was suggesting that everything wrong with her was right. Almost everything. Her wormfinger twitched in her glove like a caterpillar in its cocoon.
Isabelle shook her head. As little as she wanted to speak, she must not let herself be drawn into Kantelvar’s trap. She would not rebel against society’s judgment. “I was imperfectly formed.” She was flawed. Broken. To aspire to anything else would get her punished.
Kantelvar’s emerald lens focused briefly on her right hand, her wormfinger encased in its glove, before returning to focus on her face. “Your deformity is a mere accident of the womb, not a reflection of your worthiness as a vessel for … for Aragoth’s seed.”
Isabelle wished she had someplace to retreat to, but this was her sanctum. She had nowhere else to go except to fold up inside herself, and there was no more room in there.
Kantelvar continued unopposed, “Princess Isabelle des Zephyrs de l’Empire Céleste, greatest-granddaughter of the saints, will you marry Príncipe Julio de Aragoth and become a Blessed Queen?”
Isabelle licked her lips, trying to come up with some answer that made sense. More than anything, she wanted out of here, away from her father’s grip …
“My father will never allow it,” she realized aloud.
Marie stepped from the corner where she’d been lurking. Her face distorted like thin fabric as her father’s visage pressed through the veil of her flesh. Even occupying Marie’s body, his face was wasted and frail, and his voice was grating as a saw blade.
“In fact,” he said, “an agreement in principle has already been reached. The sale of breeding stock, as it were.”
Dismay filled Isabelle’s heart and she shrank away from the horrific visage, turning her back on both of them. She berated herself for even imagining hope. Of two things in this confusion she was certain: If her father was party to it, she wanted no part in it. And just as surely, she would be given no choice.
Father said, “If you are done inspecting your broodmare, come and let us discuss payment.”
“And what precisely do you imagine you are owed?” Kantelvar asked.
“You bargained for a rump princess, but what you are getting is a Blessed Queen. That is surely worth—”