A Magic of Nightfall

Allesandra ca’Vorl

Elissa ca’Karina…

Allesandra kept hearing the name, every time she spoke to her son in recent days. “Elissa said the most intriguing thing yesterday.. .” or “I was out riding with Elissa…”

Today it was: “I want you to contact Elissa’s parents, Matarh.”

Allesandra looked at Pauli, who was reading reports from the palais in Malacki near the fire in their apartments; the servants had yet to bring in their breakfast. He seemed unsurprised by the announcement-she wondered whether Jan had spoken to him first. “You’ve known the woman for a little more than a week,” Allesandra said, “and she’s significantly older than you. I have to wonder why her family hadn’t made arrangements for a marriage for her years ago. We don’t know enough about her, Jan. Certainly not enough to be opening negotiations with her family.”

Jan had begun shaking his head at her first objection; Pauli appeared to be stifling a laugh. “What does any of that matter, Matarh? I enjoy her company, and I’m not asking to marry her tomorrow. I want you to make the necessary inquiries, that’s all. That way, if everything appears as it should and I still feel the same way in, oh, a month or two…” He shrugged. “I talked to Fynn; he said that the ca’Karina name is well-regarded, and that he would have no objection. He likes Elissa, too.”

Allesandra doubted it-at least not in the way Jan liked the woman. Fynn considered the women of the court nothing more than necessary adornment, like a display of flowers and just as disposable. He himself had no interest in them, and if he ever married (and he would not, if the White Stone earned his money-with that thought, she felt again a stab of doubt and guilt) it would be purely for the political advantage that he gained from it.

Fynn would not marry a woman for love, and decidedly not for lust.

But Jan… She already knew, from palais gossip, that Elissa had spent several nights with her son in his rooms. She also knew that she had no support here: not from Jan, not from Pauli, and certainly not from Fynn, who probably found the affair amusing, especially since it so obviously annoyed Allesandra. Nor, given what she’d begun with Semini, could she say much without hypocrisy. He wants no more than you want, after all. She fixed an indulgent smile on her face, mostly because she knew it would annoy Paul.

“Fine,” she told her son. “I will make inquiries. We will see what her family has to say and proceed from there. Does that satisfy you?”

Jan grinned and flung his arms around Allesandra, as if he were a boy again. “Thank you, Matarh,” he said. “Yes, that satisfies me. Write them today. This morning.”

“Jan, just… be careful and slow with this. Will you?”

He laughed. “Always reminding me to think with my head instead of my heart. I will, Matarh. Of course.”

With that, he was gone. Pauli laughed. “Lost in a glorious infatuation,” he said. “I remember being that way…”

“But not with me,” Allesandra told him.

His smile never wavered; that hurt more than the words. “No,” he said. “Not with you, my dear. With you, I was lost in a glorious transaction.”

He went back to reading the reports.

Allesandra was walking with Semini that afternoon after Second Call, when she saw Elissa’s form flitting through the hallways of the palais, strangely unaccompanied. “Vajica ca’Karina,” she called out. “A moment…”

The young woman looked surprised. She hesitated for a moment, like a rabbit searching for a line of escape from a hound, then came over to them. She bowed to Allesandra and gave the sign of Cenzi to Semini. “A’Hirzg, Archigos,” she said. “It’s so good to see the two of you.” Her face failed to reflect her words.

“I’m sure,” Allesandra told her. “I should tell you that my son came to me this morning regarding you.”

Her eyebrows lifted over her strange, light eyes. “Ah?”

“He asked that I contact your family.”

The eyebrows climbed yet higher, and her hand touched the collar of her tashta as a faint hint of rose colored her neck. “A’Hirzg, I swear I didn’t ask him to speak to you.”

“If I thought you had, we wouldn’t be having this conversation,” Allesandra told her. “But since he’s made the request, I’ve done as he asked and written a letter to your family; I gave it to my courier not a turn of the glass ago. I thought you should know, so you might contact them as well and tell them that I await their return letter.”

Her response seemed strange to Allesandra. She would have expected a flattering response, or perhaps a blushing smile of pleasure. But Elissa blinked, and she turned her face away for a breath, as if her thoughts were elsewhere. “Why… thank you, A’Hirzg. I’m flattered beyond words, of course. And your son is a most wonderful man. I am truly honored by his attention and his interest.”

Allesandra glanced at Semini. His gaze was puzzled. “But?” Semini asked, his voice a low rumble.

A quick duck of the head, so that Elissa was staring at Allesandra’s feet, not at them. “I have deep feelings for your son, A’Hirzg. I truly do. But contacting my family…” Her tongue flickered over her lips, as if they were suddenly dry. “This is too fast.”

Semini cleared his throat. “Is there something in your past, Vajica, something the A’Hirzg should know?”

“No!” The word came out as an explosion of breath, and the young woman’s head came up again. “There’s… nothing.”

“You sleep with him,” Allesandra said, and the frank comment widened Elissa’s eyes and caused Semini to inhale loudly through his nostrils. “If you don’t intend marriage, Vajica, then how are you different from one of the grandes horizontales?”

The other young women of the court would have recoiled. They would have stammered. This one just stared flatly at Allesandra, her chin lifting slightly, her pale gaze hardening. “I might ask the A’Hirzg-with the Archigos’ pardon-how someone in a loveless marriage is so different from a grande horizontale? One is paid for her name, the other for her…” A brief flicker of a smile. “… attentions. The grande horizontale, at least, has no illusions about her arrangements. Either way, the bedchamber is merely a place of commerce.”

Allesandra laughed, suddenly and loudly. She applauded Elissa, three quick, loud strikes of cupped palm against palm. The exchange reminded her of her time in Nessantico with Archigos Ana, who also had a facile mind and would challenge Allesandra in their discussions in unexpected ways and with bald speech. Semini was gaping, but Allesandra nodded to the young woman. “There aren’t many who would answer me that directly, Vajica,” she told the woman. “You’re lucky I’m someone who appreciates that. But…” She stopped, and the laughter under her voice vanished as quickly as glacier ice in the summer heat. “I love my son fiercely, Vajica, and I will protect him from making a mistake if I see a need to do so. Right now, you are merely a diversion for him, and it remains to be seen whether that interest will last the season. Whatever might eventually happen between the two of you, it will not be your decision to make. Is that clear enough?”

“As the spring rain, A’Hirzg,” Elissa answered. She gave a curt bow of her head. “If the A’Hirzg will excuse me…?”

Allesandra waved a hand, and Elissa bowed again, clasping hands to forehead toward Semini. She hurried off, her tashta swirling around her legs.

“She’s brazen,” Semini muttered as they listened to her footsteps on the tiles of the palais floor. “I begin to wonder about young Jan’s choice.”

Allesandra linked her arm in Semini’s as they began to walk again. A few of the palais staff saw them; Allesandra didn’t care; she enjoyed Semini’s solid warmth at her side. “That was odd,” Semini continued. “It was almost as if the woman was upset that Jan had asked you to speak to her family. Doesn’t she realize what’s being offered?”

“I think she knows exactly what’s offered,” Allesandra answered. She hugged Semini’s arm tightly. She glanced back over her shoulder in the direction Elissa had gone. “That’s what bothers me. I begin to wonder if becoming involved with her was Jan’s choice at all.”