Spirit of the Sword: Pride and Fury (The First Sword Chronicles Book 1) (57 page)

Romana bowed her head. "I am at the service of the Princess Consort, if she would but command."

Portia laughed. "Oh, do stop it, Romana, you'll embarrass me in front of my guest. You know I hate to have you bowing like this, we're sisters by marriage!"

"And the Prince Imperial is my brother by birth, Majesty, yet it is still proper that I should show him the respect due to his noble seat."

Miranda felt a little nervous speaking in such high company, but she could not help asking the question. "If I may, Majesty, Highness, why do you keep speaking of the Princess Consort and the Prince Imperial?"

Portia chuckled. "Romana is an Aegea worshipper, bless her, and has picked up their peculiar way of speaking. Charming, isn't it?"

Romana sighed a little. "There is no Empress save Aegea, who did not die but ascended into heaven to watch over her children and battle for the Empire amongst the gods. Her mortal heirs are merely stewards of the throne and Empire upon her behalf."

"I do wish you would be careful, Romana," Portia said. "The priests say-"

"The Novar priests say that the idea of a mortal becoming god is blasphemy," Princess Romana said wearily. "That does not make it any less true. Nor will I be constrained by the disapproval of the Novar church, they would not dare touch one of the blood of Aegea." Romana smiled. "Forgive me, Majesty, I am spoiling your afternoon."

"Oh, it's quite alright, I feel it must be very disappointing that I can't keep up with you when you talk about politics or religion." Portia gestured for the two of them to sit down. "Come, sit with me."

They sat down at cold stone chairs around the stone table. Princess Romana gestured, and slaves piled high the table with tea, cakes, pastries, bread, fruit, dormice, all the best and all smelling delicious.

"Thank you so much," Portia said to the slaves when they were done.

Miranda raised an eyebrow. She had never heard the slaves thanked before. Romana shook her head minutely.

Portia frowned. "Romana, do your guards have to stand so close like this? They seem more like gaolers."

"They are here for my protection," Romana observed mildly.

"Are they afraid I'm going to stab you with a bread knife?" Portia asked with a chuckle.

"You should keep your own guards closer about you," Romana said, her tone becoming almost stern. "Riding off down the Stilic to pick wildflowers or blackberries or what have you. You have been seen alone in the agora, in the subura even!"

"I wore a disguise when I went to the subura," Portia said defensively.

"As I understand it you had a maid's dress on, that is hardly a disguise," Romana countered.

"Romana, I don't understand what all the fuss is about," Portia complained. "I used to visit the subura all the time before I was married."

"You were not the Princess Consort before you were married," Princess Romana pressed. "Unguarded, any vagabond with a knife could take you captive and ransom you for all the contents in the Imperial treasury."

"But they didn't," Portia said. "No one so much as looked at me the wrong way."

"Because I had some discreet fellows in my service follow you to make sure that you were safe," Romana said. "They stopped five suspicious looking characters who were about to approach you. They could have been pickpockets, or they could have been worse."

"You had me followed?" Portia asked. "Romana...I don't know whether to be flattered or insulted."

"If anything happened to you, Demodocus would be heartbroken," Romana said. "And for all our differences he is my brother. And for myself...I would not like any harm to come to you either, Your Majesty."

Portia smiled. "I always tell Demodocus that you're a very sweet girl underneath all those strange ideas you have that I can't understand."

"I just wish you would take more care with your safety," Romana said.

"Fine, fine, I will let guards follow me around and spoil my fun wherever I go, but in the palace? What could possibly happen to me here? Please, Romana, send them away, I don't like them. For me."

Romana exhaled through her nose like a bull. "Captain Thrakes."

"Highness?"

"Piquet a hundred yards down the track, full strength," Romana commanded. "Stay vigilant."

Captain Thrakes bowed. "Always, Your Highness." He ushered his troops away from the Empress and party.

Porita smiled fondly, then gestured at the food before them. "Eat. Everyone, please, tuck in."

As they began to eat, the Empress noticed the ring on Miranda's finger. "What a delightful thing. It looks absolutely lovely! Where did you get it, Miranda, if I'm not prying."

"It belonged to my mother, Majesty, though Lord Quirian tells me it is far older, an heirloom of the Aurelian people."

"Goodness," Portia murmured. "It looks wonderful to be so old. Someone must have taken very good care of it."

"I do, Your Majesty," Miranda replied. "It had to be sold once, and then I bought it back to remind me that the time when I had nothing at all are over."

Portia nodded. "Oh, please, you must stop calling me Your Majesty, Miranda. Call me Portia, I just know we're going to be great friends."

Miranda looked to Princess Romana for help. "I am not sure if that would be proper, um..."

"Well I'm the Empress, surely I get to decide what's proper and what isn't?" Portia laughed. "If you're worried about what people will say, you can call me Your Majesty in public, if you like."

Miranda gave a half laugh in response. "If you say so, Portia."

"There now, didn't that feel much better than calling me Your Majesty all the time?" Portia asked. She smiled. "I suppose I'm not what you expected, am I?"

"Um, not especially, Portia," Miranda muttered.

"You're probably wondering why I asked to meet you," Portia continued. "I know that you're doing good work for us, important work, but I'm not here to talk about that because I don't really understand it. I asked you here, because I wanted to talk to someone who wasn't a lady, for once. Someone who was like me. I understand that your mother was a seamstress."

"Yes," Miranda confirmed. "Yes, she was."

Portia chuckled. "When I worked as a tavern maid I used to think that being a seamstress was terribly lofty."

Miranda's eyebrows rose. "A tavern maid?"

Portia nodded. "I'm not a born princess, like Romana here. I'm not even a lady. My father kept an inn, and when he died my stepmother forced me to work as a maid."

"And now you are the Empress?" Miranda said, only believing it because it would explain how different Portia was to all the other nobles she had met so far. "How... just how?"

"I didn't know he was the Emperor when I met him. He was just a handsome young man who came to the inn regularly. He was kind to me. We would talk together as long as we could before my stepmother caught me. He was so kind and gallant. When he promised to take me away from the inn I laughed, I thought he was just bragging, trying to make me feel better. It wasn't until he turned up in his Imperial regalia, followed by two hundred guards, to ask me to marry him that I found out he was the Emperor." She smiled. "The truth is I would have married him anyway, if he'd asked me, even if he'd been as poor as a dockyard hauler.

"I love it here, really I do, it is beautiful, but, sometimes I find it so stuffy here, I miss freedom." Portia paused. "That sounded terribly selfish didn't it?"

Miranda shook her head. "No, it sounded very human, Portia."

Portia chuckled. "I wanted to meet you Miranda because I hoped that you might be a little more like me. All these patricians ladies... I never really comfortable around them."

"You should make more of an effort," Princess Romana said. "Like it or not, as Princess Consort you are a political actor, save that at present you are an actor who makes no effort to learn his part or lines. What possessed you to dismiss all of your ladies in waiting?"

"They weren't my friends," Portia said defensively. "They pretended to be, but I heard them laughing at me behind my back."

"And that was cruel of them, and some punishment was due for their insolence, but to send them away," Romana shook her head. "Do you know what an insult that was?"

"They insulted me first."

"Please, Your Majesty, try and understand the cause they had for their frustration," Princess Romana said. "The Livii and Rutuli are famillies as old as the Empire itself. The Salinator family has held Patrician rank since the Heraklian War in the reign of Aegeus the First. In ordinary circumstances the Emperor would have chosen his bride from amongst the daughters of such august houses, that he took you instead...can you reall expect them to be happy about it?

"And yet, nevertheless, they swallowed their disappointment and sent their daughters and grand-daughters to serve you in your household. Yes, they hoped to gain advantage from it, but they also did you great honour by the gesture. And now you have thrown that honour back in your faces, and I fear you have powerful enemies in the process."

"I don't want enemies," Portia said. "But I don't want friends who are only my friends for what they think they can get out of Demodocus through me. Why should I have to care about who these people's famillies are, and how old their history is, and what they think about me."

"You married the Prince Imperial," Romana said, not unkindly.

"I didn't want to marry the Emperor," Portia said. "I only wanted to marry Demodocus."

"You cannot have one without the other," Romana said. "And you cannot have him without the politics that accompany the throne. You may want to be deaf to them, but all refusing to play the game accomplishes is to lose it. Much better to play it well, hard as it is."

"Then what about your ladies in waiting?" Portia asked. "Junia Livius, Harmonia Rutulus, Euphemia Salinator. I dismissed their older sisters from my household but you keep them on even though they must hate me now."

"Someone must repair the damage you have done and maintain the throne's relations with the patricians," Princess Romana said.

"But shouldn't you dismiss them too, to support me?"

"I will not support when you are in the wrong," Romana said. "And Your Majesty does not have the authority to interfere in the ordering of my household. Only the Prince Imperial himself has that power. And besides, I like them. Junia, Harmonia, Euphemia, Elylyona, even Vespasia. I enjoy their company, and they have come to share my ideals, or will soon enough. I give you my word I will not let them speak poorly of you or act upon any ill will they may bear. But I will not send them from my side. I cannot do without them."

"Very well," Portia said sadly. "Miranda, I hope you won't mind visiting me again, and Demodocus too perhaps. As you can see, I don't have very many friends."

Miranda smiled. "Neither do I, Portia, but I think we both have more than we did this morning."

The rest of lunch passed in quiet comfort, until Princess Romana offered to escort Miranda back to her litter.

As they left Portia behind, Romana said, "She is a sweet girl, isn't she?"

Miranda hesitated. "Yes, I suppose so."

"Yet His Majesty should not have married her," Romana said quietly.

Miranda frowned. "Why on earth not?"

"Because she has nothing to recommend her but a sweet face and a kind heart."

"Isn't a kind heart enough?"

"For some things, maybe, but a princess must be more than that," Princess Romana declared. "A princess must be cold when necessary, hard when the times demand, commanding, decisive. She must be able to pierce through the lies of the courtiers, inspire men in battle, direct the movement of armies, negotiate with foreign envoys and awe them with the majesty of our state. She must love the land, love the people who dwell within it, and yet be able to send ten thousand of them to their deaths without demur if the Empire's needs dictate it. Do you think that any of those things are in Portia's grasp? Could she rule the Empire if Demodocus were to depart on campaign?"

Miranda bowed her head a little before admitting, "No, she could not."

"In politics, Filia, as in dancing," Romana said. "Women do all the things that men do, backwards and in less comfortable footwear. That is what it means to be the daughter of a noble house. That is what Portia lacks. She is a lamb in a den of wolves, I fear she will be devoured."

"She is the Emperor's wife," Miranda said. "Who would dare touch her?"

Romana shook her head. "This city is filled with schemes. We have been without a purpose for too long, so now we tear at one another. Prince Antiochus has his plots, so does the Lord Commenae, Lord Titaniel, Helen Manzikes. Everyone in Eternal Panthiea is seeking only their own advantage. Even you."

"But not you?"

"I stand for the Empire," Romana said. "Someone must."

"Do you not seek to become Empress, or Princess Imperial?"

"It is my destiny, but I do not covet it," Romana replied. "It will come whether I wish it or not."

"Which is not the same as saying that you do not wish it," Miranda observed.