Valentin confronts the Queen of Merot. It doesn’t go as planned.

Length: 3000-7000 words, POV: Valentin, Rating: R
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Part of: 004 Diplomacy, Contents

“Valentin,” said Cassius. “You can’t sign the treaty.”

“But,” said Valentin, “we’re signing tomorrow. I was going to be back in Monsilys by week’s end.”

Cassius sat down opposite, shifting his weight and leaning forward. “You can’t sign that contract,” he said again.

“Why not?”

“Merot has taken a patch of Gallica.”

Valentin gave him a blank look.

“A scout party was riding the northern border of Gallica. It isn’t populated up there, so it has been six weeks since someone rode it.” Cassius paused to huff out a couple of breaths. “The party encountered a troop of Merots. They fought, and there were some casualties. The Merots took the surviving scouts, but one escaped. He scouted the perimeter Merot is patrolling—it is some 200 leagues past the border.”

Blinking, Valentin said, “What is the land they’ve taken?”

“It’s good virgin forest,” said Cassius. “No mineral deposits that we’ve found and no tactical value.”

“Sekhmede did say she needed lumber.” Frowning, Valentin nodded. “So that was what it was about.” At Cassius’ blank look, Valentin added, “Sekhmede wanted a little wording change. She wanted the borders to be set as land held by right of arms. She was planning on claiming that patch under the treaty. Very tricky.”

“Well, we have perhaps a day before her generals tell her what I’ve just told you.”

“Any chance they won’t have realised one escaped?”

Shaking his head, Cassius said, “They know the size of a Jovani patrol. Someone will have added up the captives and the dead and come up one short. And they had a head start getting the news here.”

“So the issue isn’t whether or not Sekhmede knows, but whether she realises that we know.”

“My coming here will make her suspicious,” said Cassius.

“Yes, but you’ve visited before…” said Valentin. “I’m expecting her servant at any moment.” Getting up, Valentin rummaged through his belongings until he found a small black phial, which turned out to be empty. Absently setting it on the side table, he eventually found another phial, this one half-full. He took it back to his seat.

Picking up the empty bottle, Cassius frowned at it. “What is this?”

Valentin watched as Cassius unstoppered the bottle and sniffed it. The strong smell of aniseed and nutmeg made Valentin’s fingers tingle.

“Lautium.” Cassius stoppered the bottle and held it between thumb and forefinger. “How long have you been taking this stuff? Fortified wine is one thing…”

Leaning back in the chair, Valentin said, “It calms me down.”

“No doubt,” said Cassius. “The last time I saw Lautium it was being administered to help a wounded man to a swift and painless death.”

“Yes, well, you needn’t take any. I need to think,” said Valentin. He leaned back, staring at the ceiling, and took a sip. It tasted of honey and aniseed, with a teasing hint of spice, and underneath it all the bitterness of the poppy sap and wormwood. He swirled the mouthful and swallowed it, then set the bottle back on the table. He could feel Cassius’ disapproval radiating towards him as he leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. He flexed his fingers and toes and took several deep breaths, waiting for the Lautium to douse the fire running through his veins.

Sekhmede’s servant found them like that, Valentin practically supine, eyes closed, and Cassius (as Valentin discovered when he cracked open one eye), back straight, arms crossed, frowning at him. The servant glanced between them then said, “Lord Valentin, the Queen will see you now.”

“Hurrah,” said Valentin, placing his hands on the chair arms and levering himself up. He caught Cassius’ gaze and quirked a smile. “You go on without me,” he said, gesturing to the empty bottle of Lautium.

Cassius’ eyebrows were practically meeting in the centre of his forehead. He stood and took Valentin’s elbow. “What will you do?”

“Don’t worry,” said Valentin, close to Cassius’ ear. “I’ll figure something out.”

“Wonderful.” Cassius released him and paced over to the window.

Turning, Valentin followed the servant out of the room. He wasn’t entirely sure what he was going to do when he reached Sekhmede’s chamber. His ruminations had found him in an insoluble position. He imagined seducing her sweetly tonight, and then tomorrow, across the negotiating table: I can trick you too, your majesty. Cassius’ arrival would already make her wonder, without Valentin changing his behaviour—to maintain the upper hand, he would have to soothe her suspicions.

Staring at the servant’s head as they walked down hallway after hallway, Valentin let the smile fall from his face. On the other hand, a treaty based on lies would be unmade at the first opportunity. They had uncovered Sekhmede’s lie; substituting it for one of their own would just give Sekhmede greater incentive to violate the treaty and invade Gallica, at a time when Jovan could not afford to be fighting on two fronts. And… Valentin rubbed his hand over his face. He thought that perhaps she might be a bit fond of him. Maybe she would be willing to accept the very generous trade terms, even without her patch of Gallica.

Or maybe he was about to start another war.

As he was ushered into Sekhmede’s chambers, Valentin was still unsure what he was going to do. The Queen was standing towards the centre of the room, one hand resting lightly on a chair back. She gestured him in and the servant shut the door softly. As Valentin stood near the door, considering Sekhmede and shifting his weight from foot to foot, she seemed to pick up on his uncertainty. “What is it?”

Looking at her, he made his decision. This wasn’t about his personal feelings. Sekhmede had made it clear she had no compunction screwing him on the one hand, and—well—screwing him on the other. Putting aside his desire to see the boot on the other foot, he had to think about the task Adrienne had sent him to achieve. “Your majesty,” he said, “we know about Gallica.”

Sekhmede’s hand on the chair became a claw.

“I tell you this now so that we can come, between us, to an agreement on how to proceed. By the end of the month, the territory you have attempted to steal will be back in Jovani hands. I will not sign this treaty as it stands before that happens. You cannot have this patch by sleight of hand. What must I offer you to give up your claim peacefully?”

The Queen had been watching him, her eyes slowly narrowing, her back straight. Now she let go of the chair and stepped towards him. The silence stretched between them, then she said, her voice barely raised, “Guards.”

Immediately, the room was full of armed men. Valentin opened his hands before him and didn’t resist as two of them grabbed his arms. He couldn’t help how his gaze slipped away from Sekhmede. He had been arrested in the line of duty before, but for some reason, this time hurt slightly more.

“Take him back to his room and hold him there,” said Sekhmede. “Detain Lord Cassius as well, until I decide what to do with them.”

He was hustled back down the same long hallways to his room. There were Merots already in there when he arrived, going through his possessions. So much for the extra guards Cassius had left him.

However, there was no Cassius. Valentin smiled at his captors’ frustration. From what he could overhear, it sounded like Cassius had jumped out the window and was by now long-gone. He was sat down, with a large, bearded Merot hovering behind him, while all his belongings were raided for weapons. Apparently satisfied with having deprived him two daggers, a sword and his comb, the bulk of the soldiers departed, leaving him with two armed men.

Valentin stood up with a sigh. “If you gentlemen have no objections, I am going to bed.”

The Merots glanced at each other, then the one nearest nodded. Valentin sighed again and went to his ransacked case to retrieve a nightshirt. He washed his face, and shucked his clothes, then he climbed into bed and drew the drapes.

When he woke up the next morning, the same two guards were standing, one beside the window, and the other at the door. Sometime around what he thought might be lunch time (if anyone had offered him food), someone came to the door of his room, then his guards said, “Come on, you’re being moved.

“Where?”

He received a one-shouldered shrug as a response.

“Can I take my things?”

“We’re going now.”

Sighing, Valentin stood. “Right.”

He was taken up two flights of stairs into a considerably less well-appointed room with an iron-reinforced door and narrow barred windows.

This time he was left completely alone, without even his two guards for company. The room had a bed and a wooden bench underneath one of the windows. Sitting on it, he discovered that the room was at the front of the keep, and he watched troops of soldiers clattering in and out of Merove for most of the afternoon.

Shortly after sunset, he was served some bread and cheese with dinner. His boredom gave him plenty of time to reflect on his actions, and Sekhmede’s, and to wonder whether Sekhmede might actually use his death to start a war.

The next morning, he watched through his little window as she galloped, pennants flying, out of the courtyard at the head of a company of men. They seemed to be riding in the direction of the border. Perhaps they were meeting with Cassius. Valentin turned and leaned against the window, examining the stone walls of his chamber. It hardly mattered. Regardless of what Cassius might be doing, Valentin was stuck here, bored senseless, having been stupid enough to turn himself from a player to a game piece.

In the evening, more bread and cheese arrived, and Sekhmede returned to Merove. Valentin heard the lock click, and then she was in his chamber, four guardsmen spilling through the door behind her.

“Your majesty,” Valentin said, attempting a seated bow.

“Lord Valentin.” Sekhmede took two shallow breaths, “you have brought me no end of trouble.”

“If my presence disturbs you, I would happily leave,” said Valentin. “We could both put this whole unpleasant incident behind us.”

“Tch.” Sekhmede paced. “My mistake from the beginning was thinking that a treaty could bring me what I need.”

“My mistake was forgetting that you are a queen not a woman,” said Valentin under his breath, looking at the wall.

Sekhmede heard him anyway. She came to where he sat and leaned over, looking him closely in the eye. “Yes,” she said, “never forget that. Queens and women are very different creatures. I would kill you in a second if I thought it would benefit Merot.”

“You have made that very clear.”

Without another word, Sekhmede swept from the chamber. Valentin returned to studying the wall.

Over a week later, Sekhmede appeared in his room again. She was dressed in a heavy brown dress, with a leather bodice, and shoulder guards and bracers.

“Good morning,” she said as she entered, pulling off her gloves. “I have come to a decision about you.”

“Oh really,” said Valentin, standing. Midmorning sunlight slanted through his window, and the guards standing behind Sekhmede looked unusually grim.

“Mm.” She looked him up and down, then gestured over her shoulder. The guards stomped forwards.

“You’re to come with us,” said one of them.

“Where am I going?” asked Valentin, turning to Sekhmede as he was hauled out of the room.

“Goodbye, Lord Valentin,” she said. He thought she perhaps looked slightly regretful.

He was hurried down three flights of stairs to a dark, narrow corridor that smelled of dirt and urine. “Am I being taken to the dungeon?”

No response, just one guard tugging insistently on his elbow while the others clustered close. The hallway turned into another, equally dark and rank. He was pushed into a cell. As his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he realised he wasn’t alone.

“Lord Valentin,” said Lord Donellus, “I had wondered where you were.”

“Is the rest of the retinue still here?”

Donellus shook his head. “Some are. The Queen bargained some back to Jovan in return for a couple of Merot prisoners. Your detachment, too.”

“Trust Cassius to retrieve the soldiers first.” Valentin swiped a finger along the wall and it came back slimy. “When was the last time you were thrown in a foreign dungeon?”

“Some time ago, Lord Valentin,” said Donellus. “You?”

“Not all that long ago, actually. But that time I think I deserved it.”

“Yes, the negotiations did go quite spectacularly south. One minute I was dusting ink on the second-last page of the treaty, the next I was being locked in my chambers.”

The door to the cell opened, and more of the Jovani retinue joined them. A short while later, it opened again, and they were all hustled out into the hallway. They continued along it, then up a flight of stairs had into the daylight.

Valentin half-expected there to be a block in the middle, and a crowd of gawking Merot peasants, but instead they were in a small courtyard pressed up against the outer wall of Merove. The guards took them through a postern gate, and they stood in the shadow of the wall, looking out over grassland at four lines of Jovani cavalry.

“You are free to go,” said one of the guards, “with the Queen’s compliments.” He didn’t take his eyes off the cavalry as he spoke. Valentin took a couple of steps forwards and looked up. As he expected, there was a row of archers on the wall, bows trained on the horses. As his eyes skimmed along the wall, he saw Sekhmede, her hair streaming, standing against the battlements. He raised his hand, and she leaned over the ramparts and blew him a kiss.

“On behalf of Jovan, I thank the Queen of Merot for her hospitality,” said Valentin, loudly enough that the wind might carry the words to her.

The guard’s lip quirked, and he bowed.

Valentin gestured to his countrymen. “Let’s go,” he said, and they stepped out of the shadow of the wall.

It was difficult, but Valentin forced himself to keep up a confident walking pace. Being stuck between archers and cavalry was hardly a good position, and the five hundred paces between the two groups seemed to take forever to cross.

As he approached, he recognised Cassius at the forefront and adjusted his angle to bring him to his brother’s horse. Cassius gestured, and one of the men dismounted, leading the horse to Valentin.

“What happened?” Valentin said as he mounted.

“Jovan will retain the land. Merot will have the right to log it for the next twenty years, paying the Empress a royalty. I think Queen Sekhmede realised that in capturing you she had a lion by the tail.”

“Did you negotiate this?”

Cassius smiled across at him. “Yep.”

“And you didn’t maim anybody?”

The column turned for the border. “Not even one person.”

“Little brother, I am so proud of you.”

At Cassius’ gesture, they galloped for Jovan.