Best Served Cold

“Shame,” said Cosca. “I always liked the man. You should see the galleries in his palace. The greatest collection of art in the world, or so he says. Quite the connoisseur. Kept the best table in Styria too, in his day.”

“It shows,” said Monza.

“One does wonder how they get him in his saddle.”

“Block and tackle,” snapped Vitari.

Monza snorted. “Or dig a trench and ride the horse up underneath him.”

“What about the other one?” asked Shivers.

“Rogont, Grand Duke of Ospria.”

“He looks the part.” True enough. Tall and broad-shouldered with a handsome face and a mass of dark curls.

“Looks it.” Monza spat again. “But not much more.”

“The nephew of my one-time employer, now thankfully deceased, the Duchess Sefeline.” Cosca had made his neck bleed with his scratching. “They call him the Prince of Prudence. The Count of Caution. The Duke of Delay. A fine general, by all accounts, but doesn’t like to gamble.”

“I’d be less charitable,” said Monza.

“Few people are less charitable than you.”

“He doesn’t like to fight.”

“No good general likes to fight.”

“But every good general has to, from time to time. Rogont’s been pitted against Orso throughout the Years of Blood and never fought more than a skirmish. The man’s the best withdrawer in Styria.”

“Toughest thing to manage, a retreat. Maybe he just hasn’t found his moment yet.”

Shivers gave a faraway sigh. “We’re all of us waiting for our moment.”

“He’s wasted all his chances now,” said Monza. “Once Visserine falls, the way to Puranti is open, and beyond that nothing but Ospria itself, and Orso’s crown. No more delays. The sand’s run through on caution.”

Rogont and Salier passed underneath them. The two men who, along with honest, honourable, dead Duke Cantain, had formed the League of Eight to defend Styria against Orso’s insatiable ambition. Or to frustrate his rightful claims so they could fight among themselves for whatever was left, depending on who you asked. Cosca had a faraway smile on his face as he watched them go. “You live long enough, you see everything ruined. Caprile, a shell of her former glory.”

Vitari grinned at Monza. “That was one of yours, no?”

“Musselia most shamefully capitulated to Orso in spite of her impenetrable walls.”

Vitari grinned wider. “Wasn’t that one of yours too?”

“Borletta fallen,” Cosca lamented, “bold Duke Cantain dead.”

“Yes,” growled Monza, before Vitari could open her mouth.

“The invincible League of Eight has withered to a company of five and will soon dwindle to a party of four, with three of those far from keen on the whole notion.”

Monza could just hear Friendly’s whisper, “Eight… five… four… three…”

Those three followed now, glittering households trailing them like the wake behind three ducks. Junior partners in the League. Lirozio, the Duke of Puranti, defiant in elaborate armour and even more elaborate moustaches. The young Countess Cotarda of Affoia-a pasty girl whose pale yellow silks weren’t helping her complexion, her uncle and first advisor, some said her first lover, hovering close at her shoulder. Patine came last, First Citizen of Nicante-his hair left wild, dressed in sackcloth with a knotted rope for a belt, to show he was no better than the lowest peasant in his care. The rumour was he wore silken undergarments and slept on a golden bed, and with no shortage of company. So much for the humility of the powerful.

Cosca was already looking to the next chapter in the procession of greatness. “By the Fates. Who are these young gods?”

They were a magnificent pair, there was no denying that. They rode identical greys with effortless confidence, arrayed in matching white and gold. Her snowy gown clung to her impossibly tall and slender form and spread out behind her, fretted with glittering thread. His gilded breastplate was polished to a mirror-glare, simple crown set with a single stone so big Monza could almost see its facets glittering a hundred strides distant.

“How incredibly fucking regal,” she sneered.

“One can almost smell the majesty,” threw in Cosca. “I would kneel if I thought my knees could bear it.”

“His August Majesty, the High King of the Union.” Vitari’s voice was greasy with irony. “And his queen, of course.”

“Terez, the Jewel of Talins. She sparkles brightly, no?”

“Orso’s daughter,” Monza forced out through clenched teeth. “Ario and Foscar’s sister. Queen of the Union, and a royal cunt into the bargain.”

Even though he was a foreigner on Styrian soil, even though Union ambitions were treated with the greatest suspicion here, even though his wife was Orso’s daughter, the crowd found themselves cheering louder for a foreign king than they had for their own geriatric chancellor.

The people far prefer a leader who appears great, Bialoveld wrote, to one who is.

“Hardly the most neutral of mediators, you’d think.” Cosca puffed his cheeks out thoughtfully. “Bound so tight to Orso and his brood you can hardly see the light between them. Husband, and brother, and son-in-law to Talins?”