"Heaven deprives me of a wife who never caused me any other grief than that of her death." — Louis XIV
"Unhand our King!" one of the guards shouted, cuffing the Doctor's ear. The hands that had steadied them now seized him by the shoulders, trying to pry him loose.
"Hold!" To the Doctor's astonishment, it was the Warder's voice. "The King is safe."
The men grappling him let go, but the edge of a sword rested ominously against the back of his head. "Sir Adyton," one said, "beggin' your pardon, but aren't you supposed to be in prison?"
"Her Grace Rhea Feronia commanded my release, hoping to spare the Lord Doctor this peril. But I came too late to be of service." He raised his voice. "The Holy Mother had set a trap this eve to discover the traitors. Alas, during the night's upheavals, the bait was left unguarded, and the wolf bore her away. Up, Amazon, and confess your sin."
This was not, to the Doctor's way of thinking, a prudent form of damage control, but he could do little to help in his current situation. At least Nyssa had been honing her acting skills since her ludicrous attempts to pass for a hardened criminal on Folly.
She slid out from under him and raised her head slowly. Her appearance set off gasps of astonishment and outrage. "Is it a sin to love the King more than one's own life?" she said, addressing Adyton. "You were locked up. In Mars' absence, Minerva's counsel must suffice."
At this, some of the stony faces around them began to crumple with merriment. Not all, however. There was calculation and disapproval as well.
Adyton's eyes were unsmiling. "Hold your tongue, girl. I know what you are and whence you came. Our new Minerva has naught to do with you. Sully not the Queen's name! It is the Dowager who resorts to sacrilege to shield her son. To think the panoply of Apollo should adorn my lord's mistress, a lowly handmaiden of Hygieia!"
"Pardon me, but would someone help me up?" the Doctor said politely to the man poking him. "I've had rather a trying day."
Adyton waved off the guard and raised the Doctor with his own hands. "I must apologise, Lord Doctor, that you risked your life for a mere concubine and not for the King himself. Yet your honour is no less for this selfless act. You have surely delivered us from a traitor who meant to slay the King."
"Always glad to be of service." The Doctor bowed, trying to get a better look at Nyssa's injuries without appearing to take such an interest in her that he compromised her further. The blood dripping down the side of her face veiled it almost as effectively as the mask. He wished he could wipe the blood away to see how badly she'd been hurt.
Noting his scrutiny, she gave him a shaky smile. "I'm most grateful to the Lord Doctor."
"I said, hold your tongue, girl!" Adyton thundered.
She dropped her eyes meekly.
"Stalwarts of Mars," he continued, turning to the guards, "on a night when the High Hierophant's lawfully wedded lady performs her noblest duty, it would be a matter of scandal should the Basilica hum with gossip over a concubine. Therefore I beseech you in the name of Her Serene Highness Minerva, the Lady Nyssa of Traken, to hold your tongues and swear by the Sun's light not to reveal the truth about our King's… excessive virility. Nor should we insult his courage with the hysteria of maternal care. Let us avert our eyes from the blemishes of the Great, just as they forgive our own lapses that allowed two assassins to disturb the Basilica's tranquility."
"Aye," one said. A scattering of nods and salutes joined in.
"No wonder he dallies in the Healing Hives," another added, "if this is one of his mother's priestesses."
"Ah, but he won't want her back now she's marred!" chortled a third.
Adyton glowered but made no attempt to silence them. He took Nyssa's hand with a gentleness that belied his severe tones. "Come, tart, let's have you to the healers to salve those wounds. Lord Doctor, if you would accompany me, I must report this grievous news to the King." He extended his other hand. The Doctor gripped it at once. The ballroom, the guards, and the fractured dance floor faded away.
They materialised in a finely-appointed room whose curved windows overlooked yet another stunning panorama of the Basilica's spires. Potted plants, a bookshelf, a peacock-fan chair and owl motifs carved into the bedstand proclaimed the room's owner. Adyton turned to her, a small disheveled figure now faintly ridiculous in the Hierophant's bulky costume. "Your Majesty, a thousand apologies for that vile slander."
"It gave them a reason they could believe, while discrediting the idea that Achille would willingly swap places with a woman. I understand." She raised her chin. "Go to him. Quickly now, before they drag you back to your cell."
"But, Majesty, I brought you here only so you might put off Apollo's raiment before withdrawing to Hygieia's Terrace. You too, my Lord." He bowed to the Doctor. "Once again we cannot repay, but only remedy wounds bravely got on my master's behalf."
The Doctor glanced down at his torn leg. "Oh, no, it's nothing, really. Let's just see about patching up Nyssa."
"Best not," she said. "We can't count on that lie fooling everyone. Some of the priestesses know me."
"But—" both men said at once.
"I'll be fine," she said, smiling up at them. "I have my own Doctor here, don't I? Sir Adyton, please go. He needs you."
The Doctor frowned. He need hardly point out to her that his medical skills were somewhat piecemeal. But if he could get her stabilised, he knew where to take her. He would humble himself to Doctor Marius, whose expertise in skin regrowth he had already tested.
Adyton drew himself up, stretched one foot forward and folded in a bow so deep that the Doctor was reminded of a giraffe drinking. "Your Majesty. It has been my great honour to serve you. May the heavenly spheres reveal a true path to your heart's desire."
"And yours," she said quietly. "Thank you."
The corners of his mouth twitched with something close to a smile, and he vanished.
Out of the public eye at last, Nyssa let out a ragged sigh and reached for the Doctor's hand. He took hers at once, folding his other hand over it. Words tumbled out in stereo.
"Are you sure you don't want—"
"Are you sure you're all ri—"
They broke off in a puff of laughter.
"That could have gone better," she appended ruefully. "At least we're both in one piece."
"More or less."
She was trembling— shock or fatigue, perhaps, or the horror of witnessing violent deaths, now that adrenaline was ebbing away. He drew an arm around her and led her to the edge of the bed. "So. Let's get you cleaned up, shall we… your Majesty?"
"Oh, Doctor." She shook her head. "That's not me, and you know it. I've had to play another's part for so long, I've almost forgotten who I am."
"Well, let's see if we can jog your memory, then." Reaching for the broken mask and removing it as gently as he could, he was seized with another stab of anger at the sight of the red line scored across her face. Most of it was superficial abrasion from the edge of the mask, but the sword had lacerated her cheek under one eye deeply enough to need stitches. Fresh blood welled up when the mask came away. She tried not to make a sound, but her jaw clenched.
Keeping his voice light with some difficulty, he said, "I don't suppose you have a first aid kit handy?"
"Through there," she said, nodding to an open doorway. "Cabinet beneath the washbasin."
By the time he returned with the box and some linens, she had shrugged out of the Hierophant's mantle, doublet and outer layers. She was almost back to her old self, a petite figure in a ruffled linen shirt and hose. Which made the wound all the more glaring. In all their adventures, he had seldom failed so far as to let her come to physical harm. But self-recriminations were useless. Instead, he coaxed her to lie with her head on a towel and hold still while he worked. It was a delicate operation that he dared not rush. Avoiding infection was the important thing, but it would be a pity if she was marked by her ordeal.
"I confess I'm relieved to hear you say you weren't happy with this charade," he said, dabbing at her face to wash the blood away. "When I first met you, you didn't know how to lie."
"Something I learned from you, I'm afraid," she said. "Away from Traken, the universe is rather more complicated. Sometimes truths must be hidden."
"Not a lesson I'm proud to have taught you."
He set a cleansing pad against the open wound. She fell quiet, biting her lip until the analgesic in the cloth soaked in. Thankfully, the Celestenes' dermal adhesive formed a smoother suture than stitches. Maybe he would not need Doctor Marius' services after all. Nyssa began to relax, and he caught a glimpse of her old impish smile as he taped a medipatch to her cheek.
"Something amusing?"
"Oh," she said, "I was just thinking: only you could make me miss the birth of my own child!"
"I rather think that was due to the man who gave you this," he said, aggrieved.
She reached up to touch his bare face, tracing a line that would have been a mask's edge on a native, as if noting its absence. "I know. Believe me, I've never been more grateful to your talent for arriving in the nick of time." Her gaze shifted to the bloody slash down his thigh. "Or even a little after. Your turn, Doctor."
"Nyssa," he said, reddening. "I'll just… wrap it up with something. We'll be leaving soon, anyway." He hesitated. "Won't we?"
"Yes. Let me have a look." Sitting up, she pulled the medical kit towards her and drew out a pair of scissors to widen the rip in his trousers, folding the fabric back neatly and taping it down. Then she tore open a whole package of antiseptic pads. With practiced efficiency, she began wiping away the blood with one hand, switching pads as needed, while drawing the dermal bonder behind in a steady line with the other. "We ought to get one of these for the TARDIS."
Despite his discomfiture, he could not help but notice she had picked up a few skills besides subterfuge during these past few months. Rhea's mentoring, no doubt. "So, was your, ah, dramatic persona—" he gestured towards the Hierophant's mantle and cloak discarded on a chair— "always part of the plan?"
"No, Doctor. I offered to take Achille away for nine months after the Coronation and bring him back the same night, leaving no one the wiser. You could have come forward to collect me. It would have been so much easier to fake my own pregnancy."
"Nyssa." It was his turn to sound exasperated. "Ingenious, but you know very well we're not supposed to tinker with time in that way." A thought struck him. "I take it you expected me to play the stork!"
"A stork?" She blinked. "Whatever for? It was quite bewildering enough having to dress as an owl!"
Weariness, or a reprieve after months of mourning, spilled over into another burst of laughter. Nyssa closed up the medical kit and smiled, waiting for the fit to subside. He set his hands on her shoulders. "I have missed you, rather," he said, when he could speak again.
"And I, you, Doctor." Her eyes softened. "I was beginning to fear I might never see you again."
"Yes, well." Releasing her at once, he sprang to his feet and tested the leg. "Ah, that's much better. Thank you, Nyssa. Now, it's high time you got some rest. I'll look for the TARDIS. She can't have gone far."
"Very well. But Doctor?"
"Hmm?"
She glanced away. "Please don't… don't be too long, all right?"
"I won't." His throat tightened. "That's a promise."
Shortly after dawn, they teleported to the King's private suite, the Doctor back in his mended and laundered clothes and Nyssa in her owl-goddess costume. Achille, exhausted as he was, rose to make much of them. While the Doctor was all too mindful of history's clock ticking by, he hated to tear Nyssa away from this simple joy that she had endured so much to achieve: rocking slowly in a floating chair, a swaddled infant clinging sleepily to her finger after an enthusiastic bottle-feeding lesson from the father. Achille was stretched out on a chaise-lounge beside them, listening raptly to Nyssa singing a Trakenite lullaby until his eyes started to drift closed along with the baby's.
The Doctor and the Dowager had removed themselves to a couch drawn up beneath the bow windows, where Rhea filled him in on the events of the past few months. Court dances, diplomacy and politics, dodging assassins' bullets, upgrading security systems, reengineering the Basilica's power storage and generators, and leading the Council in the Hierophant's stead: Nyssa had been keeping busy. No surprise there, but still, he was fiercely proud of her. Rhea, however, had other priorities.
"…and so, after all your lady's efforts to secure an heir for us, it's a girl-child," she concluded.
"Well, you know," the Doctor said, "I've met some splendid ruling queens in my travels."
"I'm sure you have, but the Celestial Basilica needs its Apollo."
"Several of those queens overcame similar cultural biases."
"Indeed?" The Dowager narrowed her eyes. "I don't suppose this is a veiled prophecy, Time Lord?"
"Prophecy? Oh, no. Absolutely not. I was only pointing out that traditions change."
Nyssa, half listening to them, averted her face to conceal a smile.
"Fortune willing," Achille said, rousing himself, "my people will have several centuries to acclimate to the idea. They must, for I will have no other heir."
"That should cut down on assassination attempts, at least," Nyssa said.
"Why, you could be right," he said, reaching over to stroke the soft down of the baby's head. "So, I shall retain a Minerva to safeguard me, after all."
"And Sir Adyton?"
He sobered. "Back to his cell. But by your grace, he was able to welcome her into the light. I believe I can prevail upon the Council to show clemency. His defence of our royal persons should commute the charge of murder. They may banish him from the Celestial Basilica for a time to expiate his blood guilt— a decade, perhaps? But surely, it would be no sin were he to return to his old posting as a guardsman at the Healing Hives of Hygieia, where a royal daughter will soon be fostered."
"He could tutor her," Nyssa suggested. "I hope it may never be necessary, but learning self-defence might be a sensible precaution."
"You are full of good ideas," said Achille. "But my people will already be hard-pressed to accept a ruling queen. One who fights may be beyond their comprehension."
"That's part and parcel of the Minerva archetype, though, isn't it?" the Doctor said diffidently. "I mean, if you're batting for neoclassical Baroque, you might as well use the whole pitch."
Achille smiled. "That is so. Perhaps that shall be her story, as Achilles at Skyros is mine. I will let her decide when she is older." He leaned over to kiss the baby's head. "Come what may, I shall visit often, to ensure she is properly doted upon."
"I think you may rest assured of that," Nyssa said, remembering the way Adyton's dour face had brightened whenever they discussed the unborn child. "I just wish all three of you could have a proper happily ever after."
"In time. We are not Time Lords, dear lady, yet a decade for us is not so long a span." Achille yawned, then looked across at the Doctor. "But speaking of Time Lords, I see your champion chafes to return you to the stars. Therefore, loathe though I am to part with both my pillars of support on the same day, you and I have one last duty to perform together."
It was not easy to disguise Achille's figure, which would take some months to return to its proper shape. But he could pass with a girdle and the Hierophant's elaborate costume with inner layers removed in front, especially with Nyssa plumping her own robes to play the role she had intended all along. Rhea retouched the patch on Nyssa's cheek with grumbling disdain for men calling themselves doctors, then covered it with cosmetics and the owl-mask. After issuing a summons to handpicked supporters of Achille and a few nobles whom it was not wise to slight, they fed the baby again, dressed her, and transported down to the temporary platform erected for the presentation ceremony.
Its location, like so much else in the young Hierophant's reign, was unprecedented: not the ruined Hall of Jupiter, but a tongue of light extending like a jetty from the steep causeway that led from the cliffs up to the Basilica. Crowds of burgesses and ordinary citizens had been gathering on the mountain's shoulder since the night began, facing the royal palace with prayers and impromptu dances and bonfires and feasting under the stars. Their eyes were dazzled by the brilliant prisms of the Celestial Basilica glowing like lantern's glass in the morning light. A great cheer went up when a tableau of courtiers appeared on the high platform suspended beyond the cliff's edge. Framed by their entourage with the Basilica shining behind them, Achille and Nyssa seemed to be bathed in divine light.
A flourish of trumpets silenced the crowd. The Hierophant stepped forward stiffly, his gilded breastplate and elaborately-plumed headdress so ostentatious that Nyssa wondered if anyone would notice the misdirection. His clear, authoritative tenor carried easily across the heights. After months of his public-speaking voice issuing from the modulator of her own mask, it was disconcerting to hear it coming from elsewhere. It took her a moment to focus on the content of his words rather than the sound.
"— and I am not deaf to your prayers. The blessed reign of Apollo has been marred by treachery and disorder near the very apex of our hierarchy. My grief is deep, no less for the loss of my own misguided kin than for their sins. Even greater, for all those hurt or killed by their insanity. We shall honour the fallen in due course.
"But from the teeth of the tempest now comes a promise of new life to re-hallow our defiled halls. So let us postpone sorrow and renew our covenant of harmony with one another in the bright light of morning. Assume a reverent attitude, my people, and cast open your hearts' gates to welcome blessings of a higher order. I give you— Phoebe Nyssa Feronia Estelline-Avenant, born in Light!"
Nyssa smiled privately at the grandiose concatenation of names. Achille had mischievously explained that Phoebe could be adjusted to Phoebus should the need arise. Which, if she had read the Doctor's hints correctly, was not fated to happen.
Arms fluttering with feathers, she raised little Phoebe skyward, so that the sunlight reflecting from silver threads in the baby's presentation gown appeared to swath her in a nimbus of fire. Phoebe began to wriggle and howl. Scattered laughter broke out amidst the applause. Nyssa lowered her quickly and began to rock her again, humming the lullaby she remembered from her mother. The crowd quieted, too, a murmuring hush of approval carried on the breeze.
"Behold my joy," Achille said. "I ask you all to pray for her. But now, if you will forgive a doting husband, there is one last thing I must say. For base rumours have reached our ears, unworthy of the esteem in which you hold us. Know that I love my Queen, my wise and fair Minerva, who has vouchsafed this treasure to me." So saying, he removed his mask— stubble augmented by a false beard for now, until he was quite himself again— executed a neat quarter-turn, raised Nyssa's mask with tenderness, and kissed her before commoners and nobles alike. The nobility would be scandalised, but the applause this time was deafening, drowning out the baby's cries.
Nyssa adjusted Phoebe so she wouldn't be squeezed between them and smiled into Achille's dancing eyes. It was only pantomime, but he was a pleasant enough kisser. And she recognised the private message he was conveying under cover of public display. There were other kinds of love besides romantic or physical. She would miss him, just as she missed Tegan.
Straightening, she caught a glimpse of the Doctor's studiously blank expression behind the king's plumage. There were as many kinds of masks as love, she reflected wryly.
Achille repositioned his mask over his face, took the baby tenderly from her arms and turned smartly to face the crowd.
"Apollo oriens!" he shouted, so that his voice echoed off the jutting rocks on either side of the natural amphitheatre below.
"Etiam Minerva!"
The courtiers bracketing them on either side of the turned and began to process towards the back of the platform, offering reverent bows and deep courtesies to the royal couple as they passed. The sliding road bore them up in a swift current towards the palace.
It was time.
A very real flutter of… not doubt, exactly, but certainly apprehension… clutched at Nyssa's stomach. Her knees felt wobbly. She was suddenly conscious again of the dizzying drop below, from which they were held aloft by gravitic engineering only a little more reliable than TARDIS shielding.
She took Achille's elbow, turned away from the cheering onlookers in an elegant toe-point turn, promenaded at his side to the rear of the dais, and stepped down onto the moving path. Her eyes closed. Letting her hand drop, she pitched forward lifelessly in an apparent swoon, forcing herself not to break her fall with her arms. The forcefields cushioned the impact. Scattered cries and screams rose up from below as she began to ascend. Lying like a bird felled by flying into a window, she was speeding up and away before anyone could help her.
"Pia Mater, Lord Doctor, attend!" the Hierophant cried out, his voice almost lost in the pandemonium that erupted. The Dowager, leaning on the Doctor's elbow, pushed forward, struggling to reach the fallen Queen. "Refugium!"
Bright sunlight and horrified uproar cut off like a shutter falling. The four of them and the baby were back in Achille's antechamber. Phoebe began to wail again.
Nyssa sat up, removed her mask and exhaled. "Well, that's that. I hope I was convincing."
"You were," Achille said, cuddling the child and looking down into her tiny reddened face. "I think you frightened her."
"You frightened me," the Doctor muttered under his breath, offering Nyssa a hand up.
She stood gratefully and spread her arms to take the baby one last time. "Oh, Phoebe. It's all right. I wish I could stay. Hush, now, hush. Don't be afraid." No wonder the baby was crying. Nyssa could feel it too, an aura of hysteria carried on the Lattice's psychic field, instead of its usual soothing hum. She regretted having to add one more tragedy to the night's upheavals. Achille would have his hands full restoring public morale.
"Here, let me," the Doctor said at her elbow. He set two fingers on Phoebe's puckered forehead and closed his eyes in concentration. Slowly her sobs subsided. The baby gave once last peep and smiled vaguely up at them, waving her fists. The Doctor beamed at her. "There you go. Dreadfully annoying, all those minds wailing at you. I feel the same way about lutes."
Nyssa smiled, handed Phoebe back to her father and the feathered cloak across to Rhea, and returned to the Doctor's side. "Then we'd better get you away from here, before they start up again."
"Why, he is a wizard," Achille said. "My thanks, Lord Doctor, for all the gifts you have given us. My lady, I could dance a season and never convey what you have meant to me these many months. It has been a pas de deux I shall remember and cherish all my life. Now reclaim your place in the firmament, dear friend, and may the gods watch over you."
"And you, Achille. Take care of yourself. Goodbye, Phoebe! All my love." She bent to kiss the girl's brow, then bobbed a grave courtesy to the Dowager. "Your Grace."
The TARDIS was waiting for them on the far side of the canyon. Having discovered her by aircar shortly after dawn, the Doctor had dropped off a portable transmat pad instead of trying to land on the ledge where she was perched. Now they were standing beside her, looking back at the magnificent castle in the clouds which had been Nyssa's home for so many months. Wisps of fog, shining in the sunlight, were rising up from the canyon's cool depths, slowly veiling the gleaming structure like Avalon withdrawing from mortal sight.
Nyssa stood quite still, trying to commit the Celestial Basilica's translucent facets and graceful lines to memory. She felt oddly hollow. But of course, she had become accustomed to the psychic thrum of the Lattice, which on most days had steadied her with a pervasive sense of well-being.
The Doctor cleared his throat. "Are you sure you want to leave?" She could hear reluctance in every word, much as he tried to hide it. "The Celestial Basilica is unique in the universe, although it's not without its problems. You could be a positive force for change."
"And defy the Laws of Time?" She shook herself out of her reverie and smiled at him. "No, Doctor, but thank you. It's time to move on. You taught me this, too: we can't solve everyone's problems. We just have to solve the right problem."
He relaxed and breathed out. "Precisely."
It would be so much easier, for all its imperfections, to embrace the peace that the Basilica had to offer. But her sojourn in the clouds had clarified her resolve. Now, more than ever, she knew she must help those who lived outside castles and closed gardens, outside the protection of healers and warders. She had tried to do so on Mondas. There were other Mondases out there.
"I'm looking for a place where my skills can make a difference to those who have almost nothing, people whose future isn't yet fixed in history. Until then, I want to travel with you, Doctor. There's no place I'd rather be."
No doubt the Doctor would have been deeply embarrassed to know that she thought of him in the same flowery terms as the Celestenes. Knight, champion, lord: he was all those things. Yet the high-born did not have a monopoly on the most important title of all: friend.
Something of her thoughts must have showed in her face, because he stared at her for a raw moment before taking refuge behind a boyish grin. "Well, we ought to be going then, hadn't we?"
As he unlocked the TARDIS door, a distant, solemn gong began to reverberate across the canyon. It sounded like a titanic bell submerged beneath ocean's waves.
"The Queen is dead," she murmured.
The Doctor turned her away and drew her gently inside. "Long live the Queen."