The Last Dark Chalice

Son

Seasons went by. Winters turned her great empire into a realm of white and she ordered more and more furs to wear when she discussed matters of state with her councilors or received foreign ambassadors, or watched Mikkel talk to his tutors, laugh with his friends, wield the blades the court swordmasters gave him. She might be a little biased but he was truly the best of all lads his age. None of her councilors expressed any doubts for the day he would attain his majority – and she would step aside.

Praises. Gratitude. Good regards from both her fellow rulers and her people. What more could an Empress want? She even relished Mikkel's spirit when he asked her outright why she had banned all sorcerers from her court, save for Valin Kalami. When he expressed doubt. Her own guilt, her part in letting her husband be killed – aiding his murder with her own hands – would not let her gainsay the Lord Sorcerer too much, for he had been the one who had assured her that his spell for a successful conception and birth had worked in her very wedding night and she had not believed him, letting her new husband live too long, long enough for his death to torment her even now, although less often. But she could not help but take pride in her son's will and willingness to doubt everything and everyone. He was not weak-willed as she had been once. He would never be controlled by lust and love – why, he would not allow himself to be controlled by even her!

Valin Kalami was less amused and she was glad of this as well. Sometimes, she almost forgot that he had forgotten himself. A man of Tuukos! A son of the land of slaves! Yes, Mikkel did well by reminding him of this. Very well indeed.

Still, the Lord Sorcerer was a man while Mikkel still wasn't. And when the marriage proposal arrived from Hastinapura, it was Kalami whom she let convince her. Mikkel's willingness to take the Emperor of Hastinapura's daughter to wife delighted her, for it showed how well she had brought him up to put Isavalta before everything else – but it also worried her. Ananda was Kacha's kin – and Medeoan remembered only too well how Kacha had deceived her.

"Why do you think your son will be more resilient than you are?" the Firebird cackled in its cage.

"Shut up, shut up, shut up!" Medeoan yelled.

"Release me!" the Firebird screeched and she wondered if its rage had truly shaken the walls of the palace, or if she was going mad.

At the end, she put the wellbeing of Isavalta ahead, as she should. With countless warnings that Mikkel listened to politely and didn't bother to take seriously. Which meant that Medeoan had to be watchful for both of them when the girl arrived.

The girl. Ananda. Not beaufiful, not at all. Too dark. Too plump. Too well-trained in the ways of Isavalta. If Medeoan did not know better, she could have believed that the girl's parents had truly wished to make up for Kacha's betrayal by giving Isavalta the perfect empress. She could have believed that Ananda's eagerness to be liked came from her heart and not the dark pit the royal family of Hastinapura had in its place.

If all of this was true, why had she come with a sorcerer? The explanation that this was the Hastinapura way did little to put Medeoan's mind at ease. She knew it was true but it had been true for Kacha's Yamuna who had aided him in his attempts to displace and control her. Was the girl's Sacra truly different? Sometimes, Medeoan caught distrust and watchfulness in the way he looked at her and Kalami. What was he planning?

If all of this was true, why did Ananda plan to change so many things – everything in Medeoan's court? Why did she want to make it a second Hastinapuran palace? Studies and philosophical debates were not proper pastimes for a lady. At least Mikkel should know this – but he did not! He loved the idea. He loved everything about Ananda.

This was the problem.

"Be careful, my son," she warned him over and over, hearing the Firebird's cackling in her head – and it mixed with his laugh when he refused to even listen to her.

"She isn't Kacha, Mother Imperial," he said. "She isn't going to betray me. She loves me."

If only he knew what a sad echo his words were! An echo of the words of a young girl aimed at the first person who had tried to make her see.

Finally, the day of the wedding came. With a pale face and a last wrenching of her foolish, indulgent mother's heart, Medeoan watched how the two of them knelt before the house gods, how Ananda was officially pronounced Empress of Eternal Isavalta, and for a moment, just for a moment wondered if the joy and love on the girl's face could be true. When she looked at the Lord Sorcerer, he shook his head, wrestling her back to reality. It won't be for long, she told herself. Just until Ananda reveals herself as the traitor she is. Then, I'll be able to return her to Hastinapura and still keep the union. I'm saving him.

She repeated this over and over as she walked in the bridal chamber and the young men around Mikkel noticed her, stopped laughing, left. The anxiety in his face made her stop dead in her tracks, realize what she had failed to see before. He had never lain with a woman! He had been waiting for… for this Hastinapuran thing! Fear gripped her as tight as a fist and she wondered why he did not feel anything strange in her voice as she offered him the means to better satisfy his new bride.

The last test, the last chance to prove her wrong… And he failed it. Had she not taught him to never accept anything to do with sorcery without bringing it for inspection first? Not even from me, she had told him over and over. But when it came to pleasing Ananda, he forgot all caution. He took the chalice that she offered him, and drank the wine as black as blood. "To your health, Mother Imperial," he said and she wondered when she would again hear his voice so clear, so his. The enchanted girdle that Kacha had meant to put on her was soon on him and she saw the moment will got sucked out of his eyes, and she closed her own because it was too terrible a thing to watch. It won't be for long, she told herself again, and then once again when Ananda's screams echoed long and horrible in the night and at one point got undistinguishable from the screeching of the Firebird insisting for its release.

The End