Chapter IV

The Queen's Plan

The night was crisp and the hallways were empty as Fornia left her bedroom and slowly passed each of the muses’ doors. They were all closed, and no lamplight shone from underneath them.

Fornia stopped when she came to Soryne’s door. There had been quite a lot going on at dinner, she remembered. Soryne had looked at the prince most peculiarly, and the prince had even returned the glance once or twice. Even the queen had been acting differently from her usual aloofness; rather, she acted stern and cold, as if she was worried or angry. This was hardly proper behavior for celebrating a son’s homecoming. Something strange was going on, and Fornia hoped to find out what it was.

She moved on from Soryne’s door and continued down the hallway, pondering. The queen had slipped her a note after dinner that asked her to come to her chambers at midnight; Fornia wondered if Soryne’s actions that morning had anything to do with this. However, something in the back of Fornia’s head told her that the matter at hand would be far more serious.

“The queen is not one to be slighted this much by absent servants,” Fornia muttered, turning a corner and reaching the golden-painted doors of the queen’s chambers. “There is more to this than meets the eye.”

Carefully, she knocked, and was answered by a maidservant. Fornia entered and was immediately confronted by the sight of not just the queen but also Princess Kechria and Prince Epnotides.

The queen lounged on a couch by the window and was dressed in a white chiton with a red mantle. Her long black hair was decorated with golden ornaments that twinkled in the torchlight. The prince and princess stood off to the side, and Fornia assumed that they had been talking before she entered.

“Your majesty,” said Fornia, and bowed.

“Fornia, my most faithful muse,” Queen Ponyria drawled, her voice dripping from her lips like poison. “I am glad you have come.” The queen motioned for the maidservant to leave the room.

Fornia remained standing; the princess moved to sit next to her mother, and the prince drifted to the back of the room by the windows, gazing out towards the seacoast.

“My children are already aware of what I plan to inform you of,” the queen continued, looking at Princess Kechria with a pleased expression; then she glanced back at her son, seeming slightly annoyed. Fornia wondered if he was proving to be a different man than when he had left so long ago; she would not be surprised if this was true, and even less so if this bothered her mistress.

“I have planned a few activities to occur between now and the arrival of the king in two weeks’ time,” the queen went on. “We will have several concerts and recitations in which my muses will display their work. I think that your youngest protégé is finally old enough; she is close to eighteen, is she not?”

“Yes, your majesty,” said Fornia. The ages of the muses were something that Fornia had always been attentive to; she did not let Thysia do many things that the older muses did, since she started so young and was still a child at heart. The others were somewhere in between twenty and twenty-five; and she herself, being twenty-nine, was nearing thirty a little faster than she would have liked. However, there were no more excuses that Fornia could present in order to keep Thysia away from the public. Most girls came out when they were between thirteen and fifteen, and Fornia had held Thysia back long enough.

The truth was that Fornia did not like the queen, nor did she like the way that she exploited the nine muses’ talents. More and more as each day passed Fornia wished that she had feigned being a mute that morning that the queen had spotted her singing in an alley.

And now the queen wished to exploit them even further.

“In these concerts, I will have a few songs sung, some poetry read, some speeches given; but I wish for you to give us the great satisfaction of hearing your best poetry read to the whole city.”

Fornia looked at the queen’s children, wondering why this news should make Princess Kechria boast a smirk and Prince Epnotides hide a grimace.

“This poetry shall not be your everyday ode, however,” smiled the queen, and Fornia stood up straighter. Upon occasion she took up the poet’s pen, but it was at her own provocation and never based upon others’ ideas.

“You will be writing about the increasingly terrible deeds of the king and turning the hearts of the people against him in order that upon his return, they will not be angry when I kill him.”

Fornia betrayed no sentiment or surprise at this announcement, but inwardly she was shocked that it had come to this. Only the queen, sly and cunning as a snake, would plan to murder her own husband.

“You are perhaps wondering what could cause me to take such strong actions against him. Of course I was young and in love when we first married, and if he had continued to be the same man he was when he was young, all would be well. But he has committed terrible crimes that are unforgivable. My son may be able to vouch for this, as he has been his closest companion over the past ten years.”

Prince Epnotides, who had been staring miserably at the window, now turned and raised his eyebrows at this remark. The queen was looking back at him expectantly and when he realized that he was to speak, he cleared his throat.

“Ah, yes, well, war does terrible things to a man.”

Queen Ponyria laughed sourly. “My son, my daughter, what I am about to say is news to you both, and occurred nearly eleven years ago when the war in Priam was just beginning to stir. Your sister Imenrys, my eldest child, whom we had been told died from a terrible seizure in the night, was murdered. She was sacrificed to Lyatres by your father in hopes that he would have a successful war campaign. Well, now that he has, he shall die for the immeasurable pains that he has caused us.”

Fornia watched Prince Epnotides’ eyes grow wide; though he turned back to look out the window once more, she could see his disbelief in the way that his breath was rushed. Fornia knew what he was thinking: how could his beloved father go to such drastic measures to win a foolish war?

Princess Kechria, on the other hand, was exchanging enraged expressions with her mother. It was clear that she was more angry than grieved: she had been very small when the war began, only six. Clearly it was not too hard for her to see her father in such a light, for she had so few memories of him to begin with.

“This brings me back to my plans for the concerts,” said the queen. “Upon the arrival of the king, we will give the grandest one yet. You will write a lovely, long poem about how he murdered his own daughter, and then the people will order him executed.”

“Will that not be called treason, mother?” Asked the prince suddenly, and the pain in his face was evident.

“Of course it won’t. We will not dwell on that.” The queen waved this away like a fly. “I will have a dagger on me and do the deed myself, right there and then. We will say that it is an order from the gods. The soldiers will be too weary of foreign war to begin a civil one. Don’t be stupid, my son. What have all those years on the battlefield done to your silly head?” The queen obviously intended to jest, but the prince turned away to the window once more and Princess Kechria glared at him from across the room.

Fornia still stood and listened, saying nothing. It was not her place to deny what the queen had ordered, and she would offer no rebellion against it.

“You, Fornia, have been quiet all this time. Tell me what you think.”

“Your plans are steady and if executed correctly will work, my queen,” said Fornia, giving the safest answer.

The queen smiled and narrowed her eyes. “So you agree to do as I say?”

“Of course, my lady. Shall I begin the verses at once?”

“As soon as your mind can bear to exert itself,” the queen laughed. “But do not leave; I see you inching for the door. Clever girl. You must swear to secrecy if you are to leave this room.”

When all was said and done, Fornia quitted the queen’s chambers feeling apprehensive, though not more than she had when she entered in the first place. The first anxiety had simply been replaced by another.

As she passed Soryne’s door, she realized that the poor girl probably knew what was happening; the prince’s behavior towards her at dinner, though not noticeable, could tell the whole story. Coupled with the way the prince had been acting just now, Fornia thought the ordeal rather obvious. This was good; Soryne could rebel if she wished, and Fornia would not feel condemned by the gods to act against the queen’s wishes.

Of course Fornia would do as the queen said. The alternative option was imprisonment and execution, and then who would protect the muses from their tyrant and from the assassination of the king?

Fornia did not know whether or not Imenrys’ death was really the reason that Queen Ponyria wanted the king dead; no, it was probably that she had grown far too comfortable on her husband’s throne to give it up now. She was power-hungry, as many had been before her, and there were few cures.

Fornia gritted her teeth, for she thought to herself grimly that death was one of them.