Arts of Dark and Light: Book 01 - A Throne of Bones (71 page)

The great bell was just ringing for the second time when Corvus strode into the White Palace, followed by Vecellius and his axe-bearers. The Sanctal guards stood aside at his approach, their demeanor entirely different than the last time he’d been here. They lined the corridors, one positioned every twenty paces or so, and their white cloaks over their bleached leather armor made them look like statues as he marched past them. It wasn’t customary for the Senate to meet in the Sanctal throne room, but then, this was no common meeting of the Senate.

The doors to the great chamber stood open, and he could see that most of his fellow Senators were already seated in a grand semicircle facing the central dais. The three consular seats had been arrayed upon it, below an elevated platform upon which rested the great gold-and-ivory Sanctal throne, nearly twice the size of the three below it. Like his own Eagle Chair, it was unoccupied—although not for long, God be praised. A new Sanctiff would go a long way toward keeping the unruly city from devolving into too much chaos during the winter festival. His two colleagues were already seated, although the blue-robed celestines for whom the first rows were reserved were not.

He nodded at several of his clients and other aquaintances as he walked down the length of the central aisle. But he nearly stumbled and broke his stride when he saw who was seated in the front row next to the princeps senatus on the right side of the aisle, across from the princes of the Church.

It was his brother, Magnus. He was deep in conversation with Severus Patronus, of all people. Their heads were so close they were almost touching, he saw to his astonishment. Unlike the last time Corvus had seen him, his brother was clean-shaven, but his face was still drawn, as if he had not eaten in several days. But what was he doing seated next to the man who had been his chief political rival, if not outright enemy, for more than ten years?

Well, he wasn’t going to find out now. Corvus looked quickly away, not wishing either to meet his brother’s eyes or to draw undue attention to the unholy union of House Severus and House Valerius that appeared to be taking place. As his escort smoothly split in two and moved to join their counterparts ringing the dais, he mounted the stairs then nodded to Titus Manlius and Marcus Fulvius before turning around and seating himself in the Eagle Chair. No sooner had he sat down than the doors to the chamber closed and the celestines, most of them white-bearded and stooped with age, were helped to their seats by the four young senators charged with assisting them.

Patronus rose and declared the Senate in session. He then sat down again, and an elderly celestine took his place between the platform and the assembly—the cerulengus, if Corvus interpreted the gold stripe on his sky-blue robe correctly. He raised his hands and the senators fell silent. This had not been the first intersanctum in the history of the Republic, but neither the Senate nor the People were comfortable without a Holy and Sanctified Father to guide them, and perhaps more importantly, to intercede with the Immaculate on their behalf.

“Immaculate, Son of Man, Son of God, most holy and perfect Savior of Mankind, we pray You hear our call!” The cerulengus’s voice echoed throughout the chamber despite his age. “We follow You, You who are both God and Man, who left Your first estate and became flesh so that Man might know and see and hear and touch the Eternal and Almighty God. You lived, You healed, You loved, You taught, and yet You were betrayed and hung upon a Tree for the wickedness of Man. But just as Death could not hold You, and You rose again to life eternal, so we now raise up a Man to stand in Your stead and guide Your Most Holy and Sanctified Church in, but not of, this Fallen Earth.”

When the cerulengus returned to his seat, Patronus rose again and stood before the dais, facing out toward the rows of senators. “City Fathers, I bring you the best of news: By the grace of God and the mercy of Our Immaculate Savior, the Sacred College has spoken with one voice. We have a Sanctiff!”

A great cheer went up from the assembled Senate.

“Who is it?” Corvus whispered to Torquatus.

“A Falconian, Valens,” the consul civitas leaned toward him and replied. “It’s unexpected. He’s young, not even fifty. After an impasse of this length, they usually compromise on the oldest goat in the flock in the hopes that he’ll need a successor before long.”

“A Falconian…well, at least it’s not a Crescentius or a Colonna.”

“Or Severan,” Torquatus shook his head.

There came a thunderous blaring of horns. The double doors swung open, and the new Sanctal nominee, Falconius Valens, entered the throne room. He was preceded by the Grand Masters of the four knightly orders, the Priest-Captain of the Redeemed, and two other tall, stiff-backed men of martial appearance whom Corvus assumed to be the commanders of the Sanctal Guard. He was followed by a phalanx of twenty-one archbishops, all wearing towering white mitres and sky blue mantels over their white vestments As one, the Senate rose to its feet and began to applaud, including Corvus and his two colleagues.

In contrast to the splendor that surrounded him, Falconius Valens was clad in nothing more than an unadorned white robe, and he walked barefoot over the crimson carpet that led to the dais. But he stood out like a bird among butterflies and looked all the more noble for his humble attire. He was so tall that his head was nearly on a level with the top of the mitres worn by some of the shorter archbishops, and his short, neatly-trimmed beard accentuated, rather than concealed, his fine, aristocratic features. If there was no palpable sense of holiness surrounding him, neither was there the vague impression of frivolty his predecessor had occasionally conveyed.

“I see Patronus is displeased,” Torquatus muttered. “Whatever his shortcomings, at least we know he won’t be a Severan pet.”

“How can you tell?” Corvus had also glanced at the princeps senatus, and although he could see only the man’s profile, he couldn’t detect any sign of satisfaction or disgruntlement.

“Because he doesn’t look like a cat that caught a mouse.”

Corvus was willing to trust his colleague’s judgment. After more than two decades battling each other in the Senate, no doubt Torquatus knew how to read Patronus well. But Titus Manlius would never go over to the auctares, so how was it possible that Magnus, who had been a more bitter opponent of Patronus and his party than Torquatus, could have done so?

But whether he was pleased or displeased by the college’s choice, Severus Patronus did not shirk his duty. When the procession reached the dais, the military commanders took their positions around it on the left, whereas the archbishops stretched out in a semicircle nearly half around it to the right.

Valens himself mounted the first step, then turned around to face the senators. He extended his ringless hand to Patronus.

The princeps senatus took it, but he did not kiss it. Instead, he raised it above his bald head and called out to the Senate in a loud and well-practiced voice.

“City Fathers, I present to you the Most Eminent and Most Reverend Lord Giovannus Falconius Valens, celestine of the Our Lord and Savior’s Sanctified and Immaculate Church, the chosen of the Almighty God and the Sacred College. Will you have him as your king?”

“We have no king but God,” the group response echoed through the chamber like thunder. It sparked a sensation of fierce pride in Corvus. This was the faith of their fathers that had made Amorr great. This was the unshakable faith in God, not Man, that had raised this city above all the other nations and cities of the Earth.

Patronus continued with the ritual. “City Fathers, if you will not have this man as your king, will you have him as your prince?”

“We have no prince but the Immaculate, the Son of Man, the Son of God, the most holy and perfect Savior of Mankind!”

“City Fathers, if you will not have this man as your king or your prince, will you have him as your guide, as your guard, and as your advocate before the Most High God?”

Corvus counted to three. Then he, Titus Manlius, and Marcus Fulvius called out together as they had been instructed. “We will have him!”

A moment later, the five hundred voices of the Senate echoed them. “We will have him!”

The horns sounded three times. Then triumphant stringed music began to play from the musicians hidden behind the dais, somewhere toward the front of the chamber.

The new Sanctiff, who would be crowned publicly before the people in an open mass next Domenicus, raised his free hand in blessing the applauding senators, waited for a moment as his military commanders moved into position in front of him, then began to proceed down the aisle, followed this time by the twenty-six celestines, behind whom the archbishops fell in line. Giovannus Falconius would not receive the Sanctal ring nor take his seat upon the Sedes Ossus until he announced the name by which he would henceforth be known and the Senate’s three consular thrones had been removed from the house of God.

Two hours later, Corvus was clean, shaved, scraped, confessed, absolved, and sitting happily on the floor of the triclinium, holding his six-month old granddaughter for the first time.

It hadn’t been easy to escape the crowds of senators outside the palace. His fascitors had been forced to call upon the help of ten or twelve of his more loyal clients to extricate him from the rest of them without incident or too much delay. Or any violence, for which he was grateful, as it would have broken the uplifting air that still filled his soul after the stirring sight of seeing the most powerful and prideful men in Amorr bowing their heads and bending their knees in humility before God’s newly chosen viceroy.

“And if I’d stayed there, I might have missed you,” he said to the little girl in his arms. “And we couldn’t have that now, could we, beautiful?”

She truly was a lovely baby, with huge brown eyes that stared up fearlessly at him. He felt unexpected tears rising behind his eyes. Looking down at her was like going back in time. It was as if all the intervening years had never passed, and he was a man in his middle-twenties again, holding his younger daughter in his arms. There were times in the past when he’d thought he might have sold his soul to again experience one of those precious moments seared into his mind for all time. And now, holding little Decia, it was almost as if he was.

“Father, what’s wrong?” Valerilla asked.

He had to clear his throat before he was able to respond to her. She had grown from a tiny and helpless little creature very much like the one in his arms into a paragon of Amorran womanhood, but her brown eyes were still enormous, and they still danced with the happy humor that had marked her personality from the start. She didn’t have her mother’s striking beauty, but she was pretty, and her natural charm and easy smile more than made up the gap. Everyone loved her. Everyone always had. And although she was a mother herself now twice over, Corvus still found it absolutely impossible to think of her as anything but his little girl.

“Not a thing,” he answered truthfully, if a little huskily. “Not one single thing. I’m only astonished by how much she resembles you when you were her age.”

He felt a soft hand squeezing the back of his neck. His wife always knew when he was concealing the depth of his true emotions. But she respected his preference not to display them openly, for which he was grateful.

“Well, she knows her grandpapa,” Valerilla declared. “Look at how she smiles at you!”

The combination of his granddaughter’s cheerful, toothless smile with her happy, enthusiastic eyes was almost too much for Corvus. He cuddled her to his chest, knowing that if he held that infant stare one moment longer, he would break into decidedly unconsular tears. Bless her with beauty and love, God, he prayed silently, breathing in the pure, innocent scent of the recently bathed baby. Bless her with long life and happiness and joy. And do not hold my sins against her or her mother, Almighty Father. If there is a price that must be paid for them, let it be paid by me and me alone. Not her. Never her.

Lost in his thoughts and prayers, he had lost track of the women’s conversation. Now, a sharp tone in Romilia’s voice caught his attention, and he tried to figure out what they were talking about. Then he heard a familiar name, and he realized at once what the subject of their discussion concerned.

“It’s not right to speak ill of the dead, Rilla,” his wife said to his daughter.

“It’s not about the dead. It’s about whether Papa was right to do what he did or not! Mama, everyone has been talking about it, but none of them knew Fortex like Rina and Corvinus and me. We grew up with him, after all! I heard him talk about the honor of the legions and how frightfully disciplined they were and all that sort of nonsense a million times! Did you know he used to hit me all the time with a stick that he pretended was a vinestaff when we were playing legion and he was the centurion? He was always the centurion! So, it’s just silly to pretend that Fortex was this poor naive young officer who simply didn’t know any better. He knew better. He just assumed all those rules he used to think so grand didn’t apply to him.”