Glasswrights' Progress (50 page)

“What in the name of the Thousand Gods do you think you're doing?”

“What did you think you were gaining by making that poor old man walk all the way down the hall? You could have let the Holy Father use the garderobe in the inner room.” Rani gestured toward the door that led to Hal's private apartments.

“I wanted them down the hall so that they didn't hear me order you back to your chamber like the manipulative child you're acting tonight.”

“You're not ordering me anywhere! You don't know what you're doing here. You
need
me!”

“For what? To exaggerate and lie? To lead them to the conclusion that I don't need their help at all? To let them decide that all of Moren can die of firelung?”

“My lord, they
know
you're desperate. Anyone who's walked through the city knows that you've lost more than half of Moren. Your people are dying. They're starving and they're sick. Your borders are bracing for an attack like peasants fearing wolves. You need the church's help.”

“And you think I'm going to get it by boasting of my supposed wealth?”

“We have to boast of something!” Rani's voice broke as she shouted out the last word, and she forced herself to lower her volume. “We have to come to them from a position of strength. You
know
that. You're just afraid, because of the fire, because of all that we have lost. My lord, the fire was not a judgment upon you. It was not some vengeance of all the gods. It was an
accident
, and now we have to make things right.”

“I'm not sure I believe it
was
an accident. I heard a new rumor today, Ranita Glasswright, one that I chose not to share with our religious leaders.”

Her blood was chilled by his using her guild name. He never called her that. “And what was that?”

“I heard that the fire started on the grounds of the old glasswrights' guild. I heard that it was set to teach all future glasswrights a lesson. To teach the crown a lesson, for consorting with the guild that cost Morenia her rightful king.”

The accusation stole Rani's breath away, and she could do nothing but gape for several heartbeats. She had fought that battle. She had paid dearly to clear her name, to salvage the reputation of her guild, to identify the true killers of Prince Tuvashanoran. “My lord, you cannot believe –”

“I'm telling you what I hear, Rani. And if I'm hearing it, you can be certain that the church is, too. Just think of how they could use that tale, if they decide that you hold too much power in my court. Even
you
should understand enough statesmanship to understand the danger.”

“Even –” she started to repeat, shocked by the scorn in Hal's voice.

“I need hardly tell you that the Holy Father is not my vassal. I cannot control the church. I cannot rein it in. You've heard Dartulamino – he has not called me by my royal title this entire evening. He addresses me as ‘Defender', as a subordinate of the church. If the priests want command over all of Morenia, I'll have no choice but to give it to them.”

Still reeling from the angry accusation behind Hal's words, Rani made her voice stiffly formal. “Your Majesty, you will always have choices.”

“Like what?” Hal hissed. “Borrowing from the Fellowship? You
know
that I have worked toward a position of power there, but I have not gained their complete confidence yet. Can you possibly be so poor a merchant that you think they should hold my note?”

“Why are you so angry with me? My lord, you summoned me here! I came to help you!”

“You embarrassed me! You made me look like an impotent fool. Morenia has no place for a so-called guildmistress who doesn't even understand how to work with her king.”

Guildmistress. Rani began to understand the true threat behind the gossip that Hal had heard. He was linking all of this to the glasswrights' guild – the fire, the disease, his fears for his kingdom. He was going to take out all of his frustration, all of his hopelessness, on her one dream, on a dream that was so distant that she had yet to complete her first step, achieving the rank of journeyman. Anger stiffened her spine like steel bracing a stained-glass window.

“It was not my intention to embarrass you, Your Majesty.”

“Intention or no, that's what you've done. That's what I get for thinking a caste-jumping merchant would help me negotiate.”

Hot tears threatened to scald Rani's cheeks. “You've no right to call me names, Your Majesty. You've no right to question the choices I've made in the past – choices that benefitted the crown. I've helped you, and I will again, once the glasswrights' guild is reformed.”

“
If
the glasswrights' guild is reformed! How do you think I'm going to pay for that, Rani? How do you think I'm going to finance a guildhall and masters and the finest Zarithian glass? Or were you planning on charming
that
 out of the church as well? Or maybe you were planning on undercutting me with the Fellowship and asking
them
to pay for your guild! Is that what this is all about?”

The accusation shocked Rani, slicing through her rage like the sharpest sliver of glass. “You're mad! Is that truly what you think of me, Halaravilli? Do you honestly believe that I would whore the glasswrights' guild to the first party wealthy enough to build me a hall?”

Hal's eyes blazed at her, fiery above the smudged hollows of his exhaustion. “I really don't know what to think any longer, Ranita Glasswright.”

She was across the room before she consciously heard his words; her hands were on the iron latch. She registered the sneer in his last word, the disdain he held for her name, for her. She started to turn back, started to ask one more question, but she was stopped by the king's bitter voice: “Perhaps my father was right, after all. Perhaps he needed to destroy the glasswrights' guild. Perhaps he needed to see it torn stone from stone, to protect Morenia itself.”

Rani's fury was a physical thing, shaking through to the pit of her stomach. She pulled on the door latch with all of her strength, sending the oak planks crashing against the wall. Then she ran through the antechamber, past the astonished embrace of Farsobalinti and Mair, past the shocked pair of returning priests. She lifted her skirts as if she were a child, and she fled through the palace corridors, taking the steps to her tower room two at a time, until she was safe, secure behind another oaken door.

How dare he?

How dare Hal drag her into that dinner, force her into negotiations, only to betray her? How dare he imply that she would sell herself, sell her
guild
to the Fellowship? How dare he think that she would turn from him, turn toward the church, abandon him?

How dare he?

Only when she had torn the ruby necklace from her neck, only when she had ripped the band of mourning from her sleeve, did she force herself to sit at the table that was spread with fiery glasswork. She sat on her stool, and she rested her hands on the book she'd been studying. She tried to concentrate on the words, tried to measure her skill, tried to convince herself that she had learned enough to call herself a journeyman.

As the Pilgrims' Bell tolled its mournful count long into the night, Rani found that she could not think past the tears that slicked her cheeks, could not reason past the sobs that tore her throat. Without a guild, without merchants' wealth, without the trust of her king, she was very, very alone in the center of a dying Morenia.

 

 

About the Author

 

 

Mindy L. Klasky learned to read when her parents shoved a book in her hands and told her that she could travel anywhere in the world through stories. She never forgot that advice.

Mindy's “travels” took her through multiple careers. After graduating from Princeton University, Mindy considered becoming a professional stage manager or a rabbi. Ultimately, though, she settled on being a lawyer, working as a litigator at a large Washington firm. When she realized that lawyering kept her from writing (and dating and sleeping and otherwise living a normal life), Mindy became a librarian, managing large law firm libraries. Mindy now writes full time.

In her spare time, Mindy quilts, cooks, and tries to tame the endless to-be-read shelf in her home library. Her husband and cats do their best to fill the left-over minutes. Connect with Mindy online: http://www.mindyklasky.com

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