"Sire?" Lenka prompted, hesitant to interrupt the Dictator's musings but too concerned about him not to speak. When he didn't respond, she tried again: "Thayer, are you quite all right?"
He glanced up from the computer then at last. "Oh. Yes, Lenka, I--" Frowning, he glanced away again. "She's still not answered."
"Your e-mail? I still say--if you'll pardon my saying it, Sire--you ought to have just called her."
"If it weren't for the mission. . . ."
"Then you ought to just go after her. Take one of your ships and go. You can't just let her get away."
Thayer smiled half-heartedly as Lenka's words sank in. "Perhaps I ought to. It would be--" Then he frowned down at the computer again and gestured back towards his desk, where Lenka was now working. "No, but I can't. You have my schedule there, Lady Leannan. Pray find me a day when I haven't got a dozen meetings with foreign ambassadors or my own councilors, when there's a single moment free enough that I might slip away to Paris on my heart's own business. The lords are restless of late; I would not do well to leave Mendellia when they are so."
"They'd not mind so much," said Lenka. "Especially if you returned from your heart's own business with a Queen in tow. Who in Mendellia would not rejoice at that?"
"Mother wouldn't," he said gravely. "Nor is she the only."
"Most of Mendellia loves your chosen Queen."
"Ah, but what of my Queen herself? She still hasn't answered, Lenka. Perhaps . . ." He grimaced as the thought that had been haunting him finally condensed into words. "If she no longer wishes to be caught, am I wrong to still chase her?"
Hearing footsteps around the corner, Etidorhpa quickly backed away from the door of the Dictator's office. She hadn't caught all of what Thayer and his current lady-in-waiting had said, but what she had heard was quite enough, and most enlightening. She turned over her discoveries in her mind as she hurried back towards the wing of the Palace that housed Llessur and her women.
That the Dictator's fiancée had not answered his message was no surprise to Eti, since she herself had been responsible for making sure that the message never reached the girl. She just hoped that Thayer had not tried sending the message again--or, good grace! another even more mushily reconciliatory--because there was little chance that Eti would be able to intercept it again in the way she had intercepted the first.
But what if he had sent another message, and it was to that that his fiancée had not replied? Eti smiled at the thought. Would that not signify a real rift between the two of them? She could think of nothing she'd like better to see. Well, one thing, rather: her own self in the fiancée's place, the ring of the Queen on her own finger. To make reality out of that dream, what would she not do!
Somewhere in the Palace, the chimes of a grandfather clock sounded, reminding Eti that the hour was near for a rendezvous crucial to her plans. Not even bothering to stop in the Queen Mother's rooms or her own suite within the hall of the ladies-in-waiting, she changed course and hurried down into the public quarter of the Palace gardens.
They met at the fountain where the statue of some old Incan deity spat water into the air so that it covered him in its falling like a liquid umbrella. They greeted one another with a kiss to both cheeks, and then, with arms linked, they strolled the Palace grounds: Etidorhpa Neris and her elder sister Dohrnaira, the current lady-in- waiting and the former. Blood alone was not sufficient to explain the bond between these two; they were united also by their servitude (Eti's current, Naira's former) to the Queen Mother--and by the deep ambition of their hearts, that one of them should sit upon the throne of Mendellia. Neither of them being much for small talk, they came almost immediately to the purpose of their rendezvous.
"How go your plans?" Naira asked her sister. "Will the Queen Mother soon send you to him? You know there's not much you can do until then."
"Actually, sister," said Eti, "I've found rather more to do than we once thought we could." She explained--in brief, but not without pride's occasional embellishments--the matter of the intercepted e- mails.
"That was well done, sister," said Naira. "But still, even if you manage to divide him from her, you've got to be there for him to seize on you next in her place. Will our mistress send you soon?"
"That I cannot say," Eti grumbled. "I've done all in my power to show her that I should be her next choice. And yet, whom does she send? That Leannan girl, who everyone knows will only offend the Dictator with her sharp tongue and get herself sent away before she's halfway through the door of his office!"
"Lenka Leannan?" Naira asked in wonder. "Lady Atner chose her over you? Eti, tell me you jest!"
"I do not, sister. Day before yesterday, Sunev broke. Lady Atner had four of us to choose from for a replacement--me and Sisi, Rathsi, and Lenka."
"And she sent Lenka?"
"She did. I despair of understanding the workings of our Queen Mother's mind, sister."
"Well, surely," Naira said, "Lenka won't last long anyway, contentious as she is. She'll break soon, and then Lady Atner's certain to choose you over Rathsi or Sisi."
"So I would hope," Eti said slowly. "But . . . it has been two days, Naira. Lenka shows no signs of breaking. And Lady Atner is pleased as purple at how the game's going: she's practically wagering it all on Lady Lenka now. If Lenka breaks, maybe the Queen Mother will break with her."
"Look here, Eti," said Naira. "Even if that should happen--it doesn't stop you. There's no reason you can't win the Dictator even without the Queen Mother's backing."
"You're right, of course, sister," said Eti, brightening.
"But as to that," Naira said, "have you yet managed to catch his eye? If we can't count on Lady Atner sending you, then perhaps we must act more quickly on our own part. Does he know you from any other lady-in- waiting?"
"Not so much," Eti admitted ruefully.
"You must take his notice, sister. That is the first thing."
"And so I shall," said Eti haughtily. "One way or other, I shall. And I won't break under his notice."
Dohrnaira glowered at this little jab. "You'd best not, sister--but you don't yet know what that notice is like. Mind you--however harsh he may be, however cruel, however he spurns your affections-- you must hold to our purpose."
"I certainly shall, sister," said Eti, once again hinting none too gently at her sister's failure, when sent by Llessur Atner to the Dictator, to win the queenship herself. Yet Eti truly saw no reason why she should break under Thayer's incivility as so many other ladies-in-waiting had done over the past year. They hadn't known how to handle a Dictator and win him 'round, but Eti had no doubt of her own ability. She'd easily make him forget that foreign girl he'd chosen--and really, after a year apart from his fiancée, he ought to be about ready to forget her anyway.
"Just one thing yet, sister," Eti said. "I shall have the crown, but I'll need your help. You've talked to Father about the townhouse?"
"Yes, Eti. He thought it odd that I should wish to be in Mendel City this time of year, but he gave leave. And I have everything in order-- it's only the servants most loyal to you and me who staff the house now. We'll be secure there."
"Excellent. Of course, I'd much rather have you here at the Palace with me, Naira dear, but, you know, after how you left the last time-- well, I wouldn't wish to antagonize the Queen Mother just now, while there's still a chance of her backing me for the throne."
Naira glared slightly at her sister. "No, of course not. Well, Eti--I must go now and see that the house is being readied properly. Keep me informed of your progress." Then the rendezvous concluded and, with another kiss to both cheeks, the Neris sisters parted.