Operation Arrakis: An Agreement Has Been Reached

by Durandir

She found him, oddly enough, in the throne room. Not on the throne itself; perhaps the somewhat smaller, much emptier throne placed beside it set him ill at ease. He was, to be sure, studiously avoiding any glance in that direction, sitting instead on a low bench along one side wall, bent over and wholly focused on the scraps of paper balanced on his knees. As she drew nearer she watched him writing furiously, but as soon as she spoke, he secreted the papers away somewhere beyond her keen eye's dominion.

"Thayer, darling. . ."

As the papers disappeared he looked up sharply as if alarmed. Recognizing her changed the look on his face to one of carefully restrained--what? Contempt? Mistrust?

"Mother," he said, his voice also restrained. He knew the game; even now whatever she had been unable to name in his expression faded away to a blank, patient neutrality, mirrored by the calm of his voice. "What do you want with me?"

She adopted a hurt expression. "Only to talk. Can a mother not take joy in her son's company?" He didn't answer. Seeing how this was bound to go if they continued in the present vein, Llessur sighed suddenly and moved to sit next to her son on the bench. "Please, Thayer, let us drop this pretense. You know, as I know, that it's months since we've spoken to each other, and we both know why." He looked away, seemingly biting back his words; the Queen Mother wondered at this restraint, for her son had always been anything but reticent. She hesitated, then reached out to clasp his hand in her own. "Son, isn't it time we put this quarrel behind us? We've reached a stalemate anyway, really. And our stubbornness has done Mendellia no good--nor any good for us, either. Perhaps we can reach a compromise now. Given recent developments. . . ."

She looked away as if tactfully embarrassed to say more, but he didn't obligingly ask her to go on, so she had to abandon that strategy before it was barely begun. "Well," she resumed, "I suppose you've heard all about it by now. The whole Palace seems to have heard, and I would be remiss not to expect its lord to be well abreast of any such developments. Especially any that concern his person so closely as this. I'm sorry this had to happen, my dear. I realize how strongly you believed yourself in love with her, but . . ."

"Mother," he interrupted quietly, "hush."

"Your pardon," she murmured, hushing. Long enough, at least, to let him recover. Then she prepared to take up her argument again--but he spoke first, still quietly, his voice oddly flat.

"Mother, I don't know what I shall do."

Surprise gave her only the slightest pause, for Llessur Atner was a woman well accustomed to the ever-shifting nature of diplomacy. She gave Thayer's hand a reassuring squeeze. "You will do the right thing, of course."

"I begin to wonder," he said, glancing up for the first time, "if I can still trust myself to recognize the right thing."

"You will," she repeated. "I have no doubt of it. I know that you know this: The ruler's first duty is to his people. To his heart, only so far as his heart is for the people."

With a pained expression he looked away again. "My heart has always been for the people," he insisted, somewhat unconvincingly.

"Thus I know that you will do what is right."

"Even if it costs me what's left of my heart," he breathed in a whisper barely audible.

Casting about for a fitting reply but finding none, Llessur finally, wordlessly, stretched an arm across his shoulders and pulled him into an embrace--surprising herself to find a sudden pity for his predicament gripping her. However much he had frustrated her since Eugor's death, he was still her son. She set aside her own dreams and plans for a moment, simply to grieve with his grief, because he was her son.

Then the moment passed and she remembered the matter at hand. "Thayer," she soothed, "it's all right. It's behind you now and you can begin again. I know it hurts you to let her go, but it's for the best. You'll find someone else. Your Lady Leannan, now, she would make a fine queen--"

Thayer startled her by actually laughing, not bitterly nor sadly nor despairingly as might have been expected but with real mirth, amusement at the very suggestion. "She'd have nothing to do with it. If I dared ask her. Too well I know her feelings on that matter."

Llessur frowned at this hint of rebellion in one of her own, carefully groomed, ladies in waiting, but she let it pass for the moment. "Well, then, you'll find another. There's no lack of eligible ladies in the city. I know it is difficult for you now, but time will heal the present pains, and someday you'll find the one fit to rule beside you. We'll arrange balls; I'll invite only the most suitable families, and you'll--"

"You will not," Thayer interrupted, his voice now firm and commanding, and stood suddenly and walked away from her a few steps.

"What?"

"You've been at that game the past year and more, Mother, and look where it's left us. I'll have no more of it."

"But you must have a queen!"

"Why must I? Have I not ruled fairly this year without one? Have I not given my heart to the people's welfare?" He laughed abruptly and glanced back at her. "Perhaps that was my error: thinking that I could ever give it for any other use, to any one person--" But at that his command broke and he was back on the bench, burying his head in his hands.

"Dearest!" She held him again, more alarmed than she liked to admit. "Does it matter? Can't you just marry a proper queen, without worrying about hearts and the like?"

"Not now," he whispered. "I can't now. I think now it's best I not marry at all."

Try as she might, coax and comfort and reason and plead, she could get no more out of him. He had closed to her, ceased to hear. Finally she left him there and went back to her own quarters, to think what to do next.