Ranna witnesses a historical moment between Detrich and the dethroned Kaiser (post-revolution)

[guardiansverse]

Ranna was nine years old the day her mother told her the last story: the story of who she had been named for.

Mother told that sort of stories often, while the two of them were on their knees on the flat stones by the summer mansion’s creek. Ranna was still learning to split her attention, but Mother could scrub fine cloth and tell wild tales at the same time without missing a word or tearing a stitch. When she was small Ranna thought that was a marvelous skill. “Ranna von Scher,” her mother began the story that day – Ranna remembered the moment, the splashing of ducks into the creek, scared off by the rattling of a carriage coming through the wooded trail – “she was the lover of Herne the Landwright, the duke who married the crown princess of Hyem. Do you remember Herne?”

Ranna nodded, thinking of stories instead of her fingers cold in the creek. “He was meant to be Kaiser after the union. Instead his brother-in-law killed him and Schervo became a province of Hyem.” Most of Mother’s stories led back to that moment. It wasn’t meant to be so, Mother always finished. It wasn’t meant.

Mother nodded. Behind and above them, the carriage rattled on the embankment road. Ranna caught a glimpse of gold, a design she did not know. “The Kaiser killed Herne’s legal children, but could not find Ranna von Scher’s son. She had been a woman of status and means, but gave everything to raise her child in secret in his homeland. To make sure his roots were firm. Because they knew they were of Schervo, not of Hyem, even the usurpers’ Land’s Own Guardian couldn’t touch them.”

Ranna nodded again, though she knew this wasn’t right. This wasn’t how it worked. Reylan had explained much of those things to her; you’re brighter than me, her twin would say, you should be studying with Father, and I should be scrubbing clothes. But she didn’t complain. Mother taught other things. “I like her, she sounds very brave.”

“Oh, she was. But more than that, she was patient.” Mother turned over the fine velvet shirt she had been washing, ran it through her hands, squeezed, her fingers twined restless and deep into the fabric. “She sacrificed. That was the true greatness. A mother’s sacrifice. Even if she failed.”

That was the other thing about Mother’s stories – in the end, everyone always failed.

Ranna opened her mouth to speak. There was that certain look in Mother’s eyes then, the look that meant that it might be a safe time to ask. “Mama, would you tell more resistance stories – I know you and Papa fought for Reylan and me, just like she did for – “

Footsteps down the creek path. Running, scrambling footsteps. They both looked up. One of the kitchen maids was hurrying, flushed and wide-eyed with alarm. Calling out: “Eda, Eda – come quick, His Majesty sends for you.”

The chink in Mother’s gaze snapped shut at once. Resigned, Ranna began gathering the laundry. No more stories; not even an apology or parting word. Not when the man in the mansion was calling.

But instead of marching off, Mother waited for the maid to reach the creek. She stood to greet her. Something about her voice was different, distant. “What is it? Is it the visitor?”

The maid nodded breathlessly. She was the colour of undyed linen.

“Detrich’s come,” she said. “It will happen today.”

Mother’s jaw tightened. Her fists too, at her sides.

“Take all this back to the house,” she instructed the maid. It was not the other woman’s duty; but Mother had secured herself certain privileges. “Come, Ranna. I want you to see.”

The pace that Mother set back to the mansion was brutal. Ranna scrambled to keep up, short-legged and gasping. And yet by the time they entered all was silent, every soul in the vast house holding its breath. There was fine china laid out in the conservatory with little confections of a dozen types, and His Majesty’s easel arranged with fresh canvas in the sun. The local village girl who came with fresh flowers every day was doing her bravest best to arrange them in their vases in all the normal patterns. But when Mother and Ranna walked past her, she turned on her heel and ran.

They stopped outside the door to His Majesty’s bedchamber, and from within, Ranna heard the voice.

“I don’t see why you hesitate. Any common-born father would gladly die to win freedom and safety for his son.”

A man’s voice, a cool and certain baritone. Too cool, too certain to truly be without emotion. Mother whispered, “that is the Land’s Own Guardian. Festus Detrich.”

Ranna’s belly twisted. She wanted to reach up and grab Mother’s coarse, water-wrinkled hand, though that was a much smaller child’s comfort. She knew nothing about him but his name, but Land’s Own Guardian had never been good words to appear in any story.

Then, His Majesty’s voice: “If Emen takes him, I will agree. If Emen is regent. Until he is a man. On your honour as a soldier, swear to me, Emen will take my boy and guard his throne.”

Gasping words, strained, failing to echo. A voice born to command and broken to begging. Mother inched the door open.

His Majesty the Kaiser of Hyem was sitting on his bed, in his house-robe. It sat awkwardly on a frame that had shrunk in the three years since Ranna had first seen him. Another man stood over him, taller, wider, a man’s large shadow cast over a small shadow of a man. Festus Detrich had dark hair, copper-toned skin, and a face all of hard lines and angles. Much later, when old enough to think about such things, Ranna would recall never knowing until then that a man could be handsome in a frightening way.

He turned and looked at Mother, spoke clipped, but perfectly civil. “We’re rather busy, frowe.”

“Eda,” His Majesty called out, soft. “Don’t leave.”

Mother was tense to the verge of trembling, but she bowed at the knees, as perfect a curtsy as Ranna had ever seen from the Kaiserin in her brief visits. She said, “forgive me, Land’s Own, my liege has spoken.”

“You’ve taken everything, Festus,” the Kaiser said, somehow even smaller now that he had seen Mother. “My country. My position. My freedom. Let me have her at the last. I – I will drink what you give me, if it is from her hand.”

Ranna saw something flicker across Detrich’s face. Aborted satisfaction, rage, resignation. She did not understand. But Mother said, “I will do it.”

The Land’s Own of Hyem looked at her. He saw her, Ranna could tell, very clearly. “You know what it will mean for you.”

“That no one can know. I understand.”

“You needn’t and shouldn’t. He’s used the people enough.”

“I will do it,” Mother said, unmoving. “And you will remember that a Schervon woman has done it.”

Detrich lingered another moment, then nodded assent.

He did something then; Ranna did not know what, but something in Mother rose and opened, something moved in her face as though some bright memory, some gesture of infinite tenderness had touched her heart. She took a deep breath in, turned around to kneel before Ranna, hands on her daughter’s shoulders.

“I need you to go now,” Mother said. “Go back to the creek, finish the work, and do not forget that I love you very much.”

Ranna still did not understand, but Mother did not have that special safe look, the one that permitted questions about herself, not just about her stories. “Will you tell me more of Ranna von Scher tonight, Mama?”

“No. But I’ve told you the important part. A great change is coming, Ranna, many things will be different after today. Hyem will be different, and Schervo may be too, if we remember what is important. You must remember – “ she swallowed. Glanced back to the Kaiser, to Detrich. She said, “sacrifice, daughter, sacrifice.”

“I understand,” Ranna said; she did not, but thought that if she said so, Mother might cry.

She left then, and went back to the creek. A little while later Detrich left, and a while after that there was considerable upset at the mansion, shouts and panic, a physician called for and after that soldiers. Ranna washed clothes through it all, and later walked home alone as she sometimes did when Mother stayed the night at the mansion. The next day she came alone and left alone again. It was only on the third day that she had first heard the news that the Kaiser of Hyem had been poisoned to death by his long-abused concubine, a Schervon woman, who then took her own life. Much did change after that; but if anything changed for Schervo, she never saw it.

It was years before she understood the true story that had been told that day. And by then it hardly mattered; by then, she remembered the lesson all too well.