Marisol
Solaire Palace, Marinoss
The inquest from Amity arrived two months after Marisol had requested it. Growing increasingly aggravated by the lack of news, the queen didn't let the frustration show, holding citizen assemblies, allowing courtiers to traipse through the gardens and promenade, smiling when Marigold introduced her to her friends. Though the coronation had come and gone, the number of courtiers attending the palace each day grew and grew; young ladies sent by their families to befriend the young queen and find themselves matches, and young men hoping to catch her eye. Marisol distracted herself from them and the daily disappointment that came with the morning stack of letters and communications, by attending the city's temples, greeting the Sisters and Clerics there, smiling at the Vestals and Scorching with them.
Her presence throughout the city only drew more citizens to her assemblies, their confidence growing as the reputation of their charitable and kind queen spread. She would sit on the throne and hear their grievances, offering advice and counsel without telling them how to fix the problem directly, encouraging them to come to a solution by themselves. With the more stubborn issues and citizens, she offered to think on it and invited them back the next week.
The Dukes, seven of the eight of them still occupying their manors throughout the city, reluctant to leave the capital until the first council meeting was called, grew persistent in their offers of advice and dates for the meeting. She declined them all.
With the assemblies and her calming presence with the common folk, came gifts. Most were items and trappings suitable for a queen of her age; bolts of fine fabrics for gowns, parasols woven and crocheted from fine mesh and silk, fans made from cotton and carved bone, jewellery and sweet-smelling perfumes. Some were more daring; selections of daggers, meant for a future Prince Consort but Marisol gave them to Persephone, who had a penchant for weaponry, wine from Wych and Brynn, a fleet of camels from Vega, a necklace with the long canine of a jungle jaguar from the Monsoon Jungle. It was the chest of uncut and raw gemstones from the Ore Peaks that caught Marisol's interest, and she spent one evening sorting them into piles before mixing them back up in the box.
When the inquest did finally arrive, it came as a companion to another letter, announcing the impending arrival of an official from Amity, attending Marina Fell in the name of peace and friendship between the heart city and Marinoss.
Halfheartedly making demands for arrangements to welcome Cardinal Blythe to her city, Marisol ripped open the ribbon tying the thicker, weightier letter. The Dukes had already gathered in her offices, almost as eager to hear the answer to the question of King Marikos and Queen Carina's untimely deaths. Marigold had been there at first, but as her sister opened the parchment, she fled the room.
' What does it say, Your Grace?' Duke Roose finally asked, after several long minutes of Marisol reading and rereading the first piece of parchment.
She sighed, laying the parchment down on her desk.
' It says that an incendiary device was used. All inside perished. They found compounds of black phosphorus and scintilla dust within the wreckage. Apparently, these are commonly used but very unstable ingredients, which explains the sheer number of lives lost.' She read aloud, stumbling over the unfamiliar chemicals. ' Scintilla dust is used to make fires, but have any of you gentlemen heard of black phosphorus?' she asked, though knew the nobles in their fine robes and smooth hands were as unfamiliar with the ingredients as she was.
' No, Your Grace, but we can do more research for you.' Duke Condorre offered.
' Professor Amstrom says they found multiple devices in three different places within the main room of the Citadel, where the kings, queens and their companions gathered before the first meeting. They ignited one after the other. He sent a diagram of what he thought the device looked like before ignition.' She held it out to the nobles. The drawing looked like a barrel separated into two segments, one above the other, with a hatch to spill the contents of the top segment onto the contents below, followed by a spark. ' He says no doubt the person or people who ignited the devices died in the explosion.'
YOU ARE READING
Sins & Virtues
FantasyThe Seven Kingdoms of Amity have co-existed for generation after generation, each ruled by a revered House of Blue Bloods. Each so different in their people and cultures, the kingdoms live in harmony, until a tragic event rips through them. In a ma...
