Sins & Virtues

Chapter Twenty-Six: The Siege of Belladonna Palace

Octavia

Florent's Gardens, Belladonna Palace

It was weeks after the sudden departure of Cleric Kennett, once the engagement celebrations and subsequent parties and soirees had subsided, when Octavia found her curiosity got the better of her.

She approached Emil, on convenience rather than sensibility. Usually, Etienne was the easier twin to retrieve information from. Etienne liked to hear himself talk sometimes, whereas Emil was content in listening to his brother.

It was a particularly cloudy and dreary afternoon, and the Dark Moon had recovered enough from their revelries the night before to join their Queen and her sisters on the lawn of Florent's Gardens; the private gardens specifically for the royal family and invited guests. Etienne and Beau played croquet with Alexandria and Honoria, laughing when they had to wrestle the mallet away from Shari; now the size of a miniature pony, leggy and lanky and as playful as Honoria's jackal puppy. Sapphira swam in the nearby pond with some of her friends and Octavia's ladies, resigned to amuse herself with the female company throughout Jacobi's prolonged absence from court. Grey and Emil had been practising their archery until Octavia called over the elder twin.

' I have a personal question to ask and I want to apologise in advance.' she said, subtly wandering away from prying ears. Grey was infamous for his bat-like hearing. Emil bobbed his head and she took this as consent. ' Something the Cleric said to me before he left. How did your father die?' Emil frowned. ' I'm sorry! I don't mean to bring up bad memories or unhappy thoughts, but he made some implications about your family that I need to put to rest in my head.'

Emil waved away her apologies. ' It's fine, of course, Your Grace. I am just surprised that your father never told you about it. You were alive at the time.'

Octavia huffed a sigh. ' You remember my father. He doted upon us, sure, and we wanted for nothing but he shielded us too much too.' She gestured to the dark green lawn; nestled against the north-westerly side of Castellanus and reachable from the palace by a stone walkway that hugged the mountain wall, its trellis covering strewn with Bellflowers, Bleeding Hearts and thick Black Pearl trees. Along the edge were beds of dahlias, roses, peonies, lilies and daisies. It was one of the few green places within the capital's walls, and a private place erected by Queen Ivy, Octavia's great-great-grandmother, for her husband, Prince Consort Florent. ' Ganymede was the only time I've really been away from home before.'

' I can tell you the story. It's a bit long though. I was seven, so you would have been four at the time, and Princess Sapphira was either on her way or just born. My father and his...compatriots were getting uneasy with the number of princesses being born. If they were upset with three, how they would have reacted to five, we'll never know. They could see how much your father loved you and Princess Cordelia, and was worried that he would name you as his heir before a son arrived. Of course, my father had Etienne and me by then, our family's twin legend complete and with two boys no less.'

The "Alvere legend", as many referred to it when daring to speak of the Alvere dynasty, was the pattern of twins produced by the long-standing House that ruled the northern city of Ganymede. They had been nobility for generations and generations, welcome at court and distantly companionable with the royal family, related only by a pair of brothers many, many, many years ago. Twins appeared in every generation, sometimes multiple sets but always in the inheriting family line, Etienne and Emil's line, and almost always male. It was a phenomenon watched with interest and sometimes distrust.

' My father started an uprising. He petitioned the nobility that King Septimus was unfit to rule and unable to sire son, and as such he should name one of us his heir or else my father would take the throne instead. Most saw it as ridiculous, which it was. Even I knew at that age that we didn't have blue blood, so had no right to rule, but my father wouldn't be silenced and carried on for a long year. Your father's supporters and friends formed their own uprising against my father's. They came to blows many times, once or twice within the capital borders. King Septimus tried to placate everyone, but my father...he wasn't an easy man. Once he had an idea in his head, he would have it or the world would hear about it.